Posts

Theoretical physicists from the Technical University of Munich and the Max Planck Institute conducted simulation experiments to determine that certain quasiparticles are essentially immortal. Per the second law of thermodynamics nothing lasts forever, but these quantum particle fields can reassemble themselves after decaying – just like the phoenix from Greek mythology. Ruben Verresen, lead author on the research, said: Immortality, in this case, is more like pattern re-emergence than rebirth....

Things will likely never go back to normal, but eventually we’ll find a way to occupy space together again and that could be difficult for people who’ve developed social anxiety or had setbacks in their treatment due to the unique nature of pandemic isolation. We couldn’t find any actual rats to ask how they’re coping with the race, but a team of laboratory mice might just have the answer: it’s dropping a bunch of acid and letting nature do its thing....

Mechanical engineers from Rice University have actually turned spider cadavers into what they call “necrobots,” able to function as mechanical grippers. What’s “necrobotics?” The use of animal characteristics or components to create robotic systems isn’t a novelty in research. Think of bio-inspired and biohybrid robots. In bio-inspired approaches, researchers look to an animal’s physical morphology for design ideas and implement them in complex engineered systems. In biohybrid systems, live or active biological materials serve as the basis for a system, demanding careful and precise maintenance....

Sennheiser’s Momentum True Wireless were among the first to prove you could strive for more. The headphones looked nice, had solid connectivity, blocked ample outside noise, and perhaps most importantly, sounded better than almost any competition. But they had their flaws too. They suffered from severe battery drain problems while resting in their case, were too big for some ears, and had some unintuitive controls. The new $299 Momentum True Wireless 2 (MTW2) improve on most of those flaws, and while they aren’t perfect by any means, they are still the headphones to beat when it comes to sound quality....

Search engine optimization might be one of the most misunderstood factors driving the web today. Currently, almost 93 percent of all web traffic everywhere starts from a Google search. And in case you think social media is now the one true method that grabs attention online these days, you’ll probably be shocked at how vastly wrong you are. No, SEO actually drives over 1,000 percent more traffic than organic social media posts....

While the company hunts for the new CEO, WhatsApp co-founder, and Signal Foundation board member, Brian Acton will take an interim role. In this story, we’ll trace Signal’s journey to the present day, and the road ahead as it looks to sustain itself. Marlinspike launched Signal as a merged app from RedPhone encrypted voice calling app and the TextSecure encrypted texting app in 2015. Over the years, it has gained popularity as one of the most private chat platforms with end-to-end encryption....

If you’re intrigued about what the company is potentially going to announce, we’ve got you. If you want to know how to watch it, friend, we’ve got you. In this piece though, we’re looking at the possibility that today’s event isn’t a standalone extravaganza. Instead, it’s most likely one of a pair of events. Excuse me while I button up my trenchcoat, find my magnifying glass, and kick-off a drinking problem....

There’s no way of knowing for sure if this is the “Dualshock 5” or whatever Sony intends to call their next-gen controller, of course. It could be a prototype for something meant for this generation, or just a basic concept the company’s patenting just in case. But still, speculating is fun. Let’s see what this controller has to offer. Credit: Sony/JPO The design change isn’t a drastic one. I’d argue the shift from the Dualshock 3 to the 4 was bigger than this one....

Long story short: they offer all the smoothness I loved from the Vado SL, but with oodles of torque to spare. The Vado and Como are getting major redesigns with improved aesthetics, a more powerful motor, and some welcome quality of life improvements such as theft prevention and rear vehicle detection. The Como is Specialized’s upright commuter ebike, meant to give you a great view of the road ahead of you in the most comfortable position....

Similar to Spotify’s ‘Daily Mix’ and ‘Dicover Weekly’ features, the new playlist uses Spotify’s finely honed algorithms to try and puzzle out what type of podcasts you might be interested in listening to next. That might simply include the next episode in a podcast you’re already listening to, or suggestions for new podcasts based on your past history. The company says it also takes care to avoid spoilers in story-driven podcasts by showing you a trailer or pilot episode first....

Almost three out of four marketers believe social media marketing has been effective in pushing their business forward. It’s where you can find 90 percent of millennials, almost 80 percent of Gen X and even nearly half of all Baby Boomers. So when you post content to the web from your business, something you should be doing up to three times a day or more, that content needs to be focused, impactful and meaningful to the overall story you’re telling about your business....

A study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) has found most escooter injuries occur on pavements, with riders citing potholes and signposts as the most common reasons for accidents. Researchers from the institute interviewed 103 escooter riders who sought care at Washington, D.C.’s George Washington University Hospital over eight months in 2019, and found 58 percent had been injured riding on the pavement – with 40 percent of those surveyed injured while taking their first ride....

Research by the Human Interface Technology (HIT) Lab in NZ found that the colors of a robot — white and black — have a social cue that results in how people interact with and respond to them. The results suggest that people perceive robots with anthropomorphic features to have a race, and therefore, the same race-related prejudices that humans experience extend to robots, too. The study’s findings were based on a shooter bias test, in which participants were asked to perceive threat level based on a split-second image of various black and white people, with robots occasionally popping up — it found that black robots that posed no threat were shot more than white ones....

The UK government has recouped nearly all of its £8 million grant it gave to the British vacuum cleaner manufacturer to develop an electric vehicle, the Telegraph reports. Dyson was given the money back in 2016 as part of government plan to stimulate the economy and create jobs. In part, the money was going to help Dyson’s development and expansion into the electric car market. The vacuum maker reportedly put $2....

Deep learning can help discover mathematical relations that evade human scientists, a recent paper by researchers at DeepMind shows. Like many things coming from the Alphabet-owned artificial intelligence lab, the paper, which is titled “Advancing mathematics by guiding human intuition with AI,” has received much attention from science and tech media. Some mathematicians and computer scientists have lauded DeepMind’s efforts and the findings in the paper as breakthroughs. Others are more skeptical and believe that the use of deep learning in mathematics might have been overstated in the paper and its coverage in popular press....

Nope. Samsung’s ultra-thin glass screen is apparently no more durable than plain old plastic. Zack Nelson (that’s right, his name isn’t Jerry), put the phone through his usual gamut of durability challenges. These including a bend test, dropping sand into the hinge, and of course, the scratch test. Disappointingly, the phone scratches with literally the same ease as a regular plastic screen, starting at a level two on the Mohs hardness scale....

While simple (and old) measures such as quarantines, social distancing, washing hands, and wearing masks were still the most effective, our modern society wanted to give a modern answer to the virus. Thus, the pandemic became an accelerator for the more widespread use of technology — Zoom meetings and home deliveries became more prevalent, as some even tried it for the first time after the outbreak. But as these solutions solved our urgent needs, they were not always ready for the task....

That’s the situation tech journalist Monty Munford has been left in after losing over $30,000 (£25,000) worth of cryptocurrency. The writer and journalist shared his account with the BBC as a warning to Bitcoin beginners who might be thinking about making their first step in to, as Munford put it, “the murky world of cryptocurrency investment.” How Munford lost his cryptocurrency is painfully simple and it boils down to breaking the first law of holding cryptographically secured digital assets....

Demonstrators in Hong Kong have been using messaging platforms like Telegram to organize themselves, alert each other about activities on the ground, as well as information on where to find resources like gas masks and drinking water. Yesterday, the service went down after it was affected by a ‘powerful’ DDoS attack for roughly an hour. CEO Pavel Durov noted that the ‘state-actor sized’ attack was traced to IP addresses in China....

The filing, shared by Roadshow by CNET, alleges that Tesla didn’t follow recycling protocols to recycle EV batteries in an environmentally friendly way. The specific issue in Germany concerns how Tesla is recycling batteries that have been damaged in an accident and can’t be reused. Tesla is meant to connect customers with a third party company that can safely dispose of the damaged battery pack. However, as Input reports, it has failed to do this in a reasonable time frame....