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Scientists already believe that diamonds could be a solid foundation for practical quantum computers. You can use atom-scale defects in diamond to store quantum bits that hold contradictory data (say, both on and off) in a way that lets you read the…

The Walker Art Center in Minneapolis has agreed to remove a controversial outdoor “gallows” sculpture following protests by local Native Americans. The large work includes design elements of seven different historical U.S. gallows, including one used to hang 38 Dakota Indians in the state in 1862.

“I regret the pain that this artwork has brought to the Dakota community and others,” museum executive director Olga Viso said in a statement announcing the decision Saturday. “This is the first step in a long process of healing.”

The two-story structure entitled “Scaffold,” created in 2012 by Los Angeles artist Sam Durant and inspired by a dark history of American hangings, was intended as a criticism of capital punishment. But many in the local community considered it insensitive. The hanging of the “Dakota 38” after the U.S.-Dakota War in Minnesota was the largest state-sanctioned mass execution in U.S. history.

The artist now supports dismantling his exhibit, saying: “It’s just wood and metal – nothing compared to the lives and histories of the Dakota people,” Viso said in her statement.

“I am in agreement with the artist that the best way to move forward is to have Scaffold dismantled in some manner and to listen and learn from the elders,” she added.

Viso said she had hoped the choice of the work would trigger a valuable dialogue and increased awareness about capital punishment and violence. But added: “I regret that I did not better anticipate how the work would be received in Minnesota, especially by Native audiences. I should have engaged leaders in the Dakota and broader Native communities in advance of the work’s siting,” she wrote in an open letter last week.

The details of how the work will be dismantled will be determined in meetings this week with tribal elders.

The large work — with steps for visitors to climb to the gallows— was to be one of 18 new works in a renovated Minneapolis Sculpture Garden at the center to be unveiled June 3.

Protesters on the scene applauded the decision when it was announced, but many plan to camp out at the space until the exhibit is removed. And anger was still running high, with some on the scene brandishing signs reading: “This isn’t art; this is murder.”

James Cross, who identifies as Anishinaabe and Dakota, said the decision to erect the scaffold without any input from the Native American community was a “slap in the face,” he told The Pioneer Press.” 

“Scaffold” was praised by critics when it was shown in 2012 in Germany and in Scotland.

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It’s been well over two years since ASUS announced its original ZenBook Pro, and while it received a spec bump late last year, it’s about time for the company to revamp its premium desktop replacement line. Announced at the “Edge of Beyond” event ahe…

President Donald Trump has been tweeting regularly throughout the weekend, but not once has he mentioned the fatal stabbing in Portland, Oregon that left two men dead after they confronted a man spewing hatred to two Muslim girls.

On Friday, Ricky John Best and Taliesin Myrddin Namkai-Meche were stabbed to death while traveling on one of Portland’s MAX trains. They both stood up to confront a man verbally attacking two girls, one of whom was wearing a hijab.

Police say Jeremy Joseph Christian, 35, who has ties to white supremacist groups, targeted the girls for “religiously and racially motivated reasons.” When confronted by Best, Namkai-Meche and a third man, 21-year-old Micah David-Cole Fletcher, Christian violently attacked them with a knife. Fletcher survived the stabbing but remains in the hospital with serious injuries. 

Since the fatal attack made national news on Saturday, Trump has sent more than a dozen tweets. Not one of those messages mention Portland, the two deceased men being hailed as “heroes,” or a condemnation of the attacker’s actions that are being investigated by police as a hate crime.

Instead, Trump has focused his public comments on deriding the news media, congratulating Republicans on a congressional win in Montana and his recent trip to the Middle East and Europe.

Trump’s most recent tweets appear to address the seemingly never-ending Russia scandal troubling his administration. Over the weekend, the Washington Post reported that Russia’s ambassador Sergey Kislyak told Moscow officials that Trump’s key advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner discussed possibly setting up a secret communication channel between the then-incoming president’s transition team and the Kremlin. 

Twitter users have noticed the omission of the tragedy in Portland from Trump’s tweets, most notably by former “60 Minutes” host Dan Rather. The newsman wrote an impassioned letter pleading with the president to acknowledge the attack.

“Perhaps Portland, Oregon is off your radar. It is, after all, a rather liberal place. It’s even a “sanctuary city,” Rather wrote. “But it is still an American city. And you are its president.”

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”Moonlight,” and its story of a young black gay man struggling with his identity, may have won the coveted best picture Oscar this year, but it is still hard to find an LGBTQ character in a major Hollywood movie, according to a report on Thursday.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender advocacy group GLAAD said that only 23 of the 125 films released by the seven major Hollywood studios in 2016 includes LGBTQ characters. The “Q” stands for Questioning or Queer.

While U.S. television has made great strides in recent years with LGBT stories and characters, Hollywood movie studios are lagging way behind, the GLAAD report said.

Worse still, some are still featuring outdated humor, including the new “Baywatch” movie which has a scene where stars Zac Efron and Dwayne Johnson respond in horror to accidentally kissing one another, it noted.

“The time has come for the film industry to step up and show the full diversity of the world that movie audiences are living in today,” said GLAAD President Sarah Kate Ellis.

“Films like ‘Moonlight’ prove there is a huge opportunity to not only tell LGBTQ stories worthy of Oscar gold, but to open the hearts and minds of audiences here and around the world in places where these stories can be a lifeline to the people who need it most,” she added.

While GLAAD said that its findings were up one percentage point from 2015, when 22 films contained an LGBTQ character, 10 of the 2016 crop gave such characters less than one minute of screen time.

Hollywood studios also fall far behind other media in portraying transgender characters. GLAAD counted just one character (in “Zoolander 2”) in its 2016 report, and said that character existed solely as a punchline.

Despite some notable examples earlier this year, including a gay character in the new live action blockbuster “Beauty and the Beast,” GLAAD said “the forecast for the summer blockbuster season is a continuation of LGBTQ invisibility.”

(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; Editing by Richard Chang)

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