If anything fell upwards, it would rewrite physics textbooks. Amazingly fiddly experiments to test whether antimatter can do just this are kicking off.
Click to read an excerpt — subscribers can read the whole thing.
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In Brief CRISPR has opened up limitless avenues for genetic modification. From disease prevention to invasive species control, Jennifer Kahn discusses the discover, application, and implications of gene drives.
Jennifer Kahn, a science journalist for the New York Times, recently did a TED Talk in which she discussed the discovery, application, and implications of a CRISPR gene drive used to make mosquitoes resistant to malaria and other diseases like chikungunya, and Zika.
Watch the talk in the video below, and learn how geneticists are achieving the (seemingly) impossible:
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The VR simulator that could turn you into a SUPERHERO: Hypersuit uses a movable ‘exoskeleton’ for virtual flight…
A virtual reality exoskeleton could soon allow you to ‘explore breathtaking universes’ without ever leaving your home.
The Hypersuit, demonstrated at the CES Unveiled event in Las Vegas on Tuesday, is a full-body immersive VR simulator that relies on arm movements to control the user’s ‘flight.’
A Wolverine Inspired Material
Posted in robotics/AI
A mysterious signal coming from deep in the universe has finally been traced to its source.
Fast Radio Bursts, or FRBs, have only been heard 18 times and have been a puzzle to scientists since they were detected in 2007. Nobody knows where they could be coming from or how they might be triggered, with speculation ranging from a huge star, jets of material shooting out of a black hole – or even aliens.
FRBs are powerful but very short radio waves, which last no more than a millisecond.
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Paleontologist Jack Horner participates in a “Jurassic World” Q&A at the Natural History Museum.
Here at Popular Science, we can’t wait to see Jurassic World, which opens in theaters nationwide today. I mean, who can resist velociraptor biker gangs:
But we were also curious about the real scientific research that inspired the movie. So we talked with Jack Horner, a noted paleontologist who has consulted on the entire Jurassic Park movie franchise, including Jurassic World.
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In Brief
- The Taiwanese company that manufactures Apple’s iPhone has announced a three-part plan to fully automate its factories, with hopes to achieve 30% automation by 2020.
- The move could put as many as a million people out of work, another example of automation’s major implications for the global workforce.
Foxconn Electronics, the Taiwanese manufacturing company behind some of the biggest electronic brands’ devices, including Apple’s iPhone, has announced that it will ramp up automation processes at its Chinese factories. The goal is to eventually achieve full automation.
In an article published in Digitimes, General Manager Dai Jia-peng of Foxconn’s Automation Technology Development Committee explains that the process will unfold in three phases.
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Google, Microsoft and a host of labs and start-ups are racing to turn scientific curiosities into working machines.
- By Davide Castelvecchi, Nature magazine on January 4, 2017
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