At least 15,000 years ago, a single language started to break up. It broke into about seven different languages and, over the next 5,000 years, splintered into thousands more. Those languages became what's spoken by billions throughout Europe and Asia.

The seven languages are part of a "superfamily" of Eurasiatic languages, the Guardian reports, a long-debated theory on the history of human speech. It's tough to definitively trace back words when about half of words are replaced by completely different words every 2,000 to 4,000 years, but the British team advancing the super-languages theory has already shown in another study that certain words stay the same for tens of thousands of years longer. Using a computer model to search for words that only changed very, very rarely, the team determined which modern words likely sounded similar to the same words in ancient languages, then checked their results against a list of words reconstructed by linguists. That pointed them to a split from a common language at about 15,000 years ago.

Also interesting are some of the "ultraconserved" words that seldom changed throughout history: Frequently used words like "I" and "we" understandably have a long history but also, inexplicably, the verb "to spit." Apparently spitting is essential to our development as humans.

[Guardian]

With enough money and enough might, humans could probably get to Mars in the next couple of decades. It's a proposition made all the more relevant by the continuing findings of the rovers Opportunity and Curiosity. It would be a mammoth undertaking, but it's possible, at least in concept. But should humans go, and should we stay? Will we? Buzz Aldrin thinks so.

Aldrin releases a new book today, "Mission to Mars," in which he argues a future U.S. president should commit by 2019 to sending humans to Mars, and not returning them safely to Earth. It will take a brave leader to suggest something like this, but brave leaders have sparked space exploration before, he says.

His plan centers around something called a Mars Cycler, which Aldrin first conceived of nearly 30 years ago. It would create a "celestial triad of worlds," hubs for the ebb and flow of passengers, cargo and commerce among Earth, the moon and Mars. The ships would be new designs--he says he's "incensed" that most current space exploration prototypes look like Apollo--and he doesn't want them to use solid rocket motors, a "technology that keeps popping up out of the casket."

"Let's take a page from commercial airliners and ratchet ourselves up from the disposable Dixie-cup model," he writes.

The Cycler would need several steps to get off the ground. First, the project would include a practice run on the big island of Hawaii. A habitat module or some other system component would be remotely delivered by some robotic technology, probably controlled by a satellite or via radio link from Houston. Secondary components would have to be air-dropped together, with extreme precision. Then things get real. The first off-planet element would be a control center or habitation module, delivered to the L2 Earth-moon gravity-balancing point. That, in turn, would become a place from which controllers would manage the remote landing of the first moon habitat. Eventually, all this practice would lead to a remotely controlled delivery of the first stages of a Mars base.

"If we persevere on this path, we can reach out some 200 million miles to Mars before 2035--66 years after Neil Armstrong and I flew the quarter-million miles through the blackness of space to touch down onto Tranquillity Base," Aldrin writes. "There's a historical milestone in the fact that our Apollo 11 landing on the moon took place a mere 66 years after the Wright Brothers' first flight."

I was intrigued, so I decided to ask to him about this. It turned out Buzz was eager to talk. As I quickly realized, conversations with Buzz are not necessarily back-and-forth. When he's excited about something, he's going to tell you about it, tangents and all. I wanted to ask if I could yell at the moon with him, but we didn't get that far before his people pulled him offline for another interview.

PopularScience.com: Why would you want humans to stay on Mars permanently?

Buzz Aldrin: The uniqueness of that has yet to be fully reached. We bring people back. But the purpose of going to Mars is for humans to first begin to occupy, permanently, another planet in the solar system. The astronauts or pilgrims, whatever you might call them, are going to be very historically unique human beings. And the leader of an Earth organization who makes a commitment to history--of humans living on Earth, to begin permanent settlement/occupation of not the moon, but of another planet--this leader will have a legacy for history that will supersede Columbus, Genghis Khan or almost any recognized leader. I guess religiously, that might include Jesus Christ and Mohammed and Abraham and David. They are obviously going to be remembered for their contribution to human history.

This will probably take two decades from commitment, and result in the non-return of humans from the surface of Mars. They would occupy a permanent Mars base, built previously from a moon of Mars, and my favorite selection is the inner moon, Phobos. Over a period of three different visits to the moon Phobos, the Mars base will be assembled remotely, from sequentially-landed large elements, habitats and whatever else, that are to become the permanent base.

How would the Mars Cycler get people to Mars?


Aldrin: I was motivated to improve the U.S. strategy of going back to the moon in 1985. That's a long time ago. Going back to the moon would be a great achievement for tourism adventure flights. But it resulted in the Aldrin Cycler, which was published in ‘86. It included cycling spacecraft between Earth and Mars, back and forth. It was really the first major disclosure of a new strategy of transportation for permanent transportation economics, of delivering human beings from the Earth to Mars.

The cycler consists of two mated together, side-by-side connected, interplanetary spacecraft. It's the very basic component of future projections by my USV, unified space vision, which is my personal-experience replacement for President Bush's vision for space exploration.

I tried to change the name of the book, but it was just too late to add an "s," so it would be "Missions to Mars," not "Mission." My plan for the future is unique in a sense, because it implies human permanence at Mars. Humans transported to the surface of Mars by cycling spacecraft. It's kind of complex, but every other synodic period, a cycler delivers to Mars. That means you would need two cyclers, one for the first, third, fifth, ninth odd number of 26-month opportunities, and the other cycler, for 2, 4, 6 even-numbered synodic periods. It's a major improvement on the Aldrin Cycler, that was first discovered/invented/worked out, but not patented, in 1985.

What's your Unified Space Vision?

Aldrin: It unifies five elements of space policy: 1) exploration; 2) science; 3) development; 4) commercial; and 5) security. Many, many people have verified that that is national space policy, those five items. We unite those five elements strategically by comparing and integrating our five elements of space policy with every other country internationally. Like ESA, JAXA, China, India, Germany--all of those space policies of other internationals are essential to be integrated into my unified space vision, because of the moon. At the moon, the U.S., in my opinion, needs absolutely to lead an international lunar base. This discourages commercial human landings on the moon by government subsidy. Let's not have the taxpayers paying for a big rocket, a lunar landing, so that commercial human beings from the U.S. can dig up and mine and occupy the international lunar base.

In the book you mention that your nickname at NASA was "Dr. Rendezvous," because your MIT doctoral thesis was about two piloted aircraft meeting in space. Is that why are you interested in this cycler concept?

Aldrin: It's ironic. My selection as an astronaut was unique because I had not been trained as a test pilot. So my application, along with Ed White, my very close friend who graduated West Point and was killed in the Apollo [1] fire, he and I applied in 1962 for the second group. Ed was selected, I was not. I made it in the 1963 selection of astronauts, because of the change of not requiring test pilot training, which I had intentionally avoided. But I had written my thesis on space rendezvous at MIT, and was very motivated for the space future, in the Air Force or anywhere else.

That's some background as to why you are interviewing me after two autobiographies. In 1973, I wrote "Return to Earth," which was made into a movie in 1976. But it dealt only with mental health issues and depression. It did not include alcoholism recovery, and I now have 34 years of sobriety from alcohol. The most recent autobiography, "Magnificent Desolation," described my recovery from alcoholism.

What do you think of space tourist Dennis Tito's plan to swing around Mars and back? Is this how you envision a future Mars Cycler working?

Aldrin: Sort of. It has the essence of a gravitational swingby of Mars, to bring the spacecraft back in as short a time as possible. Those times occur in 2016 and 2018 but not again until 2031. We probably can't make 2016, but we can make 2018. That would bring the spacecraft back, if successful, just prior to the 50th anniversary of the first lunar landing.

Does the cycler plan borrow a page from modern airlines?

Aldrin: Absolutely. Airlines, private industry, followed the government system of airplanes to deliver the mail. The government system to deliver the mail from one city to another, and then reuse the airplane. It led obviously to transporting not just mail, or cargo, but the private delivery of human beings between city and city and back.

Now there is the commercial potential of transportation of human beings from the surface of the Earth, to Earth orbit and potentially to swing by the moon, and back to Earth. Or to swing by Mars and return to Earth, and be the delivery system of us, or international human beings, from Earth to Mars. Then we're not expending the vast resources that would be needed to bring people back from Mars.

How should we get started? What's the most important aspect?

Aldrin: The first element, before the retirement of space shuttle, was supposed to be to deliver a test bed to the space station. Long-duration life support systems, separate from the station but connected. The second element would be a prototype of an interplanetary habitation module, delivered to the space station, which could become a safe haven for astronauts at the station to abandon a disabled space station, separate in this hab module, and be returned to Earth. The third, fourth and fifth iteration is further testing of the interplanetary space vehicle, referred to in my book, in low-Earth orbit, to the moon, in cycling orbits, to L2 and L1, and to lunar surface as the first element of the international lunar base. That would be to test radiation, systems, etc to support other nations' human beings on the surface of the moon.

July 2019 would be the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing. It would be the ideal time, in my estimation, for the president elected in 2016 and 2020, from whichever party, to gain the legacy of the two-decade commitment to permanence of human beings on the planet Mars. That is the essence of Buzz Aldrin's Unified Space Vision. It's a very unique and beautiful opportunity for U.S. leadership.

Hey, kids! The U.S. Food and Drug Administration wants you to know that it doesn't recommend tanning beds to those of you under 18. And it'd like to require tanning lamp manufacturers to carry that warning, although it won't legally prohibit minors from tanning.

The agency is publishing a proposal on Thursday (until then, you can find a pre-publication version at the link) with a few new rules it wants for tanning lamps. Other changes include reclassifying the lamps as moderate risk devices, instead of low-risk devices, and requiring manufacturers to submit performance tests to the FDA.

The FDA's number-one concern about the lamps is melanoma, the rarest, but deadliest, of the three types of skin cancer. The American Academy of Dermatology, which supports the FDA action, has found that those who tan indoors have a 75 percent increased risk for getting melanoma. The average person has a 2 percent risk of developing melanoma over a lifetime.

Check out this, this and this for some of the studies that have linked tanning-bed use with increased melanoma risk. That last study, conducted in 1,083 people in Australia, found that melanoma risk increases with just one tanning bed session, and it increases with every use. Studies have also found that people who used tanning lamps at younger ages versus older ages have a higher risk of melanoma.

The FDA concluded that while some tanning lamps do help users produce vitamin D, it's not clear if that's worth the risk. Supplements are a safer way to get vitamin D, the agency said. And getting a "base tan" doesn't protect much against sunburn, nor does it protect at all against premature aging and cancer.

Once the proposal is officially published on Thursday, it'll be open for public comment for 90 days.

One day in 2009, Israeli engineer Izhar Gafni sat in a quiet library designing a machine to extract seeds from pomegranates when his mind drifted to cycling, his favorite pastime. Gafni admired bikes made from sustainable bamboo, but their high cost seemed prohibitive. He wondered, Why not make them from cardboard, instead?

Over the next two years, Gafni learned to fold cardboard sheets into the strongest possible shapes; his experimentation led to robust structures resembling honeycombs and bird nests. He then spent another year crafting the material into bicycle components. "I almost felt like the Wright Brothers going into unknown territory," he says.

The product of his labor is a single-speed bicycle with spokes, rims, and a frame made from cardboard. Varnish protects the glued paper core from moisture, while old car tires serve as puncture-proof wheels. Gafni used a car's timing belt as a chain and formed plastic bottles into pedal cranks. The 28-pound prototype, called Alfa, can safely support a rider nearly 20 times its weight.

Gafni intends to mass produce four models: two 18-pound bikes for adults, assisted by optional rechargeable electric motors, and two smaller versions for children. He hopes to build each bike for less than $12 in materials and sell them for no more than $30. Through advertising plastered on each bike-or enough grant money-people in developing countries could ride them for free. Gafni can already envision fashioning his cardboard into baby strollers, wheelchairs, and even cars. "You can do almost anything with it," he says.

INVENTOR
Izhar Gafni

COMPANY
I.G. Cardboard Technologies

INVENTION
Alfa Bike

COST TO DEVELOP
$250,000

MATURITY
6/10

See the rest of the articles from our 2013 Invention Awards section here, and see all of our May issue here.

According to Japan Times, a new species of carnivorous plant has been found in Aichi Prefecture, on the central-southern coast of Japan's main island. The Japan Times calls it a "pitcher plant," which it is not; as a species related to (and mistaken for) Drosera indica, it's actually a sundew.

Sundews and pitcher plants are both carnivorous, and largely insectivorous, but they're very different otherwise. Pitcher plants have a large, cup-shaped flower with a slippery rim that unsuspecting prey falls into, where it is digested. Sundews, on the other hand, have tentacles, looking like very small spines topped with a clear drop of dew, hence the name. It isn't dew, of course; it's a sort of sticky mucous that traps insects, where they die of exhaustion, dehydration, starvation, or suffocation, to be digested by the enzymes within the mucous.

I've not been able to find any other mention of this new species, but Japan Times says that a "professor of plant classification" at Aichi University of Education, Mikio Watanabe, is behind the discovery. Aichi University lists Watanabe as a member of the natural sciences team. Japan Times says that Watanabe conducted genetic analysis--no mention of what kind--and found that the plant looks similar to the common Drosera indica species of sundew but is in fact a different species. Maybe not as cool as a new dinosaur, but it did survive to the present day, so, take that, dead dinosaur.

If you weren't looking at the constellation Leo very early on Saturday morning, you probably missed the brightest explosion NASA scientists have ever observed. It was three times as bright as the next-brightest explosion, and a ridiculous, basically unimaginable 35 billion times brighter than visible light.

The explosion was a gamma-ray burst, or GRB, a type of event that's the brightest we know about in the universe. During a supernova, in which a massive star collapses into a black hole, neutron star, or quark star, sometimes a GRB is emitted. Nobody's exactly sure how GRBs happen, but they're observed during a supernova and consist of a tightly focused, narrow beam of radiation, moving at speeds about as close as you can get to the speed of light without exceeding it. Imagine compressing a weird space-apple from all sides until a jet of space-apple juice explodes out of a tiny point before the apple turns into a black apple hole. (This is not a perfect analogy.)

They're also often the source of the perennial superlative of "farthest thing we've ever seen," since they're so bright and move so fast.

This one, about 3.6 billion light-years away, was observed by Fermi's Gamma-ray Burst Monitor, and was subsequently seen by just about any ground-based observation unit that was pointed anywhere near the constellation Leo. Astronomers often use GRBs to find the supernova from which they emitted; the GRB is so bright that it's a useful way to pinpoint where a supernova may have happened. NASA says they expect to find that supernova within a couple of weeks.

[NASA via Smithsonian]

A vaccine to treat heroin addiction has proven effective in keeping drug-addicted rats from relapsing in a preclinical trial, according to a study published this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Researchers from the Scripps Research Institute in California say the vaccine is now ready for human trials.

Initial research into the vaccine in 2011 found that it could effectively keep rats from becoming addicted to heroin without affecting the pain relief they experienced from other opiates. This study built on those results using rats that were already addicted, finding that the vaccine could keep them from resuming compulsive drug-taking behavior even after they experienced withdrawal.

Heroin addiction has proven challenging to treat with vaccines because in order to prevent heroin from working, a vaccine has to target not only the drug itself, but the chemicals it breaks down into once it enters the bloodstream. A few seconds after injection, heroin metabolizes into a compound called 6-acetylmorphine (6-AM) and then morphine, which then pass into the brain, binding to opiod receptors and producing psychoactive effects.

The vaccine generates antibodies that bind heroin and its metabolites in the bloodstream, preventing them from making their way to the brain. It essentially keeps the body from experiencing the fun parts of drug use, like euphoria and pain obstruction.

"They sit in the bloodstream like a sponge, they grab these molecules when they show up, and activate clearance or destruction of the molecules," senior author George Koob told the San Diego Union-Tribune.

In the study, rats were trained to press a lever three times to receive an injection of heroin. During 12-hour periods of self-administrated access to the drug, the addicted rats began taking heroin compulsively in greater and greater quantities. Then the researchers removed the heroin for 30 days and gave some of the rats the vaccine. After the period of abstention, they were re-exposed to freely accessible heroin. Rats that didn't receive the treatment resumed taking the drug in increasing quantities, while those that received the treatment didn't redevelop the compulsion.

If it passes through the human testing phase, the vaccine could help people going through addiction treatment from relapsing. According to data from the National Institute on Drug Abuse 4.2 million Americans have used heroin at least once around their lives, and around 23 percent of heroin users develop a dependency. "Ideally for human patients, the vaccine would be given with other treatments," author Joel Schlosburg explained in a press statement.

Another heroin vaccine developed by a ground of Mexican scientists was patented early last year. Vaccines are also being developed to treat addiction to meth,cocaine and nicotine.

The Scripps researchers are currently seeking a pharmaceutical company to sponsor clinical trials, which can cost millions of dollars to run.

[U-T San Diego]

On April 22, Kiera Wilmot, a 16-year-old public school student in Bartow, Florida did what any kid with an ounce of curiosity does: She performed an experiment. Like many acts of science, however, it didn't go as planned.

Wilmot allegedly mixed a few household chemicals in an eight-ounce water bottle, capped the lid, set it down, and stood back to watch, according to local news reports. She expected a little smoke to appear. Instead the top blew off and made a firecracker-like bang.

No one was hurt. No property was damaged. She didn't even run away. The principal's eyewitness account, along with those of Wilmot's friends and schoolmates, all suggest she was simply satisfying her curiosity on school property before classes began. "She wanted to see what would happen [when the chemicals mixed] and was shocked by what it did," Bartow High School principal Ron Pritchard told 9news.com.

Despite praising Wilmot as a "good kid" who has "never been in trouble before," Polk County Public Schools trumpeted its zero-tolerance policies and called the police. They arrested Wilmot and charged her with two felonies. Now expelled, Wilmot may be forced to finish her education in a juvenile facility and graduate with a permanent record.

A big part of the problem here is fear. Schools have allowed it to guide student codes of conduct that ignore what science is, how it works, and the importance of experimentation in inspiring influential researchers. I'm specifically reminded of a piece called "Don't Try This At Home" by Steve Silberman, who reported on the increasing criminalization of garage chemistry.

The story ran seven years ago this month but is still surprisingly relevant. Silberman explores how and why chemistry kits and education became so toothless. As part of his reporting, he highlights prodigious scientists who owe their success to foolish childhood experimentation. Gordon Moore, who pioneered the integrated circuit and co-founded Intel, for example, created and detonated his own dynamite at age 11. David Packard, co-founder of Hewlett-Packard and father of Silicon Valley, proudly manufactured gunpowder as a kid. (Thomas Edison should have been in there, too -- he performed enough dangerous feats to fill his biographies.)

Other brainiacs regale us on the importance of backyard chemistry in leading to fruitful science careers, including neurologist Oliver Sacks, Don "Mr. Wizard" Herbert, Popular Science's own Theodore Gray, and Roald Hoffmann, winner of the 1981 Nobel Prize in chemistry. "There's no question that stinks and bangs and crystals and colors are what drew kids ... to science," says Hoffmann in Silberman's story. "Now the potential for stinks and bangs has been legislated out."

Silberman convincingly argues that fear of lawsuits (by manufacturers and teachers alike) have led U.S. educators to shy away from teaching science that poses any degree of danger. Schools have codified those fears in zero-tolerance policies that reject context and reason in delivering punishment. Suddenly, a popping soda bottle that hurts no one becomes a life-threatening explosive device.

Did Wilmot make a mistake? Yes. Should she carry two felonious charges into her adult life? No.

Kids are kids. Their futures ride on trying, failing, and learning from mistakes. Much of that happens during personal experimentation, and schools should equip them to do it responsibly, whether or not it happens on school property.

Sure, dangerous behaviors deserve punishment. But it's time we stop creating and acting on zero-tolerance school policies to dole them out. We need to treat kids as kids and give them a fair shake by weighing context, reason, and maturity -- not brand them as criminals when they create "stinks and bangs," either accidentally or intentionally, for experimentation's sake.

What are middle-aged men watching on YouTube in your city? With the new YouTube Trends Map, you can now check out what videos are going viral in real-time in different regions of the U.S., filtering by gender, age, and shares versus views.

Strictly based on views, most of the country seems to be watching the relatively boring "Belen vs St. Thomas Water Polo Handshake," while a select few regions (more if you're looking only at female views) in the northern part of the country are watching Grey Spain's explanation of the "Only For Children" child abuse prevention ad campaign.

When we get to sharing activity, things get a little more interesting. As of this morning, the eastern half of the country is basically a wall of True Blood, with the season six trailer as the top shared video in 56 percent of U.S. regions. True Blood occasionally gets ousted by "Bad Lip Reading of the Walking Dead" and a music video for the band The Clood. Alaska only has three viewable regions, but the state appears to be torn between its enthusiasm for True Blood and a cell phone video called "Young woman being arrested for nothing."

Graphs under the map break down the top videos in different demographic groups based on the number of regions where each video is number one in the rankings, so you can make sure you're keeping up with what all the cool kids are watching these days.

Later this year, the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way will dine on a small passing cloud of gas, which wandered too close and is now spiraling toward the black hole's maw. But that may only be a first course, according to new observations.

The Herschel space telescope spotted a vast amount of surprisingly hot molecular gas near the galactic center. It might be falling in towards the black hole, or just orbiting it. The black hole is located near a radio source called Sagittarius A*, or Sgr A*, so sometimes the black hole is referenced with that name.

Herschel could see it because its far-infrared eyes can peer through the dust between us and the black hole. Scientists working with Herschel saw several types of gas molecules at the Milky Way's heart, and found it is extremely hot, around 1,000ºC or 1,823ºF. By contrast, typical interstellar clouds are usually only a tad warmer than absolute zero. Astronomers think the gas might be hot because of shockwaves from magnetized gas, and from ultraviolet radiation streaming from the stars that live near the galactic center.

Meawhile, this superhot gas may be speeding toward Sgr A*, according to Javier Goicoechea of the Centro de Astrobiología in Spain and lead author of a new paper reporting the results.

"Our Galaxy's black hole may be cooking its dinner right in front of Herschel's eyes," he said in a statement.

The findings are a step toward understanding the mechanics of a supermassive black hole, and it just happens to be the one in our cosmic backyard. The paper is scheduled for publication in Astrophysical Journal Letters.

Talk about an upgrade. Xerox plans to introduce software this year that would transform certain combination printer-copier-scanners into automated grading machines, the Democrat and Chronicle reported.

Teachers would be able to send pages of printed tests with handwritten answers into the machines and get grades back. While it grades, the machine keeps track of which students do poorly on which questions, so it is able to tell teachers who's struggling, and with what concepts. You can see the machine at work in this video from Xerox.

Before, it was easier to get this kind of analysis for multiple-choice tests-you know, the ones where you have to be careful to bubble in answers exactly as instructed-but now testers can start to get more detailed data from handwritten tests, too. Xerox hopes to save teachers time and allow them to focus on tasks that machines can't do, such as lesson planning, Deborah Drago-Leaf, a support manager for the company, told the Democrat and Chronicle.

The software, called Ignite, needs some pointers first. Teachers enter in the test and an answer key, which Ignite uses not only to figure out which answers are right but also to know where on the page to look for handwritten answers. Teachers also need to tell the software what concepts each question covers.

Fourth-graders at one school in Rochester, New York, that has tested the software were impressed. Their teacher, Pat McDonald, named their machine Ziggy and told the Democrat and Chronicle that the kids have written poems about Ziggy. "They think it's cool the machine can read their handwriting," she said. She herself was enthusiastic about the technology.

Xerox plans to have Ignite ready for schools to buy for the 2013-2014 school year.

[Democrat and Chronicle]

Over the past few months, the Large Hadron Collider has been ramming protons and lead ions together in the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS), one of its particle detectors. After each collision, some of the newly produced particles zoom away together like a school of fish, in a scientific puzzle called the "ridge effect," rather than bouncing off in all directions.

When heavy ions like lead collide with each other, the ensuing particles are borne off by a drop of plasma, but it's unclear if that's what's happening when lead ions collide with lighter protons. The results from LHC's tests, submitted to Physics Letters B last week, suggest that it's the same effect. If accurate, the teensy drop of plasma formed would be the smallest drop of lab-formed liquid ever.

The collision of two heavy ion nuclei creates a hot, dense meld of quark-gluon plasma, a "primordial soup" that may have existed just after the Big Bang.

Symmetry has a good explanation for how the phenomenon, called collective flow, might work:

Collective flow of particles causes the ridge effect in collisions of larger nuclei, like lead and gold. CMS researchers ran a short (four hour) test of proton-lead collisions in September, and were surprised to find evidence that collective flow might exist there, too. A longer test began in January 2013 and continued for several weeks.

Previously, protons were thought to be much too small to support quark-gluon plasma, but this study provides more evidence for collective flow in proton-lead collisions, with correlations in the movements of both pairs of particles and groups of four.

[Symmetry]

In the 1960s, the Central Intelligence Agency recruited an unusual field agent: a cat. In an hour-long procedure, a veterinary surgeon transformed the furry feline into an elite spy, implanting a microphone in her ear canal and a small radio transmitter at the base of her skull, and weaving a thin wire antenna into her long gray-and-white fur. This was Operation Acoustic Kitty, a top-secret plan to turn a cat into a living, walking surveillance machine. The leaders of the project hoped that by training the feline to go sit near foreign officials, they could eavesdrop on private conversations.

The problem was that cats are not especially trainable-they don't have the same deep-seated desire to please a human master that dogs do-and the agency's robo-cat didn't seem terribly interested in national security. For its first official test, CIA staffers drove Acoustic Kitty to the park and tasked it with capturing the conversation of two men sitting on a bench. Instead, the cat wandered into the street, where it was promptly squashed by a taxi. The program was abandoned; as a heavily redacted CIA memo from the time delicately phrased it, "Our final examination of trained cats... convinced us that the program would not lend itself in a practical sense to our highly specialized needs." (Those specialized needs, one assumes, include a decidedly unflattened feline.)

The CIA's robo-cat didn't seem terribly interested in national security.Operation Acoustic Kitty, misadventure though it was, was a visionary idea just 50 years before its time. Today, once again, the U .S. government is looking to animal-machine hybrids to safeguard the country and its citizens. In 2006, for example, DARPA zeroed in on insects, asking the nation's scientists to submit "innovative proposals to develop technology to create insect-cyborgs."

It was not your everyday government request, but it was an utterly serious one. For years, the U .S. military has been hoping to develop "micro air vehicles"-ultrasmall flying robots capable of performing surveillance in dangerous territory. Building these machines is not easy. The dynamics of flight change at very small sizes, and the vehicles need to be lightweight enough to fly, yet strong enough to carry cameras and other equipment. Most formidably, they need a source of power, and batteries light enough for microfliers just don't have enough juice to keep the crafts aloft for very long.

Consider two of the tiny, completely synthetic drones that engineers have managed to create: The Nano Hummingbird, a flying robot modeled after the bird, with a 6.5-inch wingspan, maxes out at an 11-minute flight, while the DelFly Micro, which measures less than 4 inches from wingtip to wingtip, can stay airborne for just 3 minutes.

DARPA officials knew there had to be something better out there. "Proof-of-existence of small-scale flying machines... is abundant in nature in the form of insects," Amit Lal, a DARPA program manager and Cornell engineer, wrote in a pamphlet the agency issued to the prospective researchers. So far, nature's creations far outshine our own. Insects are aerodynamic, engineered for flight, and naturally skilled at maneuvering around obstacles. And they can power themselves; a common fly can cruise the skies for hours at a time. So perhaps, DARPA officials realized, the military didn't need to start from scratch; if they began with live insects, they'd already be halfway to their dream flying machines. All they'd have to do was figure out how to hack into insects' bodies and control their movements. If scientists could manage to do that, the DARPA pamphlet said, "it might be possible to transform [insects] into predictable devices that can be used for . . . missions requiring unobtrusive entry into areas inaccessible or hostile to humans."

The same advances that enabled the development of modern wildlife-tracking devices are making it possible to create true animal cyborgs.DARPA's call essentially launched a grand science fair, one designed to encourage innovation and tap into the competitive spirit of scientists around the country. The agency invited researchers to submit proposals outlining how they'd create steerable insect cyborgs and promised to fund the most promising projects. What the agency wanted was a remote-controlled bug that could be steered to within 5 meters of a target. Ultimately, the insects would also need to carry surveillance equipment, such as microphones, cameras, or gas sensors, and to transmit whatever data they collected back to military officials. The pamphlet outlined one specific application for the robo-bugs-outfitted with chemical sensors, they could be used to detect traces of explosives in remote buildings or caves-and it's easy to imagine other possible tasks for such cyborgs. Insect drones kitted out with video cameras could reveal whether a building is occupied and whether those inside are civilians or enemy combatants, while those with microphones could record sensitive conversations, becoming bugs that literally bugged you.

As far-fetched and improbable as DARPA's dream of steerable robo-bugs sounds, a host of recent scientific breakthroughs means it's likely to be far more successful than Acoustic Kitty was. The same advances that enabled the development of modern wildlife-tracking devices-the simultaneous decrease in size and increase in power of microprocessors, receivers, and batteries-are making it possible to create true animal cyborgs. By implanting these micromachines into animals' bodies and brains, we can seize control of their movements and behaviors. Genetics provides new options, too, with scientists engineering animals whose nervous systems are easy to manipulate. Together, these and other developments mean that we can make tiny flying cyborgs-and a whole lot more. Engineers, geneticists, and neuroscientists are controlling animal minds in different ways and for different reasons, and their tools and techniques are becoming cheaper and easier for even us nonexperts to use. Before long, we may all be able to hijack animal bodies. The only question is whether we'll want to.

Excerpted with permission from Frankenstein's Cat: Cuddling Up to Biotech's Brave New Beasts by Emily Anthes, published in March 2013 by Scientific American / Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC. Copyright © 2013 by Emily Anthes. All rights reserved.

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When Popular Science published these dazzling visions of the future in May 1947, science seemed to be propelling humanity faster and faster into a strange new world: engineers and pilots were making the first flights to graze the edges of space; physicists had already unleashed the horrifying power of the atom bomb; and governments were funding audacious ideas like weather control.

In the cover story "Science Never Stops," writer Harland Manchester described science as a "blank check": "The world has made vast strides in the last 75 years; even greater triumphs lie ahead if mankind has the courage to go on with the job," he wrote.

While some of the ideas in this article didn't quite come to pass (we haven't yet established a global communications system using moon microwaves) others were more prescient: many major cities now have beltways, and humans have indeed traveled to the moon and back-and we may be on our way to Mars. See the gallery for a look at what the big dreamers of 1947 thought the future would be like.

We've been following the progress of Terrafugia, the Massachusetts-based creator of several (prototype) flying cars, for a while, despite the company never having actually released one. But that hasn't stopped the company from "announcing its vision for the future of personal transportation": a plug-in flying car.

Terrafugia's Transition is the company's most famous creation. It's more of a drivable plane than a flying car, really, but it's gotten FAA certification and is just about the closest we've gotten to a flying car so far. The Transition hasn't gotten past the prototype stage, but Terrafugia has chosen to steamroll past that and show off what they think will be coming a generation or two from now: the TF-X.

The TF-X would be a hybrid plug-in electric vehicle, capable of vertical takeoffs like a helicopter, but able to adjust its propellers from an upright position to a horizontal position so it can fly like a plane. The video is oddly specific about specs, considering this thing is completely conceptual, but it claims the vehicle will have automatic takeoffs and landings, and reach speeds of 200mph with a range of 500 miles.

Within his first 30 minutes on the job at an aluminum factory in 1999, metalworker Michael Buckman inhaled so many noxious fumes he was sick with bronchitis for three days. As he recovered, Buckman wondered whether a commercial welding helmet could have filtered his breathing air. "I didn't see anything out there like what I was thinking about," he says. So he set out to build the WindMaker: a helmet that can prevent lung damage.

WindMaker draws fresh air from behind the helmet, pushes it through a HEPA-rated filter, and then blows it toward the front, cooling skin while preventing fog on the glass faceplate. A fan near the chin helps expel air, blowing away toxic smoke in the work zone. LED lights on each side of the faceplate illuminate the welding job, while a thick shroud deflects sparks.

Several companies have expressed interest in licensing the helmet. Before anyone can sell WindMaker, however, the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health needs to extensively test its air-filtering abilities-a costly process that requires consumer-ready units. If the device lives up to its claims, the convenient combination of eye, heat, spark, and respiratory safeguards could motivate more welders to protect themselves, says Shawn Gibbs, an occupational health expert at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. "And that increased use is something welding needs," he says.

Buckman already has ideas for high-tech add-ons, including wireless communication devices, solar panels, video cameras, and heads-up displays. Whatever futuristic features make it into the final helmet, Buckman is confident it will deliver on safety. "I got hurt on the job," he says. "I had to go through that experience to design this."

INVENTOR
Michael Buckman

COMPANY
None

INVENTION
WindMaker Helmet

COST TO DEVELOP
$200,000

MATURITY
8/10

See the rest of the articles from our 2013 Invention Awards section here, and see all of our May issue here.

Our old friend, the bat, is the king of extreme hearing in the mammalian world. It uses echolocation, emitting ultrasonic sounds and measuring the length of time before the sounds echo back, in order to locate prey.

But it turns out there's an animal that uses an even more extreme variety of sounds--and it's theorized that it's a direct response to the bats.

Ultrasound simply refers to a sound that is outside a human's sonic range--which isn't that hard, really, as humans have modest auditory abilities. Researchers at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland have discovered that the greater wax moth (Galleria mellonella), a dull-colored, generally boring and common moth, has the most extreme hearing sense of any known animal. It's capable of hearing sounds frequencies of up to 300kHz, blowing away our piddly human abilities (at our best, humans can only hear up to about 20kHz).

The researchers suspect that the moth's extraordinary sense of hearing is largely used to outwit its main predator: the common bat. Greater wax moths are very common prey in their native Eurasia, as well as in North America, where they're an introduced species, for various types of bats. Echolocation is a particularly effective habit for bats partly because it's so unusual; a bat's prey will have no idea it's being targeted. So the wax moths have evolved to be able to hear the bat's greatest weapon for evasive purposes.

It's also possible that the moths use their even higher-frequency abilities to communicate with other moths outside the hearing range of bats.

The study appears in the journal Biology.

A "sting operation" (I'm not sure it took that much stealth, but hey) has uncovered 10 U.S. companies that may be willing to sell people's data in violation of the Fair Credit Reporting Act, according to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.

Commission paralegals and investigators pretended they were representing businesses or individuals on the market for consumer data such as credit scores. "They made very clear they intended to use the data for an FCRA-covered purpose," Laura Berger, a commission attorney, tells Popular Science.

Out of 45 data companies commission staffers shopped with, they found 10 didn't follow through with Fair Credit Reporting Act obligations such as asking for evidence that an employer buying data about an employee had informed the employee. (Remember those credit report releases you often have to sign when you start a new job?) The commission didn't actually go through with any data purchases, however, so it can't say if the companies perhaps would have followed the law later on in the purchasing process, Kristen Anderson, another commission attorney, says.

"In the contacts that we made with those companies, there just seemed to be a willingness to provide information for FCRA-covered purposes without necessarily complying with the law," Anderson says.

ConsumerBase and one unnamed company seemed willing to sell lists of people pre-screened for credit card offers. Brokers Data and U.S. Data Corporation seemed willing to sell information insurance companies use to decide whom to cover and how much to charge. Crimcheck.com, 4Nannies, U.S. Information Search, People Search Now, Case Breakers and USA People Search seemed willing to sell data employers use to decide whom to hire or to evaluate their employees.

The commission has sent the companies informal warning letters. Since it didn't find hard evidence of wrongdoing, the letters don't represent legal action. Instead, they "encourage" the companies to do some internal reviews.