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Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Nvidia has given the world a "SuperNIC" – another device to improve network performance, just like the "SmartNIC," the "data processing unit" (DPU), and the "infrastructure processing unit" (IPU). But the GPU-maker insists its new device is more than just a superlative.

So what exactly is a SuperNIC? An Nvidia explainer describes it as a "new class of networking accelerator designed to supercharge AI workloads in Ethernet-based networks." Key features include high-speed packet reordering, advanced congestion control, programmable I/O pathing, and, critically, integration with Nvidia's broader hardware and software portfolio.

If that sounds like what a SmartNIC or DPU would do, you're not wrong. The SuperNIC is even based on a current Nvidia DPU, the BlueField-3.

Nvidia's BlueField-3 SuperNIC promises Infiniband-ish network performance – if you buy Nvidia's fancy 51.2Tbit/sec switches – Click to enlarge. Source: Nvidia.

The difference is the SuperNIC is designed to work alongside Nvidia's own Spectrum-4 switches as part of its Spectrum-X offering.

Nvidia's senior veep for networking, Kevin Deierling, emphasized in an interview with The Register that the SuperNIC isn't a rebrand of the DPU, but rather a different product.

Before considering the SuperNIC, it's worth remembering that SmartNICs/IPUs/DPUs are network interface controllers (NICs) that include modest compute capabilities – sometimes fixed-function ASICs, with or without a couple of Arm cores sprinkled in, or even highly customizable FPGAs.

Many of Intel and AMD's SmartNICs are based around FPGAs, while Nvidia's BlueField-3 class of NICs pairs Arm cores with a bunch of dedicated accelerator blocks for things like storage, networking, and security offload.

This variety means that certain SmartNICs are better suited, or at the very least marketed, towards certain applications more than others.

For the most part, we've seen SmartNICs – or whatever your preferred vendor wants to call them – deployed in one of two scenarios. The first is in large cloud and hyperscale datacenters where they're used to offload and accelerate storage, networking, security, and even hypervisor management from the host CPU.

Amazon Web Services' custom Nitro cards are a prime example. The cards are designed to physically separate the cloudy control plane from the host. The result is that more CPU cycles are available to run tenants' workloads.

Original Submission

taylorvich writes:

https://phys.org/news/2023-11-reveals-clues-whales-dolphins-echolocation.html

A study published in Diversity provides new insight into how toothed whales and dolphins came to navigate the underwater world using sound waves.

Whales and dolphins, which lack external ears, rely on a technique called echolocation to navigate and hunt in the dark. Much like shouting and listening for echoes, these animals emit high-pitched sounds that bounce off objects and reflect back at them, allowing them to map out their surroundings.

Their skulls and soft tissues near and within the blowhole are asymmetrical, meaning that a structure on one side is larger or differently shaped than its counterpart on the other side. This "lopsidedness" enables the production of sound. At the same time, a fat-filled lower jawbone conducts sound waves to the internal ear, allowing the animals to locate where sounds are coming from (directional hearing).

Yet, how whales and dolphins evolved this sophisticated "built-in sonar" is not fully understood.

Now, research co-authored by Jonathan Geisler, Ph.D., professor and chair of anatomy at New York Institute of Technology, and first author Robert Boessenecker, Ph.D., paleontologist and research associate at the University of California Museum of Paleontology, provides vital clues.

The researchers analyzed a large collection of fossils that included two ancient species of dolphins within the genus Xenorophus, one of which is new to science. These species are some of the primitive members of Odontoceti, the suborder of marine mammals that includes all living echolocating whales and dolphins.

Journal Reference:
Robert W. Boessenecker et al, New Skeletons of the Ancient Dolphin Xenorophus sloanii and Xenorophus simplicidens sp. nov. (Mammalia, Cetacea) from the Oligocene of South Carolina and the Ontogeny, Functional Anatomy, Asymmetry, Pathology, and Evolution of the Earliest Odontoceti, Diversity (2023). DOI: 10.3390/d15111154

Original Submission

hubie writes:

A system of ancient ceramic water pipes, the oldest ever unearthed in China, shows that neolithic people were capable of complex engineering feats without the need for a centralised state authority:

In a study published in Nature Water, the archaeological team describe a network of ceramic water pipes and drainage ditches at the Chinese walled site of Pingliangtai dating back 4,000 years to a time known as the Longshan period. The network shows cooperation amongst the community to build and maintain the drainage system, though no evidence of a centralised power or authority.

Dr Yijie Zhuang (UCL Institute of Archaeology), senior and corresponding author on the paper, said: "The discovery of this ceramic water pipe network is remarkable because the people of Pingliangtai were able to build and maintain this advanced water management system with stone age tools and without the organisation of a central power structure. This system would have required a significant level of community-wide planning and coordination, and it was all done communally."

The ceramic water pipes make up a drainage system which is the oldest complete system ever discovered in China. Made by interconnecting individual segments, the water pipes run along roads and walls to divert rainwater and show an advanced level of central planning at the neolithic site.

What's surprising to researchers is that the settlement of Pingliangtai shows little evidence of social hierarchy. Its houses were uniformly small and show no signs of social stratification or significant inequality amongst the population. Excavations at the town's cemetery likewise found no evidence of a social hierarchy in burials, a marked difference from excavations at other nearby towns of the same era.

The level of complexity associated with these pipes refutes an earlier understanding in archaeological fields that holds that only a centralised state power with governing elites would be able to muster the organisation and resources to build a complex water management system. While other ancient societies with advanced water systems tended to have a stronger, more centralised governance, or even despotism, Pingliangtai demonstrates that was not always needed, and more egalitarian and communal societies were capable of these kinds of engineering feats as well.

Journal Reference:
Li, C., Cao, Y., Zhang, C. et al. Earliest ceramic drainage system and the formation of hydro-sociality in monsoonal East Asia [open]. Nat Water 1, 694–704 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44221-023-00114-4

Original Submission

fliptop writes:

Google's Threat Analysis Group announced a zero-day against the Zimbra Collaboration email server that has been used against governments around the world:

In June 2023, Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) discovered an in-the-wild 0-day exploit targeting Zimbra Collaboration, an email server many organizations use to host their email. Since discovering the 0-day, now patched as CVE-2023-37580, TAG has observed four different groups exploiting the same bug to steal email data, user credentials, and authentication tokens. Most of this activity occurred after the initial fix became public on Github. To ensure protection against these types of exploits, TAG urges users and organizations to keep software fully up-to-date and apply security updates as soon as they become available.

TAG first discovered the 0-day, a reflected cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability, in June when it was actively exploited in targeted attacks against Zimbra's email server. Zimbra pushed a hotfix to their public Github on July 5, 2023 and published an initial advisory with remediation guidance on July 13, 2023. They patched the vulnerability as CVE-2023-37580 on July 25, 2023.

Originally spotted on Schneier on Security.

Related: State Hackers Breach Defense, Energy, Healthcare Orgs Worldwide

Original Submission

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/starships-33-engines-created-the-mother-of-all-shock-diamonds

The War Zone has an interesting report on the shock diamonds produced by the engines of the Starship rocket during the recent launch attempt.

"When you typically see a shock diamond or a mach diamond, it can be from like a jet engine test, or a single rocket nozzle test. [When you] look at those up close... you see the same shock diamond effect on the smaller scale."

"But what was interesting, specifically about this case [the second Starship launch], is you had 33 engines firing together, which you would kind of intuitively think would make for a pretty messy environment. I think close up [this] is probably true, there's some complicated dynamics happening there."

Additionally, the article features a passel of pictures of the launch.

Original Submission

hubie writes:

An innovative new study from the Texas A&M School of Public Health offers objective insight on employee behavior and the potential benefits of flexible work arrangements:

If there's one thing most office workers can agree on, it's that they tend to feel less productive toward the end of the day and the end of each work week. Now, a team of researchers at Texas A&M University has found objective evidence of this phenomenon in action.

A recent interdisciplinary study at the Texas A&M School of Public Health used a novel method of data collection to show that employees really are less active and more prone to mistakes on afternoons and Fridays, with Friday afternoon representing the lowest point of worker productivity.

[...] "Most studies of worker productivity use employee self-reports, supervisory evaluations or wearable technology, but these can be subjective and invasive," said Benden, professor and head of the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health. "Instead, we used computer usage metrics — things like typing speed, typing errors and mouse activity — to get objective, noninvasive data on computer work patterns."

The team then compared computer usage patterns across different days of the week and times of the day to see what kinds of patterns emerged.

"We found that computer use increased during the week, then dropped significantly on Fridays," said Roh, assistant professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics. "People typed more words and had more mouse movement, mouse clicks and scrolls every day from Monday through Thursday, then less of this activity on Friday."

In addition, Roh said, computer use decreased every afternoon, and especially on Friday afternoons.

[...] What is the takeaway for employers? To start, flexible work arrangements, such as hybrid work or a four-day work week, may lead to happier and more productive employees.

Journal Reference:
Roh T, Esomonu C, Hendricks J, Aggarwal A, Hasan NT, Benden M (2023) Examining workweek variations in computer usage patterns: An application of ergonomic monitoring software. PLoS ONE 18(7): e0287976. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0287976

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

World War II concluded decades ago, but live mines lurking on the ocean floor still pose threats, potentially spewing unexpected geysers or releasing contaminants into the water. Experts conduct controlled explosions to clear underwater munitions, but concerns have arisen over the environmental impacts of these blasts.

Now, results published in Environmental Science & Technology show that the contamination produced by detonation depends on the blast type, with weaker explosions leaving behind more potentially toxic residues.

After World War II, according to research estimates, up to 385,000 metric tons of unexploded munitions—including 40,000 tons of chemical munitions—were dumped into the Baltic Sea. These discarded weapons remain dangerous: They have the potential to jet plumes of water and sediment upward, send shock waves through the ocean, and punch holes in ships' hulls.

In addition, the mines' metal shells can corrode in seawater, leaking potentially toxic explosive compounds, such as TNT, into the environment over time. Technicians typically clear historic munitions with controlled explosions, but there is debate among scientists about whether weak or strong blasts are better.

While smaller blasts minimize shock waves and physical damage, Edmund Maser and coworkers suspected that these weaker ones release more toxic residue than strong blasts. To test whether this is true, the team wanted to measure the explosive residues near underwater mines after controlled detonations of the two different intensities.

taylorvich writes:

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2023-11-emotions-music-powerful-memories.html

Time flows in a continuous stream—yet our memories are divided into separate episodes, all of which become part of our personal narrative. How emotions shape this memory formation process is a mystery that science has only recently begun to unravel. The latest clue comes from UCLA psychologists, who have discovered that fluctuating emotions elicited by music help form separate and durable memories.

The study, published in Nature Communications, used music to manipulate the emotions of volunteers performing simple tasks on a computer. The researchers found that the dynamics of people's emotions molded otherwise neutral experiences into memorable events.

"Changes in emotion evoked by music created boundaries between episodes that made it easier for people to remember what they had seen and when they had seen it," said lead author Mason McClay, a doctoral student in psychology at UCLA. "We think this finding has great therapeutic promise for helping people with PTSD and depression."

As time unfolds, people need to group information, since there is too much to remember (and not all of it useful). Two processes appear to be involved in turning experiences into memories over time: The first integrates our memories, compressing and linking them into individualized episodes; the other expands and separates each memory as the experience recedes into the past. There's a constant tug of war between integrating memories and separating them, and it's this push and pull that helps to form distinct memories. This flexible process helps a person understand and find meaning in their experiences, as well as retain information.

"It's like putting items into boxes for long-term storage," said corresponding author David Clewett, an assistant professor of psychology at UCLA. "When we need to retrieve a piece of information, we open the box that holds it. What this research shows is that emotions seem to be an effective box for doing this sort of organization and for making memories more accessible."

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes the following story:

North Korea has notified Japan that its third attempt to launch a satellite will take place between November 22 and December 1.

According to a notice posted by Japan's coast guard, it expects the rocket's trajectory to pass over the Yellow Sea and East China Sea.

South Korea is also aware of the military spy satellite’s launch. Defense minister Shin Won-sik reportedly noted over the weekend that the launch is imminent. The minister also pointed out that the hermit kingdom's mission could be timed to launch before the South's first homegown reconnaissance satellite launches on November 30 atop a SpaceX Falcon 9.

According to South Korean public broadcaster KBS, the military warned of a stern response – including a partial suspension of the 2018 inter-Korean military deal.

On the subject of spying and North Korea, Radio Free Asia has reported that those found in the hermit kingdom with unregistered laptops and tablets will be punished as spies.

The media agency reports that punishment could include execution – as was the case for a student who allegedly smuggled copies of the Netflix series Squid Game – or years of hard labor.

North Korea's concern is that those exposed to foreign media or entertainment could pick up on "anti-socialist" ideas.

acid andy writes:

https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/math/a45533729/periodic-table-of-shapes/

Just as molecules can be broken down into atoms, so too can mathematical shapes be broken down into more basic components. These components are known as Fano varieties—named after Italian mathematician Gino Fano—and understanding them can help mathematicians make major discoveries.

There's just one problem. Fano varieties are notoriously difficult to categorize.

That's what scientists at the Imperial College of London discovered when they set out to create a "periodic table of shapes" more than a decade ago. Similar to how elements are grouped together with like elements on the periodic table, this geometric table aims to group related Fano varieties together. [More (sic)] easier said than done.

So, the Imperial team—which also includes scientists from the University of Nottingham—turned to AI and machine learning to help speed up the process. The results of this novel method were published in the journal Nature Communications in early September.

"Fano varieties are basic building blocks in geometry—they are 'atomic pieces' of mathematical shapes," the study reads.

[...] Fano discovered the first of these "atomic" shapes back in the 1930s. More have been discovered since, but so far, they lack any organizing principle. Once categorized in a periodic table defined by a shape's unique quantum period, gaps could help tell mathematicians where new shapes could be discovered (much like what the periodic table does for chemists and physicists).

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes the following story:

In September, OPSGROUP, an 8,000-strong international group of pilots, dispatchers, schedulers, controllers, and flight technicians, began highlighting incidents in which commercial aircraft in the Middle Eastern region received spoofed GPS navigation signals. These attacks also impacted the fallback navigation systems, resulting in total failure, writes Motherboard.

There have been more than 50 incidents in the last five weeks, centered around Baghdad, Cairo, and Tel Aviv. The attacks use a specific vector that OPSGROUP describes as "unthinkable" and exposes a "fundamental flaw in avionics design." The spoofing affects the aircraft's Inertial Reference System (IRS), used to help planes navigate.

"The IRS should be a standalone system, unable to be spoofed," wrote OPSGROUP. "The idea that we could lose all on-board nav capability, and have to ask [air traffic control] for our position and request a heading, makes little sense at first glance – especially for state of the art aircraft with the latest avionics. However, multiple reports confirm that this has happened."

One report says that an Embraer 650 business jet crew en route from Europe to Dubai lost both GPS navigation units aboard the airplane and GPS signals to both pilot/co-pilot iPads. The crew said the IRS didn't work anymore, and they only realized something was wrong when the autopilot started turning left and right. After the aircraft flight management system showed a GPS error message, the crew requested radar vectors from air traffic control showing they were 80 nautical miles off course and had nearly entered Iranian airspace with no clearance.

Motor Trend reports https://www.motortrend.com/news/buy-hyundai-car-on-amazon that next year you will be able to buy a Hyundai car through Amazon (at least in USA). The top picture at the link shows a typical car dealer building, surrounded by a parking lot with a mix of new cars and car-sized brown cardboard Amazon boxes. While cute, this is also a clue--cars still have to be picked up at a dealer.

"How people shop and buy products it's always evolving," Marty Mallick, Amazon vice president of worldwide corporate business development said. "We have a new generation of users that are growing up with a smartphone on their hand. And we saw a demand from our customers that they were seeking from Amazon."

[...] The process should be simple. Customers would log onto Amazon.com and see the inventory available in their area. They'll be able to select the trim, options, and hit checkout. After adding your Hyundai to the cart, you'll be able to put your down payment and sign all the paperwork online—no need to go to the dealer. There will not be any haggling, threats to walk out to get a better deal, or price markups. "Here's the price. It shows you what rebates you qualify for, incentives that are available, and then you decide if you go through financing," Mallick added.

[...] Booking a test drive will not be available on Amazon, so customers will have to visit a dealer to get a feel for the car in person. "We're looking at the dealership as the hub of the physical experience," Mallick added.

[...] Wait times to pick up a vehicle shouldn't be long, Jin said. Because Amazon will only display the current inventory that dealers have, the car should be available within a couple of days from the date of purchase.

Then there's this, which may not be so popular with Soylentils?

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

A large drone aircraft has been operated from one of Britain's aircraft carriers for the first time, indicating how the Royal Navy intends to expand its air power beyond the meager number of F-35 fighters it currently has at its disposal.

The "Mojave" aircraft took off and landed back on the carrier HMS Prince of Wales last week in trials being conducted off the eastern coast of the US. It is part of the Predator-series family of fixed-wing drones built by General Atomics, and much larger and more capable than other drones the Royal Navy has operated until now.

It is also said to be the first time that any navy other than that of America has been able to fly such an unmanned aircraft from one of their ships.

"The Mojave trial is a European first – the first time that a Remotely Piloted Air System of this size has operated to and from an aircraft carrier outside of the United States," Royal Navy director of Develop, Rear Admiral James Parkin, said in a statement.

Parkin said the success of the trial "heralds a new dawn in how we conduct maritime aviation," hailing it as another step in the evolution of the Royal Navy's carrier strike group into a mixed crewed and uncrewed fighting force.

hubie writes:

Study reveals limitations of commercial exercise machines, emphasizing the need for a more personalized approach to exercise:

The best heart rate for burning fat differs for each individual and often does not align with the "fat burning zone" on commercial exercise machines, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai researchers report.

Instead, the researchers said, clinical exercise testing—a diagnostic procedure to measure a person's physiological response to exercise—may be a more useful tool to help individuals achieve intended fat loss goals. The study, which used a machine learning-based modeling approach, was published online today in Nutrition, Metabolism and Cardiovascular Disease.

"People with a goal of weight or fat loss may be interested in exercising at the intensity which allows for the maximal rate of fat burning. Most commercial exercise machines offer a 'fat-burning zone' option, depending upon age, sex, and heart rate," says lead author Hannah Kittrell, MS, RD, CDN, a PhD candidate at Icahn Mount Sinai in the Augmented Intelligence in Medicine and Science laboratory. "However, the typically recommended fat-burning zone has not been validated, thus individuals may be exercising at intensities that are not aligned with their personalized weight loss goals."

Journal Reference:
Hannah D. Kittrell, Fred J. DiMenna, Avigdor D. Arad, et al., Discrepancy between predicted and measured exercise intensity for eliciting the maximal rate of lipid oxidation, NMCD, Volume 33, ISSUE 11, P2189-2198, November 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.numecd.2023.07.014

Original Submission

[Editor's note. I found it unnerving to see tracking links in this article. I encourage readers to "right-click" and "view source" on each link before actually clicking on each link in the article. (I despise trackers!) You have been warned. --Martyb]

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes following story:

Here's what you need to know.

For the past week my social feeds have been filled with a pretty important tech policy debate that I want to key you in on: the renewal of a controversial program of American surveillance.

The program, outlined in Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), was created in 2008. It was designed to expand the power of US agencies to collect electronic “foreign intelligence information,” whether about spies, terrorists, or cybercriminals abroad, and to do so without a warrant.

Tech companies, in other words, are compelled to hand over communications records like phone calls, texts, and emails to US intelligence agencies including the FBI, CIA, and NSA. A lot of data about Americans who communicate with people internationally gets swept up in these searches. Critics say that is unconstitutional.

Despite a history of abuses by intelligence agencies, Section 702 was successfully renewed in both 2012 and 2017. The program, which has to be periodically renewed by Congress, is set to expire again at the end of December. But a broad group that transcends parties is calling for reforming the program, out of concern about the vast surveillance it enables. Here is what you need to know.

Of particular concern is that while the program intends to target people who aren’t Americans, a lot of data from US citizens gets swept up if they communicate with anyone abroad—and, again, this is without a warrant. The 2022 annual report on the program revealed that intelligence agencies ran searches on an estimated 3.4 million “US persons” during the previous year; that’s an unusually high number for the program, though the FBI attributed it to an uptick in investigations of Russia-based cybercrime that targeted US infrastructure. Critics have raised alarms about the ways the FBI has used the program to surveil Americans including Black Lives Matter activistsand a member of Congress.

In a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer this week, over 25 civil society organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Center for Democracy & Technology, and the Freedom of the Press Foundation, said they “strongly oppose even a short-term reauthorization of Section 702.”