[url]http://arstechnica.com/security/2016/03/men-behind-diffie-hellman-key-exchange-receive-top-computer-science-prize/[/url]

[QUOTE]On Tuesday, the Association for Computing Machinery, the nation’s leading organization for computer science, awarded its annual top prize of $1 million to two men whose name will forever be immortalized in cryptography: Whitfield Diffie and Martin Hellman.[/QUOTE]

Today the director of the FBI admitted in Congressional testimony that the Bureau "Might" use an iPhone crack on more than one phone.

I can see people hacking this and then doing all sorts of strange things with it. What if you could disable the rendering of the Minecraft game and then simulate days or weeks of progress in mere hours? Or have villagers that dynamically respond to your actions.

You could have different personalities for the bots, miners and farmers and plain old assistants that protect you and help you find cool stuff.

[url]http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2450886/microsoft-to-bolster-artificial-intelligence-using-minecraft[/url]

[url]http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/2016/0316/For-the-love-of-junk-food-European-storks-ditch-migration-for-easy-meals[/url]

[QUOTE]White storks have stopped migrating from Europe to Africa for the winter, say researchers. Instead, they remain in Spain and Portugal year-round, feasting on landfills' 'junk food.'[/QUOTE]

[url=www.nytimes.com/2016/03/20/magazine/the-secrets-of-the-wave-pilots.html]The Secrets of the Wave Pilots[/url] | NYT Magazine

Fascinating stuff - the art and science of using subtle sub-signals among the wave-cacophony of the seas as reliable navigational "landmarks", which are immune to the vagaries of the tide and storms. Regarding the deep connection between navigation and storytelling -- the just-begun USA network series [i]Underground[/i] has fugitive slaves exchanging a map of the route north to the Ohio River in the form of an innocuous-sounding children's story.

One wonders how much such ancient "I can't believe they were able to do ____ using just _____" ingenuity has been lost forever. As a wise man once said, "you can learn a lot just by paying attention" -- the kind of attentiveness and surroundings-awareness to which modern nav-tech is inimical.

[URL="http://www.scientificcomputing.com/news/2016/03/illuminating-universes-ignition#.VuGC-8xVLb0.twitter"]Illuminating the Universe’s Ignition[/URL]

[URL="http://www.fastcompany.com/3057525/biotech-firms-battle-over-who-owns-genetic-data"]Biotech Firms Battle Over Who Owns Genetic Data[/URL]

[URL="https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/03/160310124904.htm"]Blame your noisy brain for misses and fumbles[/URL]

[URL="http://www.hakaimagazine.com/article-long/no-wool-no-vikings"]No Wool, No Vikings[/URL]

[URL="http://www.fantasticstoriesoftheimagination.com/a-crash-course-in-the-history-of-black-science-fiction/"]A Crash Course in the History of Black Science Fiction[/URL]

[URL="http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-quest-for-the-reallife-treasures-of-ataris-swordquest"]The Quest For The Real-Life Treasures of Atari’s Swordquest[/URL]

Developments in battery tech
 

[SIZE=3][URL="http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/03/new-lithium-battery-ditches-solvents-reaches-supercapacitor-rates/"]New lithium battery[/URL] ditches solvents, reaches supercapacitor rates[/SIZE][SIZE=2][SIZE=3]
[/SIZE]The all solid-state battery operates between -30 and 100 degrees Celsius.
[/SIZE]
[QUOTE]For most of us, the only way we judge a battery is by how long it can deliver electrons to our favorite devices. But many applications require more than that. They need batteries that operate across a large temperature range, are compact or flexible, and can manage a fast charge/discharge rate. Plus, we'd all like them not to explode or fail suddenly.

Most energy storage tech involves balancing a trade-off among these various properties. But a new report from a collaboration between academic researchers and Toyota seems to promise it all: a battery more compact than lithium-ion, a better energy density, the charge speed of a supercapacitor, and improved safety. How is this all possible? They got rid of the liquid electrolyte typical of most lithium-ion batteries.
[/QUOTE][SIZE=2]
[/SIZE]

Magnetic springs and latches in the same piece
 

[url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IANBoybVApQ[/url]

Ship forward to two minutes to see the interesting part.

[QUOTE=retina;429942][url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IANBoybVApQ[/url]

Ship forward to two minutes to see the interesting part.[/QUOTE]

That's quite the idea they have. I would imagine there are applications that go far beyond a magnetic spring-n-latch.

Chasing SETI's "Wow!" Signal- Here's a GoFundMe project to check out a possible source for the 1977 unexplained signal. The amount they need for a 5-meter radio telescope seems surprisingly small to me.

[URL="http://www.astronomy.com/news/2016/03/astronomers-crowdfund-effort-to-recreate-alien-signal"]http://www.astronomy.com/news/2016/03/astronomers-crowdfund-effort-to-recreate-alien-signal[/URL]

Norm

[url]http://www.nasa.gov/topics/nasalife/features/heals.html[/url]