An Israeli company is offering a flash drive-sized scanner that can tell users what exactly is in the food or medicine on the table using near-infrared spectroscopy.
If you have synesthesia, where one sensory input involuntarily stimulates another, the world is a symphony of color and a painting of sound. Taken from...
The Federal Bureau of Investigation plans to start using a facial database, according to papers obtained by the Electronic Frontier Foundation in a FOIA lawsuit. But facial recognition technology isn't very accurate yet.
A recent study published in The New England Journal of Medicine and an FDA committee hearing suggest that a stool test called Cologuard will likely be approved as a non-invasive screening for colorectal cancer.
In February of this year, Facebook's $19B acquisition of mobile messaging platform WhatsApp set a record for the largest software acquisition of all time. It set the...
While traditional sports only grudgingly accept technological augmentation, the 2016 Cybathlon, a kind of hybrid between the XPRIZE and Olympics, embraces it with both...
Four paralyzed men who received epidural electrical stimulation were able to regain some voluntary movement of their legs. The finding challenges everything doctors thought they knew about paralysis.
Stem cell treatments are set to go mainstream as a UK consortium ramps up production of red blood cells from embryonic stem cells with plans to try it on human patients for the first time in 2016. Delivering blood transfusions through stem cells would push such therapies well into the medical mainstream. But it will also require industrial-scale production.
We don’t fully understand how neural networks form—that is, how neurons evolve from a few disconnected individual cells into the highly organized and closely...
7 in 10 American consumers say privacy concerns will keep them from buying Google Glass; a startup sells a DIY cyborg kit, syringe included; UW researchers show off scary-good age-progression software; rare genetic mutation makes siblings immune to viruses -- can we get in on that?
Flexible electronics guru John Rogers has developed a wearable electronic patch that incorporates standard silicon chips. The patch uses a microfluidic construction with wires folded to allow it to bend and flex around the rigid off-the-shelf chips.
As I'm sure you've already read, Facebook recently acquired Oculus Virtual Reality for $2 billion.
This is a huge deal... and here's why:
Brief Company Timeline:
August 2012Â -- Oculus...
With the Raspberry Pi, a programmable credit card-sized computer, British computer scientists sought to rekindle garage innovation. What would young students do with the power of computing if they could buy a computer for just $35 and access all of its parts?
Google must get more free advertising than any firm on the planet. When they recently announced they’d briefly open their Glass Explorer Program to...
A new atlas of study results related to the mouse connectome offers the equivalent of a highway map, with local roads to be filled in later. The atlas, described in a recent paper in Nature, represents more than four years of work undertaken at the Allen Institute for Brain Science. It’s the most detailed information we have on the brain of any animal other than that of the roundworm C. elegans, which has just 302 neurons.
In 2013, the addition of renewable capacity slowed slightly compared to the previous year as a result of shrinking governmental incentives and investment, according to a new report from The Pew Chartiable Trusts. While the survey found that renewable energy still relies on public incentives, it also suggested that at least parts of the industry are not as dependent as they once were on such incentives, thanks to falling prices.
Military uses drones as mobile hotspots; sponge injection helps heal gunshot wounds; calorie-counting device questioned; robotic surgeon designed to operate in space.
A San Francisco startup called Open Garden has a use for mesh networking that has drummed up excitement: a chat app that works even when there's no phone or internet service available.
Air pollution claimed 7 million lives in 2012, according to a report just released by the World Health Organization, with the vast majority of deaths occurring in low- and middle-income countries. One out of every eight premature deaths in 2012 was attributable to air pollution, the numbers reveal — a rate double that reported in previous years due to more accurate measures of pollution in both outdoor and indoor environments and in a broader range of rural areas.
Computers' EQ rises; lab-grown muscles get stronger; Texas goes big in wind power; and researchers create real-time video game interface of the human brain.
Those who eat seven or more servings of fruits and vegetables a day cut their risk of death at any age by more than half, compared to those who don’t get a full serving of the foods. The study was able to document the death-defying benefit of each additional daily portion of fruits and vegetables.
The World Health Organization estimates some 90% of the world’s visually impaired folks live in the developing world. Most suffer from correctible but undiagnosed...
A Wi-Fi-connected collar called Silent Herdsman monitors cows' movements to determine, with the help of artificial intelligence software, when they are in heat. It may sound absurd, but the name of the game in milk production is impregnating cows as soon as possible after they’ve had their last calf.
Echoing Google's Project Loon, Facebook is now looking to connect those would-be users. Facebook will use drones, along with satellites and the emerging free-space optical communications protocol, to connect the unconnected.
Most of us aren’t scientists, but every once in awhile, nearly everyone unintentionally runs a science experiment in their refrigerator. If left long enough,...
The term ‘transhuman’ inevitably (for me) summons grotesque visions of humans and machines merging into a Borg-like race bent on eradicating biological imperfection. These...
Nanotechnology is gradually turning its hypothetical promise into real applications. Some see nanotech-based medicines as an entirely new set of tools in a doctor’s medical bag. Among commercial companies, Vecoy Nanomedicines is most bullish on the promise of nanotechnology to combat viruses.
