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A Quarter of Sun-Like Stars Host Earth-Size Worlds

astroengine writes “Although there appears to be a mysterious dearth of exoplanets smaller than Earth, astronomers using data from NASA’s Kepler space telescope have estimated that nearly a quarter of all sun-like stars in our galaxy play host to worlds 1-3 times the size of our planet. These astonishing results were discussed by Geoff Marcy, professor of astronomy at the University of California, Berkeley, during a talk the W. M. Keck Observatory 20th Anniversary Science Meeting on Thursday. ’23 percent of sun-like stars have a planet within (1-2.8 Earth radii) just within Mercury’s orbit,’ said Marcy. ‘I’ll say that again, because that number really surprised me: 23 percent of sun-like stars have a nearly-Earth-sized planet orbiting in tight orbits within 0.25 AU of the host stars.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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A Quarter of Sun-Like Stars Host Earth-Size Worlds

Higgs Boson is Now Official!

There it is! Where’s Higgs Boson T-Shirt by Mike Jacobsen | More Higgs boson T-Shirts After the big announcement last year, physicists have made it official. They have indeed found the Higgs boson: Physicists announced on July 4, 2012, that, with more than 99 percent certainty, they had found a new elementary particle weighing about 126 times the mass of the proton that was likely the long-sought Higgs boson. The Higgs is sometimes referred to as the “God particle,” to the chagrin of many scientists, who prefer its official name. But the two experiments, CMS and ATLAS, hadn’t collected enough data to say the particle was, for sure, the Higgs boson, the last undiscovered piece of the puzzle predicted by the Standard Model, the reigning theory of particle physics. Now, after collecting two and a half times more data inside the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) — where protons zip at near light-speed around the 17-mile-long (27 kilometer) underground ring beneath Switzerland and France — physicists say the particle is a Higgs. Jeanna Bryner of LiveScience has the full story: Link

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Higgs Boson is Now Official!

This Hair’s-Width Endoscope Will Revolutionize Micro-Surgery

Your chances of being split open sternum to sphincter for a medical procedure are quickly declining (whew) thanks to the advent of endoscopic surgery and robotic surgical platforms like the DaVinci , though even these revolutionary procedures have their limitations. But thanks to a team of Stanford researchers, size is no longer one of them. More »

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This Hair’s-Width Endoscope Will Revolutionize Micro-Surgery

The World’s Fastest Computer Is Being Slowed Down By Too Much Gold

Last November, Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Titan supercomputer was named the fastest in the world . But it turns out that a few tests were skipped along the way—and now too much gold on its motherboards means it can’t run at full tilt. More »

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The World’s Fastest Computer Is Being Slowed Down By Too Much Gold

First a baby, now 14 adults “functionally cured” of HIV

Earlier this month, doctors announced that a baby had been cured of an HIV infection . Now, using a similar technique, it appears that 14 adults have likewise been successfully treated for the disease. The trick, say the scientists, is to tackle the infection early. The research was conducted by Asier Sáez-Cirión of the Pasteur Institute and his results now appear in the open source journal PLOS Pathogens . His team analyzed 70 people with HIV who had been treated by combination antiretroviral therapy (cART) just a short time after infection, a range spanning 35 days to 10 weeks. This is much sooner than people are normally treated. And in fact, these patients, called the Visconti Cohort , were all diagnosed with HIV early (and by chance) when they turned up at hospitals to be assessed for other conditions. The cohort stuck to the antiretrovirals (ARVs) for an average of three years, during which time the drugs kept the virus in check (they do not eradicate HIV from the body). Eventually, all of the patients stopped taking the ARVs for various reasons (personal choice, different drug protocols, etc.). Normally, HIV will return when patients stop taking their ARVs. But this time, something interesting happened. The authors of the study described it this way: We identified 14 HIV patients (post-treatment controllers [PTCs]) whose viremia remained controlled for several years after the interruption of prolonged cART initiated during the primary infection. That’s roughly one in ten of the patients , a group that included four women and 10 men. On average, they were off the medication for seven years. It’s important to note that the patients still have the HIV infection. Also, they’re not ” supercontrollers ” (the

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First a baby, now 14 adults “functionally cured” of HIV

Backdoor Found In TP-Link Routers

New submitter NuclearCat writes “Polish security researchers have found a backdoor in TP-Link routers, allowing an attacker to not only gain root access to the local network, but also to knock down the router via a CSRF attack remotely. (Further information — Google translation of Russian original). According to the researchers, TP-Link hasn’t yet responded to give an answer about issue. The good news: Users who replaced their TP-Link firmware with Open/DD-WRT firmware can sleep well.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Backdoor Found In TP-Link Routers

Video Inpainting Software Deletes People From HD Video Footage

cylonlover writes “In a development sure to send conspiracy theorists into a tizzy, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Informatics (MPII) have developed video inpainting software that can effectively delete people or objects from high-definition footage. The software analyzes each video frame and calculates what pixels should replace a moving area that has been marked for removal. In a world first, the software can compensate for multiple people overlapped by the unwanted element, even if they are walking towards (or away from) the camera.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Video Inpainting Software Deletes People From HD Video Footage

Albert Einstein Wanted to Create the Best Refrigerator Ever That Would Last a Century

Did you know Albert Eistein wanted to make a fridge? Seriously. The greatest brain in modern physics dedicated a lot of time in trying to create a long lasting, energy efficient, environmentally friendly refrigerator. More »

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Albert Einstein Wanted to Create the Best Refrigerator Ever That Would Last a Century