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upstart writes:

Toshiba set to split into two companies:

Toshiba has officially decided to split itself up into two smaller companies after months of internal wrangling.

The two standalone companies, both of which will be publicly traded, will be: Infrastructure Service, which covers energy, transportation, batteries, and other areas; and Device, which covers digital devices, semiconductors, and storage.

As Bloomberg reports, the original plan – which faced opposition from shareholders – was to separate out its infrastructure operations, which will now instead continue under Toshiba.

[...] The iconic Japanese company has been under increasing pressure over recent years after a series of scandals and mismanagement. An expansion into nuclear power, for example, forced the company into selling its crown jewel semiconductor business.

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upstart writes:

Widespread Megaripple Activity Detected Across the North Polar Region of Mars:

Megaripples, intermediate-scale bedforms caused by the action of the wind, have been studied extensively and thought to be largely inactive relics of past climates, save for a few exceptions. A new paper by Planetary Science Institute Research Scientist Matthew Chojnacki shows that abundant megaripple populations were identified across the north polar region of Mars and were found to be migrating with dunes and ripples.

Megaripples on Mars are about 1 to 2 meters tall and have 5 to 40 meter spacing, where there size falls between ripples that are about 40 centimeters tall with 1 to 5 meter spacing and dunes that can reach hundreds of meters in height with spacing of 100 to 300 meters. Whereas the megaripples migration rates are slow in comparison (average of 0.13 meters per Earth year), some of the nearby ripples were found to migrate an average equivalent of 9.6 meters per year over just 22 days in northern summer – unprecedented rates for Mars. These high rates of sand movement help explain the megaripple activity.

"Using repeat HiRISE images acquired over long durations – six Mars years or 13 Earth years – we examined the dynamic activity of polar bedforms. We found the thin Martian atmosphere can mobilize some coarse-grained megaripples, overturning prior notions that these were static relic landforms from a past climate. We mapped megaripples and adjacent bedforms across the north polar sand seas, the most expansive collection of dune fields on Mars," said Chojnacki, lead author of "Widespread Megaripple Activity Across the North Polar Ergs of Mars" that appears in Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets.

Journal Reference:
Matthew Chojnacki, David A. Vaz, Simone Silvestro, et al. Widespread Megaripple Activity Across the North Polar Ergs of Mars, Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets (DOI: 10.1029/2021JE006970)

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upstart writes:

DuckDuckGo founder says privacy needs to be as simple as a single button press:

The success of the quest to establish a more private web will depend upon the ability to create a new path of least resistance for users, the founder of search engine DuckDuckGo has said.

In an exclusive interview with TechRadar Pro, Gabriel Weinberg said that the audience for privacy-preserving products will only reach a critical mass once it becomes simpler for people to make the switch.

"Most people currently say they care about privacy, but only half actually take action. We think this figure will continue to grow as consumers understand more and more about privacy harms," he told us.

"However, bringing web users from one group to the other will also be about helping people appreciate there's something they can do about these problems. We're trying to be the easy button for privacy."

Do people really care, or do they just want their pron and kitten videos?

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upstart writes:

Human Spinal Cord Implants: Breakthrough May Enable People With Paralysis To Walk Again:

[...] For the first time in the world, researchers from Sagol Center for Regenerative Biotechnology at Tel Aviv University have engineered 3D human spinal cord tissues and implanted them in lab model with long-term chronic paralysis. The results were highly encouraging: an approximately 80% success rate in restoring walking abilities. Now the researchers are preparing for the next stage of the study: clinical trials in human patients. They hope that within a few years the engineered tissues will be implanted in paralyzed individuals enabling them to stand up and walk again.

[...] Prof. Dvir explains: "Our technology is based on taking a small biopsy of belly fat tissue from the patient. This tissue, like all tissues in our body, consists of cells together with an extracellular matrix (comprising substances like collagens and sugars). After separating the cells from the extracellular matrix we used genetic engineering to reprogram the cells, reverting them to a state that resembles embryonic stem cells – namely cells capable of becoming any type of cell in the body. From the extracellular matrix we produced a personalized hydrogel, that would evoke no immune response or rejection after implantation. We then encapsulated the stem cells in the hydrogel and in a process that mimics the embryonic development of the spinal cord we turned the cells into 3D implants of neuronal networks containing motor neurons."

The human spinal cord implants were then implanted in lab models, divided into two groups: those who had only recently been paralyzed (the acute model) and those who had been paralyzed for a long time – equivalent to a year in human terms (the chronic model). Following the implantation, 100% of the lab models with acute paralysis and 80% of those with chronic paralysis regained their ability to walk.

Journal Reference:
Lior Wertheim, Reuven Edri, Yona Goldshmit, et al. Regenerating the Injured Spinal Cord at the Chronic Phase by Engineered iPSCs‐Derived 3D Neuronal Networks [open], Advanced Science (DOI: 10.1002/advs.202105694)

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upstart writes:

Facebook loses users for the first time in its history:

Facebook parent Meta's quarterly earnings report on Wednesday revealed a startling statistic: For the first time ever, the company's growth is stagnating around the world.

Facebook lost daily users for the first time in its 18-year history — falling by about half a million users in the last three months of 2021, to 1.93 billion logging in each day. The loss was greatest in Africa, Latin America and India, suggesting that the company's product is saturated globally — and that its long quest to add as many users as possible has peaked.

Meta's stock price had plummeted more than 26 percent by Thursday afternoon, shaving $220 billion off its market value and costing the company the biggest one-day loss in its 18-year history. The company is facing challenges on multiple fronts, as competitor TikTok booms, federal and international regulators scrutinize its business practices, and it begins a lofty transition to focus on the "metaverse."

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upstart writes:

NSO Group: Israel launches inquiry into police hacking claims:

Israel's government will set up a commission of inquiry to examine allegations that the police used spyware to hack the phones of Israeli public figures without authorisation.

Officials, protesters, journalists and a son of former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were targeted without court orders, the newspaper Calcalist said.

A witness in Mr Netanyahu's corruption trial was also allegedly hacked. Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said the reports were "very serious, if true".

Reports say the police used Pegasus software, developed by NSO, an Israeli surveillance firm. NSO has faced widespread allegations that the product has been sold to and misused by authoritarian governments across the world.

The company has insisted that it does not operate the software once it is sold to clients and has previously stated that it could not be used to track Israeli citizens. It has not commented on the latest development.

Pegasus infects phones, allowing operators to extract messages, photos and emails, record calls and secretly activate microphones and cameras.

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upstart writes:

The Battle for the World's Most Powerful Cyberweapon [Ed's Comment: If paywalled try https://archive.fo/cbnUR]

In June 2019, three Israeli computer engineers arrived at a New Jersey building used by the F.B.I. They unpacked dozens of computer servers, arranging them on tall racks in an isolated room. As they set up the equipment, the engineers made a series of calls to their bosses in Herzliya, a Tel Aviv suburb, at the headquarters for NSO Group, the world's most notorious maker of spyware. Then, with their equipment in place, they began testing.

The F.B.I. had bought a version of Pegasus, NSO's premier spying tool. For nearly a decade, the Israeli firm had been selling its surveillance software on a subscription basis to law-enforcement and intelligence agencies around the world, promising that it could do what no one else — not a private company, not even a state intelligence service — could do: consistently and reliably crack the encrypted communications of any iPhone or Android smartphone.

owl writes:

Barbed Wire Fences Were An Early DIY Telephone Network:

Before Ma Bell came to town, and long before DSL, it was barbed wire, of all things, that brought rural communities together. A Sears telephone hooked up to barbed wire—miles of which were already conveniently strung along fences—connected far-flung ranches in the recently settled American west. Thus an ingenious and unregulated telephone system sprung up a hundred years ago.

More than just physical wire differentiated these rural telephone systems and their more formal urban counterparts. Without switchboards, without individual lines, and without telephone fees, the barbed wire telephone system became its own social network. Today, we might see elements of "personalised ringtones, chat rooms and online music" in this telephone network, as Bob Holmes writes in a feature at New Scientist.

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takyon writes:

New artificial enamel is harder and more durable than the real thing

Enamel enables teeth to take a stomping and keep on chomping. The hardest tissue in the human body is tough enough to resist dents, yet elastic enough not to crack during decades of jaw smashing. It's so incredible that scientists haven't created a substitute that can match it—until now. Researchers say they have designed an artificial enamel that's even tougher and more durable than the real thing.

"This is a clear leap forward," says Alvaro Mata, a biomedical engineer at the University of Nottingham who was not involved with the study. The advance, he says, could have uses beyond repairing teeth. "From creating body armor to strengthening or hardening surfaces for floors or cars, there could be many, many applications."

[...] In the new study, scientists tried to mimic nature's enamel assembly. Instead of peptides and other biological tools, they used extreme temperatures to coax the wires into an orderly formation. As with earlier construction of artificial enamels, the team built its new material from wires of hydroxyapatite—the same mineral that makes up real enamel. But unlike in most other synthetic enamels, the researchers encased the wires in a malleable metal-based coating.

This coating on the crystalline wires is the secret ingredient that makes this artificial enamel so resilient, says study co-author Nicholas Kotov, a chemical engineer at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. The coating makes the wires less likely to snap, because the soft material around them can absorb any powerful pressure or shock. Although the wires in natural enamel feature a magnesium-rich coating, the researchers upgraded to zirconium oxide, which is extremely strong and still nontoxic, Kotov says. The result was a chunk of enamellike material that could be cut into shapes with a diamond-bladed saw.

Also at Scientific American.

Journal Reference:
Hewei Zhao, et. al.,Multiscale engineered artificial tooth enamel, Science (DOI: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abj3343)

Original Submission

takyon writes:

India goes RISC-V with VEGA processors

One of the main advantages of RISC-V architecture is that it is open, so any organization with the right skills can develop its own cores, and India's government has taken up this opportunity with the Microprocessor Development Programme (MDP) helping develop VEGA RISC-V cores locally.

Thanks to funding by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) managed to design five RISC-V processors ranging from a single-core 32-bit RISC-V microcontroller-class processor to a Linux capable quad-core 64-bit out-of-order processor.

[...] We should not expect a processor for desktop Linux anytime soon, as AS4161 [the 64-bit quad-core] mostly targets storage and networking applications.

Vega Microprocessors

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upstart writes:

Controversy erupts over Aussie museum's identification of HMS Endeavour wreck:

The HMS Endeavour is famous for being sailed by Capt. James Cook to the South Pacific for a scientific expedition in the late 18th century. But the Endeavour (by then renamed the Lord Sandwich) met its demise in the Atlantic, when it was one of 13 ships the British deliberately sank (or "scuttled") in a Rhode Island harbor during the American Revolution.

Now, the Australian National Maritime Museum has announced that its researchers have confirmed that a shipwreck proposed as a likely candidate in 2018 is indeed the remains of the HMS Endeavour. However, the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project (RIMAP)—the museum's research partner in the project—promptly released a statement calling the announcement premature. RIMAP insists that more evidence is needed and that its own final report is still forthcoming.

bart9h writes:

The article at sci-news.com says:

Mosquitoes track odors, locate hosts, and find mates visually. The color of a food resource, such as a flower or warm-blooded host, can be dominated by long wavelengths of the visible light spectrum (green to red for humans) and is likely important for object recognition and localization. However, little is known about the hues that attract mosquitoes or how odor affects mosquito visual search behaviors. A new University of Washington-led study shows that after detecting a telltale gas that we exhale, yellow fever mosquitoes (Aedes aegypti) fly toward specific colors, including red, orange, black and cyan, but they ignore other colors, such as green, purple, blue and white.

"Mosquitoes appear to use odors to help them distinguish what is nearby, like a host to bite," said Professor Jeffrey Riffell, a researcher in the Department of Biology at the University of Washington.

"When they smell specific compounds, like carbon dioxide from our breath, that scent stimulates the eyes to scan for specific colors and other visual patterns, which are associated with a potential host, and head to them."

In the new experiments, Professor Riffell and his colleagues tracked behavior of female Aedes aegypti, when presented with different types of visual and scent cues.

Like all mosquito species, only females drink blood, and bites from Aedes aegypti can transmit dengue, yellow fever, chikungunya and Zika.

Journal Reference:
Alonso San Alberto, Diego, Rusch, Claire, Zhan, Yinpeng, et al. The olfactory gating of visual preferences to human skin and visible spectra in mosquitoes [open], Nature Communications (DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-28195-x)

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upstart writes:

Climate change: Satellites map huge methane plumes from oil and gas:

Huge plumes of the warming gas methane have been mapped globally for the first time from oil and gas fields using satellites.

Plugging these leaks would be an important step in buying extra time to curb climate change. The new research found plumes covering vast areas, sometimes stretching to 200 miles - the leaks are thought to be mostly unintended.

Last year, about 100 countries promised to cut methane emissions by 2030.

"We knew about individual gas blow-outs before, but this work shows the true methane footprint of oil and gas operations around the planet," explains Riley Duren, an author of the paper and CEO of Carbon Mapper which tracks methane emissions.

upstart writes:

Apple shocks iOS developers with 27% commission on third-party payments:

Apple has surprised iOS app developers by announcing a plan to charge 27 percent commissions on third-party payments—nearly as high as Apple's standard in-app payment cut of 30 percent. While Apple is applying the 27 percent commission only to dating apps in the Netherlands in order to comply with a government order, critics worry that Apple will charge commissions in any country where it's required to allow third-party payments unless such commissions are specifically forbidden.

In a new support document for developers, Apple said the 27 percent commission will apply even when a developer simply links to their own website. "To comply with an order from the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM), Apple allows developers distributing dating apps on the Netherlands App Store to choose to do one of the following: 1) continue using Apple's in-app purchase system, 2) use a third-party payment system within the app, or 3) include an in-app link directing users to the developer's website to complete a purchase," the document's introduction said.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

MIT Engineers Create the "Impossible" – New Material That Is Stronger Than Steel and As Light as Plastic

Using a novel polymerization process, MIT chemical engineers have created a new material that is stronger than steel and as light as plastic, and can be easily manufactured in large quantities.

The new material is a two-dimensional polymer that self-assembles into sheets, unlike all other polymers, which form one-dimensional, spaghetti-like chains. Until now, scientists had believed it was impossible to induce polymers to form 2D sheets.

Such a material could be used as a lightweight, durable coating for car parts or cell phones, or as a building material for bridges or other structures, says Michael Strano, the Carbon P. Dubbs Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT and the senior author of the new study.

[...] The researchers found that the new material's elastic modulus — a measure of how much force it takes to deform a material — is between four and six times greater than that of bulletproof glass. They also found that its yield strength, or how much force it takes to break the material, is twice that of steel, even though the material has only about one-sixth the density of steel.

Irreversible synthesis of an ultrastrong two-dimensional polymeric material (DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-04296-3) (DX)

From the paper:

Further processing yields highly oriented, free-standing films that have a 2D elastic modulus and yield strength of 12.7 ± 3.8 gigapascals and 488 ± 57 megapascals, respectively.

Original Submission