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JNCF writes:

The Gaurdian reports that Australia's comet-spotting program lost funding and shut down last year,

The Earth has been left with a huge blind spot for potentially devastating comet strikes after the only dedicated comet-spotting program in the southern hemisphere lost its funding, leading astronomers have warned.

The program, which discovered the Siding Spring comet, was shut down last year after losing funding.

“It’s a real worry,” Bradley Tucker, an astronomer at the Australian National University (ANU) and University of California Berkeley, told Guardian Australia.

“There could be something hurtling towards us right now and we wouldn’t know about it.”

The Siding Spring survey – named after the observatory near Coonabarabran in central New South Wales, where the Mars comet was first spotted – was the only program in the southern hemisphere actively searching for potentially hazardous comets, asteroids and meteors.

It seems that the Gaurdian is running this story now because the program had previously spotted a comet that came close to Mars on Sunday, but this is the first I remember hearing about it.

AnonTechie writes:

Two of the most aggressive forms of neurological illness, Alzheimer’s disease and brain cancer, may see tougher fights now that scientists have opened up the blood-brain barrier in humans for the first time.

The surgery is already being hailed as a breakthrough. Considered the “front frontier” in neuroscience, the blood-brain barrier is the sheath of cells that separates the organ from the rest of the body. While it stops harmful toxins in the blood from hijacking vital tissues, it also prevents helpful drugs from rooting out tumors and disease. But now scientists say all that could change.

http://www.medicaldaily.com/blood-brain-barrier-opened-first-time-human-patients-cancer-breakthrough-307737

[Additional Coverage]: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn26432-brain-barrier-opened-for-first-time-to-treat-cancer.html
[Abstract]: http://www.xcdsystem.com/fus2014/abstract/abstractforms/screen_view_abstract_public.cfm?ID=32349

frojack writes:

The Register reports

  A drop in the solar wind of a kind not seen since 1715 has made travel beyond Earth orbit a lot more dangerous, according to Professor Nathan Schwadron, studying data from the Cosmic Ray Telescope for the Effects of Radiation – so much so that a manned Mission to Mars may not be feasible for many decades.

The Sun may be entering a so-called "Maunder Minimum", a lengthy spell of low activity. Such a minimum last occurred from 1645-1715. Solar Minimums are characterized by significant reduction in the solar wind.

The solar wind normally has the effect of reducing the amount of dangerous cosmic radiation that can reach the inner solar system. While particles and radiation from the Sun are dangerous to astronauts, cosmic rays are even worse, so the effect of a solar calm is to make space even more radioactive than it already is.

For the sake of planning, a 3 per cent risk of an astronaut dying due to radiation exposure during a mission is seen as the acceptable limit: it's a dangerous job, after all (one should note that the death would probably be after the mission from cancer, perhaps many years later, rather than from severe radiation sickness while still in space). From Schwadron and his crew's analysis, if a lengthy solar quiet spell is indeed in the cards, the maximum time an astronaut can reasonably spend in space will be well under a year.

The time to 3 per cent Risk of Exposure Induced Death (REID) in interplanetary space was less than 400 days for a 30 year old male and less than 300 days for a 30 year old female in the last solar Maximum cycle.

The time to 3 per cent REID is estimated to be ~20 per cent lower in the coming solar Minimum cycle. If the heliospheric magnetic field continues to weaken over time, as is likely, then allowable mission duration will decrease correspondingly to about 320 days for men, 240 days for women.

Using our current technology, Space.com says the fasted time to Mars orbit is 168 days, making even a manned fly-by mission perilously close to the 300 day limit.

One way missions would still seem possible. But the Martian atmosphere provides precious little shielding and a solar minimum would double the amount of cosmic radiation on the surface.

Former NASA astronaut Dr Franklin Chang Díaz has suggested that nuclear plants of the type used in submarines could power plasma rockets to take a crewed ship to Mars in a month.

silverly writes:

Today I discovered an absolute gem from the past.

If you were around in 1984 you might have been super awesome and played core wars.

Core Wars is a programming game in which two or more programs run in a simulated computer with the goal of terminating every other program and surviving as long as possible. Known as Warriors, these programs are are written in an assembly language called Redcode.

Basically it's Counter-Strike/COD for programmers where you can fight in a team team, as a free-for-all, or one-vs-one.

What other cool things from the past might us youngun programmers have missed or not have an appreciation of?

gewg_ writes:

The Center for American Progress reports:

New research has found that climate change is causing mountain goats living in the Alps to shrink. The study, which was published Tuesday in the journal Frontiers in Zoology, found that adolescent Alpine chamois mountain goats are significantly smaller than their peers were 30 years ago, weighing about 25 percent less than goats in the 1980s did. The researchers called this change in body mass over 3 decades "striking". They also said the shrinking "appears to be strongly linked" with increased temperatures in the growing season of the goats' Alpine habitats.

The study noted that climate change has been linked to changes in body mass of other species before. But in those situations, the mass change was typically due to a change in the amount of food available or in the timing in which food was available--changes in bud burst timing in the spring, for instance. That wasn't the case in the goats' situation, however.

They have modified their behaviour and avoid foraging during the warmest part of the day so that they don't overheat.

AnonTechie writes:

The American Physical Society (APS) and the American Institute of Physics (AIP) announced today, on behalf of the Heineman Foundation for Research, Educational, Charitable, and Scientific Purposes, that theoretical physicist Pierre Ramond, director of the Institute for Fundamental Theory at the University of Florida, has won the 2015 Dannie Heineman Prize for Mathematical Physics -- one of the highest honors for scientific investigators in that field.

In recognizing Ramond, the two organizations cited his "pioneering foundational discoveries in supersymmetry and superstring theory, in particular the dual model of fermions and the theory of the Kalb-Ramond field".

"Since the days of ancient Democritus, philosophers and scientists who pondered what makes up the fundamental building blocks of matter have thought about point-like particles -- first atoms then subatomic particles like electrons or quarks", said H. Frederick Dylla, executive director and CEO of AIP. "But by initiating superstring theory in the early 1970s, Pierre Ramond generalized to all particles the notion that the basic building blocks are not point particles at all, but tiny string-like objects that vibrate to form the particles."

The prize consists of a certificate and a $10,000 award, which will be presented at a special ceremony during the April 2015 APS meeting in Baltimore, Md.

n1 writes:

El Reg reports:

Adobe has tweaked its Digital Editions 4 desktop ebook reader to now encrypt the data it secretly sends back to headquarters – data that details a user's reading habits.

Previously, information on every single tome accessed by Digital Editions 4 was phoned home unencrypted, allowing anyone eavesdropping on a network to intercept it. Now that information is transmitted via HTTPS, and only if the book includes copy-protection measures.

Version 4.0 of the software collected detailed records about books the user has been reading, such as which pages were read and when, and sent this intelligence back to the adelogs.adobe.com server. There was no way to opt out of this, short of deleting the application.

Now, with version 4.0.1, that information is encrypted and sent to the aforementioned server, and is limited to books with DRM protections. We note that the server's SSL/TLS configuration scores an A- from Qualys; the server's certificate has a 2048-bit RSA key albeit with a SHA-1 signature, and it prefers RC4 over stronger ciphers.

n1 writes:

Phys.org reports:

A Silicon Valley company is paying more than $43,000 in back wages and penalties after labor regulators found eight employees brought from India were grossly underpaid and overworked while assigned to a special project in the U.S.

The probe announced this week by the U.S Department of Labor uncovered several egregious violations at Electronics for Imaging Inc., a printing technology specialist that generated revenue of $728 million last year, when the misconduct occurred.

Among other things, Electronics for Imaging paid the eight workers far below California's required minimum wage—$8 per hour at the time—while they helped the company move its headquarters from Foster City, California, to Fremont, California, during a three-month period, according to the Labor Department.

While assigned to the project, some of the Indian workers logged as many as 122 hours in a week without being paid overtime. As result, they received as little as $1.21 per hour.

An anonymous coward writes:

The BBC and Phys.org report on a new paper by researchers from University of Florida and University of Zurich, concerning the megalodon (an extinct species of shark that could grow to four times the size of a modern great white). This latest research claims to peg the date of megalodon's extinction at 2.6 million years ago. It also suggests that the extinction of the largest sea predator at the time made it possible for whales to grow to their current size.

Our results suggest that C. megalodon went extinct around 2.6 Ma. Furthermore, when contrasting our results with known ecological and macroevolutionary trends in marine mammals, it became evident that the modern composition and function of modern gigantic filter-feeding whales was established after the extinction of C. megalodon. Consequently, the study of the time of extinction of C. megalodon provides the basis to improve our understanding of the responses of marine species to the removal of apex predators, presenting a deep-time perspective for the conservation of modern ecosystems.

A mathematical approach called Optimal Linear Estimation (OLE) was used by the researchers on 42 of the most recent megalodon fossils.

AnonTechie writes with an article from Ars Technica:

Justice Department lawyers have asked a federal court in Pittsburgh to dismiss a sweeping lawsuit brought earlier this year by a local lawyer against President Barack Obama and other top intelligence officials.

In a new motion to dismiss filed on Monday, the government told the court that the Pittsburgh lawyer, Elliott Schuchardt, lacked standing to make a claim that his rights under the Fourth Amendment have been violated as a result of multiple ongoing surveillance programs.

Specifically, Schuchardt argued in his June 2014 complaint that both metadata and content of his Gmail, Facebook, and Dropbox accounts were compromised under the PRISM program as revealed in the documents leaked by former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden.

cosurgi writes:

There's no linked story but I thought this is worth sharing.

I was looking for some specific proof about locally compact spaces. And to my very surprise I found Pr∞fwiki. It's a site full of wonderful mathematical proofs. It's crystal clear, or at least aims to be so. Much clearer to read than wikipedia, which in my opinion tends to be full of various things except ones that can be directly verified, just by reading it and checking the proof. By looking at history I see that it's operating since roughly 2009. And it needs our help, of course. When I find some proof I will definitely add it there! Will you?

azrael writes:

Sunnyskyz website has a fascinating article on hydrogen sulfide gas' therapeutic benefits. While this is dated from July this year, I don't think it has made an appearance here yet.

"Although hydrogen sulfide gas"—produced when bacteria breaks down food—"is well known as a pungent, foul-smelling gas in rotten eggs and flatulence, it is naturally produced in the body and could in fact be a healthcare hero with significant implications for future therapies for a variety of diseases," Dr. Mark Wood said in a university release.

Although the stinky gas can be noxious in large doses, scientists believe that a whiff here and there has the power to reduce risks of cancer, strokes, heart attacks, arthritis, and dementia by preserving mitochondria.

Further information is available on the University of Exeter's website, lending credence to this being more than just a hoax article - despite the amusing title.

lhsi writes:

The Conversation has launched a US version of the site.

They also list 10 ways in which we are different, detailing what makes them stand out from other information services.

Hugh Pickens writes:

Abby Phillip reports at the Washington Post that that Mark Zuckerberg just posted a 30-minute Q&A at Tsinghua University in Beijing in which he answered every question exclusively in Chinese - a notoriously difficult language to learn and particularly, to speak. "It isn't just Zuckerberg's linguistic acrobatics that make this a notable moment," writes Philip. "This small gesture — although some would argue that it is a huge moment — is perhaps his strongest foray into the battle for hearts and minds in China." Zuckerberg and Facebook have been aggressively courting Chinese users for years and the potential financial upside for the business. Although Beijing has mostly banned Facebook, the company signed a contract for its first ever office in China earlier this year. A Westerner speaking Mandarin in China — at any level — tends to elicit joy from average Chinese, who seem to appreciate the effort and respect they feel learning Mandarin demonstrates. So how well did Zuckerberg actually do? One Mandarin speaker rates Zuckerberg's language skills at the level of a seven year old: "It's hard not see a patronizing note in the Chinese audience's reaction to Zuckerberg's Mandarin. To borrow from Samuel Johnson's quip, he was like a dog walking on its hind legs: It wasn't done well, but it was a surprise to see it done at all."

AnonTechie writes with an article from Popular Science:

The first privately funded lunar mission launched today. The mission involves sending a 31-pound spacecraft called 4M, fitted with an antenna, small computer, and radiation sensor, on a Chinese rocket to Earth's satellite. Funded by private company LuxSpace, the craft will fly by the moon transmitting a signal back to Earth that can be picked up by amateur radio enthusiasts. The project is hitchhiking on a Chinese rocket transporting China's latest lunar spacecraft, which is also scheduled to fly by the moon -- another step in their moon exploration program.

4M began broadcasting exactly 77.8 minutes after it's launch at 1:59 PM Eastern Daylight Time. LuxSpace is hosting a contest to see who can recieve the most messages from the private payload before the mission ends (You can compete either as an individual or as a team.). The messages sent from the payload will be sequences of tones broadcast at different frequencies. Even if you don't want to participate in the contest, you can track the mission's progress online.