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Researchers Slow MERS In Mice

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a 3D rendering of the MERS virus

Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) is on the rise. Since it was first discovered in 2012 in Saudi Arabia, it has infected over 1,000 people, killing more than 30 in the most recent outbreak in South Korea. Because the disease is so new, researchers still have a lot of questions about how it works and there are no specific vaccines or treatments for it, in part because the animal models that researchers often use to answer some of the preliminary questions don’t work for this particular disease. Now researchers have found a workaround, according to a study published today in PNAS, which will hopefully help them find better treatments for MERS more quickly.

Even though they don’t look much like us, mice are pretty similar to humans in surprising ways—we can both get Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, and ALS, for example. But sometimes diseases affect our species differently, and MERS is just one of those diseases that doesn’t infect mice.

This fact, the study authors write, is what has been slowing down the investigative efforts into finding treatments for MERS. So researchers from Regeneron Pharmaceuticals used a piece of technology called VelociGene to engineer the virus so that it affects mice. After infecting a few mice to figure out which antibodies they made to ward off the disease, the researchers put the virus into another type of modeling technology called VelocImmune, a mouse model that spits out human antibodies when infected. When the researchers tested the resulting human antibodies on the original virus in the lab, they found them to be extremely effective. And, interestingly, when mice were given antibodies to fight the mouse equivalent of the virus one day before being infected, the antibodies prevented the virus from replicating—the researchers found less of the virus' RNA in the mice's lungs, indicating that their level of infection would be much less severe.

There are many other tests that need to be done before a vaccine that produces these antibodies could reach the market, including testing on humans. But the researchers hope that, by identifying the antibodies to fight of MERS and by using VelocImmune to produce them very quickly, they can help the effort to thwart the growing MERS outbreak before it spreads further.


Lawmakers Move to Ban Funding For Human Embryo Editing

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President Obama addresses a joint session of Congress about healthcare in 2009.

On June 17, the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee released a bill that outlines the funding for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for 2016. But the bill has an unusual caveat: if it passes as it currently stands, it would bar the agency from spending any money to assess research or clinical applications for products that manipulate the human genome. It would also require the agency to set up a committee to review a forthcoming report that considers the ethics of editing human embryos.

This legislation comes at a pivotal moment when editing the genes of human embryos is no longer hypothetical. In April, Chinese researchers published a study in which they detailed their use of CRISPR/Cas9, a protein that snips genetic material and replaces it with the desired genes. Even though the embryos weren’t viable, the experiment created a huge international stir, with most experts calling for a moratorium on research that modifies embryonic DNA until the international research community could set some ethical ground rules. Foremost among the many concerns is that of consent—any edits (even accidental ones) to an embryo’s DNA are permanent and passed down to future generations, and an embryo cannot consent.

This type of research is very controversial, and it’s understandable that the U.S. government would not want to let their grantees jump into it prematurely. But there are already lots of legal hoops in place to prevent exactly this kind of research from happening, according to an article in Nature News and Comment. The National Institutes of Health has had a ban on editing genes of human embryos since 1996. The FDA has been keeping its eye on this kind of research for a long time, which is why it commissioned a report by the U.S. Institute of Medicine to uncover the implications for it, so far the agency has not given any indication that it would actually sponsor this kind of research. And while the House bill will discourage embryo editing in clinical trials (because the FDA can’t spend money to assess it), it still wouldn’t pertain to research like that of the Chinese team because it didn’t involve viable embryos. Several bioethicists are asking: What good would this extra layer of ethical consideration actually do?

For the bill to become a law, it would have to win approval from the House of Representatives, the Senate, and President Obama. The Appropriations subcommittee has already approved it.

We Wish This Luxury Airship Was Real

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Luxury Airship Concept

Luxury Airship Concept

Mac Byers, via Internet Archive

Luxury airships are confined to the dust-bin of history--beautiful, slow-moving machines best remembered for a fiery crash. We are now more than ever in an age of airship revival. Google bought a pair of old Navy airship hangars. An abandoned army dirigible found a second life in the United Kingdom, attracting public funders this past May in the hope that it will work as a powerful cargo hauler. Modern airship designs promise powerful carrying ability and efficiency, but they could also promise us something rare and lost: unimaginable luxury, through tours among the clouds. Here’s one such vision for an airship as premium sky cruise vessel.

Check out the concept video below:

This concept was designer Mac Byers' final year project for a Transport Design BA at the University of Huddersfield. The craft appears to navigate by changing the angle of rotors mounted on the side, allowing for vertical takeoff and landing. Dining areas look out upon the Earth and sky below through giant windows, and the inside has the mixed feel of a modern office complex and an overpriced but discerning hotel bar. Large bedrooms feature their own sitting areas and the windows extend to right behind the pillows, so passengers can wake up from their falling dreams and find themselves face to face with clouds.

As an alternative to ocean-bound cruise liners, the airship could offer radically different tourist locations, as well as the sheer joy of just living among the clouds. Alas, it appears the design may be as wispy and insubstantial as the fog itself. Byers' design first made the rounds around the Internet in 2013, and his personal site is no more. Archives of it exist in the Wayback Machine, where the dream of luxury airships are nestled safely in a different sort of cloud.

HT [Boats that fly]

Soon, Your Phone Could Warn You If You're Approaching Railroad Tracks

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Last year in the United States, 270 people died in collisions between cars and trains. Today, the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) announced a measure that they hope will lower that number of fatalities in the future. The only catch? They need Google's help to make it happen.

Many people use Google Maps and other navigational systems to get around, relying on smartphones and other devices to not only get them safely from point A to point B, but to do it on time and show construction, traffic status, and even schedules for public transit options. It seems like one of the only things that it doesn't have are clearly labelled points where a road meets a railway.

The FRA already had an app that showed people the locations of every one of the 250,000 railroad crossings in the country, but it wasn't connected to navigational apps or devices, and not many people used it. So, as of today, the FRA is asking Google and other companies to take that data and put it into their maps, making it so that when a driver approaches a crossing, their directions will alert them to their proximity to the train tracks.

The hope is that the additional notification will keep drivers more aware at crossings that aren't well marked.

"For drivers and passengers who are driving an unfamiliar route, traveling at night, or who lose situational awareness at any given moment, receiving an additional alert about an upcoming crossing could save lives." Sarah Feinberg, acting administrator of the FRA, wrote in a blog post.

The War Over Your Future Driverless Car Service Has Begun

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Uber

An example of a driver that Uber might replace, if the ride-sharing company continues to move towards driverless cars.

Even though Google’s driverless car only hit public roads last week (and reportedly already had a close call), another tech giant is already angling to pose as a competitor. Uber, the often-sued not-a-taxi app, just acquired 100 engineers and unknown “assets” from Microsoft Bing, Google’s mapping competitor, according to TechCrunch.

This transaction is the latest in a series of steps by Uber to prepare for a future of driverless cars, and signals a growing complication between Uber and Google, the latter of which is also an Uber investor through Google Ventures. On February 2, Uber announced it would partner with Carnegie Mellon University to develop robotic means for “safe, reliable transportation to everyone, everywhere," in other words, self-driving cars. The very same day, news broke that Google is developing its own ride-sharing app, presumably to put its driverless car research to work.

Uber's latest addition of 100 Microsoft engineers is no small move of intellectual property, and it’s a clear sign that Uber is looking to improve and expand its core services. Microsoft will no longer be collecting its own maps for Bing, instead leaving that to Uber, who also brought an ex-Google Maps leader on board this month. That former Google VP, Brian McClendon, will oversee Uber’s work at Carnegie Mellon, and will presumably oversee the numerous CMU robotics experts Uber is reported to have poached from the leading robotics institution.

Uber has a vested interest in driverless solutions. The company has been long-plagued with bitter legal battles from taxi companies and its drivers alike. Just this month, the California Labor Commission ruled in favor of a former Uber driver, granting her more than $4000 in business expenses. If other drivers come forward with the same claim, Uber could be forced to to reclassify its drivers as employees (they’re currently contractors), and potentially pay overtime wages, payroll tax and health insurance. Driverless cars obviously don’t demand the same type of equitable treatment as human drivers (at least not yet).

Uber has also been working on expanding its delivery service, acting as both a courier for food and packages. Right now if you’re in a few select cities, Uber can bring you food, and same-day merchant delivery might be on the horizon. Uber also has been testing a courier service, Uber Rush, in New York City. However, Uber Rush is a bike courier service, which might be more difficult to replace with driverless cars. Cars, by definition, do not have arms to deliver packages.

Illinois Drone Task Force Is Made Up Mostly Of Cops

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DJI Inspire In Flight

DJI Inspire In Flight

Kwangmo, via Wikimedia Commons CC BY-SA 4.0

When it comes to drone law, some opinions are more equal than others. A bill sitting on the Illinois Governor’s desk would create an “Unmanned Aerial System Oversight Task Force”, with 22 set-aside seats for representatives from different groups who might reasonably have opinions on drone use. So long as the public is included, it’s a good idea, but there’s something strange about the list: it completely omits any group concerned with civil liberties, and it also leaves out the media.

This is especially strange, because the Task Force’s stated job of “providing guidance into the safe operation of drones, while not infringing upon the constitutional rights of others” and “provide oversight and input in creating comprehensive laws and rules for the operation and use of drone technology within this State”

Here are the 22 groups that Illinois deems important enough to regulate drones in the Land of Lincoln, clustered by relevance:

The first four are all direct drone industry or rulemaking organizations, so those are good:

  • a member of the Division of Aeronautics of the Department of Transportation, nominated by the Secretary of Transportation
  • a UAS technical commercial representative
  • a UAS manufacturing industry representative
  • a person nominated by the Attorney General

There are representatives from industries that might use drones, and their regulators:

  • a member of the Department of Agriculture, nominated by the Director of Agriculture
  • a member of a statewide agricultural association, nominated by the president of the association
  • a member of the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, nominated by the Director of Commerce and Economic Opportunity
  • a member of a statewide commerce association, nominated by the president or executive director of the association
  • a member of a statewide surveying association, nominated by the president of the association

Here are the police departments represented. The task force is over one fifth police! The task force helpfully specifies one cop from Chicago and one cop from not-Chicago to even it out.

  • a member of the Department of State Police, nominated by the Director of State Police
  • a Conservation Police officer of the Department of Natural Resources, nominated by the Director of Natural Resources
  • a member of the Illinois Conservation Police Lodge, nominated by the president of the Lodge
  • law enforcement official from a municipality with a population of 2 million or more inhabitants, nominated by the mayor of the municipality
  • a law enforcement official from a municipality with a population of less than 2 million inhabitants, nominated by a statewide police chiefs association
  • a member of a statewide association representing real estate brokers licensed in this State, nominated by the president of the association
  • a member of a statewide surveying association, nominated by the president of the association

There are other, drone-tangential industries, like retail, hunting, and freight trains:

  • a member of a statewide sportsmen's federation, nominated by the president of the federation
  • a person nominated by an electric utility company serving retail customers in this State
  • a member of a statewide retail association, nominated by the president of the association
  • a member of a statewide manufacturing trade association, nominated by the president or chief executive officer of the association
  • a member of a statewide property and casualty insurance association, nominated by the president or chief executive officer of the association
  • a member of a statewide association representing real estate brokers licensed in this State, nominated by the president of the association
  • a member of a statewide freight railroad association, nominated by the president of the association

And there’s the National Guard, who in 2012 had people without pilots licenses operating drones in Illinois airspace, which was at the time against FAA rules. Since then, the National Guard were granted permission to share information their drones collected with local police.

  • a member of the Illinois National Guard, nominated by the Adjutant General

Completely missing from the list are organizations tasked with government oversight or with privacy as their mission. The drone industry itself only has two representatives, and the closest the public gets to a direct advocate is the person nominated by the Attorney General. This is a marked contrast with Grand Forks North Dakota, where drone use began tightly regulated, with a university review board providing oversight not just of student drone use but also unmanned flights by local police.

In its present form, the “Unmanned Aerial System Oversight Task Force Act” is sitting on the Governor’s desk, awaiting signature.

Microbes in the Weight Room

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A Standard Weight Room

Source: Wikipedia

In addition to water bottles, disinfectant spray bottles have become commonplace in many athletic facilities. The routine is simple to adopt; after you’ve used a piece of equipment, simply spray down the surfaces you’ve touched and give it a wipe.

The overall goal of this recent requirement is the prevention of infection spread, particularly Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus aureus, MRSA. Some twelve years ago, this bacterium, once thought to be only acquired in healthcare facilities, began to show up in the community. Between 2002 and 2003, in Los Angeles alone, outbreaks were recorded suggesting this bacterium was growing in the community. One happened to involve athletes; the spread presumed to be direct body-to-body contact.

Over the next few years, other outbreaks occurred, particularly in those playing football. Some, such as one in Connecticut involved ten people in a team of 100 players. The spread wasn’t limited to direct contact as other indirect means such as showers and sharing locker areas became suspect. By 2008, the risk spread from the locker room to the field.

With MRSA growing in this niche of athletics, the scope spread to other athletic environments. Simply being in a gym with shared weight equipment became a potential risk factor. But a study also published in 2008 put some doubt on the potential for spread suggesting the risk was minimal at best. Yet, because the weight room offers the perfect opportunity for microbial spread, there was no point in ignoring the risk. As a result, disinfection at source was implemented.

But even this strategy seemed to be ineffective as MRSA spread continued. Perhaps the most famous occurred in 2013 involving the NFL’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Three members of the team came down with the infection. The concern was so great at least one of the scheduled games was threatened. The team managed to clean their facility and put an end to the outbreak.

The incident brought even more attention to the issue and sparked worry amongst both athlete and facility managers. Yet, amid the apprehension, little had been done to find out whether MRSA was in fact a serious issue for everyone. After all, these may have been isolated events or a case of bad luck. But until a proper assessment of the microbial population in an athletic facility was performed, there was only speculation.

Last week, some answers to underlie the potential for infection spread, finally became available. A team of American researchers undertook the task of exploring the bacterial population of a gym and revealed the microbial population of an athletic facility. Their results provide some ease for those worried their visit to the gym may soon be followed by a trip to the hospital.

The group chose three university facilities in Chicago. They chose several different machines to sample, including elliptical machines, mats, weights and benches, as well as the floor. The samples occurred every hour over two different days. By the time the collection was complete, a total of 356 samples were obtained.

Each sample then went through a genetic analysis to identify the bacteria present. This resulted in nearly 11 million sequences. Of those, over 50,000 could be linked to a particular bacterium. This equated to 800 different bacteria per sample. The sequences were then typed to identify the genus and then compared to other samples to determine prevalence over the two day period.

The results revealed environmental bacteria were the most common. This included Pseudomonas and Acinetobacter, which made up 18% of all the bacteria identified. This wasn’t unexpected as any environment would be likely to harbor these organisms. Another expected result was the relatively high amount of skin-associated bacteria. Corynebacterium, Micrococcus and Kocuria were frequently identified as was Staphylococcus, the genus of MRSA (although it wasn’t identified in this study).

Once the bacteria were identified, the authors then tried to determine trends in microbial population. What they found was a core bacterial community for each of the surfaces. As for the other bacteria, they seem to have high turnover based on the variety of humans using the equipment. This may be due to extraneous factors, such as sweat load, the level of hygiene exhibited by an individual, and the frequency of cleaning/disinfection within the facility.

The results also reveal the incidence of infection transmission isn’t the equipment’s fault. In order for spread, a colonized person has to use the equipment and leave behind enough bacteria to be picked up by another person. The amounts would also be so small an additional laceration of the skin would be necessary to speed up the transmission.

There is of course, one caveat to this study. The authors never explicitly looked for MRSA. But research has revealed it is usually transient and requires an infected person to be present in order to cause an outbreak. This suggests in a healthy population, the risk for catching MRSA from a piece of equipment is relatively low.

But once an MRSA-infected individual enters the mix, the situation can change quickly. Unfortunately, this also means without some way of knowing if a person is infected, all environments in a gym should be regarded as being a potential source of spread. This means the best way to stay safe is to adhere to the disinfection policy. To be even safer, it might be good to use it before as well as after you’ve pumped some iron.

This is Why the Titan Rocket's Launch with a "Bwoop!"

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The Saturn V launches are the probably the most iconic launches of the Apollo era, a 363-foot rocket riding on a pillar of flames. But the Gemini launches were, in many ways, far more beautiful. The sleek Titan II missile launched the streamlined spacecraft into orbit on a clear flame. It also made a “bwooping” sound at the moment just before liftoff, a uniquely strange sound.

Shepard's Freedom 7 Launch

NASA

The US Army’s Redstone rockets that launched Al Shepard and Gus Grissom on the first two suborbital Mercury missions were distant descendants of the Nazi V-2 rocket. As such, it shared a number of similarities with the former offensive weapon, including its use of kerosene (RP-1) as the fuel and liquid oxygen as the oxidizer.

Beginning with John Glenn’s 1962 flight, NASA switched to the Atlas missile as the launch vehicle. These US Air Force-built rockets used the V-2 as a jumping off point but were marked by some signification changes including a thinner skin that demanded the whole structure be pressurized with nitrogen to keep from collapsing under its own weight.

Because the Atlas had its fair share of problems in its early life (it had a 51 percent success rate when Glenn rode one into orbit), the Air Force started working on a backup missile called Titan. Built by the Martin Company, Titan I was the first incarnation that didn’t stray too far from the Atlas. It was a two-stage rocket powered by kerosene and liquid oxygen.

With Titan II came some changes.

Gemini 5's Titan II Launch

NASA

The Titan II debuted hypergolic propellants, a kind of fuel and oxidizer combination that ignites on contact. There’s no need for an ignition source to get hypergols burning. They are also storable substances. The liquid oxygen used in the Titan I had to be loaded in just before launch. The Titan II used Aerozine 50, a 1:1 mixture of hydrazine and unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine as the field and dinitrogen tetroxide as the oxidizer. This was a significant benefit since the Titan II was designed to be stored and launched from an underground missile silo on a moment’s notice.

In the early 1960s, the Titan II was converted into a space launch vehicle by man-rating certain critical systems. This version also used Aerozine 50 as the fuel but made a slight change in oxidizer, opting instead for nitrogen tetroxide. It was this civilian version that launched twelve Gemini missions, ten of which were manned, between 1965 and 1966. And each launch had one feature that made the rocket stand apart from its predecessors: the Titan II made a distinctive “bwooping” sound the second before the rocket lifted off the ground. And the cause was something called a start cartridge.

When a rocket is sitting on the launch pad, the fuel and oxidizer tanks in its first stage, the stage that fires first to get it off the ground, sit on top of the rocket engine. In the case of the Titan II, the oxidizer feeding system used a single duct to connect the tank to the combustion chambers of the two engines while two outlets fed fuel into the combustion chamber at the same time. When they mixed, they ignited, generating thrust to get off the ground.

The Titan II Launching from a Missile Silo

USAF

The fuel and oxidizer didn’t flow into the combustion chamber on their own own. Both needed a little help from turbopumps; two of these drove the propellants to the combustion chambers at the right flow rates and pressures. But those turbopumps also needed a bit of a helping hand from a starter cartridge.

The start cartridge in the Titan II was powered by solid propellant. It produced hot gases that were directed under high pressure to an inlet nozzle, the force of which got the turbine spinning quickly. This turbine drove the fuel and oxidizer pumps that in turn delivered propellants into to the combustion chamber where they ignited on contact, sending the rocket off the Earth.It burned for just one second, but it was enough to get the fuel and oxidizer flowing. Once the rocket got flying, the exhaust gases were directed such that they drove the turbo pump assembly to keep the fuel and oxidizer flowing.

The use of a start cartridge wasn’t limited to rockets using hypergols. The Saturn V, which used kerosene and liquid oxygen, also used a start cartridge to get the fuel and oxidizer flowing into the combustion chamber of the first stage F-1 engines. But only in the Titan II did the start cartridge make a distinctive “bwooping” sound when the start cartridge fired.

Source: techbastard.com; Apollo Lunar Surface Journal; "Titan II: A History of a Cold War Missile Program" by David K. Stumpf.


This Skateboard Folds In Half To Stow In A Backpack

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Foldable Skateboard

Illustration by Trevor Johnston

Jammable materials? That's my jam!

For their final engineering-class project, a team of students at the University of Colorado at Boulder decided to create a jammable material, a flexible substance that acts solid when put under pressure. Juniors Fai Al Mulla, Seth Zegelstein, Sam Oliver, and Justin Olsen tried four different prototypes, and the one that worked best was also made from the cheapest material: construction paper. Layers of the paper could be jammed, or made rigid, if the students sealed them between pieces of plastic and applied pressure by pumping out the air. That experiment soon led to “flappy board”—a skateboard that can be folded in half. “The idea behind this project was for the skateboard to be portable,” says Al Mulla. By folding up the board, users can stash it in a backpack between rides.

Before Riding

A small battery-operated pump can suck the air out of the board through a spout, creating enough pressure to harden the 42 layers of paper inside.

After Riding

Releasing a valve allows air to re-enter. This relieves the pressure inside the board and makes it foldable.

This article originally appeared in the July 2015 issue of Popular Science.

Air Force Sent Self-Destruct Command To Broken SpaceX Rocket

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After the explosion of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket on Sunday, the hunt is on to find out what went wrong. Although the company says it still isn’t sure what the hell happened, the Air Force has just announced that its safety officers sent the command for the rocket to destroy itself--but that was long after it was already breaking apart from a malfunction, USA Today reports.

Before the rocket's first stage could separate from the rest of the rocket and attempt to land on a drone ship, the rocket suffered a catastrophic failure and started breaking up. Some 70 seconds later, safety officers sent the self-destruct command. The command may have prevented the rocket from going out of control, as well as helping it burn off its toxic fuel before falling into the ocean.

Although SpaceX CEO Elon Musk tweeted that the failure came from too much pressure building up in the liquid oxygen tank of an upper stage, it’s not clear what caused the high pressure.

What Weapons Would China Use In World War III?

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Today, Ghost Fleet: A Novel of the Next World War, is coming out. By August Cole and Eastern Arsenal's very own P.W. Singer, it's a novel about what might happen if the brewing Cold War between the U.S. and China were ever to turn hot.

Here's a handy visual guide to the arsenal of the Directorate—China's fictional new government:

Ghost Fleet Type 055 Cruiser

Zheng He

www.top81.cn

The Zheng He, one of the first Type 055 cruisers, serves as the proud flagship for the joint Sino-Russian naval taskforce in the north Pacific. As the pride of the Directorate's naval forces, the Zheng He can carry 128 long range anti-air, anti-ship and land attack missiles, as well as a big 130mm cannon.

Ghost Fleet H/PJ-38 Cannon

H/PJ-38

he_andy at lt.cjdby.net

The H/PJ-38 cannon is the main gun found on Type 052D destroyers and the might Type 055 cruiser. It fires 90kg shells at distances of over 30km, making it good not just for shore bombardment, but also for long range gunnery duels with enemy warships in a pinch.

China 052D Destroyer Luyang III

Kunming

f.kscan

The first 052D destroyer, the 7,500 ton Kunming, was launched in late 2013 and commissioned in March 2014 (its hull number, 172, was not painted on then). The 052D, a modern destroyer with better primary radars than current AEGIS warships, serves as the mainstay of the PLAN, and later the Directorate Navy.

Hologram China Drone Technology

Holographic Ground Control Station

Wendell Minnick, at Defense News

The Holographic Ground Control Station (GCS), displayed at the Zhuhai 2014 Airshow, allows for other personal to observe the drone pilot's operations. A holographic control station on a major warship, like say the Type 055, creates an immersive but accessible way for commanders to get a grasp of the big picture without drowning in abstract data.

3D Virtual Reality China Pilot Training

VR Headsets put PLANAF Pilots into 3D

sunmingchi via lt.cjdby.net

Right now, Chinese pilots use 3D headsets to train in a virtual reality (VR) enabled environment. As VR sets grow in capability, military personnel and hackers could use them not for practice, but as essential equipment for doing everything from calling in airstrikes to hacking enemy networks.

Ghost Fleet Jiaolong Deep Sea Submersible

Jiaolong

Chinese Internet

The Jiaolong (Flood Dragon) is a 3-person deep sea submersible that can dive down to 7,500 meters below the ocean surface to investigate the seabed. The Directorate's usage of deep sea submersible is actually the first step to the next great Pacific war.

China Tiangong

Tiangong 3

bisbos.net

This CGI of the Tiangong 3 space station shows three Tiangong space station modules, a Shenzhou manned module underneath and a Tianzhou automated resupply vehicle all docked together. Theoretically, the Tiangong 3 could be surreptitiously armed with an anti-satellite laser for a "space Pearl Harbor". Theoretically.

China exoskeleton

Kicking High

china.com

This new Chinese exoskeleton is both strong and agile enough to support its wearer engaging in high side kicking, flexibility is a key requirement for infantry power armor. Directorate troops wear exoskeletons on the streets of occupied territory, giving them agile strength for carrying heavy weapons and sprint apprehend to errant NSM activists.

Ghost Fleet ZH-05 Smart Grenade Rifle

ZH-05

Hongjian via China Defense Forum

The ZH-05 is China's smart rifle, succeeding where the US Army's OICW failed. With fancy sights, a programmable grenades set for directional fragmentation and airburst explosives, and a hard hitting 5.8mm rifle under the grenade launcher, the ZH-05 will give Directorate forces a high tech edge against any urban insurgent in the world.

Ghost Fleet ZTZ-99A Tank

ZTZ-99A

FORBIN via Sinodefense Forum

The ZTZ-99A tank, is China's most modern and heavily protected tank. While its 125mm main cannon is perfectly deadly against other tanks, its thick armor and planned remote weapons station makes it a contender for urban warfare in a pinch.

Z-10 attack helicopter China

Thunderstorm

www.81.cn

The Z-10, like other modern attack helicopters, carries a wide variety of missiles and rockets like the HJ-10 anti-tank missile, as well as its 23mm chain gun, which can spit out about 600 8oz shells a minute. While usually a land based attack helicopter, with the right amount of derring do and ingenuity, it can be based off a wide range of ships, naval or disguised civilian, for attacks from the sea.

Ghost Fleet Soaring Dragon UAV Drone

Soaring Dragon

www.top81.cn

The high altitude, long endurance Soaring Dragon UAV uses a unique box wing design to reduce drag, thus increasing its fuel efficiency and flight time endurance. Its long flight time and high flight altitude makes it well suited to continuously patrol large areas of ocean surface for any suspicious or hostile activity.

Ghost Fleet DF-21D Antiship Ballistic Missile Stonefish

Stonefish

Chinese Internet

The DF-21D anti-ship ballistic missile (AShBM) is the breakout star of the Chinese anti-access arsenal. While the current DF-21D can only reach the western portions of the Pacific, hypersonic glider vehicles on future AShBMs descendants would extend their range well into at least the central Pacific.

Ghost Fleet Aerostat

VTAS Aerostat

Shepard Media

VTAS already offers Chinese military aerostats (blimp like balloons tethered to a ground station). Flying at thousands of meters above the ground, aerostats can pack a wide range of sensors, such as acoustic gunshot detectors (great for nabbing insurgents), radars to spot cruise missiles and ships, and infrared sensors to notice unauthorized persons in restricted zones.

Ghost Fleet Robots Team Grit

Robot Hunters

Team Grit

Team Grit's Cogburn robot crawls into rubble and wreckage to look for survivors. While this DARPA Challenge entrant has benign purposes, Directorate forces in the future repurpose similar legged robots to hunt for insurgents in urban environments.

Ghost Fleet Quadcopters

Quadcopter

Call of Duty Black Ops II

China is already home to many of the world's leading consumer drone builders, like DIY, not to mention a booming military robotics sector. As quadcopter drones get larger, cheaper and smarter, putting guns on them to hunt insurgents and other "bad actors" will be the next logical step.

Ghost Fleet Robot Helicopters

SVU-200

Ewatt Fetters

This Ewatt Technology SVU-200 robot helicopter (designed by the American Fetters Aerospace) can carry 200 kg of payload while traveling at 209km per hour in the sky. What's even more amazing is that it was displayed in Washington DC during a 2013 drone exhibition. In the future, the Directorate will use militarized one- and four-rotored cousins of the SVU-200 to monitor, and shoot at, enemies on Pacific islands.

Ghost Fleet PL-12 PL-21D

Long shots

CASIC

Chinese PL-12 and the even longer ranged PL-21 are long-ranged missiles usually mounted on Chinese aircraft. But with ramjet engines to improve maneuverability (not to mention some covert modifications), the PL-12D and PL-21 would make deadly ground- and drone-launched surprises against even the most modern stealth fighters.

Ghost Fleet Radar

H200 Radar

Chinese Internet

The H200 is one of China's first phased array radars, but remains just as deadly. While originally paired with the KS-1 surface to air missile, its compact design makes it mobile enough to be placed quickly into urban settings, where with the right soft and hard upgrades, it could guide even deadlier missiles.

Y-20 China transport aircraft

Y-20 Comparision

green-stone13.livejournal.com

This speculative CGI compares the current Y-20 prototype with the smaller D-30 engines at the bottom, while the more powerful and efficient WS-20 engined Y-20 is at the top. Directorate forces use the WS-20 to shuttle around VIPs, as well as to quickly stage out and rotate paratroops, tanks and other reinforcements on expeditionary and occupation missions.

China J-20 Stealth Fighter 2015

2015 in Flight

Andreas Rupprecht at China Defense Forum

The optimized J-20, once it enters into full service by the end of the decade, will have WS-15 turbofan engines that allow it to supercruise at supersonic to "get there fastest and furthest". It'll be China's premiere stealth fighter, tasked with defending the mainland's airspace.

China aircraft carrier Liaoning Type 052C

Liaoning Task Force

Andreas Rupprecht, via China Defense Forum

Since its commissioning in 2012, the Liaoning has been very active at sea, including naval exercises with other Chinese warships, including the 052C guided missile destroyer "171", seen in the background. Getting the most experience from its first aircraft carrier is a vital step for China to build a world class navy with airpower projection and joint operational capability.

Ghost Fleet J-15

Flying Sharks

Gaoshan at GJX5537@163.com

Gaoshan, a famous CGI artist of Chinese aircraft, shows two J-15 "Flying Shark" carrier fighters with full loads of anti-air and anti-ship missiles. The J-15 in the foreground carries Russian designed Kh-31/YJ-92 anti-radiation missiles for hunting radars, while the closer J-15 carries two deadly YJ-12 supersonic antiship missiles.

Ghost Fleet J-31 Stealth Fighter

J-31

Gaoshan at GJX5537@163.com

Built as a lower end complement to the famous J-20, the J-31 stealth fighter can be staged out of airfields, as well as providing a stealthy punch for Chinese aircraft carriers. Their ease of maintenance and powerful antiship missiles makes them a good choice for island defense.

Ghost Fleet YJ-12 anti-ship missile

YJ-12

Chinese Military Aviation

The YJ-12 is China's deadliest air launched anti-ship missile. With a range over 400km miles, the missile travels at speeds above Mach 3.5, meaning that once it flies from out of the horizon, the target ship has only less than 10 seconds to respond with last ditch defenses like Gatling cannons.

You Get One Whole Extra Leap Second Today--Here's Why

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Tonight, there will be an extra second in the day, added in at midnight Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). That’s 8:00 pm Eastern, if you want to stare at a clock and see … not much. It is just a second after all.

A leap second is added on to account for the fact that a day isn’t exactly 24 hours long.

The Earth’s rotation is actually slowing down. On average, a day is 2 milliseconds longer than 24 hours. The gravitational pull of the moon and the sun are acting like a brake, slowing it down just a little bit over time, but other aspects of the Earth also affect the rotation of the planet. Things like the seasons, changes in the Earth's core, the amount of ice in the ice caps, and even weather events like El Niño can cause changes in the amount of time it takes the Earth to make a full rotation on its axis.

To account for the difference between the planet's rotation and the time on our atomic clocks (which we use as the basis for our time-keeping), occasionally we throw in a leap second to keep our watches in sync with the Earth.

NASA has a good video on the topic:

Unlike leap years, during which an extra day is added to the end of February every four years like clockwork (sorry...), a leap second is added almost arbitrarily and with relatively little warning.

Since it was introduced in 1972, a leap second has always fallen on one of two days, either June 30 or December 31. But in the past 43 years, the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service (IERS), the organization that decides leap seconds, has only ever issued 25 leap seconds, spaced unevenly over the years. The announcement of this year’s leap second occurred in January, giving people only a few months to prepare.

It might seem like a strange thing to prepare for, but because leap seconds are added manually, they can cause a lot of problems on the internet. Three years ago, when the last leap second was added, websites crashed, and so did software systems, leading to delayed planes and other issues. The systems couldn’t process a day ending at 23 hours 59 minutes and 60 seconds (as opposed to 23:59:59, like it usually does).

Because of the problems (and the general annoyance), there have been repeated calls to abolish the leap second, or at least develop a way to allow people to prepare for it better. The next discussion of the subject will happen later this year, in November.

Machines Sniff Out Illegal Specimens Of Wood

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Illegally traded specimens of endangered species present a huge problem to investigators and customs officials all over the world. But in some cases, the illegal trade isn’t ivory or endangered animals: it’s bits of wood.

Wildlife trade is one thing, and forensic specialists have managed to come up with some ingenious (and spectacular) deterrents to illegal wildlife trade, including advanced DNA testing that is now used to protect endangered or threatened animals. Detecting illegal wood products is more challenging, especially after the timber has been processed.

Until now. NPR with Oregon Public Broadcasting reports that a wildlife forensic lab has managed to start identifying illegal wood samples using a DART-TOF (Direct Analysis in Real Time – Time of Flight) mass spectrometer, a machine that can smell the difference between types of wood.

"Originally we had no idea if it was going to pan out or not. But I knew if it had an odor ... this instrument is kind of like a massive nose, almost," Ed Espinoza told NPR.

Here’s how it works. When investigators find something they think might have been made with illegal wood, they send it to the lab. The lab takes a small sample and puts it in the machine. The machine reads the unique combination of chemicals given off by the wood, and spits out a reading that the scientists can compare to other samples in a growing database. If the wood is a match for a rare or endangered species, the authorities can take action against the people using illegally forested wood.

The hope is that eventually technologies like this can help people figure out where forests are most vulnerable, and prevent continued deforestation.

Fireworks Bring Exhilaration, Joy, And Pollution

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This weekend is the Fourth of July, a time for family, and hot dogs and, of course, fireworks.

Fireworks are awesome. They are the best. They are also flaming rockets of exploding material that we send flying into the air above our heads. And amazing as they are, there is a downside.

And we aren’t talking injuries, or fires (PSA: Don’t be dumb with fireworks), though both are serious. Apparently an unseen danger or fireworks lingers in the air after they go off. Researchers with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) published a study that showed that for a brief amount of time between the evening of July 4 and the morning of July 5, the amount of fine particles in the air goes up by 42 percent across the entire country. Measurements taken right next to areas where fireworks were being shot off showed an increase of 370 percent.

Particulates On Independence Day

Particulates On Independence Day

A graph showing the amount of particulates in the air during the fireworks free-for-all on Independence Day.

The particles that they looked at were particulate matter less than 2.5 micrometers across (PM 2.5), 1/30 the width of a human hair according to the EPA, and are a health risk because they can get stuck in people's lungs. Once there, they can damage the lungs, blood vessels, and heart, especially if a person is exposed to them over long periods of time as is the case in areas with lots of exhaust, industry, or smog, all of which contain small particulate matter.

That’s a lot of fireworks, and a lot of pollution. But that doesn’t mean we should panic. While people that have respiratory illnesses should probably stand upwind of the fireworks, the increase in particulate matter due to fireworks shouldn't make a big difference to the rest of us.

Whether or not you decide to take additional precautions, enjoy the show, and clean up after yourself.

Does Sugar Make Kids Hyper?

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On a Sugar High

Jason Schneider

The image of a kid on a sugar high bouncing off the walls gained credence in the 1970s and ’80s, when several studies linked sugar intake to behavioral problems such as hyperactivity.

But in 1995, Vanderbilt University pediatrician Mark Wolraich reviewed 23 studies involving more than 400 children and found no evidence for the belief that sugar impacts a kid’s behavior or cognition. “We came as close to proving the null hypo­thesis as you can,” says Wolraich, who is now Chief of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics at Oklahoma University.

In the early 1990s, psychologists Richard Milich and Daniel Hoover took a different approach to answering the question: They studied 31 boys ages 5 to 7 whose parents identified them as “sugar sensitive.” The researchers gave the boys aspartame-sweetened Kool-Aid and then videotaped them interacting with their moms. Beforehand, the researchers told half the moms their kids had consumed sugar and told the other half the truth. Parents who thought their kids were on a sugar high rated them as being more hyperactive and criticized them more severely. Milich and Hoover concluded that the link between sugar and behavior might be based on parents’ expectations, not on the sweetener itself.

There might also be other factors at play when sugared-up kids go nuts. Candy and cake, for example, are staples on Halloween and at birthday parties—events rife with kid drama. Or there might be other substances in the mix. Chocolate, for instance, is packed with stimulants, such as caffeine and theobromine.

Still, for many parents, sugar remains the go-to scapegoat, even if proof is lacking. “We’re always looking to explain our behavior,” Milich says. “We don’t like to be in a vacuum where something happens and we don’t know why.”

Have a question? Tweet your science questions and quandaries to @PopSci with the hashtag #AskAnything, or email us at AskAnything@popsci.com.

This article was originally published in the July 2015 issue of Popular Science


Facebook CEO Says Telepathy Is Coming After Virtual Reality

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Mark Zuckerberg/ Facebook

Mark Zuckerberg tries the Oculus VR headset.

During his townhall Q&A session on his Facebook page today, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg shared his idea of what a technologically integrated future looks like: and it’s a lot like an episode of Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror.

Zuck wrote:

One day, I believe we'll be able to send full rich thoughts to each other directly using technology. You'll just be able to think of something and your friends will immediately be able to experience it too if you'd like. This would be the ultimate communication technology.

The comment, which has since been deleted, talks about virtual and augmented reality as the future of digital media, stating that video will become even more important than photos. With Zuckerberg at the helm, Facebook, which has a history of acquiring large swaths of media real estate like Oculus and Instagram, is well-poised to make the blossoming field of virtual reality a piece of commonplace technology. Between this statement and Google's contact lens, the future of human interaction with reality is getting a little more clear.

Full text here:

There are a few important trends in human communication that we hope to improve.

First, people are gaining the power to share in richer and richer ways. We used to just share in text, and now we post mainly with photos. In the future video will be even more important than photos. After that, immersive experiences like VR will become the norm. And after that, we'll have the power to share our full sensory and emotional experience with people whenever we'd like.

Second, people are gaining the power to communicate more frequently. We used to have to be with someone in person. Then we had these bulky computers at our desks or that we could carry around. Now we have these incredible devices in our pockets all the time, but we only use them periodically throughout the day. In the future, we'll have AR and other devices that we can wear almost all the time to improve our experience and communication.

One day, I believe we'll be able to send full rich thoughts to each other directly using technology. You'll just be able to think of something and your friends will immediately be able to experience it too if you'd like. This would be the ultimate communication technology.

Our lives improve as our communication tools get better in many ways. We can build richer relationships with the people we love and care about. We know about what's going on in the world and can make better decisions in our jobs and lives. We are also more informed and can make better decisions collectively as a society. This increase in the power people have to share is one of the major forces driving the world today.

Screenshot/ Facebook

Rosetta Orbiter Spots 18 Holes On Comet

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On the other side of our solar system, the Rosetta spacecraft is orbiting a duck-shaped comet named 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. New images have revealed that the surface of that comet is riddled with sinkholes. We've counted 18 so far.

Comet 67P is essentially a ball of ice and dust, and as the comet swings in closer to the Sun, scientists think some of that ice warms up and evaporates in a process called sublimation. After the ice sublimates, the thin layer of dirt on top collapses, resulting in a pockmarked surface. The comet’s larger pits are hundreds of meters wide and hundreds of meters deep.

Some scientists think sublimation could also be the driving force behind Comet 67P’s odd shape, although it’s more likely that the comet was formed by two gently colliding rocks.

New Horizons Spacecraft Gets A Whiff Of Pluto’s Methane

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Methane On Pluto

The New Horizons spacecraft detected methane on Pluto with the help of Ralph, an infrared spectrometer. In the inset, Pluto's false pink color indicates the methane signature. (Note: Pluto is not pink in real life.)

As the New Horizons spacecraft closes in for its July 14 rendezvous with Pluto, its detectors have identified methane on the former planet’s surface. Considering the spacecraft is still 11 million miles away, Pluto must have some strong gas.

Pluto is frosted in frozen methane—the stuff of farts and fuel here on Earth. Scientists first spotted it there in 1976 using ground-based observations, but this is the first time the spacecraft has been able to confirm the observations.

The spacecraft didn’t really “smell” the methane (which, to the human nose, is odorless, by the way). Instead it “saw” the gas with its infrared spectrometer.

Different molecules absorb different levels of infrared radiation. The radiation makes the molecules vibrate, giving off characteristic wavelengths that scientists can use to identify which atoms are in the compound. In this case, the infrared measurements indicated a carbon and four hydrogen atoms, which can pretty much only mean one thing: CH4, methane.

The methane may have been frozen there since the solar system formed 4.5 million years ago. As New Horizons flies by in mid-July, we’ll get a better idea of how the gas is distributed over Pluto’s surface. Meanwhile, other imaging techniques will help to reveal the composition of the former planet’s thin atmosphere.

Swine Flu Vaccine May Have Caused Spike In Narcolepsy Cases

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There's no telling when narcolepsy can render someone unconcious

Back in 2009, the global H1N1 (swine flu) outbreak was the cause of a lot of concern. But while many public health officials were focused on the flu itself, a team of neuroscientists led by researchers at Stanford University noticed something strange: That year saw a huge uptick in the number of people diagnosed with narcolepsy, a sleep disorder famous for causing its sufferers to be rendered unconscious for several minutes during unpredictable “sleep attacks.” They suspected that the flu vaccines, which were being deployed in high numbers worldwide, might have had something to do with it. People vaccinated with one in particular, called Pandemrix, showed particularly high levels, and the researchers sought to figure out why. Their study, published today in Science Translational Medicine, could shed new light on what causes narcolepsy, which is still poorly understood.

Pandemrix and a similar vaccine, Focetria, were formulated from two different strains of the swine flu virus. The virus contains a protein that has a similar structure to a receptor for hypocretin, a hormone that regulates sleep and wakefulness. (Narcolepsy destroys the cells that make this hormone.) And while both Pandemrix and Focetria contained the protein, Focetria had about 75 percent less of the protein. This led the researchers to hypothesize that the antibodies that the body was producing to fight the flu could also be combatting the hypocretin receptor and causing narcolepsy. The researchers confirmed this idea by testing 20 people who had received the Pandemrix vaccine—17 of them had elevated levels of antibodies targeting the hypocretin receptor. None of the six people tested who received Focetria had the same antibodies.

The causes of narcolepsy have remained a mystery for decades, and these finding suggest a new theory: That narcolepsy could be an autoimmune disorder. People with a genetic predisposition, combined with high levels of the swine flu virus, could generate enough antibodies that persist in the body for months and even pass through the blood-brain barrier. Once in the brain, these antibodies could tamper with sleep-wake cycles and cause narcolepsy. Without more research done to evaluate the idea, the study authors can't be sure that these antibodies cause narcolepsy, but for now they call the mechanism “an inviting possibility.”

‘Steve Jobs’ Trailer Turns Apple Founder’s Life Into A Dark Opera

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The birth of the Mac is a tale as old as…well, as old as the first Mac, which dates back to 1984. The Macintosh 128K breathed new life into the already-burgeoning computer industry, and with its entrance came the persona of Steve Jobs, a hypercharged detail-man who refused to accept failure.

And for the second time this decade, Hollywood is treating us to Jobs’ story, this time under the direction of Slumdog Millionaire’s Danny Boyle, and written by tech-biopic veteran Aaron Sorkin (who wrote The Social Network, and more notably, The West Wing).

In a trailer released today, Michael Fassbender takes on the role of Jobs, showing equal parts of the legendary CEO’s emotional outbursts and Hollywood’s propensity for designers shoving papers off desks.

The movie, aptly titled Steve Jobs, brings us from the dramatic unveiling of the first Macintosh to deep into Jobs’ twilight years, taking turns at his relationship with his family and once-partner Steve Wozniak (Seth Rogen). The movie will features three acts, each one an "iconic" product launch, according to the film's website. Rogen’s voice opens the trailer: “What do you do? You’re not engineer. You’re not a designer. You can’t put a hammer to a nail. I built the circuitboard. The graphical interface was stolen! So how come, 10 times in a day, I read Steve Jobs is a genius?

“What do you do?” a relatively-schlubby Wozniak asks again of the sleek, well-groomed Jobs.

“Musicians play their instruments. I play the orchestra,” cooly replies Jobs, cuing an orchestral number that pushes the viewer through a 2 more minutes of quick cuts and full-moon spectacles.

Responses has been mixed on Twitter:

But Marco Arment, developer and co-host of the Accidental Tech Podcast has some different thoughts.

Steve Jobs hits theaters October 9, 2015.

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