E Ink has just announced a breakthrough in flexible electronic paper displays. The new display which has a 100dpi resolution and is only 300 microns thick has the potential of truely changing the way we read our information
A new species of marine worm that lives off whale bones on the sea floor has been described by scientists. The creature was found on a minke carcass in relatively shallow water close to Tjarno Marine Laboratory on the Swedish coast. Such zombie worms, as they are often called, are known from the deep waters of the Pacific but their presence in the North Sea is a major surprise. The new species has been named Osedax mucofloris, which literally means bone-eating snot-flower
— via The Register
The CIA’s venture capital arm, In-Q-Tel, has announced a strategic development agreement with SkyBuilt Power. The CIA seems to be interested in SkyBuilt’s new Mobile Power Station, which can be parachuted into remote locations and be up and running in a few hours with only two people needed to set it up. The MPS harnesses both solar and wind power and is capable of up to 150 kilowatts of electricity. The devices uses off-the-shelf components and easily swappable parts to be cost-effective
A cunning rat released on a deserted island off New Zealand to find out why rats are so difficult to eradicate, outsmarted scientists and evaded traps, baits and sniffer dogs before being captured four months later on a neighbouring island
Promession is a process where corpses are freeze-dried, shaken into a powder, and then put in a biodegradable coffin. Developed in Sweden, the process was apparently created as a response to limited burial space and to reduce the pollution emitted from burning dental fillings during traditional cremation — via Boingboing
After more than a year of speculation and false starts, Apple is finally expected to announce the iTunes Australia music store on Tuesday
It sounds like a conspiracy theory, but it isn’t. The pages coming out of your colour printer may contain hidden information that could be used to track you down if you ever cross the US government
15 years ago today, Col Needham posted some shell scripts to rec.arts.movies which allowed anyone to search lists of actors, actresses, directors, and biographies. From this humble beginning — which predates Yahoo, Google, and even the web itself — the IMDb has wrangled the collective wisdom of millions of submitters to become not only a top 100 web site but also a standard hollywood tool for film making. IMDb is celebrating with a retrospective of the last 15 years of IMDb and movies
Many of us remember the scene from Star Trek IV where Scotty barters the formula for transparent aluminium for a small run. It now appears that we can now add transparent aluminium to the science fact column
Sweeping new anti-terror laws include a plan to jail people for up to seven years for promoting feelings of ill will
or hostility between different groups that would threaten the peace
Britain’s spy agency the Secret Intelligence Service, known popularly as MI6, has opened its first web site. While much about the agency is still not public, the web site has information on service history and career opportunities for would-be spies. This rare peek at the real group popularised by the James Bond series brought over 3.5 million visits in its first few opening hours
OpenOffice.org had hoped to celebrate its fifth birthday today by launching the next generation of its office software suite, but a glitch has delayed release of the product for one week
Mounir Laroussi, a researcher at Old Dominion University has invented a hand-held device that is dubbed a plasma pencil. The pencil generates a cold plasma
, which can be used to kill germs that contaminate surfaces, infect wounds and rot your teeth. In the future, it might be used to destroy tumours without damaging surrounding tissue. When he turns the pencil on, it blows a high pitched whistle as a glowing, blue-violet beam about 50mm long instantly appears at one end. Stick your finger in its path and you only feel a cool breeze, but the beam is powerful enough to blast apart bacteria that’s crawling on your skin
A German architect has filed an application for a new type of cement made of dog poo. Friedrich Lentze, 57, from Berlin, applied for a patent for his odourless heating and building material
made from the dog poo cleaned from the streets of the German capital every day. Dung has for centuries been used as building material and he had combined it with modern materials to come up with a new type of insulating cement — via Warren Ellis
The BBC has commissioned the Doctor Who scriptwriter Russell T Davies to make an adult spin-off of its most famous sci-fi show. The new programme will be called Torchwood (an anagram of Doctor Who) and will follow a crack team investigating alien activities and crime in modern-day Britain. It will feature in its starring role John Barrowman, who played Captain Jack Harkness in Doctor Who and who will play the same character in Torchwood
A one-celled creature found on a sandy beach may be in the process of kidnapping and incorporating an even tinier plant to use as a living energy source. They said the newly discovered organism seems to be in the process of endosymbiosis — in which one creature incorporates another, creating a new form of life
The remains of the world’s oldest noodles have been unearthed in China. The 50cm-long, yellow strands were found in a pot that had probably been buried during a catastrophic flood. Radiocarbon dating of the material taken from the Lajia archaeological site on the Yellow River indicates the food was about 4,000 years old. The discovery goes a long way to settling the old argument over who first created the string-like food
A Chicago Tribune obit for a veteran called Theodore Roosevelt Heller contains the best admonition to mourners I’ve ever seen: In lieu of flowers, please send acerbic letters to Republicans
— via Boingboing
The people of Belgium have been left reeling by the first adult-only episode of the Smurfs, in which the blue-skinned cartoon characters’ village is annihilated by warplanes. The short but chilling film is the work of Unicef, the United Nations Children’s Fund. The short film pulls no punches. It opens with the Smurfs dancing, hand-in-hand, around a campfire and singing the Smurf song. Bluebirds flutter past and rabbits gambol around their familiar village of mushroom-shaped houses until, without warning, bombs begin to rain from the sky. Tiny Smurfs scatter and run in vain from the whistling bombs, before being felled by blast waves and fiery explosions. The final scene shows a scorched and tattered Baby Smurf sobbing inconsolably, surrounded by prone Smurfs. The final frame bears the message: Don’t let war affect the lives of children
Authorities in Queensland, Australia are investigating a Brisbane pathology lab employee who allegedly stole bits of brains from corpses. Apparently, the hormones found in the pituitary glands that he reportedly nicked can be injected into race horses as a stimulant — via Boingboing
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