Clock

og2t via Flickr

If you had traveled from the future to the present, you might be likely to mention some things that you'd learned there (for example: buy this lottery ticket). Using this logic, physicists searched for prescient mentions of future events on the present-day internet, scouring Twitter, Facebook, Google, Google+ and Bing. They used these services to see if anybody had mentioned Pope Francis or the comet ISON before these terms existed, looking at the time span from the early 2000s to mid-2013, the idea being that both terms represented major events travelers-from-the-future might talk about somewhere online. But they came up empty.

This doesn't mean that time travelers don't exist, said study author Robert Nemiroff, a physicist at Michigan Technological University. But it is the largest study of its kind to date, and suggests that if there are time travelers walking amongst us, they aren't, for example, tweeting about what they've learned in the future, Nemiroff told Popular Science. (Or maybe they don't care about Catholics or comets.)

This is not the first time somebody has looked for evidence of future time travelers. Physicist Stephen Hawking, for example, held a party for time travelers in July, 2012, and only sent out invitations afterward. Sadly, nobody came.

Nemiroff said he and his colleague Teresa Wilson didn't look for time travelers from the past since past information is already "out there," and nobody has yet (to the best of his knowledge) built a machine capable of, you know, time travel. Twitter ended up being the most useful service; Google turned up too many false-positives, and Facebook allows user to backdate posts, confusing the search effort.

The scientists will present their study at a scientific meeting on Monday (Jan. 6), and have submitted it to several journals. Nemiroff said he came up with the idea for the research during a poker game with students. 

More Milk, Fewer Of These Guys

Maryland Department of Agriculture

After generations of careful breeding, dairy cows around the world produce more milk than ever. At the same time, they've actually become less fertile, a phenomenon farmers and researchers have worried about for years.*

Now, a team of European biologists has uncovered one reason behind the decline, at least for several types of Danish cattle. The same genes that make cows produce more milk also kill off cow embryos, they found.

The European researchers found that up to a third of Nordic Red Cattle are missing one copy of each of the same four genes. (Like humans, cows are supposed to have two copies of all of their genes, one from their moms, and one from their dads.) Having no copies of those four genes is deadly, but at the same time, having one copy of each makes a cow produce more milk than normal cows that have two copies. Those missing genes are a gift with a dangerous catch.

Of course, before this study, farmers didn't know how all of this worked. They simply chose high-producing cows to breed, thus passing on their shortened genes. That's why the genetic flaw is so common in Nordic cows. Inbreeding makes the situation worse, but, with artificial insemination, it's common on farms.

Farmers could improve things by checking whether the bulls they use in breeding are missing copies of these four genes, Goutam Sahana, a Danish geneticist who worked on the study, said in a statement. Those that are shouldn't mate with high-milk-producing cows, which may be missing those genes, too. By preventing animals that are both missing genes from mating with each other, "a quantum jump in fertility could be achieved in Nordic Red breeds," Sahana said.

What about cattle in the U.S.? This study looked only at Nordic herds, so it can't say whether American cows have the same genetic flaws. But American researchers are also looking into genetics for an explanation of fertility declines in cows at home. Last year, Texas A&M announced it received a $3 million grant to study the genetics of dairy cattle fertility. After all, it's those cute baby calves that keep the farm going.

Check out the entire study in the journal PLOS Genetics.

*Some hard numbers for the curious: In 1960, the average American Holstein cow gave about 6,300 kilograms (13,900 pounds) of milk a year. In 2000, the average cow gave 11,800 kilograms. In 1970, the average cow needed 1.8 rounds of artificial insemination to get pregnant. In 2000, cows needed, on average, three rounds. Cows now also take longer to become fertile again after giving birth to a calf.

Edgertronic

Courtesy Edgertronic

This article originally appeared in the January 2014 issue of Popular Science.

No GMO Here

Beach on Hawaii Island, the state of Hawaii's largest

Alaska Dave on Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0

So what exactly is the science on the safety of GMOs? There are a lot of pro- and anti-GMO claims to filter through. The New York Times published a great spoonful of sugar this weekend to help that medicine go down: Amy Harmon profiled the GMO debate in Hawaii, and followed County Council member Greggor Ilagan as he plowed into research to decide whether to vote for or against a Big Island-wide GMO ban.

Ilagan learned that widely publicized studies purporting to show ill health effects from eating genetically modified foods have been discounted. He found that there is little risk of genetically modified genes cross-pollinating with plants of other species, although the risk is never zero. He learned more about "superweeds" that resist herbicides designed to kill them. They likely arise from extensive herbicide use with Monsanto's Roundup Ready crops, not directly from the Roundup Ready genes themselves. They're a problem, but not necessarily one that has to come with GMO foods.  

At the same time, Ilagan grappled with passionate, well-meaning constituents who use incorrect or confused science to oppose GMOs. As it is for many, the path is not at all clear for him, at first. It's nice to feel you're not alone in your confusion… but it's also nice to see that Ilagan is able to learn enough to take a stance when it comes time to vote.

The end is no surprise, as the vote has already happened. After extensive research, Ilagan chose to oppose the ban, but it passed anyway, because of other Council members' votes. Genetically modified crops are now banned from the island.

[The New York Times]

Alien believer

RT / YouTube

There has been more alien activity since the first nuclear bombs were detonated in 1945, he said. "They are very much afraid we might be stupid enough to start using atomic weapons again and that would be very bad for us and them as well." If we were more peaceful, they would be more willing to share their technology with us, he said. According to his website, in September 2005 Hellyer "became the first person of cabinet rank in the G8 group of countries to state unequivocally 'UFO's are as real as the airplanes flying overhead.'"

Luckily, most of the aliens are benign or want to help us, though one or two might mean us harm, Hellyer said. Some of the aliens actually look like people, and two female aliens recently visited Las Vegas dressed as nuns and were not detected, he claimed. Perhaps they wouldn't have gotten away with that stunt in, say, Omaha. 

It's too bad that Hellyer appears to be crazy; his aliens seem to have some good ideas. They think we are spending to much money fighting each other, and not caring enough for the planet and our sick and poor. "We are polluting our waters and our air, and we are playing around with these exotic weapons… and they [the aliens] don't like that. They'd like to work with us to teach us better ways, but only, I think, with our consent."

Also, in case you weren't aware, "the star of Bethlehem is one of God's flying saucers." Thanks for the info, Paul!  

[Via CNET]

Shaq and Noel Lee

Colin Lecher

The first press conference I visited today at the Consumer Electronics Show--the gigantic Las Vegas trade show Popular Science is covering this week--was for Monster Cable, a gadget maker with a reputation for bizarre press conferences. It did not disappoint. I'd swear to god I hallucinated three-quarters of it if I didn't have photo documentation to prove it all happened. Here's a short sampling of my notes: 

old logos, old cables

????

SEGWAY WITH GOLD RIMS

IT HAS FLAAAMES

Jesus, sell me that

disruption disruption disruption 

The Segway rider is Noel Lee, the CEO of Monster, who has a disability and rides the two-wheeler during events like this. I've never been to a Monster conference, but it's hard to imagine there have been many events weirder than this. 

Lee announced an endless reel of new stuff that mostly didn't seem that new: there were announcements for new headphone colors, new colors for a DJ mixing gadget, and a new announcement that old, retro logos were going to be used. Then Nick Cannon came out--yes, Nick Cannon--and gave an awkward, meandering talk about Monster, eventually moving into an introduction of his DJ friends. He explained the difficulty of getting a large group of DJs to wake up and be somewhere at 9 a.m. Lee, apparently a little flustered at this, asked, “Did you want to talk about the show?” 

Nick Cannon, et. al

Colin Lecher

Cannon proceeded to bring out all of his DJ friends. "At dinner last night, we said, no shots, no shots," one of said DJ friends explained. 

And then Lee maybe half-jokingly asked him to leave the stage. 

Yeah. 

The show proceeded to dubstep-heavy video clips displayed on a gargantuan screen, and a series of partnerships with brands I assumed had no need for headphones were announced. There's a line of headphones coming up for Adidas, and a pair of UFC-branded headphones, for all of your blood-sport audio needs. (They're called, no kidding, the Octagon.) A fighter I didn't recognize but who's apparently big came out to thank Lee. And have you ever watched World Poker Tour because it's Sunday and whatever there's nothing else on? The commentator for that, who has a golden voice and some kind of brass-like suit coat, was there to announce a partnership with Monster, where Monster apparently gives them large sacks full of money in exchange for putting their logo on everything. 

Then Shaq came out (yep!), pantomimed driving, flirted with a model, and showed off a new power card. He kissed Lee. At this point I determined Mr. O'Neal is almost exactly two Segways tall. I can't explain it, but I feel happy to know that. 

Chocolate Factory

Marcelo Coelho

"I made the Digital Chocolatier, a machine that builds chocolates layer by layer, from the bottom up. Four tubes hold nuts or chocolate. The chocolate tubes are heated for melting. For each layer, a servomotor positions the correct tube, and a valve releases the contents. Chocolate’s hard to work with—it clogs—and we had to fabricate the parts because existing chocolate valves are too big for home use. Printing takes about a minute, and a thermoelectric plate and heat sink cool the printed treat. This machine is the first step toward a 3-D food printer. I’m convinced it’s possible to create things you couldn’t do by hand—for example, a cake that’s chocolate and gradually swirls into a lemon pie. That’s something we can do on a computer with a digital image in 10 seconds. Wouldn’t it be cool to do it physically?”

Marcelo Coelho is a designer and research affiliate at Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab.

This article originally appeared in the January 2014 issue of Popular Science.

Communicating Cars

Department of Transportation

Officials will decide in the "coming weeks" whether all new cars in the U.S. must have the technology to communicate with other cars and warn drivers—or even brake for them—when there's a crash impending, ABC News reports. Those same officials originally said they would make a decision about these technologies by December 31, The Detroit News reports, but then announced they'd "made significant progress," but weren't ready for a decision.

These technologies have gained a lot of ground over the past few years. They've been tested in a pilot in the streets of Ann Arbor, Michigan. Carmakers themselves have developed their own systems to sell in luxury models. There are still some hurdles for the tech to overcome, especially if cities want their own infrastructure to talk to these smarter cars, too—to monitor traffic, for example. But many experts agree they'll make our roads safer by reducing deadly human error. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which is in charge of deciding whether car-to-car communication should be mandated by law, thinks the tech could prevent 80 percent of light vehicle crashes. Nevertheless, the Auto Alliance, a major carmakers' organization, opposes mandatory car-to-car communications, The Detroit News reports.

Should the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration vote "yes" on vehicle-to-vehicle communications, the soonest Americans would see them in every new car is the model year 2017, The Detroit News reports. And, of course, older, non-communicating cars would linger on the roads for much longer.

[ABC News, The Detroit News]

Sharp AQUOS Quattron+

Sharp Electornics

Moving from one video standard to another is a pretty messy process. It requires an entire ecosystem of cameras, players, displays, and software. One of the big-buzz items at this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas is one of those conversions: the move from HDTV to 4KTV. A 4K display, as you would expect, has roughly four times the pixels of an HD display, which means much (much) sharper images. Trouble is, we're still so early in the 4K conversion that we're missing a key thing: um, content. At its press conference this morning, Sharp unveiled a clever stopgap—something to tide us all over until 4K is affordable enough for the average Joe. 

The solution? Make the pixels you have into more pixels. Sharp did this for the first time several years ago, when they added an extra color to the pixels on its line of HDTVs. Typically, each pixel on a set has three subpixels (blue, green, and red) that combine to color the pixel in question. Last time the company did this trick, they added a fourth yellow subpixel. What did that get you? A broader range of colors -- like, crazy I-don't-know-if-my-eyes-can-even-see-this-much-color kind of color range.

This time, they're taking those four subpixels and dividing them in half vertically. The panels on upcoming line of Quattron+ TVs have a resolution 1920 pixels by 2160 pixels, instead of the 1920x1080 of standard HDTVs. Regular, old HD footage comes out with the same vertical resolution as 4K video. Ta-da!

Sets in the Quattron+ series will range from $2,300-$3,000. Compare that to the company's 4K models, which start at $5,000.

DISH's New Gear

Colin Lecher

A dead-eyed kangaroo mascot straight out of a third-tier baseball league fist-bumped me on the way in to the Dish press conference, inside a giant banquet hall, where the president and CEO of the company entered with a stampede of "joeys" and proceeded to tell a few dated jokes in a Southern accent. (He mentioned "power," then: "No, not Austin Powers! Oh, behave!") It was charming in that hokey, 15-second local commercial kind of way.

Then came the announcements. Dish's goal is to make setting up your cable easier than it's been, because it's 2014, and it's time we stop being slaves to cords and wires. But they're also hedging their bets by improving on their current set-top box, the Joey. Here's what they showed off.

DISH's Press Conference

Colin Lecher

First, the Super Joey. The Joey, paired with Dish's Hopper box, is a DVR setup that can record six shows at once. The Super Joey is mainly notable for being able to record eight simultaneously. 

But more interesting are the totally new products, like the Wireless Joey, which uses Wi-Fi to connect your TVs to Dish where cords can't reach. Meanwhile, Dish is offering apps to bring Dish to other devices: if you've got a PlayStation 3 or PS4, you'll now be able to download an app and play your shows through that. If you want to take it on the go, you can already download your TV shows on a tablet or smartphone for offline viewing and set up recordings over the web. Now Dish has expanded that from iOS and Android devices to Kindle Fires, too. (The iPad version has a voice control option, which I'm on the record as disliking. But I'm mentioning it.) Also: it works with Google Glass, so if you're in that tiny Venn diagram of people planning on using both of these products, there you go.

Maybe TV tech doesn't have the same momentum as other gadgets, but this is the trend to watch from Dish and companies like it: a focus on helping people watch TV, especially when they're not anywhere near an actual TV.

Belkin CrockPot WeMo Slow Cooker

Belkin

The Internet of Things is made of promises. Promises and, well, junk. Take, for example, the HapiFork; the smart utensil, which debuted at the Consumer Electronics Show around this time last year, monitors the pace of the user's eating and alerts them when it's time to slow down. Helpful, thanks. Really.

This year, Belkin is showing the rest of the IoT and connected home manufacturers how it's done. They've teamed with CrockPot to apply their WeMo connected appliance platform to slow cookers. Helpful! Thanks! (No, really this time.) Users can adjust timing and temperature of the Wi-Fo connected cooker through Belkin's iOS or Android app. Peace of mind goes a long way. 

The slow cooker will be available this spring for $99.

NSA Powerpoint Slide

Even the slides get redacted.

NSA

A story quietly titled "Out of Control," published in a special 1996 issue of the National Security Agency's professional journal Cryptologic Quarterly, warns that one of the best ways into a computer system doesn't involve any hacking at all. The article foresees exactly the kind of threat Edward Snowden would pose to the agency in 2013.

The report opens:

In their quest to benefit from the great advantages of networked computer systems, the U.S., military and intelligence communities have put almost all of their classified information "eggs" into one very precarious basket: computer system administrators. A relatively small number of system administrators are able to read, copy, move, alter, and destroy almost every piece of classified information handled by a given agency or organization. An insider-gone-bad with enough hacking skills to gain root privileges might acquire similar capabilities. 

Snowden apparently sought out just such a job as a contractor with the NSA because, in his own words, "My position with Booz Allen Hamilton granted me access to lists of machines all over the world the NSA hacked."

Thanks to the way electronic communication works, system administrators have access to a whole range of information stored on the networks they oversee. "Out of Control" also provides an almost quaint look at early 1990s use of systems like email and servers. The report is written for an audience that understood how to keep paper documents safe in the Cold War but needs help understanding the risks that come with new technology.

Intelligence personnel can no longer lock the draft versions of their Top Secret SCI reports in their safes at night and go home feeling reasonably secure. Instead, those reports and almost everything else they have done is out of their control, stored electronically on some server in some other room or even in another building.

Curiously, the policy recommendations made at the end of the report might all be valid security techniques, but they radically reduce the usefulness of computers for the people using them. One recommendation is for personal passwords that system admins cannot access, with the acknowledged risk of reports permanently lost when the user forgets their own password. Beyond encryption, the report recommends that hard drives used by analysts be "encrypted and stored in a three-combo safe," which would certainly make logging into work every morning a pleasant and totally enjoyable ordeal.

Another recommendation is that users be physically separated from the local network or the internet while working, only plugging the cables into the computer when needed to quickly send out messages and then staying offline the rest of the time. And, as with most any set of recommendations, there is a call for an increased budget. As the unknown author of "Out of Control" writes, budget cuts lead to low morale, and low morale makes it likelier a system administrator could be bribed by another country.

Finally, "Out of Control" hits at the main problem with private, compartmented, or secret information held somewhere outside the individual's control:

Yes, it is less expensive and far more convenient to store everything on servers, but just because it can be done does not mean that it should be done. If individual computer users are going to be held accountable for the classified information that each personally handles, then they must have more control over how and where their information is stored and who has access to it.

Two different versions of this report are available online: one from the NSA, and another from George Washington University's National Security Archive. Cryptome has a side-by-side comparison, so the differences in redactions are easy to see. 

[h/t @DaveedGR]

Ivory crush

Some of the ivory crushed by the U.S. government in November 2013.

USFWS / YouTube

"Environmentalists said they hoped that the widely publicized event, which was attended by state officials, foreign diplomats and wildlife campaigners, would raise awareness within China of the dramatic scale of elephant poaching," the New York Times reported: 

The Chinese authorities received widespread plaudits when, in a first for the country, they destroyed more than six tons of confiscated ivory ornaments and tusks in Dongguan, a city in the southern province of Guangdong, which is a major hub for the ivory trade...

Cristián Samper, president and chief executive of the Wildlife Conservation Society, said in a statement that the society “congratulated” the Chinese government “for showing the world that elephant poaching and illegal ivory consumption is unacceptable. We are hopeful that this gesture shows that we can win the war against poaching and that elephants will once again flourish.”

Patrick Bergin, chief executive of the African Wildlife Foundation, described the event as a “courageous and critical first step by China to elevate the important issue of wildlife trafficking and elephant poaching among its citizens and around the world.”

While the United States crushed nearly all of the ivory in its possession, China's stockpile likely exceeds 45 tons of ivory, the World Conservation Society estimated. 

Musical notes

Prof.rick via WikiMedia Commons

The drug, known as valproic acid or Valproate, "restores the plasticity of the brain to a juvenile state," Harvard researcher and study co-author Takao Hensch told NPR. It's the first time that a drug has ever been shown to help people become better at identifying pitch, he said. The study was conducted on 24 young men with little musical training, half of whom took the drug and half of whom took a placebo.

The finding is exciting enough, but it also suggests the drug could be used to help people acquire a second language, another ability that is difficult after a critical learning threshold early in life. "I think we are getting closer to" a day when this drug could be used for learning new languages, "because we are able to understand at greater cellular detail how the brain changes throughout development," Hensch said. "But I should caution that critical periods have evolved for a reason, and it is a process that one probably would not want to tamper with carelessly." 

To hear an interview with Hensch, head over to NPR. 

Sony At CES

Colin Lecher

4K, the heir apparent to HDTV, is still expensive, and even if you can afford it, you're not going to find too much video that works with it. Sony, though, with a lot already invested in 4K, is still pushing ahead, adding a whole new line of TVs and content partnerships, along with price-cutting the tools to actually make the content. Although it's still not clear how much you'll have to spend to be on the front lines.

The electronics company announced nine new 4K TVs coming to consumers. To put more stuff on those screens, Sony also announced partnerships with companies like Netflix, which will be producing its original series House of Cards in 4K, and move older shows, like Breaking Bad, into the format. Sony's also using its feature film arm, Sony Pictures, to make sure its cameras are being used and produced in the format.

But the format might still be out of reach for the time being, at least for most people. Sony didn't touch on price for the televisions--maybe not a good sign?--but they did announce a new version of their flagship 4K handycam, touting its affordability. 4K for the common human is still $2,000, apparently. 

Xperia Z1S

Colin Lecher

Rounding out the announcement was a smartband and fitness tracker, tethered to a very beautiful-looking Android app called LifeLog. It tracks how much you walked, calories you burned, etc. (You apparently earn points as you go, which makes me uncomfortable, because, you know, I'm just living here, Sony.) Also coming: a smaller version of the Xperia Z1 smartphone, with an app that moves all of your stuff from your old phone. Also also coming: the Xperia Z1S, which features a killer on-board camera. That's available online starting next Monday. 

But mostly, 4K stuff. Super-HD Kevin Spacey is coming.

A honey bee on a flower

Bob Peterson, via Flickr

Honey bees can give each other directions using polarized light as a landmark to find potential food. Light becomes polarized as it reaches us through the atmosphere, but the polarization is typically not seen by the naked human eye. In a new study from the University of Queensland's Queensland Brain Institute, researchers have found that the very useful (and adorable) waggle dance, which the honey bees perform to inform others about where to find food, is actually based on the patterns of polarized light. 

Researchers have previously explored how bees' eyes see the polarized light and use it to navigate, which has also been studied in ants. With this study, scientists at the University of Queensland have found that the so-called waggle dance bees perform translates that polarized light map of the sky into the movement that guides others. Fellow honey bees will then follow the polarized light, as dictated by the waggles.

Since the polarization of light indicates which direction it comes from, when the honey bee returns to perform the dance on the vertical face of the honeycomb, the axis of the dance indicates in which direction, relative to the light, the food source lies. For the experiment, researchers created artificially polarized light, and monitored the waggle dances produced as the light patterns were changed. 

Building on previous studies that have examined how waggle dances can be altered by illuminating the hive with artificially polarized light, these "experiments demonstrate that foraging bees can sense and signal the direction of their flight by using information that is based purely on the polarized-light pattern of the sky," the study reads. 

And beyond giving a better understanding of how honey bees find their way, the study may also help to shed more light on how the tiny bee brain works. 

MakerBot Replicator Z-18

MakerBot

Bre Petis isn't messing around at his first big Consumer Electronics Show press conference. The final of three new MakerBot Replicators the company founder unveiled (more on the other two in a second) boasts a whopping 12-by-12-by-18 print capacity. Volumetrically, that's 2,592 cubic inches--a scale that Petis calls "epic." The printer, dubbed the Replicator Z-18, is an industrial beast; its print area can produce several items simultaneously, or, if you prefer, one gigantic one. Petis actually donned a helmet produced in the Z-18 during his reveal. His enthusiasm was hard to mask. As he unveiled the Z-18, he gushed: "This has been the goal all along." 

Seeing that this massive 3-D printer might not be for everyone (especially given its $6,499 price tag), Petis also unmasked two smaller models. The Replicator Mini will run $1,375 and has a print area comparable to the company's original Cupcake fabricator. The mid-range (and simply named) Replicator is the company's prosumer offering, with an 8-by-10-by-6 print capacity and a $2,899 price tag. All the new machines work with MakerBot's PLA filament, are app and Wi-Fi connected, and include a nifty internal camera feature, so you can spy on your progress. 

The Replicator is available for order now, while the Mini and Z-18 will roll out later this spring. 

Corsair MX RGB

Corsair

To understand Corsair's MX RGB Project gaming keyboard, you have to know two things: First, its keys sport mechanical switches, made by a German company called Cherry (basically, they feel like the classic IBM keyboards from the '80s, such as the iconic Model M. These switches are all the rage among gamers these days, because they offer a quicker response and a more tactile feel than the squishy rubber membrane keyboards that have come to dominate most of our desktops these days.

Second, the MX RGB Project keyboard is the first to sport a brand-new model of the Cherry switches, which can be backlit in any color you choose. Aside from their ability to produce a trippy lightshow, the customizable colors mean gamers can set presets for different games, where the most frequently used keys light up in a color that sets them apart from the others, or where only the important keys light up, so they're easier to see.

It's not clear exactly what kind of light customizations will be available yet, because the software isn't written--the MX RGB Project is just a prototype. The final version is expected to be available sometime in the middle of the year. The keyboard is, however, based around the chassis of the company's already available Vengeance K70 keyboard, which has been quite well received by reviewers and gamers. Its keys only light up in one color, though. So if you bought one of those, you'll have to look elsewhere for your psychedelic electronic lightshow. Might we suggest the JBL Pulse Bluetooth speaker?

Neurons

Patrick Hoesly on Flickr

One morning, a kindergarten teacher was about to take attendance for her class when she realized she couldn't read the paper in her hands. She tried looking over her lesson plans, but like the attendance sheet, they seemed to be covered in incomprehensible symbols.

She didn't know it yet, but the teacher, identified only as M.P. in a recent case study her doctors published about her in the journal Neurology, had had a stroke. The stroke afflicted a very specific part of her brain, leaving the 40-year-old woman with some unusual, but not unprecedented, symptoms—and plenty of functioning outside of that. Her case study is a fascinating look at what the brain, and human ingenuity, are capable of.

It turns out M.P.'s stroke interrupted the connection between the "language zone" of her brain and her visual cortex, her doctors wrote. At the same time, other sensory inputs still connected into her language zone. The results were decidedly weird. She couldn't read, but she could still write and understand spoken English, a symptom called "word blindness." Plus, she still had emotional reactions to seeing words, even though she couldn't recognize them:

For instance, when shown the word 'dessert' in writing, M.P. exclaimed, 'Oooh, I like that!' When shown the word 'asparagus' moments later, however, her response was rather different. 'I'm not doing this word! Something's upsetting me about this word!' she exclaims.

Nor have these intuitions been without utility. S.P. [M.P.'s mother] relates a recent anecdote in which, during an afternoon therapy session, her daughter was shown 2 letters from the mailbox at home. Nonplussed, M.P. quickly handed one letter back to her mother and tucked the other into her purse, saying, 'This is my friend, and this is your friend.' When asked who these friends were, she could not say, but their names nevertheless provoked an emotional response that served as a powerful contextual clue.

M.P. had her stroke in October 2012, her doctors report. Since then, she's rebuilt her life remarkably. She can't teach anymore and teared up when she told her doctors about missing reading with children; she used to be a reading specialist. But she has a new job and volunteers. And she's come up with her own way of reading, one that gets around her disability in a clever way:

Given a word, M.P. will direct her attention to the first letter, which she is unable to recognize. She will then place her finger on the letter and begin to trace each letter of the alphabet over it in order until she recognizes that she has traced the letter she is looking at. 'That is the letter M,' she declares, after tracing the previous 12 letters of the alphabet with her finger while deciphering a word in front of her. Three letters later, she is able to shorten this exercise with a guess: 'This word is 'mother,'' she announces proudly.

There are many more details in the full case study, which Neurology has posted for free. It's an approachable paper. We can't help but wonder if one day, M.P.'s case will become as well known as, say, Phineas Gage's… which would mean one more way the tenacious M.P. continued to contribute to society after her stroke.