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takyon writes:

A prominent Putin critic has been found guilty of embezzlement:

Russia's main opposition leader, Alexei Navalny, has been found guilty of embezzlement, local media report. A judge is still reading the verdict in the city of Kirov, but news agencies said it was clear in his remarks that Mr Navalny had been convicted. Even a suspended sentence would bar him from running for president next year.

An outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin, Mr Navalny has denied the accusations, saying the case is politically motivated. A sentence in the retrial, ordered after a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights, may take hours to be read out. Prosecutors had asked the judge to hand Mr Navalny a five-year suspended sentence.

In Putin's Russia, you either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.

Also at Washington Post, NPR, RT, and Reuters.

Related: Politician Killed in Moscow Ahead of Weekend Opposition Rally - "Another organiser of the upcoming rally, Alexei Navalny, was jailed on 19 February for 15 days after handing out leaflets in public promoting the rally."
Killers of Boris Nemtsov Found, Arrested
Former Russian Anti-Doping Boss Dies Suddenly

Original Submission

jdavidb writes:

Brandon Sharpe certainly created a unique proposal for his girlfriend. On the set of Star Trek Continues, with the help of Vic Mignogna (portraying Captain James Kirk) and Kim Stinger (portraying Lieutenant Uhura), Brandon proposed to his girlfriend. Judging by her reaction she either really likes Star Trek, or really likes Brandon. Hopefully both.

Best wishes to the future Mr. and Mrs. Sharpe!

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Helium, an "inert" noble gas, can form bonds with sodium at high pressure:

It's a surprising finding, he says, because, on Earth, helium is a chemically inert and unreactive compound that eschews connections with other elements and compounds. The first of the noble gases, helium features an extremely stable, closed-shell electronic configuration, leaving no openings for connections. Further, Boldyrev's colleagues confirmed computationally and experimentally that sodium, never an earthly comrade to helium, readily bonds with the standoffish gas under high pressure to form the curious Na₂He compound. These findings were so unexpected, Boldyrev says, that he and colleagues struggled for more than two years to convince science reviewers and editors to publish their results.

Persistence paid off. Boldyrev and his doctoral student Ivan Popov, as members of an international research group led by Artem Oganov of Stony Brook University, published the pioneering findings in the Feb. 6, 2017, issue of Nature Chemistry [DOI: 10.1038/nchem.2716] [DX]. The USU chemists' participation in the project was supported by the National Science Foundation and the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation.

Boldyrev and Popov's role in the project was to interpret a chemical bonding in the computational model developed by Oganov and the experimental results generated by Alexander Goncharov of the Carnegie Institution of Washington. Initially, the Na₂He compound was found to consist of Na₈ cubes, of which half were occupied by helium atoms and half were empty. "Yet, when we performed chemical bonding analysis of these structures, we found each 'empty' cube actually contained an eight-center, two-electron bond," Boldyrev says. "This bond is what's responsible for the stability of this enchanting compound."

From the abstract: "We also predict the existence of Na₂HeO with a similar structure at pressures above 15 GPa."

Original Submission

DeathMonkey writes:

A follow-up to this story: NOAA Whistleblower: Climate Data Was Manipulated, the Computers Used "Suffered a Complete Failure"

Top Republicans on the House science committee claim a former National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientist “confirmed” that his NOAA colleagues “manipulated” climate data for a 2015 study. But that scientist denies that he accused NOAA of manipulating data.

Rep. Lamar Smith, the chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, and two subcommittee chairmen issued a Feb. 5 press release — “Former NOAA Scientist Confirms Colleagues Manipulated Climate Records” — as part of an ongoing dispute over the validity of a paper published in the journal Science in June 2015 by NOAA scientists.

[...] But in interviews with the Associated Press and E&E, an online energy and environmental news outlet, Bates said he had not accused his colleagues of data manipulation.

Bates told the AP on Feb. 6 that there was “no data tampering, no data changing, nothing malicious” involved with his colleagues’ study. “It’s not trumped up data in any way shape or form,” he said.

Rather, Bates claimed Karl and his group hadn’t followed NOAA protocol in “the way data was handled, documented and stored, raising issues of transparency and availability,” the AP reported.

No Data Manipulation at NOAA

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Researchers have found that an extract from an invasive weed in Florida can disrupt Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus bacteria:

The researchers showed that a refined, flavone-rich composition extracted from the berries inhibits formation of skin lesions in mice infected with methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus auereus (MRSA). The compound works not by killing the MRSA bacteria, but by repressing a gene that allows the bacteria cells to communicate with one another. Blocking that communication prevents the cells from taking collective action, a mechanism known as quorum quenching.

"It essentially disarms the MRSA bacteria, preventing it from excreting the toxins it uses as weapons to damage tissues," Quave says. "The body's normal immune system then stands a better chance of healing a wound."

The discovery may hold potential for new ways to treat and prevent antibiotic-resistant infections, a growing international problem. Antibiotic-resistant infections annually cause at least two million illnesses and 23,000 deaths in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The United Nations last year called antibiotic-resistant infections a "fundamental threat" to global health and safety, citing estimates that they cause at least 700,000 deaths each year worldwide, with the potential to grow to 10 million deaths annually by 2050.

Schinus terebinthifolius .

Virulence Inhibitors from Brazilian Peppertree Block Quorum Sensing and Abate Dermonecrosis in Skin Infection Models (open, DOI: 10.1038/srep42275) (DX)

Original Submission

AndyTheAbsurd writes:

Fans of the Pale Moon web browser are probably already aware of this, but version 27.1 has been released as of February 9th, 2017. This update brings a number of improvements, some of them pretty major; here's a handful that I think are worth noting:

This version introduces the so-called "PMkit" modules, our effort to restore most compatibility with Firefox Jetpack/SDK extensions

Reworked the media back-end completely (thanks Travis!) to use FFmpeg (including support for FFmpeg v3 and MP3 playback) and our own MP4 parser, and no longer relying on gstreamer on Linux

Changed the way scripts are handled when they are stopped from the "unresponsive script" dialog, to prevent browser lockup

Made the use of let as a keyword versionless and ES6 compliant

You can read the full release notes in the forum thread about it or on the release notes page.

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

Autotrader reports a study:

Canadians looking to impress on their next romantic date might want to stay clear of on-demand car services, taxis or even public transit, according to the findings of a recent autoTRADER.ca survey that explores the role of the automobile in modern-day dating. In fact, a whopping 92 percent of Canadians say they find it appealing when their date shows up with their own ride. And don't even think about "borrowing the car" for the occasion – close to half of the population surveyed (48 percent) reported that they would find a borrowed vehicle unattractive or "embarrassing beyond words."

While it is unsurprising a publication called Autotrader would find car ownership is necessary for romance, do the study's claims track? Do today's humans really prefer being picked up for a date by someone who owns a car? Is being picked up on a motorcycle really the least attractive?

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Details about an upcoming Intel 3D XPoint SSD for datacenters have leaked:

Multiple leaks in Chinese-language media apparently outline the performance specifications of Intel's forthcoming Optane P4800X Series Cold Stream PCIe Add-In-Card, which is the company's first 3D XPoint-powered SSD. If Intel follows its trend of releasing enthusiast variants of its enterprise SSDs, we could see the NVMe DC P4800X head to the desktop soon. We treat any leak with suspicion, but in this case we also found a declaration of conformity certificate on Intel's site. The document confirms the name of the device and that it uses 3D XPoint, thus lending some credibility to the leak. We also found a reference to an unreleased DC P4500 Cliffdale SSD series.

[...] The enterprise isn't as sensitive to high prices if the value proposition is compelling enough, and as such, Intel's 375GB Cold Stream Optane DC P4800X is destined for the data center. The SSD features the standard PCIe 3.0 x4 connection and offers up to 2,400/2,000 MB/s of sequential read/write throughput over the NVMe interface. Cold Stream also blows in with up to 550,000/500,000 random read/write IOPS. The performance figures, while impressive, do not entirely encompass the benefits of using 3D XPoint. The new speedy media offers amazing performance at low queue depths and unwavering mixed workload performance, which are the most important metrics for actual applications. We cover some of the finer points of the 3D XPoint performance profile in our 3D XPoint Guide.

The DC P4800X purportedly offers up to 30 DWPD (Drive Writes Per Day) of endurance, which measures how many times you can fill the drive per day over the warranty period. 30 DWPD is unheard of for NAND-based SSDs; the most endurant modern SSDs top out at 10 DWPD. The DWPD metric can be muddy due to differing capacities, but overall, the DC P4800X can absorb up to 12.3PB of data during its service life. Intel's 450GB DC P3520 SSD, which is NAND-based, can withstand only 590TB, so apparently, 3D XPoint offers almost 21x more endurance than NAND.

Original Submission

Explosion at Nuclear power plant in France

GreatAuntAnesthesia writes:

There has been an explosion at a nuclear power plant in France. The explosion happened this morning [9 Feb] in the plant's engine room, officials are saying there is no risk of nuclear contamination. One of two reactors was shut down as a result of the incident.

The plant is situated in Flamanville, near Cherbourg on the Contentin peninsula in north-west France.

Explosion at Flamanville Nuclear Power Plant Near Cherbourg, France

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

Power Engineering International reports

The incident has been reported by local media, Ouest-France newspaper and M6 Radio station. These sources claim five people have suffered minor injuries as a result of the explosion.

A government official says there is no nuclear risk, and at midday EDF spokesperson Laurence Ollier confirmed, "At 9.40[1] this morning, a fire resulting in a minor explosion broke out in the turbine hall on the non-nuclear part of unit 1 at the Flamanville nuclear power plant."

"The fire was immediately brought under control by the plant's response team. As per normal procedure, the fire brigade went to the affected location and confirmed that the fire had been extinguished."

[...] "It is a significant technical event but it is not a nuclear accident" because the explosion occurred "outside the nuclear zone", said Olivier Marmion, director of the state prefect's office.

The area of the incident has variously been called a turbine hall, an engine room, and a mechanical room. It has further been described as a long structure, separated from the nuclear portion of the facility.

Original Submission #1  Original Submission #2 

"exec" writes:

ShopBLT in the US, and Kikatek in the UK, let slip pricing details a bit early.

http://hexus.net/tech/news/cpu/102322-uk-us-prices-amd-r7-ryzen-processors-spotted/

VideoCardz reports that in the US an outfit called ShopBLT (sounds like a sandwich shop) has published a trio of R7 Ryzen chip prices, with some other accompanying details. [...] The absolute top end AMD Ryzen 7 1800X is currently listed at US$490, the Ryzen 7 1700X at $381, and the Ryzen 7 1700 at $316. Remember US prices don't usually include state tax which varies depending where you live.

[...]

In the UK we have a screenshot of a listing of Ryzen CPUs from trade seller Ingram Micro. These listed processors seem to have been taken down, but luckily VideoCardz took a snap. You can see the top end 4GHz AMD Ryzen 7 1800X was listed at GBP £365, the Ryzen 7 1700X at £283, and the Ryzen 7 1700 at £235. These are ex-VAT prices so you have to add 20 per cent, unfortunately. That makes the AMD Ryzen 7 1800X £438 by my calculations. In the listings WOF seems to mean 'without fan'.

-- submitted from IRC

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Recently touted as a solution for mosquito borne illnesses like zika, dengue and chikayunga - gene driving mosquito populations to infertility isn't working out so great in the wild.

In late 2015, researchers reported a CRISPR gene drive that caused an infertility mutation in female mosquitoes to be passed on to all their offspring1. Lab experiments showed that the mutation increased in frequency as expected over several generations, but resistance to the gene drive also emerged, preventing some mosquitoes from inheriting the modified genome.

This is hardly surprising, says Philipp Messer, a population geneticist at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Just as antibiotics enable the rise of drug-resistant bacteria, population-suppressing gene drives create the ideal conditions for resistant organisms to flourish.

One source of this resistance is the CRISPR system itself, which uses an enzyme to cut a specific DNA sequence and insert whatever genetic code a researcher wants. Occasionally, however, cells sew the incision back together after adding or deleting random DNA letters. This can result in a sequence that the CRISPR gene-drive system no longer recognizes, halting the spread of the modified code.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Despite the introduction of advertising, live video streaming, and the visibility of high-profile users like the President of the United States, Twitter remains unprofitable:

For all the buzz the San Francisco company has created as the preferred platform for U.S. President Donald Trump and other high-profile figures, Twitter has lost more than $1.5 billion cumulatively since it went public in late 2013.

The company has almost $1 billion in cash on hand, and the losses are due in part to employee stock compensation, a non-cash expense. That is little comfort, though, for shareholders who end up footing the bill for those costs in the form of dilution.

Further, the company said it was revisiting core advertising strategies, suggesting a quick turnaround on revenue was not likely. Fourth-quarter revenue of $717 million was well short of analysts' expectations.

Also at ABC, BBC, and CNET.

Original Submission

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

The Metropolitan Museum of Art announces

Thomas P. Campbell, Director and CEO of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, announced [February 7] its adoption of a new policy: all images of public-domain artworks in the Museum's collection are now available for free and unrestricted use. This updated policy, known as Open Access, utilizes the Creative Commons Zero (CC0) designation. This policy change is an update to The Museum's 2014 Open Access for Scholarly Content (OASC) initiative. The Met's Open Access policy facilitates the use of more than 375,000 images of public-domain artworks for both scholarly and commercial purposes. The Museum is collaborating with global partners to enable greater access to the collection.

In making the announcement, Mr. Campbell said: "We have been working toward the goal of sharing our images with the public for a number of years. Our comprehensive and diverse museum collection spans 5,000 years of world culture and our core mission is to be open and accessible for all who wish to study and enjoy the works of art in our care. Increasing access to the Museum's collection and scholarship serves the interests and needs of our 21st-century audiences by offering new resources for creativity, knowledge, and ideas. We thank Creative Commons, an international leader in open access and copyright, for being a partner in this effort."

"Sharing is fundamental to how we promote discovery, innovation, and collaboration in the digital age," said Ryan Merkley, CEO, Creative Commons. "Today, The Met has given the world a profound gift in service of its mission: the largest encyclopedic art museum in North America has eliminated the barriers that would otherwise prohibit access to its content, and invited the world to use, remix, and share their public-domain collections widely and without restriction. This is an enormous gift to the world, and it is an act of significant leadership on the part of the institution. I want to congratulate Thomas P. Campbell, the board of trustees, and The Met staff for making such a strong commitment to collaboration and sharing, and I hope that other institutions, both public and private, will follow the path they are setting out here today."

To maximize the reach of The Met's Open Access initiative, the Museum announced its new partnerships with Creative Commons, Wikimedia, Artstor, Digital Public Library of America (DPLA), Art Resource, and Pinterest. The Museum also welcomes its first Wikimedian-in-Residence, Richard Knipel, who will collaborate with Wikimedians around the world to bring images of public-domain artworks into Wikimedia Commons, Wikipedia, and diverse GLAM-Wiki initiatives. Creative Commons will support search and re-use of The Met collection with its CCSearch beta at https://ccsearch.creativecommons.org/themet. The Met has also created a public GitHub repository.

[Continues...]

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard

Several Pirate Bay users from ISPs all over the world have been unable to access their favorite torrent site for more than a week. Their requests are being stopped in the Internet backbone network of Cogent Communications, which has blackholed the CloudFlare" IP-address[sic] of The Pirate Bay and many other torrent and streaming sites.

[...] When the average Internet user types in a domain name, a request is sent through a series of networks before it finally reaches the server of the website. This also applies to The Pirate Bay and other pirate sites such as Primewire, Movie4k, TorrentProject and TorrentButler. However, for more than a week now the US-based backbone provider Cogent has stopped passing on traffic to these sites.

The sites in question all use CloudFlare, which assigned them the public IP-address [sic] 104.31.19.30. While this can be reached just fine by most people, users attempting to pass requests through Cogent's network are unable to access them.The issue is not limited to a single ISP and affects a small portion of users all over the world, the United States and Europe included. According to Cogent's own backbone routing check, it applies to the company's entire global network.

Since routing problems can sometimes occur by mistake, TorrentFreak reached out to Cogent to ask if the block is intentional and if so, what purpose it serves. A Cogent spokesperson informed us that they looked into the issue but that the company "does not discuss such decisions with third parties," while adding that they do not control the DNS records of these sites.

The fact that the IP-address [sic] of The Pirate Bay and the other sites remains inaccessible suggests that it is indeed intentional. This is also backed up by the fact that the IP-address [sic] in question has a "BGP community string" tag that prohibits it from being sent to other networks.

Source: https://torrentfreak.com/internet-backbone-provider-cogent-blocks-pirate-bay-and-other-pirate-sites-170209/

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Astrophysicists have modeled the effects of red dwarf star flare activity on the atmospheres of orbiting exoplanets, and found that heavy gases including oxygen would be lost quickly, even in the so-called "habitable zone":

[When] the scientists accounted for superflares, their new model indicates the violent storms of young red dwarfs generate enough high-energy radiation to enable the escape of even oxygen and nitrogen – building blocks for life's essential molecules.

"The more X-ray and extreme ultraviolet energy there is, the more electrons are generated and the stronger the ion escape effect becomes," Glocer said. "This effect is very sensitive to the amount of energy the star emits, which means it must play a strong role in determining what is and is not a habitable planet."

Considering oxygen escape alone, the model estimates a young red dwarf could render a close-in exoplanet uninhabitable within a few tens to a hundred million years. The loss of both atmospheric hydrogen and oxygen would reduce and eliminate the planet's water supply before life would have a chance to develop.

"The results of this work could have profound implications for the atmospheric chemistry of these worlds," said Shawn Domagal-Goldman, a Goddard space scientist not involved with the study. "The team's conclusions will impact our ongoing studies of missions that would search for signs of life in the chemical composition of those atmospheres."

The research has obvious implications for exoplanets like Proxima Centauri b.

YouTube video (20 seconds).

How Hospitable Are Space Weather Affected Habitable Zones? The Role of Ion Escape (DOI: 10.3847/2041-8213/836/1/L3) (DX)

Original Submission