Tech Today w/ Ken May

If you’ve ever dealt with a computer crash due to virus, hard drive failure or otherwise, then you know this comic is 100% TRUE. I mean, who has time to waste constantly backing up the hard drive, and technicians can make it all better, right? WRONG. After you get your system back on track you should make this comic your desktop image and NEVER FORGET to back that data up. And remember-no amount of key pressing will bring your precious data back, and those kittie pics on your hard drive could have made you A MILLION DOLLARS! Link

Think that DNA is the only molecule that can encode genetic material? Think again. Philipp Holliger of the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology and his team has created a man-made genetic material called the XNA (as science fiction fans worldwide all ponder, what could possibly go wrong?): Holliger’s team focused on six XNAs (xeno-nucleic acids). DNA and RNA are made of a sugar, a phosphate and a base. The XNAs had different sugars, and in some of them the sugars are replaced with completely different molecules. A key hurdle for the team was to create enzymes that could copy a gene from a DNA molecule to an XNA molecule, and other enzymes that could copy it back into DNA. They started with enzymes that do this in DNA only. Over the years the team made incremental tweaks until they produced enzymes that could work on XNAs. Once they had created these enzymes, they were able to store information in each of the XNAs, copy it to DNA, and copy it back into a new XNA. In effect, the first XNA passed its information on to the new one – albeit in a roundabout way. “The cycle we have is a bit like a retrovirus, which cycles between RNA and DNA,” Holliger says. This is the first time artificial molecules have been made to pass genes on to their descendants. Because the XNAs can do this, they are capable of evolution. “The immediate question is whether these XNAs can be introduced into cells,” says Farren Isaacs of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. Once the XNAs were installed, they could replicate and evolve on their own. “That would be remarkable.” Link

Jessica Lloyd Jones creates rather unique representations of vital organs out of blown glass, then she adds neon to each piece to add a glow of life energy. Here’s what Jessica has to say about her works: Blown glass human organs encapsulate inert gases displaying different colours under the influence of an electric current. The human anatomy is a complex, biological system in which energy plays a vital role. Brain Wave conveys neurological processing activity as a kinetic and sensory, physical phenomena through its display of moving electric plasma. Optic Nerve shows a similar effect, more akin to the blood vessels of the eye and with a front ‘lens’ magnifying the movement and the intensity of light. Heart is a representation of the human heart illuminated by still red neon gas. Electric Lungs is a more technically intricate structure with xenon gas spreading through its passage ways, communicating our human unawareness of the trace gases we inhale in our breathable atmosphere. Link   –via JazJaz

Feast your eyes on this, Neatoramanauts: the world’s first diamond ring. But but, you say, diamond rings have been around forever. Yes, but not like this: a ring carved straight out of a single giant 150-carat diamond, by Shawish Jewelry. Yours for a mere $70 million. Link – via OhGizmo

Charon will require more than a single coin for this ride. Rolls Royce will soon offer a hearse based on its Phantom model. The 23-foot aluminum car debuted at a recent funeral home expo in Bologna, Italy. Link -via Born Rich | Photo: Auto Guide

Are you working for the fastest shrinking industry in the United States? You are, if you’re working for a newspaper according to this study by LinkedIn and the Council of Economic Advisors. The fastest-growing industries include renewables (+49.2%), internet (+24.6%), online publishing (+24.3%), and e-learning (+15.9%). Fastest-shrinking industries were newspapers (-28.4%), retail (-15.5%), building materials (-14.2%), and automotive (-12.8%). Instead of the growth in percentage terms, we also examined the volume of job gain / loss by industry, as indicated by the largest bubbles in the figure above. Our data show that even through the recession, the industries with the largest volume of employment growth (the largest circles on the figure above) were internet, hospitals & healthcare, health, wellness & fitness, oil & energy, IT and renewables. On the other side of the story, retail, construction, telecommunications, banking, and automotive had the largest volume of job losses between 2007 and 2011. Link – via The Atlantic

Georgia Tech has developed the Tongue Drive System, in which a stud in the tongue acts as a mouse against a pad attached to the roof of one’s mouth. The device gives unprecedented control to paralyzed computer users. The new dental appliance contains magnetic field sensors mounted on its four corners that detect movement of a tiny magnet attached to the tongue. It also includes a rechargeable lithium-ion battery and an induction coil to charge the battery. The circuitry fits in the space available on the retainer, which sits against the roof of the mouth and is covered with an insulating, water-resistant material and vacuum-molded inside standard dental acrylic. “One of the problems we encountered with the earlier headset was that it could shift on a user’s head and the system would need to be recalibrated,” explained Ghovanloo. “Because the dental appliance is worn inside the mouth and molded from dental impressions to fit tightly around an individual’s teeth with clasps, it is protected from these types of disturbances.” Link -via The Daily What Geek