Apple Wins Patent for Glasses-Free 3-D TV

Kit Eaton – 3-D TV–a fad or the future? Apple’s vote is for “future”. The company’s just won a patent on a glasses-free 3-D TV system that’s so advanced it sounds like sci-fi. And not necessarily in a good way.

Apple applied for this patent back in 2006, but unlike much of the patent speculation that surrounds one of the world’s most successful (and most sued) companies, this one has just been granted by the USPTO.

Forget some of the clunky implementations of 3-D tech — the ones which require you to either wear glasses or sit in one of several sweet viewing spots. Apple’s system relies upon a combined projector/screen/camera system to create its glasses-free imagery. Two separate images are beamed onto the textured pixels of a special screen, one for each eye of the viewer. The 3-D image can then be reconstructed, autostereographically, in the viewer’s brain with no need for glasses.

But Apple’s system uses a camera to detect the facial position of viewers, and a dynamic projection system that’s capable of beaming different images at the right angle so that each viewer receives a different 3-D effect. The result, according to Apple, is a “realistic holographic” visual experience, and also allows for 3-D “user input” via the camera–perhaps akin to MS’s Kinect. …

via Apple Wins Patent for Glasses-Free 3-D TV | Fast Company.

E.T. found? Rumors swirl

Artist conception – ARSENIC LIFE-FORM
Researchers have hypothesized that in alien organisms arsenic could successfully fill the biochemical role that phosphorus plays for known life-forms. Arsenic is poisonous to us because it mimics phosphorus so well; similarly, phosphorus would be poisonous to an arsenic-based organism.

John Roach writes:Rumors and speculation are swirling on the Internet about the subject of a news conference to be carried live at 2 p.m. ET Thursday on NASA TV “to discuss an astrobiology finding that will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life. …

Among those speakers is Felisa Wolfe-Simon, a researcher at the U.S. Geological Survey who says she’s concentrating on “arsenic biogeochemistry, cyanobacteria, novel uses for as yet undescribed metalloenzymes and of course, arsenic-based life!” …

Blogger Jason Kottke put all those pieces together and speculated that Thursday’s announcement would be about the discovery of life on Saturn’s moon Titan. But that suggestion was shot down as false in a Twitter post from The Atlantic Monthly’s senior editor and science blogger Alexis Madrigal.

Will the secret survive until Thursday? Back in August, NASA let information slip out an hour before the embargo lifted on a report in the journal Science about the discovery of two giant planets in constantly changing orbits. In that instance, NASA made its news release and other information about the discovery publicly available. Going even further back, to 1996, there’s the famous case of the Mars meteorite study that leaked out in advance of publication in Science.

What do you think has been found? …

via Cosmic Log – E.T. found? (False) rumors swirl.

Groups Vow to Fight Gov’t Takedowns of Websites

The Electronic Frontier Foundation and the operator of Torrent-finder.com have separately vowed to fight domain-name seizures by two U.S. agencies in recent days.

The U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced Monday that they have obtained court orders to seize the domain names and shut down 82 websites suspected of trafficking in copyright-infringing materials, including music, movies, sunglasses and handbags.

But representatives of the EFF and the Center for Democracy and Technology, two digital rights groups, questioned whether the domain-name seizures are legal. In some cases, the sites shut down had discussion forums that should enjoy free-speech protections under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, said Peter Eckersley, an EFF staff attorney.

Some of the websites had “huge amounts of user commentary, virtually millions of posts worth of discussion,” Eckersley said. “We’ll be looking into that and seeing whether there are any legal steps that can be taken to help these websites.”

One such site taken down was Torrent-finder.com, a search engine for BitTorrent files operating since 2005. Operator Waleed GadElKareem of Alexandria, Egypt, promised to fight the domain-name seizure, even though he had his website operating at Torrent-finder.info on Monday.

“My domain was seized without any previous complaint or court notice to me or to the domain registrar GoDaddy,” he wrote in an e-mail. “I still have my server running in USA with a new domain … because they are 100 percent sure I am not doing anything wrong.”

GadElKareem questioned the legality of the DOJ and ICE shutting down a search engine. “I only open other search engines in iframes, so I do not host or link to any illegal contents,” he said. “These actions are not responsible or legal.” …

via Groups Vow to Fight Gov’t Takedowns of Websites – PCWorld Business Center.

Microsoft files tactile touch screen patent

Microsoft has filed a patent application covering a technique for creating a tactile touch screen that changes its shape to make a textured surface, circumventing the need for a traditional keyboard.

The system relies on tiny pixel-shaped plastic cells that protrude from the screen’s surface when cued by different wavelengths of ultra violet light directed from below the screen. The wavelengths turn on and off as the user touches the screen’s surface and light is reflected off the fingers to sensors below.

While other attempts at tactile screens give only the illusion of texture, Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft’s approach is to create real texture, according to New Scientist, which reported on Monday the company’s patent application.

The system would allow users to type on a screen without looking and could also help those with limited vision to feel braille.

The innovation is designed for Microsoft’s table-sized computing display called the Surface, which is used in schools and businesses, but the potential exists for it to be transferred to mobile devices such as phones and tablets. …

via CBC News – Technology & Science – Microsoft files tactile touch screen patent.

UFO Hacker Wikileaked

While governments around the world have been busily condemning the latest round of document releases by Wikileaks, there have been other facets which have escaped the news spotlight thus far. For instance, one of the leaked documents mentions the extradition case of Gary ‘UFO Hacker’ McKinnnon, and makes clear that even the Prime Minister had approached the U.S. about keeping McKinnon in England.

The leaked document dates to October 2009, and is an internal document from the U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain to Secretary of State Hilary Clinton – described as a ‘scenesetter’ for her upcoming visit to meet with then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown. The document mentions that Brown had already approached the Ambassador about the McKinnon case in August, and so was likely to bring it up again during Secretary Clinton’s visit:

– Gary McKinnon Extradition Case -

The PM will likely raise with the Secretary (as he has with the Ambassador) the extradition case of Gary McKinnon. McKinnon is a 43-year old computer hacker with Asperger’s Syndrome who is wanted for prosecution in the U.S.; he is accused of hacking into U.S. government systems in 2001 and 2002. McKinnon has gained enormous popular sympathy in his appeal against extradition; the UK’s final decision is pending. The case has also caused public criticism of the U.S.-UK extradition treaty. In August, PM Brown, in a one-on-one meeting with the Ambassador, proposed a deal: that McKinnon plead guilty, make a statement of contrition, but serve any sentence of incarceration in the UK. Brown cited deep public concern that McKinnon, with his medical condition, would commit suicide or suffer injury in imprisoned in a U.S. facility. …

via UFO Hacker Wikileaked | TDG – Science, Magick, Myth and History.

Cell Phones May Recall Your Memories Thanks to NFC

The promise of using your phone as a digital wallet, thanks to small wireless chips called RFID tags, has grabbed the attention of the entire payment-processing industry. The premise is simple: Wave your RFID-equipped phone near a payment terminal to complete a financial transaction. In practice, the logistics of near-field communications (NFC) are still being worked out, with different standards and methods. But XtremeSignPost, a biotechnology firm in Davis, Calif., is betting that wireless mobile commerce will take root. …

interesting tidbit from the press release: “XtremeSignPost links memories in the form of videos, photos, and audio files to RFID-tagged products.”

Linked memories sounds far-fetched and futuristic, but the concept isn’t beyond the realm of possibility, if you equate memories with user-generated content such as images and videos captured with a mobile phone. XtremeSignPost calls this the “Internet of Experiences.” Take the example of a video recorded during a fishing trip in Fiji: By associating the visual “memory” with an RFID-tagged fishing lure used on the excursion, a phone swipe near the lure would recall and playback the experience. … XtremeSignPost plans to leverage the technology for targeted advertising …

RFID and near-field communications technology still isn’t mainstream, but it has been gathering momentum as analysts predict mobile payments will top $633 billion by 2015. Visa began to test wireless payment solutions in August, and wireless carriers in the U.S. are banding together to create their own mobile commerce system called ISIS.

via Cell Phones May Recall Your Memories Thanks to NFC: Tech News «.

Dark Jupiter May Haunt Edge of Solar System

Lisa Grossman – A century of comet data suggests a dark, Jupiter-sized object is lurking at the solar system’s outer edge and hurling chunks of ice and dust toward Earth.

“We’ve accumulated 10 years’ more data, double the comets we viewed to test this hypothesis,” said planetary scientist John Matese of the University of Louisiana. “Only now should we be able to falsify or verify that you could have a Jupiter-mass object out there.”

In 1999, Matese and colleague Daniel Whitmire suggested the sun has a hidden companion that boots icy bodies from the Oort Cloud, a spherical haze of comets at the solar system’s fringes, into the inner solar system where we can see them.

In a new analysis of observations dating back to 1898, Matese and Whitmire confirm their original idea: About 20 percent of the comets visible from Earth were sent by a dark, distant planet.

This idea was a reaction to an earlier notion that a dim brown-dwarf or red-dwarf star, ominously dubbed Nemesis, has pummeled the Earth with deadly comet showers every 30 million years or so. Later research suggested that mass extinctions on Earth don’t line up with the Nemesis predictions, so many astronomers now think that object doesn’t exist.

“But we began to ask, what kind of an object could you hope to infer from the present data that we are seeing?” Matese said. “What could possibly tickle [comets'] orbits and make them come very close to the sun so we could see them?”

Rather than a malevolent death star, a smaller and more benign companion called Tyche (Nemesis’ good sister in Greek mythology) could send comets streaming from the Oort Cloud toward Earth.

… After examining the orbits of more than 100 comets in the Minor Planet Center database, the researchers concluded that 80 percent of comets born in the Oort Cloud were pushed out by the galaxy’s gravity. The remaining 20 percent, however, needed a nudge from a distant object about 1.4 times the mass of Jupiter. …

via Dark Jupiter May Haunt Edge of Solar System | Wired Science | Wired.com.

Study: Vikings May Have Taken a Native American to Iceland

Lisa Abend – Pity poor Leif Ericsson. The Viking explorer may well have been the first European to reach the Americas, but it is a certain Genoan sailor who gets all the glory. Thanks to evidence that has until now consisted only of bare archeological remains and a bunch of Icelandic legends, Ericsson has long been treated as a footnote in American history: no holiday, no state capitals named after him, no little ditty to remind you of the date of his voyage. But a group of Icelandic and Spanish scientists studying one mysterious genetic sequence — and one woman who’s been dead 1,000 years — may soon change that.

Ten years ago, Agnar Helgason, a scientist at Iceland’s deCODE Genetics, began investigating the origin of the Icelandic population. Most of the people he tested carried genetic links to either Scandinavians or people from the British Isles. But a small group of Icelanders — roughly 350 in total — carried a lineage known as C1, usually seen only in Asians and Native Americans. “We figured it was a recent arrival from Asia,” says Helgason. “But we discovered a much deeper story than we expected.”

Helgason’s graduate student, Sigridur Sunna Ebenesersdottir, found that she could trace the matrilineal sequence to a date far earlier than when the first Asians began arriving in Iceland. In fact, she found that all the people who carry the C1 lineage are descendants of one of four women alive around the year 1700. In all likelihood, those four descended from a single woman. And because archeological remains in what is Canada today suggest that the Vikings were in the Americas around the year 1000 before retreating into a period of global isolation, the best explanation for that errant lineage lies with an American Indian woman: one who was taken back to Iceland some 500 years before Columbus set sail for the New World in 1492.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2033038,00.html#ixzz16k9I1xrE …

 

Study suggests that being too clean can make people sick

… Young people who are overexposed to antibacterial soaps containing triclosan may suffer more allergies, and exposure to higher levels of Bisphenol A among adults may negatively influence the immune system, a new University of Michigan School of Public Health study suggests.Triclosan is a chemical compound widely used in products such as antibacterial soaps, toothpaste, pens, diaper bags and medical devices. Bisphenol A BPA is found in many plastics and, for example, as a protective lining in food cans.

Both of these chemicals are in a class of environmental toxicants called endocrine-disrupting compounds EDCs, which are believed to negatively impact human health by mimicking or affecting hormones.Using data from the 2003-2006 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, U-M researchers compared urinary BPA and triclosan with cytomegalovirus CMV antibody levels and diagnosis of allergies or hay fever in a sample of U.S. adults and children over age 6. Allergy and hay fever diagnosis and CMV antibodies were used as two separate markers of immune alterations. …

“We found that people over age 18 with higher levels of BPA exposure had higher CMV antibody levels, which suggests their cell-mediated immune system may not be functioning properly,” said Erin Rees Clayton, research investigator at the U-M School of Public Health and first author on the paper.

Researchers also found that people age 18 and under with higher levels of triclosan were more likely to report diagnosis of allergies and hay fever.

There is growing concern among the scientific community and consumer groups that these EDCs are dangerous to humans at lower levels than previously thought.

“The triclosan findings in the younger age groups may support the ‘hygiene hypothesis,’ which maintains living in very clean and hygienic environments may impact our exposure to micro-organisms that are beneficial for development of the immune system,” said Allison Aiello, associate professor at the U-M School of Public Health and principal investigator on the study. …

via Study suggests that being too clean can make people sick.

Mystery boom still confounding officials

A tremendous boom that shattered the quiet of a Friday night in rural west Georgia continues to defy explanation.

Residents of Carroll, Douglas and Haralson counties heard it, and officials in all three counties tried to find what caused it.

They’re still trying.

Douglas County Communication Director Wes Tallon said “911 calls lit up” the switchboard after the 9:45 p.m. noise rattled windows across a large area of west Georgia.

“There was no catastrophe, we know that,” Tallon told the AJC Saturday morning.

Tallon, who lives in East Douglas, did not hear the blast. But plenty of people in the western area of the county, and in Carroll and Haralson counties farther to the west, did hear it.

Villa Rica authorities dispatched several police and fire units to the Mirror Lake subdivision when the sound was first reported, but they found no damage or even smoke.

“People all over the city heard the boom, but we couldn’t find anything,” a police department receptionist said late Friday.

The National Weather Service in Peachtree City had no natural explanation for it. And there were no obvious signs of damage on the ground.

An amateur astronomer who has published several books about sky-watching said one could probably rule out a natural phenomenon such as a meteorite.

“A really big meteor can make a sonic boom, but if it did it would make a big flash of light,” …

Bergen checked with radar installations in the area at the request of the AJC and confirmed that there were no logs of military flights around the time of the boom Friday night. And there shouldn’t have been, anyway. …

via Mystery boom still confounding officials  | ajc.com.