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John Lemke's List: Write About
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Feb 10, 11
Professor James Dale, director of the Centre for Tropical Crops and Biocommodities based at QUT, said the destruction of crops in Queensland by Tropical Cyclone Yasi proved just how important it was to have a back up available.
Professor Dale said if genetically modified plants could overcome the disease, known as Tropical Race Four, it would act as an insurance policy to supply resistant plants in the event that the disease moved into the banana production areas in north Queensland. -
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Feb 14, 11
While enthusiasts across the world pored over the Voynich manuscript, one of the most mysterious writings ever found – penned by an unknown author in a language no one understands – a research team at the UA solved one of its biggest mysteries: When was the book made?
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Feb 17, 11
Yesterday we had the news of how HBGary Federal -- the firm whose CEO claimed he had "infiltrated" the non-group's leadership and identified who ran the non-group (which doesn't actually have "leaders" in the traditional sense) -- had been exposed for planning a propaganda attack on Wikileaks at the request of some lawyers working with Bank of America (and, it turns out, recommended by the Justice Department). Part of the strategy was to somehow put a tremendous amount of pressure on Salon writer Glenn Greenwald to stop his support of Wikileaks. Exactly how that was to work was not entirely explained.
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Feb 17, 11
From The Independent: "WikiLeaks says it will take legal action against a former key member of the website who left after a bitter fallout with founder Julian Assange and went on to set up a rival whistle-blowing platform." They're referring to Daniel Domscheit-Berg, formerly aka Daniel Schmidt, whose tell-all book "Inside WikiLeaks" went on sale today in Germany.
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Feb 17, 11
By now the exposed plan of HBGary Federal, Palantir and Berico to attack Wikileaks and its supporters through fraud and deception, in order to help Bank of America, has been discussed widely. However, the leaked HBGary Federal emails suggest that this sort of plan involving these three companies had been used elsewhere. Apparently the US Chamber of Commerce had approached the same three firms to plan a remarkably similar attack on groups that oppose the US Chamber of Commerce.
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Feb 17, 11
"The NY Times has an interesting story (reg. may be required) about how JCPenney used link farms to become the number one google search result for such terms as 'dresses,' 'bedding,' and 'samsonite carry on luggage' and what Google did to them when they found out. 'Actually, it's the most ambitious attempt I've ever heard of,' says Doug Pierce, an expert in online search. 'This whole thing just blew me away. Especially for such a major brand. You'd think they would have people around them that would know better.'"
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Feb 17, 11
Is your national space program fashion-forward enough? Astronauts getting a little frumpy after the Cold War? Having trouble getting that space plane off the ground? Why not lift morale and brighten up the place with some fierce new uniforms designed by planet Earth’s most infamous ex-spy?
Yes, Russia’s famously outed sleeper agent Anna Chapman is back in yet another installment of her merciless publicity tour. This time, she’s looking to help the ground crew at Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center work it down the runway in style. Frilly epaulets for all!
“Chapman told me that she intends to participate in designing clothing for the Khrunichev [Space] Center, in what capacity, designer or financially, she did not specify,” the Gagarin Astronaut Training Center’s top astronaut told Russian state media today. -
Feb 18, 11
Composed of diverse elements, mostly of plastic, with little metal used, improvised explosive devices are very difficult to detect. In cooperation with two Colombian universities, scientists at EPFL's Electromagnetic Compatibility Laboratory have found a solution. They have developed a device enabling the remote explosion of these mines, by using the energy from their electromagnetic impulses.
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Feb 20, 11
the first vehicle powered by wind to cross a continent, the longest overall distance covered, and the longest distance covered by a wind-powered vehicle in 36 hours.
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Feb 25, 11
Today, the X PRIZE Foundation announced the official roster of 29 registered teams competing for the $30 million Google Lunar X PRIZE, an unprecedented competition to send a robot to the Moon that travels at least 500 meters and transmit video, images, and data back to the Earth. This group of teams signifies this new era of exploration's diverse and participatory nature as it includes a huge variety of groups ranging from non-profits to university consortia to billion dollar businesses representing 17 nations on four continents. The global competition, the largest in history, was announced in September 2007, with a winner projected by 2015.
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Feb 26, 11
We've all seen the Whac-A-Mole arcade game. Now, police say an Orlando man sabotaged the Holly Hill company that makes that game by planting a software virus. It shut down hundreds of games all over the world.
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Feb 28, 11
The new EPI Life mobile phone comes complete with mini electrocardiogram.
"We think it's a revolution. It has clinical significance," EPI medical chief Dr. Chow U-Jin said at the mobile industry's annual conference in Barcelona.
"Anywhere in the world you can use it as a phone but you are also able to transfer an ECG and get a reply," Chow said.
"If you get a normal reply it will just be an SMS," he added.
"If it's severe, you get a call: 'Sir, an ambulance is on the way'."
EPI Life has three hospitals in Singapore, all of which carry the phone users' history.
EPI Life costs $700 (516 euros), the price of a top range smartphone, and 2,000 of them have been on the market since 2010. -
Feb 28, 11
The Hummingbird's bird-shaped body is removable but it gives the bot an uncanny resemblance to a real hummingbird. The vehicle can hover and maneuver just like the bird.
The ornithopter can fly into buildings under the control of an operator flying the spybot with the help of a feed from its tiny video camera. The prototype is capable of flying at speeds of up to 18 km/h (11 mph) and weighs 19 grams, which is about the same as an AA battery.
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