[tt] KurzweilAI.net Daily Newsletter

Tue Apr 22 14:18:16 UTC 2008

KURZWEILAI.NET NEWSLETTER

NEWS
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Bionic eye 'blindness cure hope'
BBC News April 21, 2008
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A "bionic eye" developed by Second
Sight may hold the key to returning
sight to people left blind by a
hereditary disease. The Argus II
device works via a camera that
transmits a wireless signal to an
ultra-thin electronic receiver and
electrode panel that are implanted
in the eye and attached to the
retina....
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8493&m=40924

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Researchers Create Self-Healing
Computer Systems for Spacecraft
PhysOrg.com April 21, 2008
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University of Arizona researchers
are working on hybrid
hardware/software systems that one
day might use machine intelligence
to allow spacecraft to heal
themselves. They are using Field
Programmable Gate Arrays to build
these self-healing systems. FPGAs
combine software and hardware to
produce flexible systems that can be
reconfigured at the...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8492&m=40924

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The Body in Depth
New York Times April 22, 2008
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The classic 25-volume "Stereoscopic
Atlas of Human Anatomy" will soon be
made available online by Stanford
University's school of medicine and
eHuman, a company in Silicon Valley.
Eventually, it will be possible to
see the images online in...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8491&m=40924

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Laptops as Earthquake Sensors
Technology Review April 22, 2008
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Earthquake researchers in
California hope to take advantage of
the motion sensors in laptops to
create an earthquake-sensing
network. The Quake Catcher Network
(QCN) is in the beta testing stage,
with links to several hundred
laptops. The network's software will
analyze shakes sensed by a
computer's accelerometer and report
only big movements...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8490&m=40924

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Science 2.0 -- Is Open Access
Science the Future?
ScientificAmerican.com April 21, 2008
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A small but growing number of
researchers have begun to carry out
their work via the wide-open tools
of Web 2.0. Their experiences to
date suggest that this kind of
Web-based "Science 2.0" is
considerably more productive. The
real significance is the
technologies' potential to move
researchers away from an obsessive
focus on priority and...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8489&m=40924

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Rearming America
Slate April 18, 2008
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The Department of Defense has
announced the creation of the Armed
Forces Institute of Regenerative
Medicine (AFIRM). AFIRM will harness
stem cell research and technology to
reconstruct new skin, muscles and
tendons, and even ears, noses and
fingers. The government is budgeting
$250 million in public and private
money for the project's first...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8488&m=40924

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Rescue robots compete to save dolls
in distress
NewScientistTech April 21, 2008
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Robots in this year's RoboCup
Rescue competition in China this
July must navigate a complex
three-dimensional maze, using their
sensing and mapping abilities to
sniff out toy dolls that either emit
CO2, give off heat, make noise, or
move. The competition aims to
stimulate development of robots to
help humans in dangerous situations,
like...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8487&m=40924

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Stephen Hawking calls for Moon and
Mars colonies
NewScientistSpace April 21, 2008
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Stephen Hawking has called for a
massive investment in establishing
colonies on the Moon and Mars,
arguing that the world should devote
about 10 times as much as NASA's
current budget -- or 0.25% of the
world's financial resources -- to
space. "A goal of a base on the Moon
by 2020 and of a manned landing on
Mars by 2025 would reignite the
space...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8486&m=40924

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Stomach-proof gel hints at jab-free
diabetes treatment
New Scientist news service April 22, 2008
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University of Texas at Austin
researchers have developed a gel
that can smuggle insulin past the
stomach and slowly release the drug
into the blood, doing away with
diabetics' daily injections. The
team created a new water-based gel
using nanoparticles of two polymers.
When formed into particles around
100 nanometers across and combined
with...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8485&m=40924

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Skype Launches Low-Cost Global
Calling Plans
InformationWeek April 21, 2008
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Skpype on Monday launched an
aggressive $9.95-a-month
international calling plan for U.S.
customers that includes landlines
and some cell-phone calls to 34
countries....
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8484&m=40924

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U.S. Food Rationing? Urgent Global
Shortage Hits
LiveScience April 21st, 2008
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The global food shortage, already
at crisis stage in many countries,
seems poised to hit home. Major
retailers in New York, in areas of
New England, and on the West Coast
are reportedly limiting purchases of
flour, rice, and cooking oil, and
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
warned Monday that the world must
urgently increase food production....
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8483&m=40924

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Pay Attention! Brain Scanners
Detect Slip-Ups Before You Do
Wired April 21, 2008
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University of Bergen researchers
have used fMRI machines to record
neurological patterns preceding
careless errors. Researchers
observed test subjects' minds going
on autopilot up to half a minute
before the subjects actually made
mistakes, even though the subjects
weren't aware of their own lapses of
attention. They hope to correlate
the...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8482&m=40924

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Researchers detail chemotherapy's
damage to the brain
KurzweilAI.net April 22, 2008
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Researchers at University of
Rochester Medical Center and Harvard
Medical School have found a widely
used chemotherapy drug,
5-fluorouracil (5-FU), causes
healthy brain cells to die off long
after treatment has ended and may be
an underlying biological cause of
the cognitive side effects ("chemo
brain") that many cancer patients
experience....
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8481&m=40924

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Vitamin D deficiency may be linked
to brain dysfunction
KurzweilAI.net April 22, 2008
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Scientists at Children's Hospital &
Research Center at Oakland have
found evidence for vitamin D's
involvement in brain function,
warranting vitamin D supplementation
for groups chronically low in
vitamin D, particularly nursing
infants, the elderly, and African
Americans. The evidence includes
wide distribution of vitamin D
receptors...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8480&m=40924

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PETA's Latest Tactic: $1 Million
for Fake Meat
New York Times April 21, 2008
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People for the Ethical Treatment of
Animals (PETA) has announced a $1
million prize for the first person
to produce and bring to market
in-vitro (tissue-culture) meat, if
done by 2012. Scientists have been
developing technologies to grow
tissue cultures that could be
consumed like meat, avoiding the
expense of land or feed and the
disease...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8479&m=40924

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Sleep Deprivation for Germs
ScienceNOW Daily News April 21, 2008
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Hebrew University in Jerusalem
researchers have found a method to
awaken bacteria that are in a
dormant state that could improve the
effectiveness of antibiotics. Most
antibiotics kill only microbes that
are growing and multiplying, leaving
dormant bacteria untouched. The
researchers gave fresh nutrients to
a set of stationary (low or no...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8478&m=40924

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Superhumans Possible Via Designer
Cloning
LiveScience April 14, 2008
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A recently developed technique that
might eventually produce facsimiles
of human embryonic stem cells from
skin cells opens a whole new can of
worms--the possibility of creating
chimera humans, Robert Lanza, chief
scientific officer of Advanced Cell
Technology, says. "If we had a few
skin cells from Albert Einstein, or
anyone else in the...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=8477&m=40924

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