Computer bits are binary, with a value of 0 or one. By contrast, neurons in the brain can have all kinds of different internal states, depending on the input that they received. This allows the brain to process information in a more energy-efficient manner than a computer. Physicists are working on memristors, resistors with a memory, made from niobium-doped strontium titanate, which mimic how neurons work.
When fathers exercise, children are healthier, even as adults
Most parents know that the diet and exercise habits of a pregnant woman impacts the health of her baby, but little is known about how a father’s health choices are passed to his children. A new study finds that lifestyle practices of fathers prior to conception may have a major impact on the lifelong health of their children.
Home-based biofeedback therapy is effective option for tough-to-treat constipation
Biofeedback therapy used at home is about 70 percent effective at helping patients learn how to coordinate and relax bowel muscles and relieve one of the most difficult-to-treat types of constipation, investigators report.
Web-based open source dashboard of North Pole
It’s called ArcCI (or Arctic CyberInfrastructure) and promises to combine the thousands of images that have been taken along the years of the Arctic Ocean into one global database that will help scientists and the world see the physical changes occurring in the region including ice loss. The hope is that this web-based repository will allow researchers to spend more time analyzing information rather than just collecting and processing data.
Meet Jim Allison, the Carousing Texan Who Just Won a Nobel Prize For His Cancer Breakthrough
Jim Allison is an iconoclastic scientist who toiled in obscurity for years. Then he helped crack a mystery that may save millions of lives: Why doesn’t the immune system attack cancer?
Caavo Control Center & Universal Remote (Version 2) Review
Caavo rethinks the universal TV remote for the second time this year. Our full review of Caavo’s new, much cheaper, Control Center.
DNA Tests Could Help Docs Detect Infectious Diseases Like Typhus Faster
It’s still too expensive and unproven, but it has the potential to prevent antibiotic overuse and keep people healthy.
Kim Stanley Robinson Writes Like the Past to Warn of the Future
The novelist’s sci-fi may feel old-school, but it’s distinctly calibrated to make change happen now—so the future in his books doesn’t come true.
Elon Musk trolls ‘virgin’ Fortnite players, game fights back – CNET
The billionaire businessman and the hit game had a brief but entertaining Twitter fight.
My Dead Wife, the Robot Car is a Black Mirror-equse podcast about autonomous cars
There are a ton of podcasts out there, but finding the right one can be difficult. In our column Pod Hunters, we cover what we’ve been listening to that we can’t stop thinking about.
In the beginning of Stitcher’s new podcast, My Dead Wife, the Robot Car, a widower named Matt signs up with a mysterious tech company to work as a test driver for a new autonomous car. After a confusing introduction — the company rep won’t divulge any details about the company or even tell him his name — he’s set up in one a car, when he receives a rude surprise: the car’s AI is programmed to replicate his recently-deceased wife Joyce, whom he was about to divorce.
“Yeah, you big idiot, what part of this are you not getting?”
The company pulled together a…