This could be the 2008 sartorial equivalent of that 1980s classic, the Piano Tie, but it is certainly a lot more useful. Researchers at Iowa State University have glued solar panels onto the symbol of male corporate oppression and hooked it up to a Nokia phone, which sits in a handy pocket at the back of the tie. [ read more ]

If almost every species on Earth was killed some 250 million years ago, how did our ancient ancestors survive and evolve into us?

In the deep history of our planet, there have been at least five short intervals in which the majority of living species suddenly went extinct. Biologists are used to thinking about how environmental pressures slowly select the organisms most fit for survival through natural selection, shaping life on Earth like an artist sculpting clay. However, mass extinctions are drastic examples of natural selection at its most ruthless, killing off vast numbers of species at one time in a way that is hardly typical of evolution. [ read more ]

Even Jules Verne did not foresee this one. Deep down at the very bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, geochemist Andrea Koschinsky has found something truly extraordinary: “It’s water,” she says, “but not as we know it.”

At over 3 kilometres beneath the surface, sitting atop what could be a huge bubble of magma, it’s the hottest water ever found on Earth. The fluid is in a “supercritical” state that has never before been seen in nature.

The fluid spews out of two black smokers called Two Boats and Sisters Peak. [ read more ]

From the plains of southern New Mexico, we bring you a story of headset-wearing cows. The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are teaming up to remotely corral cattle using a wireless device that sends sound straight into the bovines’ ears. HDTV-watching pigs can’t be far behind.

The solar-powered “Ear-A-Round” is a naugahyde “helmet” held in place by the cow’s ears. Atop the holster sits an electronics device hooked to sound-transmitting stereo earphones and containing a GPS unit that could let farmers monitor the animals’ whereabouts from afar. [ read more ]

Imagine gliding in a floating hotel over the Serengeti, gazing down at herds of zebra or elephants; or floating over Paris as the sun sets and lights blink on across the city as you pass the Eiffel Tower.

Such flights of fancy may one day be possible, if the dream of Jean-Marie Massaud, a French architect, comes true.

As the cost of fuel soars and the pressure mounts to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, several schemes for a new generation of airship are being considered by governments and private companies. “It’s a romantic project,” said Mr. Massaud, 45, sitting amid furniture designs in his Paris studio, “but then look at Jules Verne.”

It has been more than 70 years since the giant Hindenburg zeppelin exploded in a spectacular fireball over Lakehurst, N.J., killing 36 crew members and passengers, abruptly ending an earlier age of airships. But because of new materials and sophisticated means of propulsion, a diverse cast of entrepreneurs is taking another look at the behemoths of the air. [ read more ]

According to the less alarming forecasts of the GIEC (Intergovernmental group on the evolution of the climate), the ocean level should rise from 20 to 90 cm during the 21st Century with a status quo by 50 cm (versus 10 cm in the 20th Century). As a solution to this alarming problem architect Vincent Callebaut came up with this ecotectural marvel that could serve as a luxurious future retreat for 50,000 inhabitants seeking refuge from rising waters due to global warming. He believes the world will be desperately seeking shelter from the devastations of climate change, and hopes the auto-sufficient amphibious city will serve as a luxurious solution. To bad that right now we are close to 7 billion people and this luxurious future retreat is just for 50,000 inhabitants ( just for rich people ). [ read more ]

A team of physicists in Vienna has devised experiments that may answer one of the enduring riddles of science: Do we create the world just by looking at it?

To enter the somewhat formidable Neo-Renaissance building at Boltzmanngasse 3 in Vienna, you must pass through a small door sawed from the original cathedrallike entrance. When I first visited this past March, it was chilly and overcast in the late afternoon. Atop several tall stories of scaffolding there were two men who would hardly have been visible from the street were it not for their sunrise-orange jumpsuits. As I was about to pass through the nested entrance, I heard a sudden rush of wind and felt a mist of winter drizzle. I glanced up. The veiled workers were power-washing away the building’s façade, down to the century-old brick underneath. [ read more ]

I want to start out with a little game, called “How Do You Know When Your Empire Is Collapsing?” – invented in a little different form by a
political scientist on Long Island.

Let me give you a few examples of how it works.

Let’s say for starters, you know your empire is collapsing when the empire that is your fiercest rival buys up a total of 26 percent of three of your major Wall Street firms for $9 billion, and declares that it has another $200 billion that it is looking to invest. Next, you might figure your empire is collapsing when its total debt obligations amount to $50.5 trillion. That is so big that it’s about the same as the total household income of everyone in the country, including the billionaires. In other words, we owe almost more than we make. [ read more ]

Crime groups operating as “mobsters without borders” have gained significant footholds in global markets and provide logistic support to terrorists, the United States said on Wednesday.

Launching a campaign against such international criminals, Attorney General Michael Mukasey said they were more adaptable and sophisticated than La Cosa Nostra and other syndicates the U.S. government set out to defeat half a century ago.

“These international criminals pose real national security threats to this country,” Mukasey said in a speech to the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank. He cited recent cases, many with links to the former Soviet bloc. [ read more ]

Sandy Pentland is using data gathered by cell phones to learn about human behavior

Every time you use your cell phone, you leave behind a few bits of information. The phone pings the nearest cell-phone towers, revealing its location. Your service provider records the duration of your call and the number dialed.

Some people are nervous about trailing digital bread crumbs behind them. Sandy ­Pentland, however, revels in it. In fact, the MIT professor of media arts and sciences would like to see phones collect even more information about their users, recording everything from their physical activity to their conversational cadences. With the aid of some algorithms, he posits, that information could help us identify things to do or new people to meet. It could also make devices easier to use–for instance, by automatically determining security settings. More significant, cell-phone data could shed light on workplace dynamics and on the well-being of communities. It could even help project the course of disease outbreaks and provide clues about individuals’ health. Pentland, who has been sifting data gleaned from mobile devices for a decade, calls the practice “reality mining.” [ read more ]