Hasta La Gadget!

How many times do we have to tell you to back up your data people? Let this serve as an object lesson–two leading cancer researchers at Oklahoma University had their computer stolen recently.

It may have contained the cure for prostate cancer–or, at the very least, some vital clues in the fight against it. Sook Shin and her husband Ralf Jankecht had years of data on the thing. And no, they didn’t back up. Sin told the press, “I’m so devastated, and I feel so guilty.”

The couple is offering $1,000 for the safe return of their 13 inch Macbook, which was stolen from their Jetta parked outside of an Oklahoma-area Panera Bread, after a thief broke the window and stole a computer bag containing the computer.

“Please return the computer with the data saved,” added Jankecht. “This would tremendously help us and you would do something for society.”

Scientists have long used a simple technique to follow the lives of specific penguins: placing a band around their flipper, thus making them easy to spot. But it turns out those simple bands actual harm the birds, reducing their lifespan and even diminishing the number of offspring they produce.

A study took place over ten years, and looked at a group of 100 King penguins — half of which had a flipper band, half of which had been outfitted with an implanted transponder. After a decade, 18 of the transponder penguins were still alive, while just 10 of the banded penguins survived. The penguins with the bands also arrived to breeding grounds much later and took longer to find food, thus leading to a reduced number of chicks.

The reason for the issues is most likely that the bands cause drag, reducing the penguins swimming abilities. They also make the birds more visible to predators.

“I would say no [it is not ethical],” French researcher Claire Saraux told the BBC. “The exception would be using them only on land, and that probably won’t be a problem so long as you take them off the birds before they go to sea – and that could still be useful, because I can tell you that when you go into a colony of 50,000 penguins to find yours, it’s not easy.”

Cotton may very well be the fabric of our lives, but it’d sure feel a lot better draped across our skin if we could incorporate stretchable electronic devices into it. That’s the goal of NC State’s own Dr. Yong Zhu, who has worked with a team of gurus to create “the first coils of silicon nanowire on a substrate that can be stretched to more than double their original length.” Essentially, this type of breakthrough brings us one (major) step closer to “incorporating stretchable electronic devices into clothing, implantable health-monitoring devices, and a host of other applications.” Compared to prior studies on buckling, this particular approach one-ups those focusing on freestanding nanowires, with the new coils’ mechanical properties enabling them to be “stretched an additional 104 percent beyond their original length.” That’s a lot of technobabble, for sure, but what you need to realize is just how amazing your life will be as soon as The Zhu Crew figures out how to improve the reliability of the electrical performance when the coils are stretched to the limit. Flexible PMPs woven into your ski jacket? Bendable LCDs sewn right into your car’s headrests? The future… it’s here.

NC State’s coiled nanowire discovery could lead to stretchable electronic devices originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 12 Jan 2011 22:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  NC State University  | Email this | Comments

Are you the next Einstein? Google is looking for you. The company “believe[s] that science can change the world,” and it’s looking to back that belief with some valuble prizes, attempting to “celebrate and champion young scientific talent as we do athletes and pop idols.”

The search giant has partnered LEGO, National Geographic and Scientific American for a an online science contest. The competition is targeted at students across the world, aed 13 to 18. Projects are due on April 4th. Semi-finalists will be announced in May.

In July, 15 finalists will bring their projects to Google for a live event with science judges, including Dean Kamen, Nobel laureate Kary Mulis, Google exec Vint Cerf, Scientific America editor Mariette di Cristina, and CERN director Mariette di Cristina.

More information, incuding registration, is available on Google’s official blog.

Earlier this week, a Texas man was released after spending 30 years in prison. Cornelius Dupree was convicted of robbery with a deadly weapon in 1980 and sentenced to 75 years. Now, thanks to DNA evidence, he’s been exonerated. Since 2001, that state has freed more than 41 prisoners through the use of DNA evidence. And now, thanks to new breakthroughs, the science is about to become even more accurate.

Scientists at Erasmus University Medical Center in The Netherlands announced this week that they have developed a new test that can detect hair color in samples gathered through blood, semen, and saliva, adding to a list of characteristics that includes age and hair color.

The new evidence can detect black or red hair with 90 percent accuracy and blond or brown hair with 80 percent accuracy, according to the scientists.