The ingenious twig-burning folks at BioLite have done it again. Their latest, the NanoGrid, is a combo battery pack and lighting system for the outdoors. Now you can charge your gadgets and light up your campsite with the power of a single wood stove. Read more…
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BioLite’s New Lanterns Are a Tiny Powergrid For Your Campsite
California wants better batteries, which is why t he electric company Southern California Edison is planning a set of, let’s say, unconventional energy storage solutions, including huge 450-gallon ice packs. Why? It all has to do with a little-known problem with California’s wind-reliant electric grid. Read more…
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California’s Grid May Soon Store Energy in Giant Ice Packs
After a long drought, California is suddenly getting pounded with its biggest storm in a decade. Whoa, what’s happening? It’s all the work of an atmospheric river, a particular weather event that can be devastating when it hits land. Read more…
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The Meteorological Phenomenon That’s Flooding California
According to an article in World News Daily Report , loggers in the Amazon have accidentally cut down a 5, 800-year-old Samauma tree, the oldest in the world. Except there is no such tree. This “news” article with 143, 000 Facebook shares is a wholesale fabrication. Read more…
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Loggers didn’t cut down world’s oldest tree—but the real story is better
The Centers for Disease Control has some dubious competition in the mishandling deadly pathogens business. A investigation by the Guardian reveals dozens of serious safety lapses in UK labs. In one case, a government lab shipped out live anthrax because someone had grabbed the wrong tubes. Read more…
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A UK Government Lab Accidentally Mailed Out Live Anthrax
Philae, the probe that landed on a comet as part of the Rosetta mission, has detected organic molecules in the comet’s atmosphere. We don’t know exactly what the molecules are yet, but they could hold a key to early life on Earth. Hell, this is a big reason we sent Rosetta all the way to a lonely comet in the first place. Read more…
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Rosetta’s Lander Has Found Organic Molecules on a Comet
In the middle of the 19th century, Chicago embarked on a quest to literally lift itself out of the mud. Water couldn’t drain from the low-lying city, so its streets became impassable swamps. The most reasonable solution, Chicago decided, was just to raise the whole goddamn city by 4 to 14 feet. Read more…
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Chicago was raised over 4 feet in the 19th century to build its sewer
The Federal Trade Commission announced today that AT&T will pay $105 million for hiding extra charges in cellphone bills. The best part of the news? $80 million of it will go back into the pockets of people bilked by AT&T. Read more…
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AT&T Will Repay $80 Million In Shady Phone Bill Charges
Of the many theories swirling around why legendary Stradivarius violins are so great (aside from, you know, it’s just all in our heads ), almost all have something to do with the wood . Maybe it was trees growing in a Little Ice Age or logs being stored in Venice lagoons or a special wood preservative. It makes sense, then, that one way to spot a fake is to go back to the wood—specifically, back to tree rings . Read more…
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You Can Spot a Fake Stradivarius By the Tree Rings in the Wood
Sepsis is an nasty and surprisingly common way to die. The illness is triggered by blood infections but, ultimately, it’s your own immune reaction—not the bacteria or virus—that poisons you to death. Filtering those pathogens out of blood right away, though, could be a promising treatment. Enter a new device made of m agnetic nanobeads coated in sticky proteins that attract bacteria, viruses, and fungi. Read more…
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Magnetic Nanobeads Can Snatch Bacteria and Virus Out of Blood