It turns out that the human cells scientists have studied the most and used in research for more than 60 years have some unexpected and pretty intense genetic mutations. Good thing they weren’t used as part of 60,000 published papers. They were? Oh geez. More »
This week those responsible for working to find the elusive subatomic big of matter known as the Higgs boson have confirmed that they have, indeed, been able to confirm its existence. Of course as these scientists at CERN are, indeed, scientists, most have been just as cautious about saying they’re sure of their findings as their post would indicate: the data “strongly indicates that it is a Higgs boson” – is what they’ve announced today. This is indeed a proud day for the $10 billion dollar Large Hadron Collider one way or another.
The initial suggestion that the particle science may have confirmed this week could exist came from 83-year-old Peter Higgs and his team. Though immediately following the announcement it’s been suggested more than once that this discovery will summon a Nobel prize for someone, it’s not quite clear whether the CERN team or Higgs himself would be up for recognition. If the award weren’t just limited to humans, the prize may well have been headed directly for CERN’s Large Hadron Collider itself, it and its 17-mile (27-kilometer) tunnel altogether.
This machine is responsible for creating the energy surges needed to discover the Higgs boson. With collision simulations of the energies generated immediately following the initial Big Bang that created our universe, only one in every trillion tests would – and perhaps has – created a Higgs boson particle.
The confirmation of the existence of the Higgs boson particle would, in turn, prove the existence of the Higgs field. The Higgs field is part of what’s called the Standard Model of particle physics that explains why some particles have mass. Discovering the Higgs boson and confirming the Higgs field would in turn validate the last in a series of parts included in the Standard Model.
If the Standard Model is validated in full, this could open the door to developments in what at the moment is called “new” physics. If we’re moving from the Standard Model towards “new” physics, we’ll eventually be lead to new technologies and innovations whose reach is currently incalculable.
The possibilities here are well and above the cost – any cost – that creating the Large Hadron Collider could have created as the end result could change our understanding of how the universe fits together – and how we interact with it. The possibilities are endless, and right this minute we’re at a point in our collective history that we may well be placing in history books forevermore!
[image via Wikipedia]
Higgs boson “God Particle” all but confirmed: here’s why it was worth it is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Physicists at CERN say new data crunching indicates the LHC discovery last July is almost certainly a Higgs boson, though there’s still some mystery as to which kind of the previously-theoretical particle it might be. The ATLAS and CMS teams manning the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) have worked their way through 2.5x the data that was possible for the Higgs boson announcement last year, they said this week, and that initial confidence looks to have been prescient. “The preliminary results with the full 2012 data set are magnificent and to me it is clear that we are dealing with a Higgs boson” CMS spokesperson Joe Incandela said of the latest findings.
However, there’s still work to be done, and the Higgs still has some mysteries to be unlocked. “We still have a long way to go to know what kind of Higgs boson it is” Incandela concedes, with the identification process to be followed by a measurement one.
That second stage is already underway, in fact. “The beautiful new results represent a huge effort by many dedicated people. They point to the new particle having the spin-parity of a Higgs boson as in the Standard Model” ATLAS spokesperson Dave Charlton said. “We are now well started on the measurement programme in the Higgs sector.”
CERN made headlines last year when it announced that evidence from the LHC indicated what had previously been only a theoretical particle had been identified in real life. To do that, the LHC had been systematically smashing particles together and examining the results:
“Whether or not it is a Higgs boson is demonstrated by how it interacts with other particles, and its quantum properties. For example, a Higgs boson is postulated to have no spin, and in the Standard Model its parity – a measure of how its mirror image behaves – should be positive. CMS and ATLAS have compared a number of options for the spin-parity of this particle, and these all prefer no spin and positive parity. This, coupled with the measured interactions of the new particle with other particles, strongly indicates that it is a Higgs boson” CERN
Actual LHC testing won’t resume for some time, however, with the system currently down for maintenance. That’s not expected to be completed until 2015, though the CMS and ATLAS teams say they’ve a backlog of data to work through which should keep them going until more collisions can be run.
CERN: Yep, looks like it’s definitely a Higgs boson is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
A while back DARPA issued a challenge to researchers and educational institutions to help construct a robot that could meet a series of specific tasks. The competition had a prize of $2 million and was called the DARPA Robotics Challenge. The goal of the challenge was to have entrants build robots that have four limbs and possessed strength along the lines of a human.
One caveat for the program was that the robot had to have the dexterity needed to be able to climb ladders and use tools. Carnegie Mellon University is one of the educational institutions that participated in the challenge. The robot created by the University is called the CMU Highly Intelligent Mobile Platform or CHIMP.
The robot has an interesting motivation system using triple-jointed limbs that are able to move on tank treads over roads and rough ground. The robot is also able to lift itself up and travel using two of the tracks while using claw-like manipulator arms to climb ladders, move debris, or turn a steering wheel. DARPA is seeking robots it would be able to enter facilities during serious accidents, such as the accident that occurred at the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan.
Robots that enter the competition also have to be able to operate without a power line or a wired connection. CHIMP uses onboard processing power for balance, collision avoidance, and navigation. The design was accepted by DARPA into the top group of Robotics Challenge entries. The first round of tests for this group of robots, including the CHIMP will begin in June. The first challenges are purely based on software. Physical task challenges will happen in December.
[via The Register]
Carnegie Mellon University builds CHIMP for DARPA Robotics Challenge is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Facebook made a sharp break from tradition when it unveiled the simplified News Feed, but how did it get there? As the social network’s Jane Justice Leibrock has just explained, it was as simple as shuffling cards. Well, almost. Leibrock gave focus group subjects a stack of cards reflecting their recent social updates and asked them to pick the cream of the crop as well as sort the rest into groups. The results led to the filtered approach that’s rolling out now: users tend to gravitate toward specific categories such as close friends, photos and direct interests, rather than piling everything together. As often as people accuse Facebook of launching surprise changes, it’s clear that the News Feed revamp involved at least some deliberation.
Filed under: Internet, Facebook
Source: Facebook
So apparently the Ukrainian Navy trains killer dolphins. That’s not the most shocking news you’ll hear all day. Apparently 3 out of the 5 killer dolphins that they have trained have run away from base, presumably to look for a mate to hook up with (at least that’s what experts believe). The dolphins took off during a training exercise held at Sevastopol Aquarium around February 24th. They’re equipped with pistols and knives, and yes, they know how to use them.
They are currently swimming around in the Black Sea in search of some other dolphins to mate with. Yury Plyachenko, a former Soviet naval anti-sabotage officer, stated that this is typical behavior coming from male dolphins. It is mating season, and they usually come back within a week. That’s not exactly reassuring since it’s been about 2 weeks and 2 days since the dolphins took off.
Before they were trained to be killers, these dolphins were in charge of civilian tasks like rehabilitating disabled children. The Ukrainian’s decided to re-train these dolphins in order to fend off enemy combat swimmers. They were fully trained to use weapons strapped to their heads. The dolphin training program originated in the USSR, and there they were taught how to find mines, or plant explosives onto enemy ships. After the breakup of the USSR, the dolphins were given to the Ukrainian Navy.
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry were quick to call these reports a lie. They stated that they were just “fabrications” and “gross provocations”. While that would be a good counter-argument, the killer dolphin training program has been caught on various Ukrainian media reports. Whatever the case may be, civilians (and ships) should probably stay away from the Black Sea for a little while.
[via RIA Novosti]
Ukrainian killer dolphins are on the loose is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
If you like thunderstorms, The Colbert Report or curly fries on Facebook, you’re a genius. If you like Sephora, Harley-Davidson or the country-western band Lady Antebellum, you’re not.
A team of international researchers, lead by Emanuele Farina from the University of Insubria in Como, Italy, have discovered a rare, quasar triplet about 9 billion light years away from Earth. The quasar triplet has been named QQQ J1519+0627 and is only the second triplet to ever be found. The researchers believe that the galaxies that these quasars are a part of may be merging together in order to form one, enormous galaxy.
A quasar, or a quasi-stellar radio source, is a very bright and powerful celestial object. It is at the center of a galaxy and is surrounding a supermassive black hole. The quasar is powered by the accretion disc around the black hole. The scientists have found that two of the quasars in the triplet are much closer to each other than the third. They believe that those two quasars were the first to create the triplet quasar system, and that the third quasar is part of a much larger structure that’s still undergoing formation.
Michele Fumagalli, an astrophysicist at the Observatories of the Carnegie Institution in Pasadena, said, “Honing our observational and modeling skills and finding this rare stellar phenomenon will help us understand how cosmic structures assemble in our universe and the basic processes by which massive galaxies form.” The system is difficult to observe, however, due to their distance. It’s difficult for the scientists to distinguish the quasar triplets from the other different astronomical bodies nearby.
The scientists believe that the three quasars are close enough that their halos of dark matter are touching each other. Fumagalli, Farina, and the team of scientists have published their findings in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. They are currently studying the quasars and trying to figure out how rare a triplet formation is. They are also looking around the universe to see if they can find more quasar triplets.
[via LA Times]
Scientists discover rare quasar triplet 9 billion light years away is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Pretty much everyone is on Facebook today and odds are you are one of the masses who use the social network. Another thing that’s common on the social network is clicking like on various things that interest you on the network. Those Likes apparently give way more about you and your personality than anyone may have imagined.
A group of researchers from the University of Cambridge say that by using publicly available Facebook Likes alone they can get surprisingly accurate estimates of things such as the user’s race, age, IQ, sexuality, personality, substance use, and political views. The research team analyzed the data set of over 58,000 US Facebook users who volunteered their Likes information.
The volunteers also offered up demographic profiles and psychometric testing results using the myPersonality application. The researchers then fed the Like information into specially designed algorithms and cross-checked the results with information from the profiles and personality tests gathered. Using this method, the researchers were able to create statistical models that could predict personal details using the information from Likes alone.
According to the researchers, the system they developed was 88% accurate for determining male sexuality, 95% accurate in determining African-American from Caucasian, and 85% accurate in differentiating Republican from Democrat. The system was also able to classify whether a person was a Christian or Muslim 82% of the time. Interestingly, the system was able to detect substance abuse about 73% of the time.
[via TG Daily]
Researchers predict IQ, age, and more using only Facebook Likes is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Every little piece of information you give away online can reveal something about you—but it seems your Facebook likes could reveal rather more than you bargained for. More »
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