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takyon writes:

Biden administration announces plan to replace 100% of lead pipes in US homes

The Biden administration on Thursday announced a "whole of government strategy" to remove dangerous lead from Americans' drinking water, including billions of dollars to begin replacing 100% of the lead pipes servicing the nation's homes.

Environmental groups praised the plan, which includes a promise to begin the process of strengthening the nation's drinking water standards to reflect the science showing that lead is toxic for children at any level.

But lawyers at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), which has been leading efforts to fight lead, said they worry that the plan lacks a solid timeline and fails to deliver enforceable requirements.

The set of actions announced by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) included the release of the first $2.9bn of $15bn approved in Biden's infrastructure plan for local water agencies to begin replacing lead pipes and called for the efforts to focus on the low-income communities who face the most risk of lead poisoning. It also listed 15 new actions across 10 federal agencies to address lead dangers from both water and paint.

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upstart writes:

Faster trains and cheaper tickets under new EU rail plans:

Faster trains, simpler tickets and support for international trips could be on the agenda for Europe's rail network, under new European Commission proposals revealed on Tuesday.

The planned Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) would see new high speed rail connections built by 2040, slashing journey times on trips including Budapest to Bucharest, Vigo to Porto and Hamburg to Copenhagen.

Core routes on the TEN-T network would have a minimum speed of 160 km/h (100 mph) for passenger trains and 100 km/h (62 mph) for freight, the Commission's action plan for boosting long-distance rail said.

The European Commission also promised "decisive action" to simplify the process of booking cross-border train travel, in order to make tickets "easier to find and book, and more attractive in price," it said.

"Today's proposals set European mobility on track for a sustainable future: faster European rail connections with easy-to-find tickets and improved passenger rights, support for cities to increase and improve public transport and infrastructure for walking and cycling, and making the best possible use of solutions for smart and efficient driving," Frans Timmermans, Commission vice-president for the European Green Deal, said.

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takyon writes:

U.S. Cracks Down on Firms Said to Aid China's Repression of Minorities

The Biden administration said on Thursday that it would put limits on doing business with a group of Chinese companies and institutions it says are involved in misusing biotechnology to surveil and repress Muslim minorities in China and advancing Beijing's military programs.

In announcing one set of the moves, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said China was employing biotechnology and medical innovation "to pursue control over its people and its repression of members of ethnic and religious minority groups."

The administration said those efforts included the use of biometric facial recognition and large-scale genetic testing of residents 12 to 65 in the mostly Muslim region of Xinjiang.

China has used such technology to track and control the Uyghurs, a predominately Muslim ethnic group.

[...] In its announcement on Thursday, the Biden administration said Beijing was using advances in biotechnology to drive forward its military modernization. A senior administration official called out China's work to edit human genes for performance enhancement and create ways for human brains to connect more directly to machines.

Also caught in the crosshairs is the drone company DJI, for providing drones used by the Xinjiang Public Security Bureau to surveil Uyghurs, Megvii, which makes artificial intelligence and facial recognition software, and Dawning Information Industry (also known as Sugon), a manufacturer of supercomputers and provider of cloud-computing services.

See also: Disney under fire for 'Mulan' credits that thank Chinese groups linked to detention camps

Previously: Massive DNA Collection Campaign in Xinjiang, China
Massive DNA Collection Campaign Continues in Xinjiang, China
China Installs Surveillance App on Smartphones of Visitors to Xinjiang Region
DNA Databases in the U.S. and China are Tools of Racial Oppression
The Panopticon is Already Here: China's Use of "Artificial Intelligence"

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upstart writes:

Judge overturns deal giving Purdue Pharma's Sackler family civil immunity from opioid claims:

A federal judge has upended the bankruptcy plan of OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma, saying the billionaire Sackler family that created the company could not be released from legal claims over the opioid epidemic.

In a 142-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon in New York said that the controversial provision to grant the Sackler family members immunity from thousands of lawsuits over the public health crisis is "inconsistent" with the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, disagreeing with the court that had approved the approximately $4.5 billion agreement in the fall.

After the decision, the company announced it would appeal. The chairman of the company's board, Steve Miller, said in a statement that the ruling would "delay and perhaps end the ability of creditors, communities, and individuals to receive billions in value to abate the opioid crisis."

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upstart writes:

The metaverse has a groping problem already:

Katherine Cross, who researches online harassment at the University of Washington, says that when virtual reality is immersive and real, toxic behavior that occurs in that environment is real as well. "At the end of the day, the nature of virtual-reality spaces is such that it is designed to trick the user into thinking they are physically in a certain space, that their every bodily action is occurring in a 3D environment," she says. "It's part of the reason why emotional reactions can be stronger in that space, and why VR triggers the same internal nervous system and psychological responses."

That was true in the case of the woman who was groped on Horizon Worlds. According to The Verge, her post read: "Sexual harassment is no joke on the regular internet, but being in VR adds another layer that makes the event more intense. Not only was I groped last night, but there were other people there who supported this behavior which made me feel isolated in the Plaza [the virtual environment's central gathering space]."

Sexual assault and harassment in virtual worlds is not new, nor is it realistic to expect a world in which these issues will completely disappear. So long as there are people who will hide behind their computer screens to evade moral responsibility, they will continue to occur.

upstart writes:

Inside the brand new royal suite at Sweden's ice hotel:

(CNN) — It's undoubtedly one of the coolest hotels in the world, and Sweden's ICEHOTEL has just launched its 32nd incarnation with a touch of royal magic.

The world's first hotel built out of snow and ice has unveiled a brand new suite designed by Prince Carl Philip Bernadotte, or Prince Carl Philip of Sweden, and his business partner Oscar Kylberg.

Named "Midsummer Night's Dream," the deluxe suite features floral elements and plants, a first for the iconic hotel, which is located 200 kilometers north of the Arctic circle in Jukkasjärvi.

[...] "Well, what better way to show the true character of the ice than to encapsulate the most delicate and beautiful Swedish midsummer flowers in an arctic environment? For us Swedes, midsummer, and especially midsummer's night, is filled with myth and legend." the pair said in a statement.

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Freeman writes:

https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/12/focusing-sound-vibrations-precisely-can-knock-over-one-lego-minifig-among-many/

Legos are a beloved staple of educational science activities and have even proved useful in particle physics experiments at CERN to explore the properties of hadrons. For Brian Anderson, a physicist at Brigham Young University, Legos are an essential component of his acoustics research. At a meeting of the Acoustical Society of America in Seattle earlier this month, Anderson described how he figured out how to focus sound-wave energy precisely enough to knock over a single Lego minifig without disturbing other minifigs clustered around it.

The key is a signal-processing technique called "time reversal," originally used by submarines in the 1960s to help focus signal transmission in the ocean. The name is a bit misleading, since it's sound waves that are being reversed, not time. The technique involves playing a sound (impulse) from a sound source—Anderson uses speakers for playing music through a computer or laptop—and using a sensor (like a microphone or a laser) at a targeted location on a metal plate to record the response to the impulse there.

That recording essentially maps the acoustic wave as it bounces around. One can then use software to reverse that signal and play it back so the waves retrace their steps and constructively interfere with each other, enabling Anderson to precisely focus that acoustic energy on the targeted location. The spatial extent of the focusing depends on the frequencies being used. Higher frequencies typically have smaller wavelengths, enabling Anderson to focus the acoustic energy to a more narrow point in space.

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upstart writes:

The Log4j security flaw could impact the entire internet. Here's what you should know:

A critical flaw in widely used software has cybersecurity experts raising alarms and big companies racing to fix the issue.

[...] Jen Easterly, head of the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), called it "one of the most serious flaws" seen in her career. In a statement on Saturday, Easterly said "a growing set" of hackers are activelyattempting to exploit the vulnerability.

[...] "It will take years to address this while attackers will be looking... on a daily basis [to exploit it]," said David Kennedy, CEO of cybersecurity firm TrustedSec. "This is a ticking time bomb for companies."

[...] "It's ubiquitous. Even if you're a developer who doesn't use Log4j directly, you might still be running the vulnerable code because one of the open source libraries you use depends on Log4j," Chris Eng, chief research officer at cybersecurity firm Veracode, told CNN Business. "This is the nature of software: It's turtles all the way down."

[...] It could [be] present in popular apps and websites, and hundreds of millions of devices around the world that access these services could be exposed to the vulnerability.

upstart writes:

Making apple spirits taste better:

For hundreds of years, apples have been a good base for liquors, such as Calvados in France and applejack in the U.S., because they're full of sugar and desirable flavors. As the mashed fruit ferments, alcohol evolves along with additional flavor compounds, which add to the complex taste of the final liquor. Distilling the fermented apples with heat concentrates the alcohol and removes unpleasant fermentation byproducts, such as carboxylic acids that can impart unclean, rancid, cheesy and sweaty flavors. Most producers use batch columns to make apple spirits because it provides a clean-tasting, high-alcohol distillate in a large volume. But the exact time to stop the distillation process -- and achieve the most flavorful liquor -- has been uncertain. Previously, Andreas Liebminger and colleagues showed that a rapid increase in apricot brandy distillate's conductivity reliably indicates the ideal time to stop the distillation. So, the researchers wanted to see if this would also hold for apple liquors.

[...] The researchers say that monitoring the conductivity in the distillates afforded them a simple way to identify the best conditions for producing apple spirits with the most desirable quality and taste.

Journal Reference:
Andreas Liebminger, Christian Philipp, Sezer Sari, et al. Monitoring of Carboxylic Acids by In-Line Conductivity Measurement to Determine Optimum Distillation Strategy for Distilling Apple Spirits, ACS Food Science & Technology (DOI: 10.1021/acsfoodscitech.1c00327)

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upstart writes:

Perseverance Mars rover makes surprising discoveries:

Scientists with NASA's Perseverance Mars rover mission have discovered that the bedrock their six-wheeled explorer has been driving on since landing in February likely formed from red-hot magma. The discovery has implications for understanding and accurately dating critical events in the history of Jezero Crater—as well as the rest of the planet.

[...] These and other findings were presented today during a news briefing at the American Geophysical Union fall science meeting in New Orleans.

Even before Perseverance touched down on Mars, the mission's science team had wondered about the origin of the rocks in the area. Were they sedimentary—the compressed accumulation of mineral particles possibly carried to the location by an ancient river system? Or where they igneous, possibly born in lava flows rising to the surface from a now long-extinct Martian volcano?

"I was beginning to despair we would never find the answer," said Perseverance Project Scientist Ken Farley of Caltech in Pasadena. "But then our PIXL instrument got a good look at the abraded patch of a rock from the area nicknamed "South Séítah," and it all became clear: The crystals within the rock provided the smoking gun."

takyon writes:

ExoMars discovers hidden water in Mars' Grand Canyon

The ESA-Roscosmos ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter has spotted significant amounts of water at the heart of Mars' dramatic canyon system, Valles Marineris.

The water, which is hidden beneath Mars' surface, was found by the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO)'s FREND instrument, which is mapping the hydrogen – a measure of water content – in the uppermost metre of Mars' soil.

While water is known to exist on Mars, most is found in the planet's cold polar regions as ice. Water ice is not found exposed at the surface near the equator, as temperatures here are not cold enough for exposed water ice to be stable.

[...] "FREND revealed an area with an unusually large amount of hydrogen in the colossal Valles Marineris canyon system: assuming the hydrogen we see is bound into water molecules, as much as 40% of the near-surface material in this region appears to be water."

The water-rich area is about the size of the Netherlands and overlaps with the deep valleys of Candor Chaos, part of the canyon system considered promising in our hunt for water on Mars.

The evidence for unusually high hydrogen abundances in the central part of Valles Marineris on Mars
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0019103521004528
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2021.114805

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takyon writes:

Startup Showcases 7 bits-per-cell Flash Storage with 10 Year Retention

Floadia Corp., a Series C startup from Japan, issued a press release this week to state that it has developed st­­orage technology capable of seven bits-per-cell (7bpc). Still in the prototype stage, this 7bpc flash chip, likely in a WORM [(Write Once Read Many)] scenario, has an effective 10-year retention time for the data at 150C. The company says that a standard modern memory cell with this level of control would only be able to [retain] the data for around 100 seconds, and so the secret in the design is to do with a new type of flash cell they have developed.

The SONOS cell uses a distributed charge trap design relying on a Silicon-Oxide-Nitride-Oxide-Silicon layout, and the company points to an effective silicon nitride film in the middle where the charges are trapped to allow for high retention. In simple voltage program and erase cycles, the company showcases 100k+ cycles with a very low voltage drift. The oxide-nitride-oxide layers rely on SiO2 and Si3N4, the latter of which is claimed to be easy to manufacture. This allows a non-volatile SONOS cell to be used in NV-SRAM or embedded designs, such as microcontrollers.

It's actually that last point which means we're a long time from seeing this in modern NAND flash. Floadia is currently partnering with companies like Toshiba to implement the SONOS cell in a variety of microcontrollers, rather than large NAND flash deployments, at the 40nm process node as embedded flash IP with compute-in-memory properties. Those aren't at 7 bits-per-cell yet, to the effect that the company is promoting that two cells can store up to 8-bits of network weights for machine learning inference – when we get to 8 bits-per-cell, then it might be more applicable. The 10-year retention of the cell data is where it gets interesting, as embedded platforms will use algorithms with fixed weights over the lifetime of the product, except for the rare update perhaps. Even with increased longevity, Floadia doesn't go into detail regarding cyclability at 7bpc at this time.

Press release.

Related: Is Octa-Level Cell (OLC) NAND Possible? We May Find Out This Year

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upstart writes:

Size doesn't matter: Rock composition determines how deadly a meteorite impact is: The minerology of the rocks that a meteorite hits, rather than the size of the impact, determines how deadly an impact it will have:

A multidisciplinary research team from the University of Liverpool and the Instituto Tecnológico y de Energías Renovables, Tenerife with expertise in palaeontology, asteroid stratigraphy, mineralogy, cloud microphysics and climate modelling, sought to explore why some meteorites have caused mass extinctions, for example the K/Pg Chixulclub impact that killed off dinosaurs, yet many which are larger in size have not.

They analysed 44 impacts over the past 600 million years using a new method: assessing the mineral content of the dust ejected into the atmosphere upon impact.

Their findings, published in the Journal of the Geological Society of London, reveal that meteorites that hit rocks rich in potassium feldspar (a common and rather benign mineral) always correspond with a mass extinction episode, irrespective of size.

Potassium feldspar is non-toxic. However, it is a powerful ice-nucleating mineral aerosol that strongly affects cloud dynamics, which makes them let through more solar radiation. This in turn warms up the planet and changes the climate. The atmosphere also becomes more sensitive to warming from greenhouse gas emissions, such as large volcanic eruptions.

[...] "Using this new method for assessing the mineral content of the meteorite ejecta blankets, we show that every time a meteorite, big or small, hits rocks rich in potassium feldspar it correlates with a mass extinction event.

Journal Reference:
M.J. Pankhurst, C.J. Stevenson, B.C. Coldwell. Meteorites that produce K-feldspar-rich ejecta blankets correspond to mass extinctions. Journal of the Geological Society, 2021; jgs2021-055 DOI: 10.1144/jgs2021-055

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oaklandwatch writes:

It's a newspaper puzzle that's like Sudoku, except it's impossible...  They call it "The Challenger" puzzle — but when the newspaper leaves out a crucial instruction, you can end up searching forever for a unique solution which doesn't exist!

"If you're thinking 'This could be a 9 or an 8....' — you're right!" complains Lou Cabron.  "Everyone's a winner today! Just start scribbling in numbers! And you'd be a fool to try to keep narrowing them down by, say, using your math and logic skills.  A fool like me..."   (A fool who once solved a Sudoku puzzle entirely in his head.)  But two hours of frustration later — and one night of bad dreams — he's stumbled onto the web page of Dr. Robert J. Lopez, an emeritus math professor in Indiana, who's calculated that in fact Challenge puzzles can have up to 190 solutions... and in fact, there's more than one solution for more than 97 of them!

At the end of the day, it becomes an appreciation for the local newspaper, and the puzzles they run next to the funnies.  But with a friendly reminder "that they ought to honor and respect that love — by always providing the complete instructions."

Original Submission

takyon writes:

SK Hynix to Manufacture 48 GiB and 96 GiB DDR5 Modules

Today SK Hynix is announcing the sampling of its next generation DDR5 memory. The headline is the commercialization of a new 24 gigabit die, offering 50% more capacity than the leading 16 gigabit dies currently used on high-capacity DDR5. Along with reportedly reducing power consumption by 25% by using SK Hynix's latest 1a nm process node and EUV technology, what fascinates me most is that we're going to get, for the first time in the PC space (to my knowledge), memory modules that are no longer powers of two.

For PC-based DDR memory, all the way back from DDR1 and prior, memory modules have been configured as a power of two in terms of storage. Whether that's 16 MiB to 256 MiB to 2 GiB to 32 GiB, I'm fairly certain that all of the memory modules that I've ever handled have been powers of two. The new announcement from SK Hynix showcases that the new 24 gigabit dies will allow the company to build DDR5 modules in capacities of 48 GiB and 96 GiB.

To be clear, the DDR5 official specification actually allows for capacities that are not direct powers of two. If we look to other types of memory, powers of two have been thrown out the window for a while, such as in smartphones. However PCs and Servers, as least the traditional ones, have followed the power of two mantra. One of the changes in memory design that is now driving regular modules to non-power of two capacities is that it is getting harder and harder to scale DRAM capacities. The time it takes to figure out the complexity of the technology to get a 2x improvement every time is too long, and memory vendors will start taking those intermediate steps to get product to market.

These are for server RDIMMs, at least for now.

Press release.

Related: SK Hynix Begins Production of 18 GB LPDDR5 Memory... for Smartphones
Samsung Developing 24Gb DDR5 ICs: 768GB DDR5 Modules Possible

Original Submission