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Jan 22, 2020

Has Malaria Really Killed Half of Everyone Who Ever Lived?

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

Across Earth’s history, our planet has been home to an estimated 109 billion human beings. And according to another oft-repeated factoid, half of all the people who have ever existed were killed by malaria, the worst mosquito-borne illness. Mosquitoes aren’t merely annoyances, they are mass murderers.

But is this actually true?

There’s little doubt that these hellacious insects are prodigious killers of humankind. The bloodsuckers spread all sorts of diseases – West Nile Virus, various kinds of Encephalitis, Dengue Fever, Yellow Fever, and Zika Virus, for example. However, the damage wrought by all of these diseases is piddling in comparison to malaria. Causing fever, tiredness, vomiting, headaches, and seizures, it struck 216 million people in 2016 alone, resulting in between 445,000 to 731,000 deaths. Believe it or not, that’s an improvement over past years. In 2000, there were 262 million cases, resulting in at least 839,000 deaths.

Jan 22, 2020

Italy’s Government Collapses, Turning Chaos Into Crisis

Posted by in categories: energy, government

A power play by the popular interior minister, Matteo Salvini, imploded the coalition. But for now, the election he wants remains just out of reach.

Jan 22, 2020

1st malaria vaccine tried out in babies in 3 African nations

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

Malaria is one of the world’s deadliest and most stubborn diseases. Now babies in three African nations are getting the first vaccine for malaria in an unusual pilot program.

Jan 22, 2020

North Korea’s Nuclear Bomb Is Much Bigger than Previously Thought

Posted by in categories: existential risks, military, nuclear weapons

A new look at 2017 test data reveals an explosion 16 times as powerful than the one that leveled Hiroshima.

Scientists looking anew at a 2017 North Korean nuclear test discovered that the explosion was likely about two-thirds more powerful than U.S. officials previously thought.

Earlier data put the yield somewhere between 30 and 300 kilotons; the U.S. intelligence community said 140 kilotons. That was already the most powerful device tested by North Korea, topping a 2016 test by about an order of magnitude. But a new look at seismological data suggests that the blast was between 148 and 328 kilotons, and probably around 250 kilotons.

Jan 22, 2020

Dead sailors stopped a ‘planetary catastrophe’ aboard a secret submarine, a top Russian naval officer said at their funeral

Posted by in category: nuclear energy

Circa 2019


Their heroism prevented the submarine fire from being a broader disaster, a likely reference to their actions to prevent a nuclear reactor meltdown.

Jan 22, 2020

Defector says North Korean regime turned its people into cannibals

Posted by in categories: entertainment, food

Like millions of movie-mad children around the world, Gim Gyu Min dreamed of being a film star when he grew up. But when he huddled in the darkness of the cinema in the 1980s and ’90s, he was forced to watch propaganda praising the North Korean regime.

Now, after a harrowing escape from his country in 1999, he is a filmmaker dedicated to making movies that expose the human-rights abuses there. “I want to let the world know that more and more people are dying under the Kim family dictatorship,” he said.

His movies are based on events that he witnessed during the North Korean famine in the late 1990s, when, among other horrors, he watched a woman being arrested for cannibalism after she resorted to eating her own son. Her child’s head had been found in a cauldron.

Jan 22, 2020

New Army Laser Could Kill Cruise Missiles

Posted by in category: military

Instead of building a 100-kilowatt weapon, the Army now plans to leap straight to 250 or even 300 kW — which could shoot down much tougher targets.

Jan 22, 2020

Students prove real-life Star Wars deflector shield is possible

Posted by in category: physics

Circa 2014


Star Wars is science fiction, but deflector shields like the ones in the films might be possible with today’s technology. There are still a few kinks to work out, but a group of physics students have figured out the basics.

Jan 22, 2020

Nuclear Pumped Lasers and the Strategic Defense Initiative

Posted by in categories: energy, military

Circa 2018


In 1963, L. Herwig proposed the nuclear pumped laser, based on the idea that the ions produced from nuclear reactions can be used as a driver for the laser medium. Since high power and high efficiency lasers with short wavelengths require high pumping power densities, nuclear pumping is an extremely appealing method. Nuclear pumped lasers could therefore direct significant amounts of energy emitted in a nuclear explosion into a very narrowly collimated beam. This beam would not only be able to destroy or damage targets from very long ranges, but also preclude subsequent use due to its own self-damaging mechanism to the initial weapon. [1] This system would ultimately constitute “a ‘third generation’ of nuclear weapons, the first two generations being the atomic (fission) and the hydrogen (fusion) bombs,” according to Edward Teller, also known as “the father of the hydrogen bomb”. [2] In this sense, it would be able to target energy toward specific targets instead of spreading energy into all directions.

Strategic Defense Initiative

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Jan 22, 2020

Physicists Develop Reversible Laser Tractor Beam Functional Over Long Distances

Posted by in categories: entertainment, particle physics, space travel, tractor beam

Circa 2015


Spaceships in movies and TV shows routinely use tractor beams to tow other vessels or keep them in place. Physicists have been hard at work trying take this technology from science fiction to reality. Significant process has recently been made by a team who have developed a laser tractor beam able to attract and repel particles about 100 times further than has been previously achieved. The lead author of the paper, published in Nature Photonics, is Vladlen Shvedov at Australian National University in Canberra.

Other recent tractor beams have used acoustics or water, but this one uses a single laser beam to control tiny particles about 0.2 millimeters in diameter. The tractor beam was able to manipulate the particles from a distance of 20 centimeters, shattering previous records. Despite this incredible distance, the researchers claim it is still on the short end of what is possible for this tractor beam technique.

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