AGU: Voyager 1 has left the solar system, sudden changes in cosmic rays indicate

 

Thirty-five years after its launch, Voyager 1 appears to have travelled beyond the influence of the Sun and exited the heliosphere, according to a new study appearing online today. The heliosphere is a region of space dominated by the Sun and its wind of energetic particles, and which is thought to be enclosed, bubble-like, in the surrounding interstellar medium of gas and dust that pervades the Milky Way galaxy.
On August 25, 2012, NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft measured drastic changes in radiation levels, more than 11 billion miles from the Sun. Anomalous cosmic rays, which are cosmic rays trapped in the outer heliosphere, all but vanished, dropping to less than 1 percent of previous amounts. At the same time, galactic cosmic rays -- cosmic radiation from outside of the solar system -- spiked to levels not seen since Voyager's launch, with intensities as much as twice previous levels.
The findings have been accepted for publication in Geophysical Research Letters, a journal of the American Geophysical Union.
"Within just a few days, the heliospheric intensity of trapped radiation decreased, and the cosmic ray intensity went up as you would expect if it exited the heliosphere," said Bill Webber, professor emeritus of astronomy at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces. He calls this transition boundary the "heliocliff."
In the GRL article, the authors state: "It appears that [Voyager 1] has exited the main solar modulation region, revealing [hydrogen] and [helium] spectra characteristic of those to be expected in the local interstellar medium."
However, Webber notes, scientists are continuing to debate whether Voyager 1 has reached interstellar space or entered a separate, undefined region beyond the solar system.
"It's outside the normal heliosphere, I would say that," Webber said. "We're in a new region. And everything we're measuring is different and exciting."
The work was funded by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

Source: American Geophysical Union

Google Android Smartwatch In The Works (Rumor)

 

Apple are rumored to be working on an iOS smartwatch, Samsung are rumored to be working on an Android based smartwatch, and now according to a recent report, Google are also working on a smartwatch.
According to a report by the FT, Google’s Android team are working on a new Android powered smartwatch, although there are not many details about the actual hardware as yet.

Google’s purchase of Motorola has given them access to all of the technology behind Motorola’s MotoACTV smartwatch, which is a fitness device, so they could be using some of this hardware in their future Android based smartwatch.
Major electronics produces like Apple and Samsung, obviously see the smartwatch as the next big thing in consumer electronics, and Google obviously has plans to get in on the game as well, it will be interesting to see if these companies come up with something that people actually want to wear every day.
Source FT, The Verge

Stephen Hawking

A belief that heaven or an afterlife awaits us is a "fairy story" for people afraid of death, Stephen Hawking has said.

In a dismissal that underlines his firm rejection of religious comforts, Britain's most eminent scientist said there was nothing beyond the moment when the brain flickers for the final time.

Hawking, who was diagnosed with motor neurone disease at the age of 21, shares his thoughts on death, human purpose and our chance existence in an exclusive interview with the Guardian today.

The incurable illness was expected to kill Hawking within a few years of its symptoms arising, an outlook that turned the young scientist to Wagner, but ultimately led him to enjoy life more, he has said, despite the cloud hanging over his future.

"I have lived with the prospect of an early death for the last 49 years. I'm not afraid of death, but I'm in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first," he said.

"I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark," he added.

Hawking's latest comments go beyond those laid out in his 2010 book, The Grand Design, in which he asserted that there is no need for a creator to explain the existence of the universe. The book provoked a backlash from some religious leaders, including the chief rabbi, Lord Sacks, who accused Hawking of committing an "elementary fallacy" of logic.

The 69-year-old physicist fell seriously ill after a lecture tour in the US in 2009 and was taken to Addenbrookes hospital in an episode that sparked grave concerns for his health. He has since returned to his Cambridge department as director of research.

The physicist's remarks draw a stark line between the use of God as a metaphor and the belief in an omniscient creator whose hands guide the workings of the cosmos.

In his bestselling 1988 book, A Brief History of Time, Hawking drew on the device so beloved of Einstein, when he described what it would mean for scientists to develop a "theory of everything" – a set of equations that described every particle and force in the entire universe. "It would be the ultimate triumph of human reason – for then we should know the mind of God," he wrote.

The book sold a reported 9 million copies and propelled the physicist to instant stardom. His fame has led to guest roles in The Simpsons, Star Trek: The Next Generation and Red Dwarf. One of his greatest achievements in physics is a theory that describes how black holes emit radiation.

In the interview, Hawking rejected the notion of life beyond death and emphasised the need to fulfil our potential on Earth by making good use of our lives. In answer to a question on how we should live, he said, simply: "We should seek the greatest value of our action."

In answering another, he wrote of the beauty of science, such as the exquisite double helix of DNA in biology, or the fundamental equations of physics.

Hawking responded to questions posed by the Guardian and a reader in advance of a lecture tomorrow at the Google Zeitgeist meeting in London, in which he will address the question: "Why are we here?"

In the talk, he will argue that tiny quantum fluctuations in the very early universe became the seeds from which galaxies, stars, and ultimately human life emerged. "Science predicts that many different kinds of universe will be spontaneously created out of nothing. It is a matter of chance which we are in," he said.

Hawking suggests that with modern space-based instruments, such as the European Space Agency's Planck mission, it may be possible to spot ancient fingerprints in the light left over from the earliest moments of the universe and work out how our own place in space came to be.

His talk will focus on M-theory, a broad mathematical framework that encompasses string theory, which is regarded by many physicists as the best hope yet of developing a theory of everything.

M-theory demands a universe with 11 dimensions, including a dimension of time and the three familiar spatial dimensions. The rest are curled up too small for us to see.

Evidence in support of M-theory might also come from the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at Cern, the European particle physics laboratory near Geneva.

One possibility predicted by M-theory is supersymmetry, an idea that says fundamental particles have heavy – and as yet undiscovered – twins, with curious names such as selectrons and squarks.

Confirmation of supersymmetry would be a shot in the arm for M-theory and help physicists explain how each force at work in the universe arose from one super-force at the dawn of time.

Another potential discovery at the LHC, that of the elusive Higgs boson, which is thought to give mass to elementary particles, might be less welcome to Hawking, who has a long-standing bet that the long-sought entity will never be found at the laboratory.

Hawking will join other speakers at the London event, including the chancellor, George Osborne, and the Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz.

Science, truth and beauty: Hawking's answers

What is the value in knowing "Why are we here?"

The universe is governed by science. But science tells us that we can't solve the equations, directly in the abstract. We need to use the effective theory of Darwinian natural selection of those societies most likely to survive. We assign them higher value.

You've said there is no reason to invoke God to light the blue touchpaper. Is our existence all down to luck?

Science predicts that many different kinds of universe will be spontaneously created out of nothing. It is a matter of chance which we are in.

So here we are. What should we do?

We should seek the greatest value of our action.

You had a health scare and spent time in hospital in 2009. What, if anything, do you fear about death?

I have lived with the prospect of an early death for the last 49 years. I'm not afraid of death, but I'm in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first. I regard the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail. There is no heaven or afterlife for broken down computers; that is a fairy story for people afraid of the dark.

What are the things you find most beautiful in science?

Science is beautiful when it makes simple explanations of phenomena or connections between different observations. Examples include the double helix in biology, and the fundamental equations of physics."

 

MICHIO KAKU in his book  "Physics of the Impossible”


Totally true story.

“In high school for my science fair project I assembled an atom smasher in my mom’s garage. I went to the Westinghouse company and gathered 400 pounds of scrap transformer steel. Over Christmas I wound 22 miles of copper wire on the high school football field. Eventually I built a 2.3 million-electron volt betatron particle accelerator, which consumed 6 kilowatts of power (the entire output of my house) and generated a magnetic field of 20,000 times the Earth’s magnetic field. The goal was to create a beam of gamma rays powerful enough to create antimatter.”

Difference Between The iPhone 4S And iPhone 5

Apple has now announced its latest iPhone, the iPhone 5, which has had a number of upgrades over last years iPhone 4S and this article is designed to explain the difference between the iPhone 4S and iPhone 5.
Apple now sells three different versions of the iPhone, the iPhone 4, the iPhone 4S and the iPhone 5.

The iPhone 5 features a new design over the iPhone 4S, the handset is taller it measures 4.87 inches as opposed to 4.5 inches on the iPhone 4S, it is the same width at 2.31 inches and is thinner than the iPhone 4S, the iPhone 5 is 0.30 inches thick where as the iPhone 4S is0.37 inches thick.
The iPhone 5 is also lighter than the iPhone 4S, weighing in at 112 grams as opposed to 140 grams for the iPhone 4S, it is also Apple’s first smartphone to come with a 4G LTE connection.

The main difference between the iPhone 4S and the iPhone 5 is the screen, the iPhone 4S feature a 3.5 inch Retina display with a resolution of 960 x 640 pixels at 326ppi.
The new iPhone 5 features a 4 inch Retina display with a resolution of 1,136 x 640 pixels at 326ppi, and it features a widescreen 16:9 aspect ratio, on top of that WiFi has also be upgraded on the iPhone 5.

The iPhone 4S comes with 802.11 b/g/n WiFi, with 802.11n WiFi on the 2.4GHz band, where as the new iPhone 5 features 802.11a/b/g/n WiFi and 802.11n WiFi on the 2.4GHz and 5 GHz bands.

Both devices come with Bluetooth 4.0 and GPS and GLONASS, and the iPhone 5 features either GSM Edge or CDMA, the same as the iPhone 4S, but the new iPhone 5 also comes with DC-HSDPA and 4G LTE.
The iPhone 5 features a new smaller Nano SIM card as opposed to the microSIM card in the iPhone 4S, unfortunately the iPhone 5 is not compatible with microSIM cards.
Processing wise the iPhone 5 features a new faster processor than the iPhone 4S, which according to Apple delivers two times faster processing and graphics performance, the iPhone 5 features an Apple A6 processor and the iPhone 4S features an Apple A5 processor.


Both devices come with an 8 megapixel camera with tap to focus, auto-focus, an LED flash, a backside illumination sensor, a five element lens and face detection.
The front camera on the iPhone 5 is different to the one on the iPhone 4S, the iPhone 4S features features a VGA resolution camera for photos and video where as the iPhone 5 features a 1.2 megapixel camera for photos and it is capable of HD video in 720p, it also comes with a backside illumination sensor.
Video recording on the iPhone 5 is slightly different, and new features over the iPhone 4S include improved image stabilization, face detection and the ability to take photos whilst in the middle of recording a video.
Another difference between the iPhone 4S and the iPhone 5 is the new Apple EarPods, the iPhone 4S comes with standard Apple Earphones where as the iPhone 5 comes with Apple’s new EarPods.

The iPhone 5 also features Apple’s new Lightning dock connector, where as the iPhone 4S comes with Apple’s older 30 pin dock connector, there is also an adapter which will let you use the older 30 pin dock connector with the new lightning connector.
The iPhone 5 features a larger battery than the iPhone 4S, and according to Apple the iPhone 5 will come with up to 8 hours of talk time over 3G, up to 8 hours of browsing time over LTE, 8 hours over 3g, and 10 hours over WiFi, plus it comes with a standby time of up to 225 hours.
The iPhone 4S comes with up to 8 hours of talk time over 3g, up to 6 hours of browsing time over 3G and up to 9 hours of browsing time over WiFi, it also features a standby time of up to 200 hours.
There is a difference in pricing between the iPhone 4S and iPhone 5, the SIM free prices are as follows, the iPhone 4S is available for $549 SIM free, it is also available on contract with a number of carriers.
The iPhone 5 will be available in three different sizes, the 16GB iPhone 5 will retail for $649, the 32GB iPhone 5 will retail for $749 and the 64GB iPhone 5 will retail for $849.

 

Skype iOS App 4.6 Update Brings New Call Design

 

Skype has this week rolled out a new update for Apple’s iOS devices, releasing the Skype iOS update 4.6 which brings with it a number of new features, together with the obligatory bug fixes and performance enhancements.
The menu feature of the latest Skype iOS update includes a redesigned calling “experience” which has been added to provide users with a cleaner and fresher looking interface.

Issues fixed by the release of the new Skype iOS 4.6 update includes correcting the order of One-to-one chats, together with the ability to now changing message to read with just a few taps. Skype explains
“Skype for iPad version 4.6 supports iPad, iPad 2, iPad mini and the latest iPad with Retina Display. Skype for iPhone version 4.6 supports iPhone 3G, iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 5, plus 2nd, 3rd and 4th generation iPod Touch. iOS 5.0 or later is required on all devices.”
For more information on the new Skype iOS 4.6 update jump over to the Skype website for details.
Source : Skype

New report confirms almost half of Africa's lions facing extinction

 

A new report concludes that nearly half of Africa's wild lion populations may decline to near extinction over the next 20-40 years without urgent conservation measures. The plight of many lion populations is so bleak, the report concludes that fencing them in -- and fencing humans out -- may be their only hope for survival. Led by the University of Minnesota's Professor Craig Packer and co-authored by a large team of lion biologists, including Panthera's President, Dr. Luke Hunter, and Lion Program Director, Dr. Guy Balme, the report, entitled Conserving large carnivores: dollars and fence, was published today in the scientific journal Ecology Letters.
"It is clear that fences work and unfenced populations are extremely expensive to maintain," said Craig Packer, who also sits on Panthera's Cat Advisory Council. Using field data from 11 African countries, the Ecology Letters study examines the cost of managing fenced and unfenced habitats, and compares lion population densities and trends in both. The report shows that conservation costs are lower, and lion population sizes and densities are greater, in reserves secured by wildlife-proof fences, compared to unfenced ecosystems. Lions in unfenced reserves were subject to a higher degree of threats from human communities, including retaliatory killing by herders, habitat loss and fragmentation, and overhunting of lion prey.
Panthera's Dr. Luke Hunter explained, "These findings highlight the severity of the lion conservation crisis today and the limited choices we have to ensure a future for the species. No one wants to resort to putting any more fences around Africa's marvelous wild areas, but without massive and immediate increases in the commitment to lion conservation, we may have little choice."
Whether fencing or some alternative physical boundary such as intensely managed buffer zones, it is clear that separating lion and human populations will be essential for the species' survival. Along with maintaining physical boundaries, conflict mitigation initiatives such as those carried out through Panthera's Project Leonardo and the Lion Guardians program, are required to reduce the killing of lions where humans and lions share the landscape.
Panthera's Dr. Guy Balme stated, "We have shown that it is possible to keep both humans and lions in African landscapes by reducing lion-human conflict, but it requires extensive resources. As the numbers of people and their livestock continue to grow in Africa, it is essential to scale up these programs to avert losing many lion populations."
Today, it is estimated that fewer than 30,000 lions remain in Africa in just 25% of the species' original natural habitat.

Source: Panthera

Nokia Lumia 800 Review

 

The Nokia Lumia 800 is Nokia’s first Windows Phone smartphone since the two companies announced their partnership earlier this year and the device comes with the latest version of Windows Phone 7.5 Mango, in our Nokia Lumia 800 review we will look at all of the features on this new Windows Phone device.
As you will see from the photos, the Lumia 800 has taken its design cues from the Nokia N9, with a sleek polycarbonate exterior and a curved glass ClearBlack AMOLED display, it is definitely one of the best looking smartphones that Nokia has produced for some time.

Nokia Lumia 800 Specifications

The Nokia Lumia 800 features a 3.7 inch AMOLED ClearBlack multi-touch display, and the display features a resolution of  800 x 480 pixels.
Processing on the Lumia 800 is provided by a single core 1.4GHz processor and it features 512MB of RAM and 16GB of built in storage, plus an 8 megapixel rear facing camera with Carl Zeiss optics and a dual LED flash plus auto-focus.



The Lumia 800′s camera is capable of recording HD video in 720p at 30 frames per second, and it comes with the latest version of Microsoft’s Windows Phone, version 7.5 Mango.
Other specifications on the Nokia Lumia 800 include 802.11 b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 2.1, HSDPA, HSUPA, and it features a micro SIM card rather than a standard sized SIM card.

 

Connectivity comes in the form of a micro USB port, which can be connected to your PC or Mac to synchronize the device with videos, music and more.
The Nokia Lumia 800 features a 1450 mAh battery, and according to Nokia’s official figures, the battery is designed to give you up to 13 hours of talk time on 2g, up to 256 hours of standby time on GSM.
On 3G Nokia says that the Lumia 800 will give you up to 9.5 hours of talk time and up to 335 hours of standby time, and for music and videos, the official figures say that you will get around 55 hours of music playback and around 6.5 hours of video playback.

Nokia Lumia 800 Design And Display

As we mentioned earlier Lumia 800 takes its design inspiration from the Nokia n9, the outer casing of the device is made from machined polycarbonate, and it looks very slick and stylish, definitely one of the best looking smartphones Nokia has produced for some time, aside for the N9.
The Nokia Lumia 800 features a 3.7 inch ClearBlack AMOLED display, which is encased in Gorilla Glass, and the display is very good, everything looks clear and sharp, and it works pretty well outside in direct sunlight.

Th3 3.7 inch display on the Lumia 800 features an 800 x 480 pixel resolution, text and websites don’t look as good on the Lumia 800 as other devices with a higher resolution display and text on some website can be a little hard to read at times, and text also looks slightly pixelated, although overall the display on the Lumia 800 is pretty good, photos and video look great on the handsets screen.

Nokia Lumia 800 And Windows Phone 7

The Lumia 800 features the latest version of Microsoft’s mobile OS, Windows Phone 7.5 Mango, which we really liked, the user interface is great, a refreshing change form the UI’s of Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android OS.
Everything fells really fast on the Lumia 800 and Windows Phone Mango, we were expecting things to feel a little slow compared to other devices considering the single core processor, but it doesn’t.
Microsoft’s Windows Phone Marketplace seems to be growing steadily, and whilst it doesn’t have anywhere near as many apps as Apple’s iOS or Google’s Android there are still some pretty cool apps available for Windows Phone handsets.
The Lumia 800 comes with a number of different Nokia Apps for Windows Phone built in, like their free navigation app, Nokia Drive and also Nokia Nokia Maps and Nokia Music.

Overall I really enjoyed using Windows Phone 7 on the Nokia Lumia 800, and the built in Nokia apps are great, the Nokia Drive is probably one of the best navigation apps we have seen on a smartphone, and it comes bundled with the device.

Nokia Lumia 800 Camera, Photos And Video

The camera on the Lumia 800 is an 8 megapixel version and it features Carl Zeiss Optics, plus a dual LED flash and auto-focus, and it is capable of recording HD video in 720p.

The photo below was taken on the Lumia 800′s camera with standard settings, and it has not been edited from the original except to add some text to it, make sure you check out the full size photo.

The video below was recorded in HD on the Lumia 800 at maximum resolution which is 1280 x 720p, we also used standard settings on the device to record the video, make sure you watch it in HD.
Overall the Nokia Lumia’s camera does a pretty good job at taking photos and recording video, just what you would expect from a high end smartphone camera, there are some devices with better camera’s out there, but there are certainly more which are a lot worse.

Nokia Lumia 800 Call Quality, Reception And Battery

We tested the Nokia Lumia 800 with UK mobile carrier Three, and call quality and reception on the device is excellent, and voice calls sounded clear, pretty much what you would expect.
With regards to battery life, the Lumia 800 features a 1,450 mAh battery, and there have been a number of reports of problems with the Nokia Lumia 800 battery.

Nokia has released a statement concerning the battery problems, and they will release a software update that is designed to fix the issue early next year.
Luckily the Nokia Lumia 800 we tested for this review didn’t suffer from the battery problems, and we were able to test it out properly over the last week.
The battery on the Lumia 800 is pretty good, heavy users should get at least a full days usage out of the device, whilst average users would probably only have to charge the handset every other day.

Conclusion

I was quite impressed with the Nokia Lumia 800, the smartphone features an excellent design, probably one of the best looking Windows Phone devices we have tested.
It certainly feels like a quality smartphone, just what you would expect from Nokia in terms of the build quality, the AMOLED display is really nice, and that paired with Windows Phone 7.5 Mango makes the Lumia 800 a great device to use.

My first ever mobile phone was a Nokia handset, and I have had a number of Nokia mobile phones over the years, although I haven’t owned a Nokia handset for quite a few years, probably about 10, the Nokia Lumia 800 is the first Nokia smartphone that would make me consider buying a Nokia phone again.
If you are in the market for a new smartphone or specifically a Windows Phone smartphone, then the Lumia 800 is definitely worth considering, have a look at the photo gallery below.
The handset we tested in this review was from UK mobile carrier Three, the Nokia Lumia 800 is available on Three with a range of different mobile contracts in the UK, it is also available from a number of other mobile operators.

Processed meat linked to premature death

In a huge study of half a million men and women, research in Biomed Central's open access journal BMC Medicine demonstrates an association between processed meat and cardiovascular disease and cancer. One of the difficulties in measuring the effect of eating meat on health is the confounding effect of lifestyle on health. Often vegetarians have healthier lifestyles than the general population, they are less likely to smoke, are less fat, and are more likely to be physically active. Only within a very large study can the consequences of eating meat and processed meat be isolated from other lifestyle choices.
This EPIC (European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition) study involved ten countries and 23 centres in Europe and almost half a million people. In general a diet high in processed meat was linked to other unhealthy choices. Men and women who ate the most processed meat ate the fewest fruit and vegetables and were more likely to smoke. Men who ate a lot of meat also tended to have a high alcohol consumption.
A person's risk of premature death (increased risk of all cause mortality) increased with the amount of processed meat eaten. This is also true after correcting for confounding variables, although residual confounding cannot be excluded. However, a small amount of red meat appeared to be beneficial which the researchers suggest is because meat is an important source of nutrients and vitamins.
Prof Sabine Rohrmann, from the University of Zurich, who led this analysis explained, "Risks of dying earlier from cancer and cardiovascular disease also increased with the amount of processed meat eaten. Overall, we estimate that 3% of premature deaths each year could be prevented if people ate less than 20g processed meat per day."
This article marks the launch of an article collection on Medicine for Global Health in BMC Medicine. The collection focuses on public health initiatives, the development of health care policies and evidence-based guidelines which are needed to address the global burden of disease. Vulnerable populations, especially in low and middle income countries, continue to be seriously affected by non-communicable and infectious diseases including neglected tropical diseases, while complications during pregnancy and childbirth in these regions leave mothers and infants at risk of severe disability or death.

Source: BioMed Central Limited

Google Reader Shutting Down July 1st 2013

Google has today announced its second spring clear out which has announced the closure of a number of Google services including Google Reader.
To ensure the dedicated following of Google Reader users have an alternative to move to before Google shits the service, Google has provided 3 month grace before the doors close on the service, before July 1, 2013.

**Update : A petition has start over at Change.org to try and persuade Google to keep their Google Reader service running.
Other Google services and applications that will soon be closing include Google Voice App for Blackberry, Snapseed Desktop for Macintosh and Windows, bringing the total to 70 features or services closed since our spring cleaning began in 2011.
A full list of all the Google Services that will be effected in the latest spring clean 2013.

• Apps Script will be deprecating the GUI Builder and five UiApp widgets in order to focus efforts on Html Service. The rest of the Ui Service will not be affected. The GUI Builder will continue to be available until September 16, 2013. For more information see our post on the Google Apps Developer Blog.
• CalDAV API will become available for whitelisted developers, and will be shut down for other developers on September 16, 2013. Most developers’ use cases are handled well by Google Calendar API, which we recommend using instead. If you’re a developer and the Calendar API won’t work for you, please fill out this form to tell us about your use case and request access to whitelisted-only CalDAV API.
• Google Building Maker helped people to make three-dimensional building models for Google Earth and Maps. It will be retired on June 1, but users are still able to access and export their models from the 3D Warehouse. We’ll continue to expand the availability of comprehensive and accurate new 3D imagery on Google Earth, and people can still use Google Map Maker to add building information such as outlines and heights to Google Maps.
• Google Cloud Connect is a plug-in to help people work in the cloud by automatically saving Microsoft Office files from Windows PCs in Google Drive. But installing Google Drive on your desktop achieves the same thing more effectively—and Drive works not only on Windows, but also on Mac, Android and iOS devices. Existing users will no longer be able to use Cloud Connect as of April 30.
• We launched Google Reader in 2005 in an effort to make it easy for people to discover and keep tabs on their favorite websites. While the product has a loyal following, over the years usage has declined. So, on July 1, 2013, we will retire Google Reader. Users and developers interested in RSS alternatives can export their data, including their subscriptions, with Google Takeout over the course of the next four months.
• Beginning next week, we’re ending support for the Google Voice App for Blackberry. For Blackberry users who want to continue using Google Voice, we recommend they use our HTML5 app, which is more secure and easier for us to keep up to date. Our HTML5 site is compatible with users with Blackberry version 6 and newer.
• We’re deprecating our Search API for Shopping, which has enabled developers to create shopping apps based on Google’s Product Search data. While we believe in the value this offering provided, we’re shifting our focus to concentrate on creating a better shopping experience for users through Google Shopping. We’ll shut the API down completely on September 16, 2013.
• Beginning today we’ll no longer sell or provide updates for Snapseed Desktop for Macintosh and Windows. Existing customers will continue to be able to download the software and can contact us for support. We’ll continue to offer the Snapseed mobile app on iOS and Android for free.

Source: Google

 

A massive stellar burst, before the supernova

 

An automated supernova hunt is shedding new light on the death sequence of massive stars -- specifically, the kind that self-destruct in Type IIn supernova explosions. Digging through the Palomar Transient Factory (PTF) data archive housed at the Department of Energy's National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), astronomers have found the first causal evidence that these massive stars shed huge amounts of material in a "penultimate outburst" before final detonation as supernovae.
A focused search for Type IIn SN precursor bursts, conducted by Eran Ofek of Israel's Weizmann Institute and the PTF team, led to this finding. Their results were published in the February 7, 2013 issue of Nature. PTF is an international collaboration that brings together researchers, universities, observatories and Berkeley Lab to hunt for supernovae and other astronomical objects.
The Causal Link
Massive stars -- somewhere between eight and 100 times the mass of our Sun -- spend much of their lives fusing hydrogen (the lightest element) into increasingly heavier elements, like helium, oxygen, carbon and so on. In the end, there is almost nothing left but an iron core. Eventually, that core collapses, releasing a tremendous amount of energy as neutrinos, magnetic fields and shock waves and destroying the star in the process. From Earth, this explosive event is observed as a supernova. If astronomers detect hydrogen, the event is classified as a Type II supernova. And if the hydrogen-emission line is narrow, the event is classified as a Type IIn (for "narrow").
In the case of Type IIn events, scientists suspected that the narrow emission line occurs as light from the event passes through a thin sphere of hydrogen that was already surrounding the star before it went supernova. Some believed that the dying star might have shed this shell of material before it self-destructed, but until recently there was no evidence to link such an outburst to an actual supernova.
That's where PTF comes in. For almost four years, the PTF team has relied on a robotic telescope mounted on the Palomar Observatory's Samuel Oschin Telescope in Southern California to scan the sky nightly. As soon as observations were taken, the data traveled more than 400 miles to NERSC -- via the National Science Foundation's High Performance Wireless Research and Education Network and the Department of Energy's Energy Sciences Network (ESnet) -- where computers running software called the Real-Time Transient Detection Pipeline screened the data and identified events for astronomers to follow up on. NERSC also archived this data and allowed collaborators to access it over the Internet through a web-based science gateway, called DeepSky.
On August 25, 2010 the PTF pipeline detected a Type IIn supernova half a billion light years away in the constellation Hercules. Shortly after, Ofek led a search of previous PTF scans of the same stellar neighborhood -- using a high-quality pipeline developed by Mark Sullivan, of the University of Southampton -- and found the supernova's likely precursor, a massive variable star that had shed a huge amount of mass only 40 days before the supernova was detected. They labeled the event, SN 2010mc.
"After NERSC tools found SN 2010mc, we went back through the archives and found evidence of a previous outburst in the same location and knew that it blew some material out of the star before the final supernova," says Brad Cenko, a UC Berkeley postdoctoral researcher and co-author of the paper. "We've seen evidence of this happening before, but there have been only one or two cases where we've been able to conclusively say when the previous outburst happened."
Ofek and the PTF team developed a scenario and tested it against competing theoretical ideas, using evidence from several sky surveys that were triggered to observe SN 2010mc once it was detected by the NERSC pipeline. They concluded that the "penultimate outburst" had blown off a hundredth of a solar mass in a shell expanding 2,000 kilometers per second, already 7 billion kilometers away from the supernova when it exploded. Earlier ejecta were detected 10 billion kilometers away, having slowed to a hundred kilometers per second.
After the supernova explosion, high-velocity ejecta passing through shells of earlier debris left a record of varying brightness and spectral features. The observations pointed to the most likely theoretical model of what happened: turbulence-excited gravity waves drove successive episodes of mass loss, finally culminating in the collapse and explosion of the core. Because the stellar outburst occurred very shortly before the supernova, the astronomers suspected that the events were causally linked. Cenko notes that this could have important implications for what processes trigger a supernova.
"I think it is a very interesting object we found, and the way we do our survey and the search at NERSC made it something we were in the unique position to find," says Peter Nugent, a Berkeley Lab senior staff scientist and member of the PTF collaboration.
The Future
Once the team found SN 2010mc's precursor, the team used Sullivan's pipeline to sift through stellar neighborhoods in the PTF archival data where other Type IIn supernovae had previously been detected. According to Nugent, this exercise helped the team identify several other similar cases.
"Although the PTF project is no longer collecting data every night, we are still relying on NERSC resources to sift through our archival data," says Nugent. "This recent discovery shows us that there is still a lot that we can learn from the archival data at NERSC, and gives us some insights into how we may design future experiments to further investigate these events."

Source: DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

A window into Europa's ocean lies right at the surface

 

If you could lick the surface of Jupiter's icy moon Europa, you would actually be sampling a bit of the ocean beneath. So says Mike Brown, an astronomer at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech). Brown -- known as the Pluto killer for discovering a Kuiper-belt object that led to the demotion of Pluto from planetary status -- and Kevin Hand from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) have found the strongest evidence yet that salty water from the vast liquid ocean beneath Europa's frozen exterior actually makes its way to the surface. The finding, based on some of the first data of its kind since NASA's Galileo mission (1989-2003) to study Jupiter and its moons, suggests that there is a chemical exchange between the ocean and surface, making the ocean a richer chemical environment, and implies that learning more about the ocean could be as simple as analyzing the moon's surface. The work is described in a paper that has been accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal.
"We now have evidence that Europa's ocean is not isolated -- that the ocean and the surface talk to each other and exchange chemicals," says Brown, the Richard and Barbara Rosenberg Professor and professor of planetary astronomy at Caltech. "That means that energy might be going into the ocean, which is important in terms of the possibilities for life there. It also means that if you'd like to know what's in the ocean, you can just go to the surface and scrape some off."
"The surface ice is providing us a window into that potentially habitable ocean below," says Hand, deputy chief scientist for solar system exploration at JPL.
Since the days of the Galileo mission, when the spacecraft showed that Europa was covered with an icy shell, scientists have debated the composition of Europa's surface. The infrared spectrometer aboard Galileo was not capable of providing the detail needed to definitively identify some of the materials present on the surface. Now, using current technology on ground-based telescopes, Brown and Hand have identified a spectroscopic feature on Europa's surface that indicates the presence of a magnesium sulfate salt, a mineral called epsomite, that could only originate from the ocean below.
"Magnesium should not be on the surface of Europa unless it's coming from the ocean," Brown says. "So that means ocean water gets onto the surface, and stuff on the surface presumably gets into the ocean water."
Europa's ocean is thought to be 100 kilometers deep and covers the entire globe. The moon remains locked in relation to Jupiter, with the same hemisphere always leading and the other trailing in its orbit. The leading hemisphere has a yellowish appearance, while the trailing hemisphere seems to be splattered and streaked with a red material.
The spectroscopic data from that red side has been a cause of scientific debate for 15 years. It is thought that one of Jupiter's largest moons, Io, spews volcanic sulfur from its atmosphere, and Jupiter's strong magnetic field sends some of that sulfur hurtling toward the trailing hemisphere of Europa, where it sticks. It is also clear from Galileo's data that there is something other than pure water ice on the trailing hemisphere's surface. The debate has focused on what that other something is -- i.e., what has caused the spectroscopic data to deviate from the signature of pure water ice.
"From Galileo's spectra, people knew something was there besides water. They argued for years over what it might be -- sodium sulfate, hydrogen sulfate, sodium hydrogen carbonate, all these things that look more or less similar in this range of the spectrum," says Brown. "But the really difficult thing was that the spectrometer on the Galileo spacecraft was just too coarse."
Brown and Hand decided that the latest spectrometers on ground-based telescopes could improve the data pertaining to Europa, even from a distance of about 400 million miles. Using the Keck II telescope on Mauna Kea -- which is outfitted with adaptive optics to adjust for the blurring effect of Earth's atmosphere -- and its OH-Suppressing Infrared Integral Field Spectrograph (OSIRIS), they first mapped the distribution of pure water ice versus anything else on the moon. The spectra showed that even Europa's leading hemisphere contains significant amounts of nonwater ice. Then, at low latitudes on the trailing hemisphere -- the area with the greatest concentration of the nonwater ice material -- they found a tiny dip in the spectrum that had never been detected before.
"We now have the best spectrum of this thing in the world," Brown says. "Nobody knew there was this little dip in the spectrum because no one had the resolution to zoom in on it before."
The two researchers racked their brains to come up with materials that might explain the new spectroscopic feature, and then tested everything from sodium chloride to Drano in Hand's lab at JPL, where he tries to simulate the environments found on various icy worlds. "We tried to think outside the box to consider all sorts of other possibilities, but at the end of the day, the magnesium sulfate persisted," Hand says.
Some scientists had long suspected that magnesium sulfate was on the surface of Europa. But, Brown says, "the interesting twist is that it doesn't look like the magnesium sulfate is coming from the ocean." Since the mineral he and Hand found is only on the trailing side, where the moon is being bombarded with sulfur from Io, they believe that there is a magnesium-bearing mineral everywhere on Europa that produces magnesium sulfate in combination with sulfur. The pervasive magnesium-bearing mineral might also be what makes up the nonwater ice detected on the leading hemisphere's surface.
Brown and Hand believe that this mystery magnesium-bearing mineral is magnesium chloride. But magnesium is not the only unexpected element on the surface of Europa. Fifteen years ago, Brown showed that Europa is surrounded by an atmosphere of atomic sodium and potassium, presumably originating from the surface. The researchers reason that the sodium and potassium chlorides are actually the dominant salts on the surface of Europa, but that they are not detectable because they have no clear spectral features.
The scientists combined this information with the fact that Europa's ocean can only be one of two types -- either sulfate-rich or chlorine-rich. Having ruled out the sulfate-rich version since magnesium sulfate was found only on the trailing side, Brown and Hand hypothesize that the ocean is chlorine-rich and that the sodium and potassium must be present as chlorides.
Therefore, Brown says, they believe the composition of Europa's sea closely resembles the salty ocean of Earth. "If you could go swim down in the ocean of Europa and taste it, it would just taste like normal old salt," he says.
Hand emphasizes that, from an astrobiology standpoint, Europa is considered a premier target in the search for life beyond Earth; a NASA-funded study team led by JPL and the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory have been working with the scientific community to identify options to explore Europa further. "If we've learned anything about life on Earth, it's that where there's liquid water, there's generally life," Hand says. "And of course our ocean is a nice salty ocean. Perhaps Europa's salty ocean is also a wonderful place for life."
The Astronomical Journal paper is titled "Salts and radiation products on the surface of Europa." The work was supported, in part, by the NASA Astrobiology Institute through the Astrobiology of Icy Worlds node at JPL.

Source: California Institute of Technology

PlayStation 4 Release Date November 2013 (Rumour)

 

A new report this week is suggesting that Sony’s new Playstation 4 release date could be as early as November 2013 in the US, and that the new PlayStation 4 games console will ship with similar services to that of Microsoft’s Xbox Live.
A source close to the development of the new Sony PlayStation 4 games console has revealed to the Kotaku games websites, that two PlayStation 4 models are planned, and that the PlayStation 4 release date is expected to be confirmed very soon.

Sony is rumoured to be adding a number of features to their new PlayStation 4 that will enable gamers to control the PS4 remotely from tablets and smartphones. Together with PlayStation 4 online services that are expected to be called PlayStation World, and will require a premium subscription to use.
The Source close to the PlayStation 4 development also revealed that every PlayStation 4 will come with PlayStation Eye. A new spectating feature will let you watch other friends play games from your the PS4 console’s dashboard, even if you don’t own a copy of the game they are playing yourself.
Earlier this month we also featured an older prototype for the new PlayStation 4 controller which features a small touchpad in the centre  and a new multi-user feature that will allow multiple gamers to login to a single PlayStation 4 console at the same time.
Sony is expected to announce the official PlayStation 4 release date later today at 6pm EST or 11pm GMT, in their press conference  in New York where the company is expected to reveal something big!!
Facts and figures are very limited at the moment as you can imagine but the pricing for the new PlayStation 4 is expected to be announced by Sony at this years E3 games event. As more information about the official PlayStation 4 release date is revealed by Sony we will keep you updated as always.
Source: Kotaku

Portable Raspberry Pi

 

We have featured a number of amazing creations using the $35 Raspberry Pi mini PC, but this new portable version of the Raspberry Pi, using a low cost LCD TFT display, and 12v power supply, pushes the boundaries once again.
The new Portable Raspberry Pi has been created by SK Pang Electronics and features a QWERTY keyboard complete with touchpad and it owns portable power pack, which has all been mounted on to a transparent base with a carrying handle.

Its creator explains how he supplies the correct power supply to the LCD display: “The monitor requires a 12v input but the battery pack only gives out 5v. Inside the monitor there is a 5v regulator. This need to be by bypass and connect straight to the 5v line. The red supply wire is removed from the plug and soldered directly onto the 5v line.”

Source: Geek : SK Pang Electronics

iPhone Prototype From Early 2005 Unveiled With 5 x 7 Inch Screen

 

Photographs of a very early iPhone prototype have been unveiled this week by the Ars Technica website, showing what was used to develop the iconic Apple smartphone back in 2005.
The images of the early iPhone prototype were provided by a former Apple employee, who when working at Apple was involved with a number of Apple hardware projects in the early 2000′s.

Ars Technica website explains: “That’s why we were excited to receive photos showing an in-house version of the iPhone from early 2005. The images to Ars through a former Apple employee who worked on various Apple hardware projects in the early 2000s and was thus exposed to some of the earliest versions of the iPhone. (He declined to be named out of concern for retribution from Apple.)”
The former Apple employee and Ars Technica source explained:
“The early prototype is also quite large—about 5″×7″ and roughly two inches thick. “Seems large now,”-”From the looks of the logic board photos, Apple had a decent idea in 2005 of where the iPhone would end up, even if the final product became much more integrated.”
For more information on the iPhone prototype jump over to the Ars Technica website for details.

Source: Ars Technica

Google Glasses Now Available To Pre-order For $1500, If You Are Chosen

As well as releasing a new video for their Google Glasses earlier today, Google have also now opened another round of pre-orders for their Google Glasses which will cost you $1500, if you are one of the lucky chosen few.
Last year when Google unveiled their new Google Glasses eyewear, they offered developers a limited number of units for the same price. Today Google has once again opened up pre-orders for their Google Glasses.

Google has a limited stock of 8,000 Google Glasses available in this pre-order round, and the application process includes a small task to complete. To be eleigable for a pair of Google Glasses simply tell Google via Google+ or Twitter “ what you’d do with your Glass in 50 words or less”. You can include up to 5 photos or images and a short video (15 secs max) if you would like to the hashtag #ifihadglass . Google explains:
“We’re looking for bold, creative individuals who want to join us and be a part of shaping the future of Glass. We’d love to make everyone an Explorer, but we’re starting off a bit smaller. We’re still in the early stages, and while we can’t promise everything will be perfect, we can promise it will be exciting”
For more information on getting your hands on a pair of Google Glasses jump over to the Google website. Good Luck!! deadline for applications is February 27th 2013. You can also view a video of promotional video of Google Glasses here.
“If you are chosen, we will reach out to you with an invitation to become a Glass Explorer (please remember to follow us so that we can contact you directly). Explorers will each need to pre-order a Glass Explorer Edition for $1500 plus tax and attend a special pick-up experience, in person, in New York, San Francisco or Los Angeles.”
Source: Google