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May 25, 2021

Microsoft has built an AI-powered autocomplete for code using GPT-3

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

O,.o! Awesome: 3


Microsoft has announced an update for its PowerApps software that uses GPT-3 to turn natural speech into code. The tool only works with the company’s simple Power Fx coding language, but it shows the potential of machine learning to transform programming.

May 25, 2021

New Dark Matter Map Reveals Hidden Bridges Between Galaxies

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics, robotics/AI

A new map of dark matter in the local universe reveals several previously undiscovered filamentary structures connecting galaxies. The map, developed using machine learning by an international team including a Penn State astrophysicist, could enable studies about the nature of dark matter as well as about the history and future of our local universe.

Dark matter is an elusive substance that makes up 80% of the universe. It also provides the skeleton for what cosmologists call the cosmic web, the large-scale structure of the universe that, due to its gravitational influence, dictates the motion of galaxies and other cosmic material. However, the distribution of local dark matter is currently unknown because it cannot be measured directly. Researchers must instead infer its distribution based on its gravitational influence on other objects in the universe, like galaxies.

“Ironically, it’s easier to study the distribution of dark matter much further away because it reflects the very distant past, which is much less complex,” said Donghui Jeong, associate professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Penn State and a corresponding author of the study. “Over time, as the large-scale structure of the universe has grown, the complexity of the universe has increased, so it is inherently harder to make measurements about dark matter locally.”

May 25, 2021

Rich people are spending millions on underground bunkers equipped with robot security and movie theaters after a year of man-made and natural threats

Posted by in categories: robotics/AI, security

Interest in such plush panic rooms is skyrocketing, he said. His firm started offering high-end shelters and the like a decade ago — of the 232 it’s built so far, 200 were commissioned in the last five years.


One $14 million panic-room project built in the San Jose Valley includes a bowling alley and indoor pool.

May 25, 2021

Honeybee venom kills aggressive breast cancer cells

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

For thousands of years, humans have used honey, propolis, and venom from the European honeybee Apis mellifera as medicines.

More recently, scientists have discovered that honeybee venom and its active component, melittin, are toxic to a wide range of tumors — including melanoma, lung, ovarian, and pancreatic cancers — in laboratory tests.

Melittin is the molecule that creates the painful sensation of a bee’s sting. Scientists do not fully understand how it kills cancer cells, however.

May 25, 2021

Europa May Have Seafloor Volcanoes That Could Spawn Life, Says NASA

Posted by in categories: chemistry, energy, space

Paradoxically, Jupiter’s ice-covered moon of Europa may have seafloor volcanoes capable of generating enough chemical energy and heat to support life, says new paper.

May 25, 2021

Elon Musk’s Dugout Loop — The DISASTER That Almost Happened

Posted by in category: Elon Musk

My take on the dugout loop. Yes, around the end I mistyped “lifestyle”, I’m very sorry, oh wait, I’m not.

Check out my Patreon tiers! https://www.patreon.com/adamsomething

May 25, 2021

Morphing computer chip repels hundreds of professional DARPA hackers

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, cybercrime/malcode

Engineers have designed a computer processor that thwarts hackers by randomly changing its microarchitecture every few milliseconds. Known as Morpheus, the puzzling processor has now aced its first major tests, repelling hundreds of professional hackers in a DARPA security challenge.

In 2017, DARPA backed the University of Michigan’s Morpheus project with US$3.6 million in funding, and now the novel processor has been put to the test. Over four months in 2020, DARPA ran a bug bounty program called Finding Exploits to Thwart Tampering (FETT), pitting 525 professional security researchers against Morpheus and a range of other processors.

The goal of the program was to test new hardware-based security systems, which could protect data no matter how vulnerable the underlying software was. Morpheus was mocked up to resemble a medical database, complete with software vulnerabilities – and yet, not a single attack made it through its defenses.

May 25, 2021

What 6 animals on the ISS can tell us about life in space

Posted by in category: space

We don’t know about how life away from Earth affects living things.


Astronauts have been sending animals to space longer than they’ve been going themselves, and the results have helped humans in space and on Earth.

May 25, 2021

Canada has waited long enough to ban chlorpyrifos

Posted by in category: futurism

In 2019, the European Union banned chlorpyrifos, allowing three more months of use. Canada’s three-year phaseout risks ongoing harms, as well as dumping of this product on our market.

Back in 2000, Canadian politicians spoke up against commonly used lawn and household chlorpyrifos products when the U.S. banned domestic uses. Despite a year of study, the PMRA had not taken action.

How long will chlorpyrifos persist in commerce?

May 25, 2021

Henrietta Lacks’ ‘Immortal’ Cells

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, life extension

Circa 2010


Medical researchers use laboratory-grown human cells to learn the intricacies of how cells work and test theories about the causes and treatment of diseases. The cell lines they need are “immortal”—they can grow indefinitely, be frozen for decades, divided into different batches and shared among scientists. In 1951, a scientist at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, created the first immortal human cell line with a tissue sample taken from a young black woman with cervical cancer. Those cells, called HeLa cells, quickly became invaluable to medical research—though their donor remained a mystery for decades. In her new book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, journalist Rebecca Skloot tracks down the story of the source of the amazing HeLa cells, Henrietta Lacks, and documents the cell line’s impact on both modern medicine and the Lacks family.