Today in Geek, 20091221

Today we reaffirm that we are living in the future. Hurray!

Politics

Mexico City Legalizes Same-Sex Marriage. Mexico City just legalized abortion two and a half years ago, but now they've jumped ahead 30 years to leapfrog over most of the United States. At least DC managed to pass it a few days before. Supporters of the Mexico City bill were chanting "Yes, we could!" That makes me smile a lot.

Entertainment

Focus on the Action to Avoid Headaches During 3D Movies. When you go see Avatar (if you haven't already), keep this in mind. Your brain really doesn't like stuff being 3D but out-of-focus, and trying to get around that gives bad headaches. Trust me on this one; I spent too much time on my second viewing looking at stuff in the background, and it played havoc on my head and stomach. I may have to go see it in non-3D so I can look for those extra little details (for example, that it takes place over several months leading up to August 24, 2154; Wikipedia says that's the anniversary of the patenting of the motion picture camera, I'm guessing that isn't a coincidence).

Astronomy

Video: The Asteroid That Will Almost Hit Earth. NASA produced a video of Apophis passing Earth on April 13, 2029. It'll pass just 18,300 miles above the planet's surface. Assuming we pass peak oil and civilization has fallen by then, I plan to remember that date to use it to secure a following in my post-apocalyptic cult; an asteroid passing that close should be interesting in the sky.

Medicine

Color-Shifting Contact Lenses Alert Diabetics to Glucose Levels. Soon diabetics will have a heads-up display of sorts, allowing them to see when they need a shot of insulin or a candy bar. Today diabetics, tomorrow killing machines sent back from the future!

Science

Groovy Teeth Suggest Dinosaur was Venomous. The story itself is cool, but it's also sort of an example of a (probably intentional) "crash blossom," a word I just learned this morning meaning "a headline that can be misconstrued." The New York Times claims that's a buzzword of 2009, but I think it's possible only the New York Times staff have heard that term.

Mad Science

Our of the Blue, DARPA Seeks Means to Manipulate Lightning. They all laughed when DARPA put giant red balloons all over the US, but DARPA's going to show them! It's going to show them all!! Muahahahaha!

Did I miss any geekery? Let me know in the comments.

Today in Geek, 20091217

Today was a good day to be a geek. There may have been a huge discovery in physics, there were at least two stories that seem too far fetched for science fiction but are actually happening, and I found a new hero. Let's start with the physics.

Science

Experiment Detects Particles of Dark Matter, Maybe. Researchers may have detected dark matter, the stuff that probably makes up about 80% of the universe, in a mine in Minnesota. The signal wasn't strong enough to say for sure yet, but the signal they got was the signal they expected if the stuff is real, so that's a good sign.

Medicine

First Commercial 3-D Bioprinter Fabricates Organs to Order. Ok, the printer is still in early testing, and the company that makes it says arteries and veins are five years off, with actual organs more like 10 (by their estimation), but if this thing works out, that'll simply be amazing. Theoretically, particularly combined with stem cell research, the printer could be used to print organs using your own cells, so they could build an organ that your body couldn't possibly reject. That's pretty darned awesome. Of course, I couldn't help thinking about how awesome the technology will be when combined with artificial meat. Mmmm, custom-designed meat.

Mad Engineering

Robotic Insects Could Pollinate Flowers and Find Disaster Victims. Some engineers want to design robobees to help pollinate flowers (since the real bees are still dying), and probably to find disaster victims, and, presumably, eventually to take over the world. I applaud your efforts, sirs.

Awesome

$300 Sci-Fi YouTube Video Lands $30m Movie Deal. The article originally put the amount at $300 million (and still mentions that amount as of right now, which would put the deal higher than the budget of Avatar). Regardless, the story is basically this: a guy made a 4-minute movies and posted it on YouTube, and Sam Raimi made a $30 million dollar deal with him to see what he can do with real money. I don't care if the resulting movie sucks, this guy is my hero. Here's the short that got him that contract:

Three days in a row. Wow. Maybe this is a thing again. As usual, let me know in the comments if I missed anything.

Today in Geek, 12/16/2009

Today's headlines were full of geeky medical news, but I have to start with the story that has me nearly giddy.

Awesome

Nearby "Super Earth" May Have Oceans, Thick Atmosphere. We found a planet that probably has a huge ocean of liquid water. It probably doesn't have life, but we're getting closer. As a researcher put it in another article on the subject, "This planet is a harbinger of what’s to come. It’s not just that we can study this one object in more detail. It’s the torch, telling us about this new thing that’s going to happen." This planet has astronomers talking about the likelihood that we'll find an inhabitable (and possibly inhabited) planet soon, and that's just awesome.

Astronomy

Dying Star Mimics Our Sun's Death. Have you ever wondered what our Sun will look like after it eats the inner Solar System? Ok, probably not, but I have, and now I know. Researchers with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics have released a video of a pulsating nearby star going through its red giant phase, the same phase our Sun will go through in about 5 billion years. Keep in mind that, at its largest, that star is roughly the size of the orbit of Mars.

Medicine

Synthetic Nano-Platelets Added to Blood Cut Healing Time in Half and Artificial Red Blood Cells To Aid Drug Delivery, Imaging. Two independent teams released news today about advances in fake blood. The first team produced "artificial red blood cells," essentially tiny packets that could be used to deliver drugs, dyes, etc deep into tissues (because they're small enough to fit through capillaries). It doesn't look like they could be targeted yet, but just getting them to fit into such small spaces is a big jump. The second team produced synthetic platelets to help stop bleeding faster. The nanoparticles work pretty much the same as platelets, crosslinking to clot the blood. Treating wounds with the nanoparticles—or injecting them to help with internal bleeding—cut bleeding time in half in rats. Assuming they can be mass produced and pass testing, I can imagine these being very useful to EMTs.

Scientists Decode Entire Genetic Code of Cancer. I'm still trying to wrap my head around what this one means. Cancers are caused by combinations of many, many mutations. No individual cancer patient has the same set of mutations as any other cancer patient. So I'm not sure yet exactly what they mean by this story, but scientists have apparently mapped the 30,000 mutations associated with melanoma (skin cancer), and the 23,000 mutations associated ith lung cancer. I'll have to dig deeper to figure out what that means, exactly, but it sounds like it's probably a big deal.

Nanotechnology

Crowds of Bacteria Turn Gears a Million Times Their Size. I love this video. The bacteria aren't really doing anything "useful," they're just swimming around randomly... but the shapes of the gears translate those random motions into work (turning the gears in the desired way). I love the idea of future devices being powered by the random motions of bacteria.

Today was a pretty big day in geek. Did I miss anything? If so, let me know in the comments.