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RandomFactor writes:

Research published in the journal Protein and Cell shows a combination of two experimental drugs reversing the effects of osteoarthritus in rats (as well as in human cartilage cell cultures).

"What's really exciting is that this is potentially a therapy that can be translated to the clinic quite easily," says Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte, lead author and a professor in Salk's Gene Expression Laboratory. "We are excited to continue refining this promising combination therapy for human use."

Affecting 30 million adults, osteoarthritis is the most common joint disorder in the United States and its prevalence is expected to rise in coming years due to the aging population and increasing rate of obesity. The disease is caused by gradual changes to cartilage that cushions bones and joints. During aging and repetitive stress, molecules and genes in the cells of this articular cartilage change, eventually leading to the breakdown of the cartilage and the overgrowth of underlying bone, causing chronic pain and stiffness.

This could be welcome news indeed for the 630 Million people worldwide (15% of the population) that suffer from the condition, and whose only options now are pain relievers or joint replacement surgery.

Previous research had pinpointed two molecules, alpha-KLOTHO and TGF beta receptor 2 (TGFβR2), as potential drugs to treat osteoarthritis. αKLOTHO acts on the mesh of molecules surrounding articular cartilage cells, keeping this extra-cellular matrix from degrading. TGFβR2 acts more directly on cartilage cells, stimulating their proliferation and preventing their breakdown.

Individually, the two molecules only moderately curb osteoarthritis. However…

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for SoyCow7701:

Space Force Offers First Peek at Camouflage Uniform:

The official Twitter account of the month-old military service posted[*] a teaser photograph Friday night appearing to show a variant of the Operational Camouflage Pattern used by the Army and Air Force.

Above the left breast pocket in Navy embroidery reads: U.S. Space Force.

[...] The uniform depicts four-star rank, indicating that the uniform belongs to Gen. John "Jay" Raymond, the first commander of U.S. Space Force. It also has the Command Space Operations badge embroidered above the service nametape.

On the left sleeve of the uniform is the United States Space Command patch, denoting the military's newest combatant command, formed shortly before Space Force itself activated Dec. 20. And above that patch is a full-color American flag patch -- a departure from the muted flags that soldiers and airmen typically wear on their right shoulders in OCP uniform.

Many questions remain. Space Force has yet to announce a rank structure, a full system of uniforms or even what to call members of the new service. In a Thursday briefing, Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said Raymond was developing a plan regarding every detail.

[*] https://twitter.com/SpaceForceDoD/status/1218335200964464650

Original Submission

Freeman writes:

Microsoft's sneaky plan to switch Chrome searches from Google to Bing:

Microsoft announced today that, beginning in February 2020, Office365 Pro Plus installs and updates will include a Chrome extension that forcibly changes the default search engine to Microsoft's own search engine, Bing.

[...] This new policy only takes places in specific geographic areas, as determined by a user's IP address. If you aren't in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, India, the UK, or the United States, you should be safe—for now

[...] Predictably, the unruly denizens of Reddit's r/sysadmin—arguably, the closest thing the modern Internet has to the scary devil monastery—are unhappy.

[...] Microsoft's actual stated reasoning for the change is to automatically enable Microsoft Search within the user's browser.

[...] Aside from the potential to enrage sysadmins and users alike, we question the wisdom of conditioning users to search for internal, likely confidential data in their Web browser's general-purpose search bar.

LibreOffice + Firefox anyone?

Additional coverage at: searchengineland

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Can the Linux Foundation Speak for Free Software?:

[Emphasis in original. --Ed.]

Although the Linux Foundation seems to represent Linux and the entire Linux user community, many community members have complained for years that the organization has defaulted to representing only the interests of its corporate membership.

This situation might not matter so much if organizations representing the community were strong enough to act as a counter-balance. The trouble is, they are not. In the last decade, the Free Software Foundation has backed away from its former activist tradition, while the Software Freedom Conservancy is almost unknown outside a small circle. Even Debian, while the dominant force among Linux distributions, makes fewer position announcements than it once did. As a result, the Linux Foundation has become the accepted public face of free software without any attempt to represent any except corporate interests.

The kindest interpretation of this situation is that the Linux Foundation has a public relations problem that it is unaware of and is overdue to correct. A more cynical interpretation is that, from its very start, the Linux Foundation has been a slow coup, gradually usurping an authority to which it has no right. Ask me on alternate days which one I believe.

Whatever the case, the solutions are the same. A concerted effort to get community members elected to at-large positions might help, although they would still be a minority. Many, too, might not want to legitimize the foundation by participating in it. A more promising response might be to see that community organizations are strengthened to provide a counter-balance, but that would be a slow solution if it worked at all.

Original Submission

AnonTechie writes:

Capitalism is in trouble – at least judging by recent polls.

A majority of American millennials reject the economic system, while 55% of women age 18 to 54 say they prefer socialism. More Democrats now have a positive view of socialism than capitalism. And globally, 56% of respondents to a new survey agree "capitalism as it exists today does more harm than good in the world."

One problem interpreting numbers like these is that there are many definitions of capitalism and socialism. More to the point, people seem to be thinking of a specific form of capitalism that deems the sole purpose of companies is to increase stock prices and enrich investors. Known as shareholder capitalism, it's been the guiding light of American business for more than four decades. That's what the survey meant by "as it exists today."

As a scholar of socially responsible companies, however, I cannot help but notice a shift in corporate behavior in recent years. A new kind of capitalism seems to be emerging, one in which companies value communities, the environment and workers just as much as profits.

The latest evidence: Companies as diverse as alcohol maker AB InBev, airline JetBlue and money manager BlackRock have all in recent weeks made new commitments to pursue more sustainable business practices.

[...] A 2017 study showed that many companies with climate change goals actually scaled back their ambitions over time as the reality clashed with their lofty goals.

But businesses can't afford to ignore their customers' wishes. Nor can they ignore their workers in a tight labor market. And if they disregard socially responsible investors, they risk both losing out on important investments and facing shareholder resolutions that force change.

The shareholder value doctrine is not dead, but we are beginning to see major cracks in its armor. And as long as investors, customers and employees continue to push for more responsible behavior, you should expect to see those cracks grow.

The Conversation

Original Submission

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram that was the inspiration for this story:

Vodafone quits Facebook's Libra currency:

Vodafone has become the latest company to leave Facebook's digital currency project, Libra.

The Libra Association has seen an exodus of backers including Paypal and Mastercard amid regulatory scrutiny.

Facebook announced in June last year that it would launch the digital currency in partnership with other members of the association. But the project quickly ran into trouble with sceptical regulators around the world.

In October, the world's biggest economies warned cryptocurrencies such as Libra pose a risk to the global financial system.

"Vodafone Group has decided to withdraw from the Libra Association," a Vodafone spokesperson said. "We have said from the outset that Vodafone's desire is to make a genuine contribution to extending financial inclusion." "We remain fully committed to that goal and feel we can make the most contribution by focusing our efforts on [mobile payments platform] M-Pesa."

Also at:
coindesk
engadget
FinExtra

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

German authorities are waking up to a Windows 7 headache, with approximately €800,000 required in order to keep the elderly software supported a little longer.

Microsoft had long been warning users, both enterprises and individuals, that the end of support was nigh - 14 January - and made available various ways of keeping those updates flowing.

Alternatively there is always the option of a migration to Windows Virtual Desktop (WVD) with three years of free-ish support (because, y'know, you still have to pay for those Azure resources).

Finally, customers that had ponied up the cash for an E5 subscription could also be entitled to an extra year of Windows 7 security updates, through to 2021 (assuming the subscription stays active).

Blighty's very own NHS is an example of just such an organisation, having splashed the cash for some E5 goodness.

The position in which the German government now finds itself might raise a wry smile somewhere in Seattle.

Original Submission

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

Microsoft Exposed 250 Million Customer Support Records:

Nearly 250 million Microsoft Customer Service and Support (CSS) records were found exposed to the Internet in five insecure Elasticsearch databases, Comparitech reports.

The records on those servers contained 14 years' worth of logs of conversations between support agents and customers, all of which could be accessed by anyone directly from a browser, without any form of authentication.

Each of the five Elasticsearch servers contained an apparently identical set of records, with data spanning between 2005 and December 2019, Comparitech's security researchers reveal.

While most of the personal information in those records was redacted, many records contained plain text data.

Exposed data in those records included customer email addresses, IP addresses, locations, descriptions of CSS claims and cases, Microsoft support agent emails, internal notes marked as "confidential," and case numbers, resolutions, and remarks, the researchers say.

"I immediately reported this to Microsoft and within 24 hours all servers were secured," security researcher Bob Diachenko, who led the Comparitech team, explains.

The data was exposed to the Internet for around two days before Microsoft secured the servers. The databases were indexed by search engine BinaryEdge on December 28, 2019, Diachenko discovered them the next day and notified Microsoft, and the company secured the servers on December 30.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

More than 250 items belonging to super-Brit Alan Turing, including his OBE medal, that went missing decades ago were found hidden behind a bathroom wall in America, according to new court documents.

The items, which include photos of the revered mathematician and school reports from his teenage years, vanished 36 years ago from the Sherborne boarding school he attended in Dorset, UK. Turing’s mother had, a few years prior, donated the belongings to the school. Turing died in 1954 from cyanide poisoning although suicide is strongly suspected.

The woman accused of the theft, Julia Mathison Turing, visited the school in 1984, and when left unattended, it is claimed, stole the items, leaving a note that read: “Please forgive me for taking these materials into my possession. They will be well taken care of while under the care of my hands and shall one day all be returned to this spot.”

In 2018, she approached the University of Colorado, claiming to be Turing’s daughter, and offered the possessions for display, alongside artwork she made based on the documents, it is alleged. But investigations by the university quickly revealed Turing had no daughter – he was gay and persecuted as such in the UK – and raised the alarm.

Armed with a federal search warrant, US Homeland Security agents raided her house and, it is claimed, uncovered a treasure trove of Turing memorabilia, including letters that she had exchanged over the years with the bursar of the boarding school.

According to court documents filed by the American government, it appears she had been carrying the belongings with her for the past 30 years as she moved from Arizona to California to Colorado, and had got away with the theft in large part because she returned some items to the school [after] a few years and claimed to have retained only a single photograph.

The school did not have an inventory of the memorabilia, and took her at her word, we're told. But the 256 items belonging to Turing, allegedly found by agents stashed in a leather briefcase hidden behind a removable piece of wall in her bathroom, tell a different story.

Original Submission

Freeman writes:

CenturyLink, Frontier Took FCC Cash, Failed to Deploy All Required Broadband:

CenturyLink and Frontier Communications have apparently failed to meet broadband-deployment requirements in numerous states where they are receiving government funding to expand their networks in rural areas.

[...]Under program rules, the ISPs were required to bring Internet access to 80 percent of funded locations by the end of 2019 and must hit 100 percent by the end of 2020. While CenturyLink and Frontier apparently failed to hit the 80 percent requirement in a bunch of states, they could meet the final goal in time if they ramp up construction.

[...]The Connect America Fund, like the FCC's other universal-service programs, is paid for by Americans through fees on their phone bills.

As we wrote Monday, Frontier is reportedly planning to file for bankruptcy within two months.

[...]After reviewing and validating the data, Frontier and CenturyLink are scheduled to provide the FCC with final numbers by March 1.

Both Frontier and CenturyLink have histories of mistreating customers. Frontier's frequent outages and long repair times triggered an investigation and settlement in Minnesota, and New York state officials are also investigating Frontier.

[...]In December, CenturyLink agreed to pay a $6.1 million penalty after Washington state regulators found that the company failed to disclose fees that raised actual prices well above advertised rates. CenturyLink was also forced to stop charging an "Internet Cost Recovery Fee" in the state. The company still faces a class-action lawsuit involving customers from multiple states alleging billing fraud.

Original Submission

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

Gravitational wave echoes may confirm Stephen Hawking's hypothesis of quantum black holes:

Research from the University of Waterloo reports the first tentative detection of these echoes, caused by a microscopic quantum "fuzz" that surrounds newly formed black holes.

Gravitational waves are ripples in the fabric of space-time, caused by the collision of massive, compact objects in space, such as black holes or neutron stars.

"According to Einstein's Theory of General Relativity, nothing can escape from the gravity of a black hole once it has passed a point of no return, known as the event horizon," explained Niayesh Afshordi, a physics and astronomy professor at Waterloo. "This was scientists' understanding for a long time until Stephen Hawking used quantum mechanics to predict that quantum particles will slowly leak out of black holes, which we now call Hawking radiation.

"Scientists have been unable to experimentally determine if any matter is escaping black holes until the very recent detection of gravitational waves," said Afshordi. "If the quantum fuzz responsible for Hawking radiation does exist around black holes, gravitational waves could bounce off of it, which would create smaller gravitational wave signals following the main gravitational collision event, similar to repeating echoes."

Original Submission

RandomFactor writes:

Researchers at Ohio State University have published details in the journal Nature Chemistry on a molecule that efficiently absorbs light across the visible spectrum (and into both the ultraviolet and infrared) and catalyzes the production of Hydrogen.

The scientists demonstrate

a new, air-stable bimetallic scaffold that acts as a single-chromophore photocatalyst for hydrogen-gas generation and operates with irradiation wavelengths that span the ultraviolet to the red/near-infrared. Irradiation in acidic solutions that contain an electron donor results in the catalytic production of hydrogen with 170 ± 5 turnovers in 24 hours and an initial rate of 28 turnovers per hour. The catalysis proceeds through two stepwise excited-state redox events—atypical of the currently known homogeneous photocatalysis—and features the storage of multiple redox equivalents on a dirhodium catalyst enabled by low-energy light.

Current single-molecule photocatalysts are rare, inefficient, and don't use much of the visible light spectrum.

Most previous efforts to make full use of the sunlight spectrum have focused on ultraviolet light, and most relied on catalysts made of two or more molecules to convert solar energy into hydrogen. Attempts to use a single-molecule catalyst proved inefficient.

Rhodium however is expensive to process and the researchers are searching for a less expensive molecule which behaves similarly.

Journal Reference
Whittemore, T.J., Xue, C., Huang, J. et al. Single-chromophore single-molecule photocatalyst for the production of dihydrogen using low-energy light. Nat. Chem. (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41557-019-0397-4

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

A little over a year ago, Caltech's Lihong Wang developed the world's fastest camera, a device capable of taking 10 trillion pictures per second. It is so fast that it can even capture light traveling in slow motion.

But sometimes just being quick is not enough. Indeed, not even the fastest camera can take pictures of things it cannot see. To that end, Wang, Bren Professor of Medical Engineering and Electrical Engineering, has developed a new camera that can take up to 1 trillion pictures per second of transparent objects. A paper about the camera appears in the January 17 issue of the journal Science Advances.

The camera technology, which Wang calls phase-sensitive compressed ultrafast photography (pCUP), can take video not just of transparent objects but also of more ephemeral things like shockwaves and possibly even of the signals that travel through neurons.

Wang explains that his new imaging system combines the high-speed photography system he previously developed with an old technology, phase-contrast microscopy, that was designed to allow better imaging of objects that are mostly transparent such as cells, which are mostly water.

Phase-contrast microscopy, invented nearly 100 years ago by Dutch physicist Frits Zernike, works by taking advantage of the way that light waves slow down and speed up as they enter different materials. For example, if a beam of light passes through a piece of glass, it will slow down as it enters the glass and then speed up again as it exits. Those changes in speed alter the timing of the waves. With the use of some optical tricks it is possible to distinguish light that passed through the glass from light that did not, and the glass, though transparent, becomes much easier to see.

-- submitted from IRC

Journal Reference:

Taewoo Kim, Jinyang Liang, Liren Zhu, Lihong V. Wang. Picosecond-resolution phase-sensitive imaging of transparent objects in a single shot. Science Advances, 2020; 6 (3): eaay6200 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aay6200

Original Submission

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

Can't go in a public restroom? You're not alone:

Most of us don't give much thought to going to the toilet. We go when we need to go.

But for a small minority of people, the act of urinating or defecating can be a major source of anxiety—especially when public restrooms are the only facilities available.

Paruresis (shy bladder) and parcopresis (shy bowel) are little known mental health conditions, yet they can significantly compromise a person's quality of life.

We don't know how many people have shy bowel, but research has estimated around 2.8%-16.4% of the population are affected by shy bladder. The condition is more common in males.

[...]

Most of us will feel a little "grossed out" from time to time when using public toilets. But what we're talking about here is different and more serious.

People with shy bladder and shy bowel experience significant anxiety when trying to go to the toilet, especially in public places like shopping centers, restaurants, at work or at school. Sufferers may also experience symptoms in their own home when family or friends are around.

Their anxiety can present in the form of increased heart rate, excessive sweating, rapid breathing, muscle tension, heart palpitations, blushing, nausea, trembling, or a combination of these.

Symptoms range in severity. Some people who are more mildly affected can experience anxiety but still be able to "go," for example when the bathroom is completely empty. Others may urinate or defecate with difficulty—for example their urine stream may be inconsistent. Some people will sit on the toilet and not be able to go at all.

Freeman writes:

Sarcos offers fully mobile, insanely strong industrial exoskeletons:

The most interesting thing we saw at the Consumer Electronics Show this year was the back side of Delta Airlines' exhibit, where some Sarcos Robotics folks were putting the Guardian XO—a powered industrial exoskeleton—through its paces, and the adventurous (and patient) could wait for half an hour or so in line to operate one disembodied arm of the Guardian attached to a 50-pound suitcase.

[...] The suits aren't just designed to be incredibly strong—they're also designed for long-term, ergonomically correct operation that won't destroy backs and knees the way a career in the military or heavy industry tends to.

[...] With such an exoskeleton, one worker might lift a 100- or 200-pound length of steel up to head height, while another does a tack weld on the underside. Or an exoskeleton-equipped worker might lift a pair of 70-pound pipe segments and carefully thread the bolts from one flange into the bolt holes in the next. More importantly, skilled workers should be able to do this kind of heavy work for entire 40-year careers—instead of retiring with blown-out backs and knees after 20 years or less.

[...] The XO is entirely battery-powered, with no tether to limit the range or motion of the operator, who can walk forward, backward, or even sideways while operating the device. It's quiet, too—in sharp contrast to the Boston Dynamics LS3 robotic pack mule, which can reportedly be heard coming a mile away.

Original Submission