A clever gadget no bigger than a personal stereo can rapidly predict food poisoning. While the gadget, called ImmunoFlow, will at first be used by food-processing companies, it is so small and light that its inventors ultimately envisage health inspectors delivering on-the-spot justice to restaurateurs trading in spoilt chicken or buggy burgers
An underwater fuel cell that runs on seawater and subsea sediment can generate small amounts of power indefinitely. Plankton release energy by using oxygen to break down organic matter in seawater or sediment. Deeper down in the sediment there is no oxygen, so the plankton rely on different chemicals. These two reactions set up a potential difference between the seawater and the sediment a few centimetres beneath
Optus has admitted that it has lost some e-mails belonging to several thousand of its dial-up Internet subscribers following a system glitch over the long weekend and for the second time in seven days, Telstra BigPond Mail customers with user names beginning with the letters P and F are being affected by a technical glitch which is leading to delays in receiving e-mail
British engineering group Mayflower Corporation unveiled a new engine which could increase fuel efficiency by at least 40 percent and decrease emissions by 50 percent
Internet filters designed to keep pornography away from children were banned at San Francisco city libraries despite a federal law mandating them
AdKey’s software allows web sites to lock out users who use apps that block banners and pop-up ads
Motorola researchers have successfully demonstrated a methane gas-powered fuel cell, which can provide enough juice between chargings for a month of mobile phone calls
Harnessing nuclear fusion — the energy that makes the stars shine — may be possible soon because of a new approach
A mother bear appears to have cared for a missing 16-month-old Iranian toddler who was found safe and sound three days later in the animal’s den
A new and controversial proposal under consideration by the World Wide Web Consortium could open the way for companies to claim patent rights — and demand royalties — on standards authorised by that body
A US court shut down thousands of web sites after it determined that they diverted web surfers and held them captive while bombarding them with ads for pornography and gambling
A man mistook his younger brother for an elk and shot him dead at the start of the elk hunting season in Finland
The semiconductor industry is in the midst of a massive technological change, converting to mass-producing chips with copper, rather than aluminium, wires. The weird part: Almost no one seems to be having major problems. Copper, which conducts electricity better than aluminium, gives designers an avenue to break through looming physical barriers that could prevent further boosts in chip performance
Scientists investigating brain function build a microscope which sees inside a rat’s head as it moves around
The Australian government has been criticised for using the fear generated by the 11 September terrorist attacks on the US to push through the controversial Cybercrime Bill Thursday night. The bill allows police to intercept Australians’ telephone, Internet and e-mail communication encourages lazy policing
and corruption
An audit of ten Australian Federal Government web sites has found most contained serious security holes and were at risk from hackers. While Bug hunter, Rain Forest Puppy, crafts a full disclosure policy to nudge vendors to acknowledge and fix security holes in software products, or be expose
Muslim sisters are burning, dying, imprisoned without a voice — all in the name of one of the greatest religions in the world. An enlightening account of the truth about Islam and women by Yasmin Alibhai-Brown
Looking somewhat like a huge, upturned golf tee, it would be the highest man-made structure on earth. It would also provide electricity to as many as 200,000 homes. If built, a proposed 200-megawatt solar chimney for rural Australia would become the most daring application yet of a quirky form of generating alternative, renewable electricity
Sandor Ligetfalvy’s never-sent, but wonderfully worded letter of resignation from McDonald’s offers a glimpse behind the shiny façade into the appalling way that employees are treated
Optus dial-up internet users could lose access to some overseas web sites and e-mail after network administrators voted to blacklist Optus for refusing to crack down on an alleged spam gang. Optus has made the SPEWS.org list, described by insiders as the nuclear weapon
of the anti-spam lobby, for allegedly housing a known spammer on its dial-up network
RSS – Posts