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Phoenix666 writes:

Phys.org:

The discovery of a 14th century underground burial site deep in Gabon's tropical forest may shed light on a little known period in Africa's history.

Hundreds of mediaeval artefacts are scattered with human remains at the bottom of a cave in the southeast of the country, discovered by a French geo-archaeologist in 2018.

[...] Almost 30 skeletons have been discovered on three levels, with more than 500 metallic artefacts made mostly of iron and ranging from knives, axes and spear tips to bracelets and collars. Researchers also found 39 pierced teeth from hyenas and panthers.

[...] Some researchers wonder whether Africa was struck by the Great Plague, over the same decades as it ravaged Europe and Asia. Maybe the Iroungou bones hold an answer.

Soil in Sub-Saharan Africa is acidic and decomposes remains quickly, so this is a rare find. Local inhabitants had no idea the cave was there or what it contained, which means there might be a lot of exciting archaeological discoveries in the future that are hiding next door.

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Phoenix666 writes:

SingularityHub:

Become partially android for a couple of years while your body heals itself.

It may sound far-fetched, but for patients needing reconstructive surgery, this could soon be the pitch from Danish startup Particle3D. The company is pioneering a novel method for 3D printing lightweight, customized bone implants that fuse with your skeleton before slowly disappearing.

The technology carries a lower risk of infection and the implants are tailored to your body (and the method could soon be heading to space with astronauts!).

[...] Traditional implants generally consist of non-degradable materials such as polymer or titanium. Particle3D uses a "bio-ink" made from tricalcium phosphate (TCP) powder particles and fatty acids. TCP [has] been used in reconstructive surgery for decades, but is normally manually sculpted by surgeons from solid blocks into the desired implant shape. This approach can limit the potential positive effects of TCP, for example, when it comes to stimulating natural bone growth.

Three words: retractable Wolverine claws.

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An Anonymous Coward writes:

What does it mean to "promote child exploitation"? When it's figurines that have been sold for years but now violate Amazon's statutes about promoting child exploitation which resulted in listings being removed. Chuck Gaffney has run a successful Amazon store for years selling anime-related products, up until recently when Amazon started cracking down on anything that could be perceived as "promoting child exploitation".

While it can be difficult for online retailers to represent themselves as selling genuine merchandise — meaning reputation means a lot — this type of behavior from the market owner is very discouraging. In response, the seller blames a "neopuritan crusade" against anime figures.

The characters at the center of this disagreement are: Hatsune Miku and Kaitō Tenshi Twin Angel.

It's a wonder that anything anime-related survives importation to the US from Japan.

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An Anonymous Coward writes:

OPEC tried to keep prices high by cutting output but Russia instead started a price war which could see petrol drop to AU$1. With Saudi Arabia and Russia battling it out for market share to get past the US it could be consumers who come out on top. This change could affect many markets from agriculture to shipping having impacts across the world.

Petrol prices in Australia are expected to drop — possibly as low as $1 a litre — after Saudi Arabia started a price war with Russia on Monday.

[...] Prices are falling as Saudi Arabia, Russia and other oil-producing countries argue about how much to cut production in order to prop up prices.

The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) suggested cutting back oil production to stabilise falling prices but Russia, the world's second-largest producer, did not seem to be on board.

It led to Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporter, slashing its official selling prices and pledging to release more supply onto the market in an attempt to punish Russia.

The price war saw prices for brent crude, which is the international standard, fall by 25.3 per cent to $33.83 per barrel, and the benchmark US crude drop by 26.1 per cent to $30.49.

It's the biggest price fall for oil since 1991.

Also, according to CNBC Oil Nosedives as Saudi Arabia and Russia set off 'scorched Earth' Price war:

Oil prices fell through the floor in early trading Monday, tanking as much as 30% after Saudi Arabia slashed its crude prices for buyers. The kingdom is reportedly preparing to open the taps in an apparent retaliation for Russia's unwillingness to cut its own output.

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

Onward film review: Pixar rolls a 20, nails homage to D&D-styled adventure:

Now that Pixar's latest film is officially in US theaters, we are resurfacing our review, which was originally published on February 21st.

Pixar's latest feature-length film, Onward, doesn't reach US theaters until March 6, and it's rare for us at Ars Technica to review a film so far in advance of its launch. When we do, it's usually for good reason.

In Onward's case, that's because we haven't seen a film so easy to recommend to Ars Technica readers in years. We know our average demographic: parents and older readers who are deeply fluent in decades of nerd culture and who appreciate films that offer genuine laughs, likable characters, and tightly sewn logic in family-friendly fashion without compromising the dialogue, plot, or heart—or beating an original, previously beloved franchise into the ground. Pixar has come out screaming with a film that feels focus-tested for that exact audience, and I'm already eager to attend the film again in two weeks.

We've seen our fair share of fantasy genre satires and comedies, but Onward delivers the most fully fledged, top-to-bottom homage to the fantasy genre since Monty Python and the Holy Grail sent up all things King Arthur. To be clear, Pixar's newest universe of characters draws more from the Dungeons & Dragons well of magical, class-based adventuring with its own twist.

[...] Onward's focus on the brothers' relationship means the film does something impressively subtle: it avoids tokenizing anybody in order to advance the protagonists' story. Barley and Ian's quest doesn't hinge upon saving helpless damsels, and everybody who gets significant screen time—even a few potential villains—is humanized or made three-dimensional in ways that you probably won't notice at first. I left this film really liking every significant character and wanting to see more of them—and as much as I like most Pixar films, their only feature-length production that left me feeling the same was the first Toy Story.

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

SpaceX tourist trips to space station reportedly to cost $55 million each:

A trio of space tourists will blast off to the International Space Station (ISS) in a SpaceX capsule, after Axiom Space made a deal with Elon Musk's company on Thursday. The first 10-day trip could happen in the latter half of next year, the company said in a release.

However, it won't be cheap -- a seat could set you back around $55 million, the New York Times reported, and one person has already signed up. Two days will be spent traveling to and from the space station, and eight on board. The tourists will be accompanied by an Axiom astronaut who'll make sure they don't distract the ISS crewmembers.

"This will be just the first of many missions to ISS to be completely crewed and managed by Axiom Space -- a first for a commercial entity,"  Axiom boss Michael T. Suffredini said in a statement. "Procuring the transportation marks significant progress toward that goal, and we're glad to be working with SpaceX in this effort."

Previously:
SpaceX Announces Partnership to Send Four Tourists Into Deep Orbit

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

Dimming Betelgeuse likely isn't cold, just dusty, new study shows:

Late last year, news broke that the star Betelgeuse was fading significantly, ultimately dropping to around 40% of its usual brightness. The activity fueled popular speculation that the red supergiant would soon explode as a massive supernova.

But astronomers have more benign theories to explain the star's dimming behavior. And scientists at the University of Washington and Lowell Observatory believe they have support for one of them: Betelgeuse isn't dimming because it's about to explode—it's just dusty.

In a paper accepted to Astrophysical Journal Letters and published on the preprint site arXiv, Emily Levesque, a UW associate professor of astronomy, and Philip Massey, an astronomer with Lowell Observatory, report that observations of Betelgeuse taken Feb. 14 at the Flagstaff, Arizona, observatory allowed them to calculate the average surfacetemperature of the star. They discovered that Betelgeuse is significantly warmer than expected if the recent dimming were caused by a cooling of the star's surface.

The new calculations lend support to the theory that Betelgeuse—as many red supergiant stars are prone to do—has likely sloughed off some material from its outer layers.

"We see this all the time in red supergiants, and it's a normal part of their life cycle," said Levesque. "Red supergiants will occasionally shed material from their surfaces, which will condense around the star as dust. As it cools and dissipates, the dust grains will absorb some of the light heading toward us and block our view."

It is still true: Astronomers expect Betelgeuse to explode as a supernova within the next 100,000 years when its core collapses. But the star's dimming, which began in October, wasn't necessarily a sign of an imminent supernova, according to Massey.

Previously:
New Image Shows Betelgeuse Isn't Dimming Evenly
Waiting for Betelgeuse: What's Up With the Tempestuous Star?

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

Chlamydia-related bacteria discovered deep below the Arctic Ocean:

Chlamydia are infamous for causing sexually transmitted infections in humans and animals or even amoeba. An international team of researchers have now discovered diverse populations of abundant Chlamydia living in deep Arctic ocean sediments. They live under oxygen-devoid conditions, high pressure and without an apparent host organism. Their study, published in Current Biology today, provides new insights into how Chlamydia became human and animal pathogens.

[...] An international group of researchers report the discovery of numerous new species of Chlamydiae growing in deep Arctic Ocean sediments, in absence of any obvious host organisms. The researchers had been exploring microbes that live over 3 km below the ocean surface and several meters into the ocean seafloor sediment during an expedition to Loki's Castle, a deep-sea hydrothermal vent field located in the Arctic Ocean in-between Iceland, Norway, and Svalbard. This environment is devoid of oxygen and macroscopic life forms. Unexpectedly, the research team came across highly abundant and diverse relatives of Chlamydia. "Finding Chlamydiae in this environment was completely unexpected, and of course begged the question what on earth were they doing there?" says Jennah Dharamshi from Uppsala University in Sweden and lead author of the study.

The team of researchers had been working with metagenomic data—obtained by collectively sequencing the genetic material of all organisms that live in an environment—which doesn't rely on growing organisms in the lab. "The vast majority of life on earth is microbial, and currently most of it can't be grown in the lab," explains Thijs Ettema, professor in Microbiology at Wageningen University & Research in The Netherlands who led the work. "By using genomic methods, we obtained a more clear image on the diversity of life. Every time we explore a different environment, we discover groups of microbes that are new to science. This tells us just how much is still left to discover."

Journal Information:
Jennah E. Dharamshi, Daniel Tamarit, Laura Eme, ..., Steffen L. Jørgensen, Anja Spang, Thijs J.G. Ettema. Marine Sediments Illuminate Chlamydiae Diversity and Evolution Current Biology (2020)

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

A new genus of forking fern family reported:

Gleichenia boryi is a poorly known species of Gleicheniaceae (the forking fern family) endemic to Madagascar and La Réunion Island. This fern was distinct from other Gleicheniaceae in its leaf morphology. However, the generic relationships of this fern have not been investigated until now.

In a study published in Plant Systematics and Evolution, researchers from Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden (XTBG) addressed the phylogenetic relationships of Gleichenia boryi to other gleichenioid ferns especially Gl. polypodioides. This Afromadagascan species is distinct in its typical pseudo-dichotomous gleichenioid leaf morphology from Gl. boryi and it is in turn the type species of Gleichenia.

[...] The new genus Rouxopteris is terrestrial ferns distributed in Madagascar and Mascarene Islands (La Réunion). The generic name is dedicated to the pteridologist Jacobus Petrus Roux (1954–2013) who made major contributions to the taxonomy of the ferns occurring in the Afromadagascan region.

"The discovery of the separation of Rouxopteris (Gleichenia) boryi sheds new light on the early diversification of Gleicheniaceae, an old lineage of leptosporangiate ferns," said Dr. Liu Hongmei, first author of the study.

More information:
Hongmei Liu et al. The significance of Rouxopteris (Gleicheniaceae, Polypodiopsida): a new genus endemic to the Madagascan region, Plant Systematics and Evolution (2020). DOI: 10.1007/s00606-020-01657-9

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

Super magnets from a 3-D printer:

Magnetic materials are an important component of mechatronic devices such as wind power stations, electric motors, sensors and magnetic switch systems. Magnets are usually produced using rare earths and conventional manufacturing methods. A team of researchers at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) has worked together with researchers from the Graz University of Technology, the University of Vienna and the research institution Joanneum Research to produce specially designed magnets using a 3-D printer. The results were published in the journal Materials.

[...] The research team, involving Prof. Dr. Jörg Franke from the Institute for Factory Automation and Production Systems at FAU, has now succeeded in creating super magnets using laser-based 3-D printing. Metallic powder of the magnetic material is added layer by layer and the particles are joined by melting. The process allows magnets to be printed with a relatively high density at the same time as controlling their microstructure. This allows researchers to tailor the magnetic properties to suit the required application exactly.

Influence of Melt-Pool Stability in 3D Printing of NdFeB Magnets on Density and Magnetic Properties, Materials (DOI: 10.3390/ma13010139)

Also at: phys.org.

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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Mitochondria cannot autonomously cope with stress and must instead call on the cell for help. Molecular geneticists at LMU have identified the long-sought signaling pathway which enables the organelles to do so.

Mitochondria are membrane-bounded intracellular organelles that supply the energy needed to power the biochemical operations required for cell function and survival. The energy is provided in the form of a compound called ATP, which can be hydrolyzed by specific enzymes to drive chemical reactions. When mitochondria are subjected to stress—owing to the accumulation of misfolded proteins, for example—their functional capacities are diminished. Degradation of mitochondrial function can have serious consequences for the affected cells, and potentially for the whole organism. In order to activate protective measures, mitochondria must transmit a distress signal into the surrounding cytosol. In a paper that appears in the leading scientific journal Nature, researchers led by Professor Lucas Jae at the LMU Gene Center now report that they have characterized the elusive signaling pathway that triggers the response to mitochondrial stress in human cells. Mitochondrial dysfunction is at the root of many serious disorders, and functional deterioration of these organelles is regarded as a major component of the aging process. The new findings are therefore of considerable significance in the search for new therapeutic approaches to the treatment of age-related diseases.

[...] According to the authors, these findings might open up new opportunities for therapeutic regulation of cellular stress responses. These could be relevant for conditions that are associated with mitochondrial malfunction—including debilitating, age-related neurodegenerative disorders, such as Parkinson's disease. Recently, drugs have been developed that can globally shut down the ISR. Although not tailored to a specific type of ISR-inducing stress, such compounds have been shown to have positive effects on cognition and learning in mice. However, unspecific inhibition of the ISR might also have undesirable effects, as the ISR, for instance, also mediates antiviral protection during infection. "In an alternative scenario, the cellular response to mitochondrial stress could be selectively modulated by manipulating the factors we have now identified," says Jae.

More information: Evelyn Fessler et al. A pathway coordinated by DELE1 relays mitochondrial stress to the cytosol, Nature (2020). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-020-2076-4

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

A filter for cleaner qubits:

A research team at the Tokyo Medical and Dental University (TMDU), RIKEN, and the University of Tokyo have demonstrated how to increase the lifetime of qubits inside quantum computers by using an additional "filter" qubit. This work may help make higher fidelity quantum computers that can be used in financial, cryptographic, and chemistry applications.

[...] there is a fundamental tradeoff between the lifetime of the qubit superpositions and the processing speed. This is because the qubits must be carefully shielded from interacting with the environment, or the fragile superposition will snap back to being just a one or zero in a process called decoherence. To delay this loss of quantum fidelity, qubits in quantum computers are coupled only weakly to the control line through which the qubit control pulses are applied. Unfortunately, such a weak coupling limits the speed that computations can be run.

Now, the team at the Tokyo Medical and Dental University (TMDU) theoretically show how coupling a second "filter" qubit to the control line can greatly reduce the noise and spontaneous radiative losses that lead to decoherence. This allows the connections to be strong, which lends itself to faster cycle times.

"In our solution, the filter qubit acts like a nonlinear mirror, which completely reflects radiation from the qubit due to destructive interference but transmits strong control pulses due to absorption saturation," says first author Kazuki Koshino.

This research helps bring about a future in which quantum computers can be found in every business and research lab. Many operational research firms would like to use quantum computers to solve optimization problems that were considered too intensive for conventional computers, while chemists would like to use them to simulate the motion of atoms inside molecules.

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

DARPA Challenge Autonomous Robot Teams To Navigate Unfinished Nuclear Power Plant:

Robots might be finding their footing above ground, but today's autonomous robots have a difficult time operating underground. DARPA wanted to give the state of the art a push forward, so they are running a Subterranean (SubT) Challenge which just wrapped up its latest round. A great review of this Urban Circuit competition (and some of the teams participating in it) has been published by IEEE Spectrum. This is the second of three underground problem subdomains presented to the participants, six months apart, preparing them for the final event which will combine all three types.

If you missed the livestream or prefer edited highlight videos, they're all part of DARPAtv's Subterranean Challenge playlist. Today it starts with a compilation of Urban Circuit highlights and continues to other videos. Including team profiles, video walkthrough of competition courses, actual competition footage, edited recap videos, and the awards ceremony. Half of the playlist are video from the Tunnels Circuit six months ago, so we can compare to see how teams performed and what they've learned along the way. Many more lessons were learned in the just-completed Urban Circuit and teams will spend the next six months improving their robots. By then we'll have the Caves Circuit competition with teams ready to learn new lessons about operating robots underground.

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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Bytram:

Facebook pulls Trump campaign ads for fake census claims:

Facebook infamously has a broadly laissez-faire policy for political candidates. If you're running for office, you can lie as much as you want in your paid and unpaid content—with one small catch. Anything that lies about voting or the census, such as sharing fake registration links or deliberately spreading incorrect polling dates, is prohibited. Even if it comes directly from the Trump campaign.

It just turns out that Facebook needs a lot of prodding—in the form of negative media attention—to follow through.

The site Popular Information first reported on the Trump campaign's ads early yesterday. The sponsored posts, which appeared on the accounts of President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence, were paid for by the Trump Make America Great Again committee, a joint fundraising effort by the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee.

One ad Popular Information featured includes an image of a sheet of paper labeled "2020 census," next to a picture of Trump giving his characteristic thumbs up, and it exhorts readers, "President Trump needs you to take the Official 2020 Congressional District Census today." It continues, "The information we gather from this survey will help us craft our strategies for YOUR CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT."

Clicking through the ad directed readers to a website labeled as the "Certified Website of President Donald J. Trump," Popular Information reported, billing itself as the "Official 2020 Congressional District Census."

Popular Information pointed out to Facebook that the ads seem to violate the company's bright-line policy prohibiting "misleading information about when and how to participate in the census," but a spokesperson for the company at first disagreed. According to Facebook, since the campaign ads also referenced the campaign, it was clear they were not official Census advertising.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

In a world first, CRISPR, the powerful gene-editing tool that can cut and paste DNA, has been used inside the human body for the first time. Scientists at the Casey Eye Institute at Oregon Health & Science University, Portland, have administered a new CRISPR-based medicine to treat an inherited form of blindness, according to the two biotech companies which make the treatment.

"This dosing is a truly historic event -- for science, for medicine, and most importantly for people living with this eye disease," said Cynthia Collins, president and CEO of Editas Medicine, a gene-editing company headquartered in Massachusetts.

The first patient in the trial received a dose of the experimental drug, called AGN-151587, via an injection in the eye. The idea is that it delivers the gene-editing tool CRISPR directly to cells in the eye which are affected by the genetic disease. CRISPR is able to find its way into those cells and correct the gene -- a cut-and-paste scenario that sees a tiny DNA edit made to remove the mutation.

Importantly, the CRISPR edit is permanent, which means patients may only need a single dose and be set for life.

The trial is expected to enroll 18 patients in total and will look at different doses of the experimental drug, refining how much is necessary to achieve the goal of reversing blindness -- without any side effects. Information about the first patient is scant, with researchers staying silent on patient information and when the surgery officially occurred.

From the press release: