[url]http://www.fastcompany.com/3046035/fast-feed/nasa-wants-your-ideas-for-a-mars-colony[/url]

[quote]Mars has been the next frontier for humans since astronauts first bounced around the moon in 1969, and while we work on rockets that will get us to our red neighbor, scientists are thinking hard about how to build a sustainable colony on Mars. What would we need to bring to survive? That's the question NASA is asking the public through a new competition. The challenge asks for written submissions detailing what astronaut-explorers will need to colonize a new planet—and the space agency is offering a total of $15,000 in prize money, to be split between three winners.[/quote]

[url]https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-announces-journey-to-mars-challenge-seeks-public-input-on-establishing-sustained[/url]

Edit: Whoops, wrong thread. Mods, please move this to the appropriate one.

[QUOTE=Dubslow;401955][url]http://www.fastcompany.com/3046035/fast-feed/nasa-wants-your-ideas-for-a-mars-colony[/url]

...scientists are thinking hard about how to build a sustainable colony on Mars...

Edit: Whoops, wrong thread. Mods, please move this to the appropriate one.[/QUOTE]

Done.

Re. the quoted snip, it is highly debatable whether humanity has built a sustainable colony here on Earth. I suggest some sort of "if you lot are still around in a million years and have shown yourselves to be good stewards of the planet you share, then maybe we'll let you go off-world in numbers" rule. In other words, Star Trek had its (honored in the breach more than the observance) Prime Directive, but I propose the above as a blocking "Zeroth Directive".

[url=https://newsoffice.mit.edu/2015/unravel-secrets-internal-waves-0506]Researchers unravel secrets of hidden waves[/url] | MIT News
[quote]Detailed new field studies, laboratory experiments, and simulations of the largest known “internal waves” in the Earth’s oceans — phenomena that play a key role in mixing ocean waters, greatly affecting ocean temperatures — provide a comprehensive new view of how these colossal, invisible waves are born, spread, and die off.

The work, published today in the journal Nature, could add significantly to the improvement of global climate models, the researchers say. The paper is co-authored by 42 researchers from 25 institutions in five countries.
...
Internal waves — giant waves, below the surface, that roil stratified layers of heavier, saltier water and lighter, less-salty water — are ubiquitous throughout the world’s oceans. But by far the largest and most powerful known internal waves are those that form in one area of the South China Sea, originating from the Luzon Strait between the Philippines and Taiwan.

These subsurface waves can tower more than 500 meters high, and generate powerful turbulence. Because of their size and behavior, the rise and spread of these waves are important for marine processes, including the supply of nutrients for marine organisms; the distribution of sediments and pollutants; and the propagation of sound waves. They are also a significant factor in the mixing of ocean waters, combining warmer surface waters with cold, deep waters — a process that is essential to understanding the dynamics of global climate.

This international research effort, called IWISE (Internal Waves In Straits Experiment), was a rare undertaking in this field, Peacock says; the last such field study on internal waves on this scale, the Hawaii Ocean Mixing Experiment, concluded in 2002. The new study looked at internal waves that were much stronger, and went significantly further in determining not just how the waves originated, but how their energy dissipated.

One unexpected finding, Peacock says, was the degree of turbulence produced as the waves originate, as tides and currents pass over ridges on the seafloor. “These were unexpected field discoveries,” he says, revealing “some of the most intense mixing ever observed in the deep ocean. It’s like a giant washing machine — the mixing is much more dramatic than we ever expected.”[/quote]

[url]http://news.nationalpost.com/news/world/pandas-are-best-suited-to-eat-meat-but-instead-theyre-munching-their-way-to-extinction[/url]

[B]Microsoft Execs Expressed ‘Shock and Disbelief’ at Internet Address Shortage [/B]

according to the Wall Street Journal: [URL]http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/05/14/microsoft-execs-expressed-shock-and-disbelief-at-internet-address-shortage/?mod=ST1[/URL]

[QUOTE=Nick;402712][B]Microsoft Execs Expressed ‘Shock and Disbelief’ at Internet Address Shortage [/B]

according to the Wall Street Journal: [URL]http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/05/14/microsoft-execs-expressed-shock-and-disbelief-at-internet-address-shortage/?mod=ST1[/URL][/QUOTE]

Poor babies. Don't they know anything about the business they are in?

[QUOTE=kladner;402715]Poor babies. Don't they know anything about the business they are in?[/QUOTE]Of course they do.

It's boiling frog syndrome.

[URL="http://www.forbes.com/sites/gregsatell/2015/05/01/the-science-of-patterns/"]The Science of Patterns[/URL]

[URL="http://kottke.org/15/04/the-full-sized-lego-car"]The full-sized LEGO car[/URL]

[URL="http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Insight_into_how_brain_makes_memories_999.html"]nsight into how brain makes memories[/URL]

[URL="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150430124005.htm"]Light -- not pain-killing drugs -- used to activate brain's opioid receptors[/URL]

[URL="http://exclusive.multibriefs.com/content/norway-is-phasing-out-fm-radio-but-dont-expect-the-us-to-tune-in/education"]Norway is phasing out FM radio, but don’t expect the US to tune in[/URL]

[URL="http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/04/23/the-digital-future-how-museums-measure-up/?smid=pl-share&_r=1"]The Digital Future: How Museums Measure Up[/URL]

[URL="http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn27415-the-first-complex-life-on-earth-got-eaten-to-extinction.html#.VWuGFZ8qX8t"]The first complex life on Earth got eaten to extinction[/URL]

[URL="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/may/04/mark-twain-cache-uncovered-berkeley"]Mark Twain stories, 150 years old, uncovered by Berkeley scholars[/URL]

[URL="http://www.nature.com/news/dino-chickens-reveal-how-the-beak-was-born-1.17507"]'Dino-chickens' reveal how the beak was born[/URL]

[URL="http://aeon.co/magazine/science/has-cosmology-run-into-a-creative-crisis/"]Has Cosmology run into a Creative Crisis?[/URL]

[URL="http://www.citylab.com/navigator/2015/05/how-germs-might-shape-the-future-of-architecture/392783/"]How Germs Might Shape the Future of Architecture[/URL]

[URL="http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2015-05/05/microwave-parkes-observatory"]Microwave oven baffled astronomers for decades[/URL]

[URL="http://exclusive.multibriefs.com/content/the-implication-of-abnormal-delta-waves-in-schizophrenia/education"]Scientists are closing in on the root cause of schizophrenia[/URL]

[URL="http://www.space.com/29334-enceladus-ocean-energy-source-life.html"]Ocean on Saturn Moon Enceladus May Have Potential Energy Source to Support Life[/URL]

[URL="http://exclusive.multibriefs.com/content/the-future-of-education-smart-and-personalized-microschools/education"]The future of education? Smart and personalized microschools[/URL]

[URL="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/22/upshot/making-computer-science-more-inviting-a-look-at-what-works.html?ref=technology&abt=0002&abg=1"]Making Computer Science More Inviting: A Look at What Works[/URL]

[URL="http://phys.org/news/2015-05-groundwater-valleys-santa-clara-valley.html"]Raising groundwater keeps valleys from sinking: Santa Clara Valley, Calif.[/URL]

[URL="http://www.livescience.com/50924-secret-life-of-sea-revealed.html"]Crazy Carnival of Dr. Seuss Creatures Hidden in the Oceans[/URL]

[URL="http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/05/16/opinion/it-is-in-fact-rocket-science.html?_r=0"]It Is, in Fact, Rocket Science[/URL]

[URL="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150521210639.htm"]Mental 'map' and 'compass' are two separate systems, researchers say[/URL]

[QUOTE=xilman;401435][url]http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2015/04/evaluating-nasas-futuristic-em-drive/[/url]

Not sure whether that is news or not but it's worth reading IMAO[/QUOTE]A perpetual motion device in disguise?[quote="http://arxiv.org/abs/1506.00494"]A "space drive" is a hypothetical device that generates a propulsive force in free space using an input of power without the need for a reaction mass. Any device that generates photons (e.g., a laser) would qualify as a propellantless "photon rocket," but the force generated by emitting photons per power input (3.33 $\mu$N/kW) is too small to be a practical propulsion device. The ability to generate greater force per power input would be highly desirable, but, as demonstrated in this paper, such a device would be able to operate as a perpetual motion machine of the first kind. Since applying a constant force results in a constant acceleration, the kinetic energy of a mass driven by such a device increases quadratically with time, while the energy input increases only linearly with time. Thus, at some point, the kinetic energy of the device-driven mass exceeds the energy input, and if this energy is collected via decelerating the mass (via regenerative electromagnetic braking, for example), then there would be a net gain in energy. For devices with thrust-to-power ratios on the order of 1 N/kW that have been discussed recently in connection with the so-called EM drive, this breakeven occurs at velocities low enough to be feasible with current technology, clearly demonstrating the absurdity of such a device. When relativistic effects are taken into account, it is shown that the photon rocket can only reach energy breakeven as the accelerated mass asymptotically approaches the speed of light. Thus, any device with a thrust-to-power ratio greater than the photon rocket would be able to operate as a perpetual motion machine of the first kind, and thus should be excluded by the First Law of Thermodynamics.[/quote]

Kaspersky Lab cybersecurity firm is hacked
 

[url]http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-33083050[/url]
[QUOTE]One of the leading anti-virus software providers has revealed that its own systems were recently compromised by hackers.

Kaspersky Lab said it believed the attack was designed to spy on its newest technologies.

It said the intrusion involved up to three previously unknown techniques.[/QUOTE]

[URL="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-33084474"]Staffordshire schoolboy discovers new planet[/URL]