HUMODS: March 2009

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Are all the bailouts moving us toward catastrophe, rather than away from it?

With all the bailouts, two wars, record general fund deficits, and the retirement of the boomers starting this year, the United States government is piling up far more debt, far faster than any other nation in history.

This carries a huge risk of causing confidence in the US dollar to erode, resulting in the dollar losing its unique status as the world single reserve currency.

If that is allowed to happen, Americans will experience a drop in our living standards unprecedented in the history of our country, worse even than in the Great Depression.

Consider that, unlike during the Great Depression, we now import most of life's necessities -- gasoline, clothing, stoves, computers, heaters, automobiles, light bulbs, much of our food, televisions -- you name it and typically somewhere between 50% to 100% is imported today. Check the labels in you local Walmart.

We run such a huge trade deficit now, that without the US dollar's reserve currency status, foreigners would simply no longer be willing to take dollars for all those necessities we import. They would want something back of value, and we don't make very many things that we can ship back to them anymore. Most of what we produce, are thing that in tough time, people can simply do without.

The bottom line is that if the stability of the dollar comes into question, the catastrophe that could then ensue would make today's painful times seem like the good old days.

I don't think our leaders fully appreciate this risk yet. Because they are following a path that massively increase the possibly of a loss of confidence in the dollar that would cause it to lose its unique status and ultimately reduce the average American's standard of living by more than half.

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Sony's brain machine interface

Honda, ATR, and Shimazu team up to make it possible for you to control any bot containing remote device with just your thoughts.... WATCH

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Are fractals the key to comprehending quantum weirdness?

Quantum theory just seems too weird to believe. Particles can be in more than one place at a time. They don't exist until you measure them. Spookier still, they can even remain in instantaneous touch when they are separated by great distances. But fractals, says physicist Tim Palmer, may be the key to showing exactly how quantum theory emerges from a deeper level of non-weird physics.... READ

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

In nano-fab breakthrough, team builds world's first nanofluidic device with complex 3-D surfaces

Cornell University has built a Lilliputian prototype chamber for manipulating and measuring different types of nanoparticles in solution. Among the potential applications are measuring and processing nano-particles for fabbing, drug delivery, gene therapy, toxicology, and the isolation and confinement of individual DNA strands for scientific study as they are forced to unwind and elongate. Image is overhead view of the nano-fab device showing the different depth levels within the chamber as horizontal bands.... READ

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Nano magnetic sheep dogs can organize cells into tissue structues

A multidisciplinary team of investigators from Duke University, Case Western Reserve University and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst created an environment where magnetic particles suspended within a specialized solution act like molecular sheep dogs. In response to external magnetic fields, the shepherds nudge free-floating human cells to form chains which could potentially be integrated into approaches for creating human tissues and organs.... READ

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Miffed over Russian space commercialization innovation, NASA goes potty

Ever since Russia adopted the smart Civilization 2.0 innovation of charging tourists for rides to subsidize their space launches, a petulant NASA has been driven potty. Now they are taking potty to the max, by making America's zero gravity toilet and exercise bike on the International Space Station off limits to Russians.... READ

It would be nice if this BBC story were merely an early April Fool's Joke, but sadly, knowing how petulantly peeved NASA's bureaucrats have been since the Russian figured out how to cover most of the costs of their launches with space tourism, it is probably true. With NASA's ridiculously expensive, overly complex and outright dangerous shuttle project floundering. And their efforts at creating a reliable new system, one more like the one the Russians now use, falling ever farther behind schedule and exploding in price. NASA bureaucracy has been acting pretty petulance of late. People of Russia, the American people apologize for NASA's petty potty petulance and encourage you to keep up the good work of actually finding ways of commercializing space.

America once knew how to do this well. By offering airmail subsidies and staying out of their way, NASA's anti-bureaucratic forerunner, helped America's innovators move us from the Wright's kite to commercial jet airlines flying Boeing 707's across the oceans, in less time than NASA has been flailing around trying to move humankind off this planet and out into space. What a thing to have to say, but it could well be that today's NASA bureaucracy is the single greatest impediment to space colonization.

America has moved on from practical innovation stimulation, to building fatally flawed and highly complex bureaucratic systems that are too-big-to-fail. There are however, a few bright spots, even within our bloated government.

Just compare NASA's recent progress with DARPA's Grand Challenge success in producing a bot-driven vehicle. First year, vehicles went nowhere, the best performing bot made it only 7 miles along the course before failing. But the very next year, in 2nd challenge, five bots successfully completed the course and bot-driven vehicles became a reality.

If we dumped NASA and put DARPA in charge of fostering humanity's move into space, in twenty years there might be viable human colonies spread all across the solar system with bots out mining the trillions in minerals from the asteroid belt. But if NASA remains in charge, we are likely to have very little, if anything more, than we have today.

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Artist forced to leave backward USA to obtain arthritis stem cell cure in South Korea

Artist John Lawson Cullison, Jr., known for work like the above in the genre of visionary realism, lost his ability to paint due to intense pain from the degeneration of his cartilage tissue caused by arthritis. Still incurable in the USA, because of pandering to religious ignorance by a past president and other politicos. Cullison was forced to travel to RNL Bio, a South Korean adult stem cell therapy company that repaired the damage to his cartilage by injecting his own stem cells into the effected joints, enabling him to get back to painting again. Don't think this fight is over now that America has a new president, some ignorant state legislators are still trying to ban stem cell use.... READ

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Can great design save even the tired old newspaper media form?

Jacek Utko, the world's most talented newspaper designer, speaks at TED about how he has made newspapers in Eastern Europe exciting again, increasing their circulation by as much as 100%, even as other newspapers in the region, and around the world, are withering rapidly away. Not sure anything can save newspapers, but seeing the incredible data presentation art form this man has turned the lowly newspaper into is an absolute inspiration.... WATCH

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

New molecular force probe stretches molecules, atom by atom

Chemists at the University of Illinois have created a simple and inexpensive molecular technique that replaces an expensive atomic force microscope for studying what happens to small molecules when they are stretched or compressed. The researchers use stiff stilbene, a small, inert structure, as a molecular force probe to generate well-defined forces on various molecules, atom by atom.... READ

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Ares - an autonomous aerial bot for exploring another world

The ARES is designed it to fly its high-value science payload on the first autonomous aerial bot, or aircraft or any kind, to soar over the alien landscape of another world, Mars.... READ

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Monitoring the on switch that turns stem cells into muscle

A team of American researchers, including 2007 Nobel Prize winner Mario R. Capecchi, have created a switch that allows mutations to be turned on in muscle stem cells to monitor muscle regeneration in a living mammal. This work could lead to a genetic switch, that allows people to grow new muscle cells to replace those that are damaged, worn out, or not working due to disease..... READ

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

Understanding the power of bots with Daniel Suarez

Author of the seminal new techno thriller Daemon, Daniel Suarez (aka author Leinad Zeraus) speaks to the Long Now Foundation on the power of bots.... LISTEN

3/31/2009 PERMALINK

The microbes in your gut determine colon cancer risk

A typical Western diet, rich in meat and fats and low in complex carbohydrates, is a recipe for colon cancer. People eating a healthy diet containing high levels of complex carbohydrate had significant populations of micro-organisms in their gut called Firmicutes. These bacteria use the undigested residues of starch and proteins in the colon to manufacture short-chain fatty acids and vitamins such as folate and biotin that maintain colonic health. One of these fatty acids, butyrate, not only provides most of the energy to maintain a healthy gut wall, but it also regulates cell growth and differentiation. Both experimental and human studies support its role in reducing colon cancer risk..... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Plant gene mod can prevent global warming from causing mass human starvation

"Exposure of plants to high temperature results in the rapid elongation of stems and a dramatic upwards elevation of leaves," said Dr Kerry Franklin, from the University of Leicester Department of Biology led the study that has identified a single gene responsible for controlling plant growth responses to elevated temperature. "These responses are accompanied by a significant reduction in plant biomass, thereby severely reducing harvest yield. Our study has revealed that a single gene product regulates all these architectural adaptations." In short, should global warming occur, we could mod a planet gene and avoid mass human starvation.... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

DNA-based assembly line for precision nano-cluster fabbing

Building on the idea of using DNA to link up nanoparticles, scientists at the Brookhaven National Laboratory have designed a molecular assembly line for predictable, high-precision nano-construction.... READ ....WATCH

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Having lost their server space picking stocks, smart bots move into farming

Our vision systems, says Vision Robotics, are first used to scan and identify oranges within a grove. Scanning heads placed at the end of multi-axis arms use arrays of stereoscopic cameras to create a virtual 3D image of the entire orange tree. The positions and sizes of the oranges are stored and passed onto the harvesting arms. Immediately following the scanning process, eight long reticulating arms are maneuvered to gracefully pick each orange quickly, efficiently, and economically.... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Artificial protein mimics blood

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have constructed from scratch a protein that can do what certain proteins in the human body can: carry and deliver oxygen. This may be a useful step in developing artificial blood.... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Spy blimp bot can stay up for ten years

The Pentagon intends to spend $400 million to develop a giant blimp which will reach an altitude of 65,000 feet and remain airborne for 10 years. The dirigible will be filled with helium and powered by an innovative system that uses solar panels to recharge hydrogen fuel cells. "It is absolutely revolutionary," said Werner J.A. Dahm, chief scientist for the Air Force, describing the proposed unmanned airship as a cross between a satellite and a spy plane. The aircraft will provide intricate radar surveillance of the vehicles, planes and even people below.... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

These days America is looking like the Bernie Madoff of economies

These days America is looking like the Bernie Madoff of economies: for many years it was held in respect, even awe, but it turns out to have been a fraud all along -- Paul Krugman. "Elite business interests -- financiers, in the case of the U.S. -- played a central role in creating the crisis, making ever-larger gambles, with the implicit backing of the government, until the inevitable collapse. More alarming, they are now using their influence to prevent precisely the sorts of reforms that are needed, and fast, to pull the economy out of its nosedive." -- Simon Johnson, former chief economist at the I.M.F. and now a professor at M.I.T.... READ (reg req)

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Banks starting refusing to foreclose

Banks have started walking away after starting the foreclosure process, simply refusing to foreclose, leaving homeowners on the hook for taxes, assessments and even potentially their loan payments.... READ (reg req)

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Unmarried chinese women no longer interested in foreign mates due to financial crisis

Foreign men have been losing their attraction as potential husbands for unmarried Chinese women since the global financial crisis started, a survey shows the proportion of women who were willing to marry a foreign man slumped from 42.5 percent to 16.8 percent. This financial crisis is really getting serious.... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Vast Spy System Loots Computers in 103 Countries

A vast electronic spying operation has infiltrated computers and stolen documents from hundreds of government and private offices around the world.... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Tokyo school to be site of trail run for teacher-bot

Students at a Tokyo primary school to be world's first guinea pigs for first bot teacher, says University of Tokyo Professor Hiroshi Kobayashi, who has been developing the bot for 15 years. The bot, says Prof. Kobayashi, is capable of teaching and expressing a limited range of emotions, including anger in case of an unruly student.... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

The big-bank model isn't going to last much longer

The big-bank model isn't going to last much longer, banking industry analyst Meredith Whitney said at the Journal's Future of Finance Initiative, and said a more sustainable approach would be bigger regional banks. Whitney, famous for foreseeing the troubles facing Citigroup, suggested that key parts of the big banking model made them susceptible to the types of problems that caused the financial crisis. One issue is the physical distance between loan originators and borrowers.... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Science is more than a body of knowledge

"Science is more than a body of knowledge; it is a way of thinking. I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness." -- Carl Sagan in The Demon Haunted World, 1997

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Can stitching together too-big-to-fail banks into even larger Bankensteins really fix our financial system?

Hmm? It can fix it alright.

What few realize is the seeds of our current financial woes go back to the decision of world government to switch from a system where money had the intrinsic value of precious-metal backing, to a system where its value was subject to constant political debasement.

As small boys, I, my father and my father's father, all paid 5 cents at the little neighborhood convenience store for a Hershey bar. But in the 40 years since the world's politicos began imposing their inflation tax, that price has skyrocketed from 5 cents to 89 cents, along with the prices of most everything else we regularly buy.

This inflation tax forces us all into becoming speculators to simply maintain the value of our money. The real rate of inflation on things we actually buy increases more each year than interest we can earn on our money, forcing us all into either taking speculative risks in search of a higher return or watching as the buying power of our stored wealth wither away year after year.

Another brilliant idea of our politicos was to insure bank deposits against loss to give the system more stability. But this only set in motion the systemic destabilization that we see today, by causing money to flow to the banks paying the highest interest rates, and inevitably taking the largest risks in order to be able to pay those higher rates.

Once their deposits were insured by the government, no one cared anymore how much risk their banker was taking. Both my dad and granddad studied a bank's financial statement carefully before depositing their hard earned money there. Thanks to deposit insurance, today no one does that anymore. You money is fully insured by the government, so there is no need to worry about the intelligence or frugality or honesty of your banker. Frugal bankers were made obsolete by this government action, their returns just weren't high enough anymore, they just weren't wreckless enough risk takers for the new financial system our politicos had created. When the government is causing inflation and assuming the risk of loss on deposits, bankers have no choice but to become speculators, just like the rest of us.

Nearly every financial regulatory law our politicos have passed over the last 50 years has encouraged the concentration of financial resources into fewer and larger economic units, run by those willing to take the most extreme risks.

Every as Hershey bar munching kids, my father and grandfather knew better than to design a system biased towards putting ever more eggs into ever fewer baskets.

But instead of exercising the wisdom of their parents and grandparents, our politicos and regulators have labored to create a reverse-Darwinian state in our financial industry, which forces the most resources to flow into the hands of the most wreckless risk-taking bankers.

Then when the inevitable inflation-driven real estate speculation such a system is certain to produce, caused the inevitable bubble to form and burst. Instead of breaking up our monstrously large banks, to prevent the stupidity of their policies from becoming known, regulators began stitching rotten big banks into even larger and more rotten Bankensteins. It was the only way to avoid recognizing that all their past policies have caused an enormous systemic failure.

Then they pressured accountants to postpone marking the value of bank assets to market. Because if true bank loses were known, regulatory malfeasance would become known, and the villagers would be coming after them with torches and pitch forks for having created these Bankensteins.

While regulators are stitching, our politicos are busy trying to cover up their own complicity, by making sure the regulators that started the fire are given even more power to run the fire brigade.

We need to scrap the old financial system and establish a more rational Civilization 2.0 system using the same multi-nucleated redundancy and robustness that keeps the Internet running despite power outages, cable cuts, server failures and even vicious coordinated attacks.

Only when our money has intrinsic value and our banking system is systemically designed to automatically avoid excessive risk and the formation of any units within it that are too-big-to-fail, can the buying power of your home, your 401K and the money in your wallet stabilize and hold their values.

Neighborhood Convenience Store Hershey Bar prices:

[1921] 5 cents
[1924] 5 cents
[1930] 5 cents
[1933] 5 cents
[1937] 5 cents
[1941] 5 cents
[1946] 5 cents
[1954] 5 cents
[1960] 5 cents
[1965] 5 cents
[1968] 5 cents
[1969] 10 cents (start of hidden fiat money inflation tax)
[1974] 15 cents
[1977] 20 cents
[1978] 25 cents
[1982] 30 cents
[1983] 35 cents
[1986] 40 cents
[1991] 45 cents
[2002] 59 cents
[2009] 89 cents

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Taking into account black swans as you plan your life

The future has always been crazier than we thought, Nassim Nicholas Taleb speaks to the Seminars About Long Term Thinking (SALT) conference about why all our systems need to be designed to withstand what he calls black swans and others call wild cards, the sudden arrival of events dismissed as being too unlikely to worry about.... LISTEN

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

U.S.A. officially becomes a Russian-style criminal enterprise state

It appears that the big bank mob and the crooked politicos they have in their pocket have managed to threaten and intimidate the Financial Accounting Standards Board into letting the banks keep bad loans on their books as if they were still good loans. “What disturbs me most about the FASB action is they appear to be bowing to outrageous threats from members of Congress who are beholden to corporate supporters,” said former U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Arthur Levitt. It has become legal for banks to lie to you about their solvency -- turning America into one big criminal enterprise -- watch out investors worldwide, we Americans want only one thing, to pick your pocket.... READ

3/30/2009 PERMALINK

Dogmas and dark ages

Sam Harris gives the Long Now Foundation a talk about the true dogma of the Bible. If you adopt the real dogmas of the Old Testament's god, then the killing you are required to do will never end.

If your children talk back to you, kill them. If your neighbor works on the sabbath, kill him. If a woman is not a virgin on her wedding night, take her to the edge of town and stone her to death. If you come into a town and see someone praying to a foreign god, you must make he whole town pay for his sin, by killing him and everyone other man, woman and child in that town. During a meeting to discuss how to prevent members of God's favored tribe from marrying members of another tribe, such a mixed-tribe couple happened to walk by, a man ran out and brutally beat them both to death. God was pleased and rewarded the man by making him and his decedents priest in his temple. And there is more killing still, God commands you to kill wizards, homosexuals, fornicators, adulterers, oh, and have slaves is fine, so long as you free any slave that you beat so mercilessly that he loses an eye.

That is the real, vengeful, petty and brutal god as defined in the Bible, which you don't hear much from the pulpit about. And Christ never repudiates these commands in the New Testament. The Koran is equally violent and brutal. Don't just accept what someone else tells you about what these books say, read them for yourself. Then decide if their primitive and barbaric philosophy is for you.... LISTEN

3/29/2009 PERMALINK

How to make money from online content, even after it gets pirated

Copying is unstoppable, so content creators are developing tools that allow them to get money from advertising even when content ends up in unexpected places.... READ

3/29/2009 PERMALINK

Artificial cartilage performs better than the real thing

The smooth cartilage that covers the ends of long bones provides a level of lubrication that artificial alternatives haven't been able to rival -- until now. Researchers say their lubricating layers of "molecular brushes" can outperform nature under the highest pressures encountered within joints, with potentially important implications for joint replacement surgery.... READ

3/29/2009 PERMALINK

New deadly virus hunter Nathan Wolfe speaks at TED

Virus hunter Nathan Wolfe's job is staying two steps ahead of deadly new viruses. He seeks to discover deadly viruses where they first emerge, usually passed from animals to humans among poor subsistence hunters in Africa, allowing scientists to find ways to counteract them before they can spread and claim millions of lives... WATCH

3/29/2009 PERMALINK

Manipulating graphene with an electron beam

This movie produced with Berkeley Lab's TEAM 0.5 microscope shows the growth of a hole and the atomic edge reconstruction in a graphene sheet. An electron beam focused to a spot on the sheet blows out the exposed carbon atoms to make the hole. The carbon atoms then reposition themselves to find a stable configuration.... WATCH .... READ

3/29/2009 PERMALINK

25 cent smart intruder sensor detects out to 50 meters

A remarkable new invention from Tel Aviv University -- a network of tiny sensors as small as dewdrops called "Smart Dew" -- will foil even the most determined intruder. Scattered outdoors on rocks, fence posts and doorways, or indoors on the floor of a bank, the dewdrops are a completely new and cost-effective system for safeguarding and securing wide swathes of property. Each individual 25 cents sensor can detect any intruder within 50 meters (about 165 feet). Prof. Yoram Shapira of Tel Aviv University Faculty of Engineering says that his teams solution is the cheapest and the smartest on the market.... READ

3/28/2009 PERMALINK

Stem cells let two year old girl see for first time

Born two years ago, Dakota Clarke could not even see well enough to recognize her own mother and father. But now her parents say she can make out their faces for the first time after pioneering stem cell treatment in China.... READ

3/28/2009 PERMALINK

Taking a walk to charge your cell phone or iPod

The illustration shows the microfiber-nanowire hybrid nanogenerator, which is the basis of using the motion of fabrics for generating electricity. "Quite simply, this technology can be used to generate energy under any circumstances as long as there is movement," says lead researcher Zhong Lin Wang, Regents' Professor, School of Material Science and Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology.... READ

3/28/2009 PERMALINK

DNA repair mechanisms relocate in response to stress

Like doctors making house calls, some DNA repair enzymes can relocate to the part of the cell that needs their help, a collaborative team of scientists at Emory University School of Medicine has found. The signal that prompts relocation is oxidative stress, an imbalance of cellular metabolism connected with several human diseases.... READ

3/28/2009 PERMALINK

Algae biofuel advances reported world algae summit

Algae Ventures says the harvester illustrated lowers the cost for harvesting, removing water and drying algae by over 99.75%. They say their cost of processing a gallon drops to only $0.01.
And Bionavitas has a Light Immersion Technology that solves a major problem in algae cultivation. By eliminating the self-shading phenomenon, when the top layer of algae gets so thick it limits light reaching algae beneath it, their device greatly increasing yields per acre.... READ .... READ

3/28/2009 PERMALINK

Causing nanotubes struts to form, boosting structural integrity of composites

Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have discovered a new technique for provoking unusual crazing behavior in epoxy composites. The crazing, which causes the composite to deform into a network of nanoscale pillar-like fibers that bridge together both sides of a crack and slow its growth, could lead to tougher, more durable components for aircraft and automobiles.... READ

3/28/2009 PERMALINK

A prototype brain with 200k neurons, 50meg synaptic connections on a chip

How does the human brain run itself without any software? Find that out, say European researchers, and a whole new field of neural computing will open up. A prototype brain on a chip is already working. An international team of scientists in Europe has created a silicon chip designed to function like a human brain. With 200,000 neurons linked up by 50 million synaptic connections, the chip is able to mimic the brain's ability to learn more closely than any other machine.... READ .... READ

3/27/2009 PERMALINK

The race to debase

The dollar drops in buying power, next day the yen declines, day after that the euro erodes. It is a new arms race, with each nation pursuing policies designed to cut the valuable of their currency faster than other nations can. To lower the cost of their goods on world markets and artificially boost sagging employment back home. The crazy concept of fiat money, where currencies are backed only by the whims of a nation's politicos, instead of something of intrinsic value like gold or silver, appears to have degenerated into a race to debase. Where the final destination will be world financial destitution. When you rob a nation's currency of its intrinsic value, you convert all of that nation's prosperity into nothing more than an illusion that can disappear overnight.... LISTEN

3/27/2009 PERMALINK

How to save the world from an asteroid impact

To investigate the best way to deflect this and other asteroids onto a harmless path, a team led by David Dearborn of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California has modelled the impact of a nuclear explosion on an object's trajectory. Thirty years before the asteroid was set to collide with Earth, a nuclear blast, equivalent to 100 kilotonnes of TNT, was set off 250 metres behind it. The nudge from the explosion increased its velocity by 6.5 millimetres per second, a slight change but enough for it to miss us.... WATCH .... READ

3/27/2009 PERMALINK

A "flat pack" living pod

With a massive courtyard style deck the 738 square feet Trapper is the perfect living pod for catching up on the things that really matter.... READ

3/27/2009 PERMALINK

Is our current economic model parasitic predation?

Back in 1974, the long running connection between improvements in worker productivity and wage growth was severed. Median per capita wages for individuals have stagnated since then, replaced with measures of growth in house hold income (two workers instead of one) and growth derived from growing the labor pool (mostly illegal immigration). During this time, the money derived from productivity improvements was shunted to capital markets under the ideological assumption that these markets would make better investments in future prosperity than individuals. That assumption has been proven false. The money was gambled away or spent on lavish increases in the lifestyles of oligarchs and their underlings. (Editor's Note: Actually, much of this wealth was diverted to governments. A tiny amount went to the lower class with the rest about evenly split between upper class and political bureaucratic elites. The worst price has probably been paid by middle class kids, who have lost nearly half of their weekly quality time with their parents due to the increase hours on the job their parents must work to feed the vast appetites of America's political & economic elites.)

It would be bad enough if it ended there, but it doesn't. There is increasing evidence that this group of "oligarchs" has ideologically captured all forms of US governance in a situation similar to what we have seen in emerging markets like Russia and Argentian.... READ

3/27/2009 PERMALINK

Scientists create molecular building block for superfast quantum computers

Researchers at the Universities of Manchester and Edinburgh have created components for molecular scale quantum computers much faster than conventional computers. Scientists have achieved the breakthrough by combining tiny magnets with molecular machines that can shuttle between two locations without the use of external force -- the basic component of a quantum computer.... READ

3/27/2009 PERMALINK

Breakthrough invention lets you power your home and car off-grid

We reported last July -- Solar power breakthrough makes energy self-sufficiency a reality -- on a breakthrough home energy system made possible thanks to an invention by Daniel G. Nocera, the Henry Dreyfus Professor of Energy at MIT. Dr. Nocera's breakthrough is truly game changing, actually appearing able to, as the good doctor claims, "transform solar power from a marginal, boutique alternative into a mainstream energy source."

What Prof. Nocera discovered was a far more efficient catalyst for using electricity to separate water into its basic components Hydrogen and Oxygen. This new catalyst allows solar energy to be practically stored in the form of these two gases, which can be turned back into energy as needed in a fuel cell device.

Prof. Nocera's breakthrough makes it practical to get all of your power for both your home and car directly from the sun. So on the occasion of Professor Nocera's presentation about his revolutionary invention at the Aspen Environment Forum, we wanted to bring this to your attention once again.

With the crisis in our nation's banking system, combined with the huge trade deficits we must run to import enough oil to power our economy, now putting the dollar at risk of a precipitous decline in value that would devastate the American way of life. Prof. Nocera's invention becomes even more vitally important. Because it offers us all a practical way out of that nightmarish scenario. By allowing each of us to replace our insane coal-fired electric company and the long vulnerable Saudi oil pipeline that fuels our vehicles and still funds Taliban fighters killing our troops in Afghanistan, with a rational system that makes each of us personally self-sufficient in energy.... WATCH ... READ

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

Modded protein suppresses cancer growth

Re-engineering a protein that helps prevent tumors spreading and growing has created a powerful therapy for people with many types of cancer. Canadian researchers have modified the tumor inhibiting protein, von Hippel-Lindau, and demonstrated that it could suppress tumor growth in mice.... MORE

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

Researchers promise U.S. independence from petroleum using algae oil

Chemists reported development of what they termed the first economical, eco-friendly process to convert algae oil into biodiesel fuel -- a discovery they predict could one day lead to U.S. independence from petroleum as a fuel. "This is the first economical way to produce biodiesel from algae oil," according to lead researcher Ben Wen, Ph.D.. "It costs much less than conventional processes because you would need a much smaller factory, there are no water disposal costs, and the process is considerably faster."... MORE

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

DNA duplications give plants an evolutionary advantage

DNA duplication enabled many plants to survive the mass extinction that wiped out the dinosaurs. The doubling of their DNA made these plants the fittest for surviving the altered climatic conditions, a mechanism that is probably also found in vertebrates. This was discovered when Yves Van de Peer (VIB-UGent) dated these duplications as closely as possible and noticed that the most recent duplications occurred at approximately the same
time in all of the plants coinciding with the last mass extinction.... MORE (pdf)

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

Microsoft creates a personal assistant bot

Built by researchers at Microsoft, the Laura personal assistant bot can book appointments for meetings or scheduling a flight. Laura can make sophisticated decisions about people and filter out those you don't want to see. Laura represents a nuanced attempt to recreate the finer aspects of a relationship that can develop between an executive and an assistant over the course of many years.... MORE

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

More evidence that your brain size matters

A collaborative study led by researchers at the Montreal Neurological Institute (MNI), McGill University has demonstrated a positive link between cognitive ability and cortical thickness in the brains of healthy 6 to 18 year olds. Image shows areas in the brain where there is an association between general cognitive ability and cortical thickness.... MORE

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

Hopkins scientists ID 10 genes associated with sudden cardiac death

Having identified 10 common variants of genes that modify the timing of the contraction of the heart, known as the QT interval, scientists in the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, in collaboration with an international contingent of researchers, now provide new insight about the underpinnings of the QT interval which, when prolonged or shortened, predisposes to sudden cardiac death.... MORE

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

Quantum tunneling could achieve faster, cheaper genomic sequencing

A ghostly property of matter, called quantum tunneling, may aid the quest for accurate, low-cost genomic sequencing, according to Stuart Lindsay and his collaborators at the Biodesign Institute of Arizona State University. Tunneling permits a particle like an electron to cross a barrier when, according to classical physics, it does not have enough energy to do so, and could give rise to a sequencing technique far faster and cheaper than those currently in use. Image shows a gold probe, outfitted with a dangling nucleotide approaches its complementary base, protruding upward from a monolayer. A set point current is established for the tunnel junction as the bases self-assemble.... MORE

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

Therapeutic cloning gets a boost from new research findings

Germ cells, the cells which give rise to a mammal's sperm or eggs, exhibit a five to ten-fold lower rate of spontaneous point mutations than adult somatic cells, which give rise to the body's remaining cell types, tissues and organs. Despite their comparatively higher mutation rates, however, adult somatic cells are used as the donor cells in a cloning process called somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT). This made researchers wonder if cloning by SCNT leads to progeny with more mutations than their naturally conceived counterparts. Also, would cloned fetuses receive DNA programming predisposing them to develop mutations faster than natural fetuses of the same age? Those scenarios are simply not likely, researchers at The University of Texas at San Antonio have found, opening prospect for therapeutic cloning.... MORE

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

Licorice extract prevents the development of intestinal polyps

Researchers at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine have found that inhibiting an enzyme known as 11-beta-HSD2 (both genetically and using an extract from licorice) blocks COX-2 activity in human and mouse colorectal tumor cells, inhibiting their growth and metastasis in experimental models of colorectal cancer.... MORE

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

A hot young egg can rejuvenate a tired old sperm

Men are fertile throughout life, but research at the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, has now shown that sometimes an old fertilizing sperm needs a little help from the egg to rejuvenate. The risk of chromosomal abnormalities in the foetus is highly correlated to the age of the mother, but is nearly independent of the age of the father (one recent study did find some IQ loss in old father's offspring -- editor). A possible explanation is that egg cells have a unique ability to reset the age of a sperm. "We are the first to show that egg cells have the ability to rejuvenate other cells, and this is an important result for future stem cell research", says Associate Professor Tomas Simonsson, who leads the research group at the Sahlgrenska Academy that has made this discovery.... MORE

3/26/2009 PERMALINK

Micromagnetic blood cleansing device removes most pathogens

Sepsis, an infection of the blood, can quickly overwhelm the body's defenses and is responsible for more than 200,000 deaths per year in the U.S. alone. Now Children's Hospital Boston has come up with a way to use magnetism to quickly pull pathogens out of the blood. Their micromagnetic-microfluidic blood cleansing device prototype can continuously cleanse over 80% of pathogens from contaminated human whole blood.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

Gold nanoparticles able to 'cook' cancer cells

Show is an electron microscope image of a gold nanosphere, magnified by a factor of one billion. The darker ring shows the "wall" of the nanosphere, while the lighter area to the right of the ring shows the interior region of the shell.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

World's first bot surgery to treat pancreatic tumors

This month Fox Chase Cancer Center performed the world's first successful minimally invasive distal pancreatectomy using the French ViKY compact laparoscope bot. "The new ViKY robotic laparoscope holder acts as an extra hand during surgery, giving me stability and steadiness," says surgeon Andrew A. Gumbs, MD. "The view of the surgical field is critical, so ViKY's pinpoint accuracy helps me perform more complex procedures laparoscopically.".... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

Brain Images Reveal the Secret to Higher IQ

New research suggests that the layer of insulation coating neural wiring in the brain plays a critical role in determining intelligence. The neural wires that transmit electrical messages from cell to cell are coated with a fatty layer called myelin that stops current from leaking out of the wire and boosts the speed with which messages travel through the brain--the higher quality the myelin, the faster the messages travel and this insulation appears to be largely genetically determined, showing IQ is inherited.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

Researchers find a new family of self-assembling molecules -- the carboranes

To be useful in real-world applications, a self-assembled monolayer (SAM) of molecules on a surface must have a stable and controllable geometry. Researchers at Penn State have found a way to control geometry and stability by making SAMs out of different carboranethiol isomers, which are cage-like molecules. Schematic shows relative dipole orientations for the carboranethiol isomers, M1 and M9.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

Master regulator gene can stop skin aging and diseases

Researchers at Oregon State University have found one gene in the human body that appears to be a master regulator for skin development, in research that could help reverse the effects of everything from skin diseases such as eczema or psoriasis to the wrinkling of skin as people age. Inadequate or loss of expression of this gene, called CTIP2, may play a role in some skin disorders, scientists believe, and understanding the mechanisms of gene action could provide a solution to them.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

How bots are able to avoid obstacles in your home

Obstacle avoidance is one of the most important aspects of mobile robotics. Without it robot movement would be very restrictive and fragile. Here is an interesting tutorial that explains the various ways object avoidance in the home environment can be achieved.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

Modding alga so it can power our civilization

Researchers studying a hydrogen-producing, single-celled green alga, Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, have unmasked a previously unknown fermentation pathway for increasing hydrogen production.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

In Civilization 2.0 all markets, all data accessible in the cloud

Regulators can't stop corruption, an offer of a $10 million per year job after they leave government is too enticing. Only the total transparency that can be achieved by moving all markets and economic data into the Cloud, freeing the Crowd do the do its own regulation has any real chance of stopping corruption.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

To see the future of agriculture go to Rikers Island prison

Researchers think that aquaponics, growing fish and veggies together in an indoor system, represents the future agriculture. Using it, theoretically, Manhattan Island could produce all its own food in a stable factory situation not depend on the vagaries of weather. To kick start the future of urban agriculture, Cornell University is teaching aquaponics to high school students and young prisoners at Rikers Island.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

Disabling a gene can keep you lean on a high-carb diet

Shown are lipids, stained red, in the fat cells before and after a gene critical to the conversion of dietary carbohydrates to fatty acids was disabled. As you can see, lipid levels in fat cells are significantly reduced.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

Google adds first semantic search bot capabilities to its engine

Google say:

we're deploying a new technology that can better understand associations and concepts related to your search, and one of its first applications lets us offer you even more useful related searches (the terms found at the bottom, and sometimes at the top, of the search results page).... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

Natural gas lying around in chunks on the ocean floor

Gas hydrates, known as "ice that burns," could provide a clean, sustainable fuel source government researchers are reporting. Gas hydrates, a frozen form of natural gas that bursts into flames at the touch of a match, are an abundant, untapped source of clean, sustainable energy found on the ocean floor.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

Network turns soldiers' helmets into sniper location system

Akos Ledeczi holds a kevlar helmet with the microphones and network node attached that can turn the helmet into an accurate shooter location system.... MORE

3/25/2009 PERMALINK

20 years of bad science or is cold fusion something real

Twenty years to the day that two electrochemists ignited controversy by announcing signs of cold fusion, a separate team has made a similar claim. But this time, the evidence appears more solid and is being taken more seriously. Watch a briefing from the researchers.... WATCH ....MORE .... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

A neurotransmitter that allows your brain to delete data

A receptor for glutamate, the most prominent neurotransmitter in the brain, plays a key role in the process of "unlearning," report researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies. Their findings could help scientists develop new drug therapies to treat phobias and anxiety disorders, particularly post-traumatic stress disorder.... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

A nano-coating that traps more power and self cleans solar cells

Using two different types of chemical etching to create features at both the micron and nanometer size scales, researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have developed a surface treatment that boosts the light absorption of silicon photovoltaic cells in two complementary ways. The surface treatment increases absorption both by trapping light in three-dimensional structures and by making the surfaces self-cleaning – allowing rain or dew to wash away the dust and dirt that can accumulate on photovoltaic arrays. Because of its ability to make water bead up and roll off, the surface is classified as superhydrophobic.... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

Moving games off consoles and into the Cloud

OnLive, a Palo Alto, CA-based startup wants to do away with gaming consoles, game resellers, and the need to buy any more expensive graphics chips and move gaming into the Cloud. Today the company announced a service that lets any computer run the sorts of graphics-intensive video games traditionally reserved for high-end gaming systems. Games can also be played on a TV using a small device offered by the company that connects a television to a broadband Internet connection.... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

Your brain activity can accurately predict your choices

A new study shows that even when people rate options similarly, they will choose the one that causes more activation in the caudate nucleus, a brain region involved in the anticipation of reward.... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

Flexible, sustainable sea living in a buoy-pod

Open Sailing aims to design an attractive technological lifestyle to overcome any possible natural and man-made disaster, stimulating people's ingenuity and sense of solidarity. We are building a floating architecture that evolves like a living organism, a laboratory for techno-social experiments in creating living pods at sea.... MORE .... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

Morphing programmable matter gadgets could soon be a reality

A bracelet or a watch that morphs into something else when you take it off. Perhaps it becomes a phone, or perhaps a small computer screen and keyboard. Researchers are just a few years away from bringing to life revolutionary morphing devices known as programmable matter which can change size, shape and function.... MORE .... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

New cheaper, better data storage technology

Researchers at Seagate have demonstrated the feasibility of a new technology that could extend the capacity of magnetic data recording for many years more. Called heat-assisted magnetic recording, it involves blasting the magnetic regions of a disk with heat to make it possible to use more stable recording media. It should make it possible to record data at densities 50 times greater than will be possible when today's technologies reach their limits.... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

A stronger, better living pod building material -- bamboo

Lamboo Inc. engineers structural bamboo I-beam joists and plywood for building your living pod. Bamboo is the fastest growing plant on the earth and therefore an excellent renewable resource. It is light, easy to use and possesses more elasticity, hardness and strength than wood.... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

55+ mpg $2,000 car hits the road in India in Europe & America soon

The highly anticipated Tata Nano has hit the streets in India and is coming to Europe and America soon. It features a 55.5 mpg fuel economy engine with ultra-low carbon emissions, and a price starting at only 100,000 rupees, about $2,050.... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

A precise, new nanotech treatment can end addiction

Scientists at University at Buffalo's Institute for Lasers, Photonics and Biophotonics and UB's Department of Medicine have developed a stable nanoparticle that delivers short RNA molecules to the brain that can "silence" or turn off a gene that plays a critical role in many kinds of substance abuse. When you silence this gene, the addict's physical craving for the substance they are abusing, simply goes away.... MORE

3/24/2009 PERMALINK

Quite literally throwing the babies out with the bath water

MADELINE Kara Neumann, age 11, died of diabetes because her parents prayed rather than taking her to doctors. Caleb Moorhead, age 6 months, died after his deeply religious vegan parents refused a simple vitamin injection to cure his malnutrition. Down through the ages the superstition and ignorance of their parents has cost the lives of millions of children. Now the superstitions among us seek to ban genetic cures for diseases that will can prevent millions of our children from suffering short, painful lives. By callously labeling children cured by genetic science of their maladies as 'designer babies' they are trying to hold back this breakthrough, like they held back blood transfusion for decades with claims that the human soul lived in our blood streams. This movement can best be quashed with memes that teach them in terms they can understand, that causing babies to suffer and die young is Devilry, not God work.... MORE