Sci-Tech news

• Activision Blizzard wants eSports to be big league

  04-11-2016 22:30
  
  Activision Blizzard is creating an eSports league of its own with competitive play of team-based shooter game "Overwatch," and a goal of building professional stars—possibly with big-league payouts.
  
  Read more

• Eiffel Tower lit green in honor of Paris climate change deal

  04-11-2016 22:20
  
  The Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomphe in Paris have temporarily been lit in green as a reminder to the world to enact the Paris Agreement on climate change.
  
  Read more

• Mark Zuckerberg is being investigated by German prosecutors for hate speech on Facebook - Chicago Tribune

  04-11-2016 21:47 via chicagotribune.com
  
  CBS Local
  Mark Zuckerberg is being investigated by German prosecutors for hate speech on Facebook
  Chicago Tribune
  On Nov. 4, Der Spiegel announced that prosecutors in Munich are opening an investigation into Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and some fellow executives for possible criminal incitement and hate speech, as Facebook's policies may be in violation of ...
  Obamacare sticker shock: health insurance prices jump an average of 22%Fast Company
  Germany isn't happy with how Facebook is h
  
  Read more

• Samsung Recall of Washing Machines Affects Millions of Consumers - ConsumerReports.org

  04-11-2016 21:37 via consumerreports.org
  Washington Times
  Samsung Recall of Washing Machines Affects Millions of Consumers
  ConsumerReports.org
  We respect your privacy. ALL email addresses you provide will be used just for sending this story. Thanks for sharing. Oops, we messed up. Try again later. Samsung is recalling about 2.8 million top-load washing machines more than a month after ...
  Samsung recalls 2.8 million 'explosive' washers due to injury riskExtremeTech
  Returned your Note 7? Good, now steer clear of your Samsung cloth
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Blizzard goes back to '96 with 'Diablo III' update, and a fan favorite returns - Digital Trends

  04-11-2016 21:26 via digitaltrends.com
  
  Digital Trends
  Blizzard goes back to '96 with 'Diablo III' update, and a fan favorite returns
  Digital Trends
  Hot on the heels of major announcements for Overwatch and Hearthstone, Blizzard offered BlizzCon attendees a sneak peek at its plans for the Diablo franchise. While we weren't treated to anything as momentous as Diablo IV, Blizzard did unveil its plans ...
  The original Diablo is being recreated in Diablo 3Polygon
  Diablo III Brings Back The NecromancerKotaku
  Blizzard is remaking the origi
  
  Read more

• Apple slashes prices of USB-C adapters for MacBook Pro - CNET

  04-11-2016 21:24 via cnet.com
  
  CNET
  Apple slashes prices of USB-C adapters for MacBook Pro
  CNET
  Phil Schiller, Apple's head of marketing, described how the USB-C ports on the MacBook Pro can do the functions many other connectors performed in the past -- if you have an adapter. James Martin/CNET. Those MacBook Pro dongles are now a lot cheaper.
  Apple cuts prices on USB-C & Thunderbolt 3 gear in response to MacBook Pro backlashAppleInsider (press release) (blog)
  Apple Drops Prices of 4K and 5K LG Displays by 25 PercentMac
  
  Read more

• From Uncharted to Call of Duty - Infinite Warfare's Narrative Director on the Shooter's New Story - GameSpot

  04-11-2016 21:00 via gamespot.com
  
  GameSpot
  From Uncharted to Call of Duty - Infinite Warfare's Narrative Director on the Shooter's New Story
  GameSpot
  Taylor Kurosaki talks about coming to Infinity Ward from Naughty Dog, the role of a single-player campaign, and more. by Chris Pereira and Mike Mahardy on November 4, 2016. Want the latest gaming news as it breaks? All the highlights in the world of ...
  'Call Of Duty: Infinite Warfare's Awful Supply Drop Loot Boxes Are Ultimately Our FaultForbes
  Don't buy the Windows Store ve
  
  Read more

• Fin24.com | 'We're sad to see Groupon SA die' - Fin24 users

  04-11-2016 20:42
  
  As the grieving process of Groupon SA begins, little did many users know that of the five stages of grief – denial, anger, depression and acceptance – ‘bargaining’ would be the most ironic emotion.
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Fin24.com | OBITUARY: Rest in Peace Groupon SA

  04-11-2016 20:42
  
  Dearly beloved, we gather here today in the presence of irate deal-seekers to bid farewell to another former and short-lived pioneer in the digital space.
  
  Read more

• Hearthstone's new expansion is Mean Streets of Gadgetzan, coming 'early December' - VentureBeat

  04-11-2016 20:09 via venturebeat.com
  
  VentureBeat
  Hearthstone's new expansion is Mean Streets of Gadgetzan, coming 'early December'
  VentureBeat
  Blizzard revealed the latest expansion for its digital card game market leader Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft during its BlizzCon event in Anaheim, California, today. bringing back lapsed players. It's called Mean Streets of Gadgetzan. The new cards ...
  Mean Streets of Gadgetzan is Hearthstone's next expansionPolygon
  Hearthstone's Next Expansion Revealed, Alongside Several New CardsGameSpo
  
  Read more

• Yay! The internet is getting more secure

  04-11-2016 20:06 via rss.cnn.com
  
  While reports of major hackings continue to make news, the sites you visit are safer than ever before.
  
  Read more

• Study finds female scientists collaborate differently

  04-11-2016 19:58
  
  Succeeding in the male-dominated science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) disciplines can be very challenging for female faculty. Now, a Northwestern University study of the collaboration patterns of STEM faculty publishing 4 November in the open-access journal PLOS Biology has found that the playing fields in some disciplines are not as level as they first appear.
  
  Read more

• Blizzard Shocks The World By Unveiling 'Overwatch's Sombra At BlizzCon - Forbes

  04-11-2016 19:51 via forbes.com
  
  Engadget
  Blizzard Shocks The World By Unveiling 'Overwatch's Sombra At BlizzCon
  Forbes
  BlizzCon kicks off in earnest today, and while I'm about to sit down and watch a few hours of the Hearthstone World Championship, I would be remiss if I didn't report on the conclusion to the preposterously long Overwatch Sombra saga. For months now ...
  BlizzCon 2016: Overwatch's Sombra revealed, Diablo returns, Hearthstone's Gadgetzan, and morePCWorld
  Blizzard unveils Sombra, new maps, and Overwatch Lea
  
  Read more

• What's Popping on Google Ahead of Election Day?

  04-11-2016 19:46 via nbcnews.com
  
  Take a deep breath -- we're in the home stretch of the 2016 campaign.
  
  Read more

• Elon Musk gives clues about SpaceX rocket explosion

  04-11-2016 19:45 via rss.cnn.com
  
  The SpaceX rocket which exploded at Cape Canaveral on Sept. 1 may have seen conditions reach such extremes that its liquid oxygen fuel may have frozen solid before the blast, according to CEO Elon Musk.
  
  Read more

• Arctic Farming: Town Defies Icy Conditions With Hydroponics

  04-11-2016 19:34
  A creative kind of farming is taking root in a coastal hub town above Alaska's Arctic Circle
  
  Read more

• Space balloons inflating passenger flight hopes

  04-11-2016 19:30
  
  After a string of high-profile setbacks for rocket programmes aimed at one day flying paying customers into space, a Spanish tech firm plans to send stargazers skyward using gas-filled balloons.
  
  Read more

• Oil and gas majors invest $1 billion in low-emission tech

  04-11-2016 19:20
  
  Ten global oil and gas companies on Friday announced they will invest $1 billion (900 million euros) in low-carbon-emission technologies to help combat climate change.
  
  Read more

• Paris Climate Change Deal Becomes International Law

  04-11-2016 19:14
  The Paris Agreement to combat climate change becomes international law on Friday _ a landmark demonstrating that countries are serious about tackling global warming amid growing fears that the world is becoming hotter faster than scientists expected
  
  Read more

• Yesterday's Silk Road could be tomorrow's environmental superhighway

  04-11-2016 19:10
  
  While China is building a gigantic modern-day upgrade of the famed ancient Silk Road resplendent in global cooperation in the name of economic expansion, a group of sustainability scholars point out that the Belt and Road Initiative (B&R) also could be a superhighway of environmental progress.
  
  Read more

• Fake Tweets, real consequences for the election

  04-11-2016 19:00
  
  Software robots masquerading as humans are influencing the political discourse on social media as never before and could threaten the very integrity of the 2016 U.S. presidential election, said Emilio Ferrara, a computer scientist and research leader at the USC Information Sciences Institute (ISI), and USC Viterbi School of Engineering research assistant professor.
  
  Read more

• Detour via gravitational lens makes distant galaxy visible

  04-11-2016 19:00
  
  Never before have astrophysicists measured light of such high energy from a celestial object so far away. Around 7 billion years ago, a huge explosion occurred at the black hole in the center of a galaxy. This was followed by a burst of high-intensity gamma rays. A number of telescopes, MAGIC included, have succeeded in capturing this light. An added bonus: it was thus possible to reconfirm Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, as the light rays encountered a less distant galaxy en route to E
  
  Read more

• Tsunami of stars and gas produces dazzling eye-shaped feature in galaxy

  04-11-2016 18:50
  
  Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have discovered a tsunami of stars and gas that is crashing midway through the disk of a spiral galaxy known as IC 2163. This colossal wave of material - which was triggered when IC 2163 recently sideswiped another spiral galaxy dubbed NGC 2207 - produced dazzling arcs of intense star formation that resemble a pair of eyelids.
  
  Read more

• NASA's MMS breaks Guinness World Record

  04-11-2016 18:50
  
  NASA's Magnetospheric Multiscale mission, or MMS, is breaking records. MMS now holds the Guinness World Record for highest altitude fix of a GPS signal. Operating in a highly elliptical orbit around Earth, the MMS satellites set the record at 43,500 miles above the surface. The four MMS spacecraft incorporate GPS measurements into their precise tracking systems, which require extremely sensitive position and orbit calculations to guide tight flying formations.
  
  Read more

• Image: Hubble takes flight with the toucan and the cluster

  04-11-2016 18:50
  
  It may be famous for hosting spectacular sights such as the Tucana Dwarf Galaxy and 47 Tucanae (heic1510), the second brightest globular cluster in the night sky, but the southern constellation of Tucana (The Toucan) also possesses a variety of unsung cosmic beauties.
  
  Read more

• Tropical Storm Meari forecast to intensify

  04-11-2016 18:42
  
  Tropical Storm Meari is currently located 331 miles north of Ulithi which is an atoll in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean. The storm has tracked northeastward at 7 knots per hour over the past six hours.
  
  Read more

• So What Will Happen to All Obama's Tweets?

  04-11-2016 18:38 via nbcnews.com
  
  President Obama won't just be handing over the keys to the Oval Office in January — he will also be relinquishing the all-important @POTUS Twitter.
  
  Read more

• Mystery Deepens Over Bones Linked to Amelia Earhart - Live Science

  04-11-2016 18:06 via livescience.com
  
  Live Science
  Mystery Deepens Over Bones Linked to Amelia Earhart
  Live Science
  The partial skeleton of a castaway found in the 1940s on the Pacific island Nikumaroro shows some similarities to Amelia Earhart, scientists say. Though extensive searches have failed to turn up the bones, scientists have found a record of the bones' ...
  Amelia Earhart might have died as a castawayPhys.Org
  Recovered Bones May Have Been Earhart'sArchaeology
  Amelia Earhart 'survived heroically' as a castaway, study
  
  Read more

• Sprint will support next-gen texting on Android next year - The Verge

  04-11-2016 15:59 via theverge.com
  
  The Verge
  Sprint will support next-gen texting on Android next year
  The Verge
  Ah, RCS: it stands for “Rich Communication Services” and it's meant to replace SMS as the default way most phones send text and multimedia messages. It's more powerful than SMS — without that silly 160 character limit and with better support for ...
  Sprint customers will get next-generation texting features soonEngadget
  Google brings RCS, the next-gen upgrade to SMS, to Android phones on SprintTechCr
  
  Read more

• In food packaging, color matters: Why darker tones are a safer bet

  04-11-2016 15:50
  
  The aesthetics of food packaging is geared to the assumptions people make about the product within. This research study makes clear that the color of packaging is an important, but tricky, element.
  
  Read more

• Samsung to recall 2.8 million washing machines in US

  04-11-2016 15:36
  
  Samsung is recalling 2.8 million washing machines with a potential for a dangerous detachment of its top lid, the South Korean company and US safety officials announced Friday.
  
  Read more

• Large-scale study reveals new insights into coral and symbiotic algae partnership

  04-11-2016 15:30
  
  A large-scale study of Caribbean coral has yielded discoveries on the pairing process between an endangered coral and the microscopic symbiotic algae they rely on for survival.
  
  Read more

• NASA's NavCube could support an X-ray communications demonstration in space—a NASA first

  04-11-2016 15:24
  
  Two proven technologies have been combined to create a promising new technology that could meet future navigational challenges in deep space. It also may help demonstrate—for the first time—X-ray communications in space, a capability that would allow the transmission of gigabits per second throughout the solar system.
  
  Read more

• Light drives single-molecule 3-wheelers

  04-11-2016 15:23
  
  Scientists at Rice University and at the University of Graz, Austria, are driving three-wheeled, single-molecule "nanoroadsters" with light and, for the first time, seeing how they move.
  
  Read more

• A remote-controlled drone helps in designing future wireless networks

  04-11-2016 15:11
  
  The development of mobile devices has set increasingly high requirements for wireless networks and the emission of radio frequencies. Researcher Vasilii Semkin together with a research group at Aalto University and Tampere University of Technology has recently tested in their research work how aerial photographs taken using a so-called drone could be used in designing radio links.
  
  Read more

• Researcher looks to use new algorithms to improve precipitation maps

  04-11-2016 15:06
  
  A UTA civil engineering professor and hydrologic researcher expects to improve the accuracy of rainfall maps produced by the National Weather Service by 10 to 20 percent for heavy-to-extreme rainfall events through a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration grant.
  
  Read more

• Amelia Earhart might have died as a castaway

  04-11-2016 15:00
  
  American aviator Amelia Earhart became famous in the 1930s for her flying adventures—at one point, she became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. But it was her sudden disappearance in July 1939 that truly sent her name into the history books. But the mystery of what happened to her and her co-pilot Fred Noonan has never been solved. Now, a team called the International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) believes they may have evidence that suggests Earhart di
  
  Read more

• Non-native insects change more than native host plant survival

  04-11-2016 14:50
  
  When non-native herbivores invade new geographic regions, the consequences can be devastating to the native plants. Epidemic levels of herbivory damage may ensue because the delicate biological interactions that keep everything in balance within the herbivore's native habitats may be missing in the invaded region.
  
  Read more

• Samsung recalls washing machines over explosion risk

  04-11-2016 14:47 via rss.cnn.com
  
  Samsung -- still reeling from its fire-prone Galaxy Note 7 smartphone -- is recalling almost 3 million washing machines because they can explode.
  
  Read more

• New research provides insight into plumage evolution

  04-11-2016 14:43
  
  During his notable trip to the Galápagos Islands, Charles Darwin collected several mockingbird specimens on different islands in the region. He later discovered that each island only contained a single species of mockingbird and no two species of mockingbird co-existed on an individual island. Due to their geographical separation, over time these birds had evolved different characteristics in coloration, behavior, and beak shape. These observations raise the question: how does a geographi
  
  Read more

• Virtual reality app makes haptics as immersive as visuals

  04-11-2016 14:42
  
  Disney Research has developed a 360-degree virtual reality application that enables users to enhance their experience by adding customized haptic effects that can be triggered by user movements, biofeedback or timelines.
  
  Read more

• Preventing infant deaths in hot cars

  04-11-2016 14:20
  
  So far this year, 39 U.S. infants and toddlers have died of heat stroke due to being left unattended in hot cars. In an effort to prevent such tragedies, two Harvard students are developing a tech-driven car seat alert system.
  
  Read more

• Understanding the impact of migration on migrant families

  04-11-2016 14:10
  
  EU-funded researchers have been investigating the lives of migrants and migrant families both in Europe and in their country of origin to better understand the impact migration has on their life course.
  
  Read more

• Impact of sea smell overestimated by present climate models

  04-11-2016 14:10
  
  Leipzig. The formation of sulfur dioxide from the oxidation of dimethyl sulfide (DMS) and, thus, of cooling clouds over the oceans seems to be overvalued in current climate models. This concludes scientists from the Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research (TROPOS) from a model study on the effects of DMS on atmospheric chemistry. Until now, models considering only the oxidation in the gas phase describe merely the oxidation pathway and neglect important pathways in the aqueous phase of the a
  
  Read more

• China cracks down on growing live streaming industry

  04-11-2016 14:02 via rss.cnn.com
  
  China issued new rules Friday to regulate the country's fast growing live-streaming video industry.
  
  Read more

• Thorny devil found to drink through its skin with assist from gravity

  04-11-2016 14:00
  
  A team of researchers with Aachen University in Germany has found that the thorny devil lizard is able to supplement its water intake by covering its body with sand and then using straw-like folds in its skin to pull in water, which is then directed to its throat. In their paper published in the Journal of Experimental Biology, the team describes experiments they carried out with several lizard specimens, what they observed and the means by which the odd-looking lizards survive in the arid deser
  
  Read more

• Faster diagnosis of sepsis pathogens

  04-11-2016 14:00
  
  Microbial pathogens can be diagnosed unambiguously and within just 24 hours by means of high-throughput sequencing of their genetic makeup and special bioinformatics evaluation algorithms. Fraunhofer researchers have validated this in a clinical study with sepsis patients. The researchers present the NGS diagnosis platform at Medica in Düsseldorf from November 14–17, 2016.
  
  Read more

• Aboriginal people inhabited W.A.'s midwest coast much earlier than previously thought

  04-11-2016 13:50
  
  Archaeologists from The University of Western Australia have discovered evidence of human activity in a cave in Western Australia's Midwest which proves that Aboriginal people lived there 15,000 years earlier than previously thought.
  
  Read more

• On-chip observation of THz graphene plasmons

  04-11-2016 13:40
  
  Researchers developed a technique for imaging THz photocurrents with nanoscale resolution, and applied it to visualize strongly compressed THz waves (plasmons) in a graphene photodetector. The extremely short wavelengths and highly concentrated fields of these plasmons open new venues for the development of miniaturized optoelectronic THz devices.
  
  Read more

• Ocean Glider sets sail for Sri Lanka

  04-11-2016 13:40
  
  An ocean glider christened Challenger will set sail for Sri Lanka in the longest journey ever attempted by an autonomous underwater vehicle.
  
  Read more

Follow @NewslockSciTech on Twitter!