Most Recently Added Most commentedBy Title | A-Z

Page 90 of 1,027First10203086878889909192939495100110120Last

Can a picture inflate the perceived truth of true and false claims?

Scientists discover the truth behind Colbert’s 'truthiness'
August 9, 2012

Stephen Colbert (credit: The Colbert Report)

Trusting research over their guts, scientists in New Zealand and Canada examined the phenomenon that Stephen Colbert, comedian and news satirist, calls “truthiness” — the feeling that something is true.

In four different experiments they discovered that people believe claims are true, regardless of whether they actually are true, when a decorative photograph appears alongside the claim.

“We wanted to examine how the kinds of photos… read more

Topics: Cognitive Science/Neuroscience

Comments (9)

Building the search engine of the future, one baby step at a time

August 9, 2012

Speak now

In Star Trek, a computer could answer any question, instantly. “Today, we’re closer to that dream than I ever thought possible during my working life — and here are some of the latest steps we’re taking today to make search even more intelligent, says SVP Google Search Amit Singhal on the Google Official Blog

1. Understanding the world

In May Goolge launched the Knowledge Graph, a… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Computers/Infotech/UI | Internet/Telecom

Comments (5)

First full-resolution and panorama images from NASA’s Curiosity Mars Rover

August 9, 2012

First full-resolution (1024 by 1024 pixels) long-range image of the Martian surface from one of the Navigation cameras on NASA's Curiosity rover, which are located on the rover's "head" or mast. The rim of Gale Crater can be seen in the distance beyond the pebbly ground. The topography of the rim is very mountainous due to erosion. The ground seen in the middle shows low-relief scarps and plains. The foreground shows two distinct zones of excavation likely carved out by blasts from the rover's descent stage thrusters. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

NASA press release

Featured Images Slide Show

Curiosity’s latest images

 

Topics: Space

Tags:

Comments (19)

Supercomputer-level millisecond-scale sampling for protein simulation on a desktop computer

August 8, 2012

Images showing the conformational space explored by the protein in the 1ms conventional MD Anton simulation, and the 500ns aMD simulation. The red diamond marks the crystal structure where both simulations were started from; the triangles represent important structures found in the 1ms simulation. The lower image shows that with a single graphics card running 500ns of accelerated MD, the same structures can be sampled and the same relative conformational space can be explored. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) captures the slowest motions of the protein, which correspond to conformational changes on long timescales. Moving L to R along the x-axis captures the primary slow rocking motion of the protein; moving vertically on the y-axis captures the second slowest motion, or wagging movement.<br /> Courtesy of the Walker MD Lab, San Diego Supercomputer Center.

Computer scientists and biochemists at the University of California, San Diego, have developed advanced GPU accelerated software and demonstrated for the first time that they could sample biological events that occur on the millisecond timescale using only an upgraded desktop computer equipped with a relatively inexpensive graphics processing card.

These results have the potential to bring millisecond-scale sampling, now available only on a multi-million dollar supercomputer,… read more

Topics: Biotech | Computers/Infotech/UI

Comments (3)

Biometric bracelet lets a medical device recognize its wearer

Wristwatch-like device measures a person's "bioimpedance" to identify him or her to medical monitoring devices
August 8, 2012

biometric_bracelet

A device that measures someone’s unique response to a weak electric signal could let medical devices such as blood-pressure cuffs automatically identify the wearer and send measurements straight to his or her electronic medical record, Technology Review reports.

For now, nurses, patients, and doctors juggle the job of keeping patients’ identities straight. But computer scientist Cory Cornelius at Dartmouth College, in New Hampshire, has developed… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Electronics

Comments (0)

What makes Paris look like Paris? CMU software uncovers stylistic core

Visual data mining of Google Street View identifies cities' distinctive details
August 8, 2012

These two photos might seem nondescript, but each contains hints about which city it might belong to. Given a large image database of a given city, our algorithm is able to automatically discover the geographically-informative elements (patch clusters to the right of each photo) that help in capturing its “look and feel”. On the top, the emblematic street sign, a balustrade window, and the balcony support are all very indicative of Paris, while on the bottom, the neoclassical columned entryway sporting a balcony, a Victorian window, and, of course, the cast iron railing are very much features of London.

 

Paris is one of those cities that has a look all its own, something that goes beyond landmarks such as the Eiffel Tower or Notre Dame. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University and INRIA/Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris have developed visual data mining software that can automatically detect these sometimes subtle features, such as street signs, streetlamps and balcony railings, that give Paris and other… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | VR/Augmented Reality/Computer Graphics

Comments (1)

This is what Wall Street’s terrifying robot invasion looks like

August 8, 2012

hft_chart

This animated GIF chronicles the rise of the HFT Algo Machines from January 2007 through January 2012 (credit: Nanex Research, hosted by imgur.com)

Given the the endless mind-whirling acronyms, derivatives and structures of the financial markets, we’re rarely served with a visualization that so elegantly illustrates the arrival of Wall Street’s latest innovation.

This is what high frequency trading looks like, when specially… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Social/Ethical/Legal

Comments (38)

Virtual nanoscopy: like ‘Google Earth’ for cell biologists

August 8, 2012

Caption: Advances in “virtual nanoscopy” enable the generation of large-scale composite images of biological tissues, as described in The Journal of Cell Biology (JCB) and made accessible through an upgrade to JCB’s JCB DataViewer web application. Users can “zoom in” from a high-resolution, composite image of a zebrafish embryo (top) to detailed images of tiny subcellular structures (bottom). Credit: © Williams et al, 2012

Just as users of Google Earth can zoom in from space to a view of their own backyard, researchers can now navigate biological tissues from a whole embryo down to its subcellular structures thanks to recent advances in electron microscopy and image processing.

An upgrade to the JCB DataViewer, browser-based image presentation tool from the the Journal of Cell Biology (JCB), now also makes these data publicly accessible for exploration and… read more

Topics: Biotech | Physics/Cosmology | VR/Augmented Reality/Computer Graphics

Comments (2)

New Sci-Fi bookshop Singularity & Co. opening this week in Brooklyn

August 8, 2012

savethescifi-1

With a mission to bring both new and out-of-print science-fiction books together, Singularity & Co. is poised to launch both an online bookstore and a real-life brick and mortar shop, Tor Blog reports.

Starting back in the spring with a Kickstarter project called “Save the Sci-Fi,” Singularity & Co. raised capital to get their bookshop off the ground.

This Thursday… read more

Topics: Entertainment/New Media

Comments (4)

The self-driving car logs more miles on new wheels

August 8, 2012

google_car

Members of the Google self-driving car team will soon start using the cars solo (rather than in pairs) for things like commuting to work, says Google Official Blog.

Our vehicles, of which about a dozen are on the road at any given time, have now completed more than 300,000 miles of testing. They’ve covered a wide range of traffic conditions, and there hasn’t been a single accident… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Social/Ethical/Legal

Comments (13)

Kindle book sales surpass print on Amazon UK

August 8, 2012

kindle

Amazon says it sells more books for Kindle than paperbacks and hardbacks combined on Amazon.co.uk, TechWeek Europe reports.

Amazon said that for every 100 print books bought through its UK site, it sold 112 Kindle books. Free Kindle books were excluded from the calculations and if included would have made the gap even wider, Amazon said.

“We hit this milestone… read more

Topics: Entertainment/New Media | Social/Ethical/Legal

Comments (6)

How the brain’s stem cells find out when to make new neurons

Studies in mice reveal how mood-altering drugs may affect brain stem cells
August 8, 2012

A single parvalbumin-expressing interneuron (red) surrounded by many adult neural stem cells (green) in the brain’s hippocampus.<br /> Credit: Gerry Sun

How do stem cells in the hippocampus — a part of the brain responsible for learning, memory and mood regulation — “decide” to create new brain cells?

Apparently, they “listen in” on the chemical communication among nearby neurons to find out what is stressing the system and when they need to act, says Hongjun Song, Ph.D., professor of neurology and… read more

Topics: Cognitive Science/Neuroscience

Comments (7)

Human cycles: history as science

August 7, 2012

800px-Marais-massacre

Advocates of “cliodynamics” say that they can use scientific methods to illuminate the past. But historians are not so sure, Nature News reports.

To Peter Turchin, who studies population dynamics at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, the appearance of three peaks of political instability at roughly 50-year intervals starting with the U.S. Civil War is not a coincidence. For the past 15 years, Turchin has been taking the… read more

Topics: Social/Ethical/Legal | Survival/Defense

Comments (66)

How micron-scale swimming robots could deliver drugs and carry cargo

August 7, 2012

microswimmer

Georgia Institute of Technology researchers have used complex computational models to design swimming micro-robots that could carry cargo and navigate in response to stimuli such as light.

The micron-scale (about 1 millionth of a meter) devices could be used in drug delivery in the body, in lab-on-a-chip microfluidic systems, and even as micro-construction robots working in swarms.

The concept is similar to other micro-robots mentioned on… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Biomed/Longevity | Nanotech/Materials Science

Comments (2)

Memory improves for older adults using computerized brain fitness program

August 7, 2012

(Credit: Dakim Brain

UCLA researchers have found that older adults who regularly used a brain fitness program played on a computer demonstrated significantly improved memory and language skills. The team studied 59 participants with an average age of 84, recruited from local retirement communities in Southern California.

The volunteers were split into two groups:  the first group used a brain fitness program for an average of 73  20-minute sessions across… read more

Topics: Cognitive Science/Neuroscience

Comments (9)

Page 90 of 1,027First10203086878889909192939495100110120Last
close and return to Home