Samsung promises that flexible and foldable screens are coming to devices soon. The company’s latest patent, which was spotted by Patently Mobile, is for a flexible phone that morphs into a smart bangle you can strap onto your wrist. It’s an entirely bizarre and futuristic idea that certainly puts more focus on accessibility than style, but it sure sounds awesome. The patent features a flexible OLED screen that’s so flexible you can curl it into a bracelet and wear it on your wrist as a smart...

A team of scientists from Stanford University is testing a new “tricorder” technology able to remotely detect abnormal matter, such as buried plastic explosives or even early stage cancers in humans, by manipulating microwaves and ultrasound. The new “radio frequency (RF)/ultrasound hybrid imaging system,” the brainchild of Assistant Professor Amin Arbabian and Research Professor Pierre Khuri-Yakub, was designed for remote detection of embedded objects in a number of different kinds of matter, i...

Scientists have discovered a new chemical that could reverse cataracts, one of the leading causes of blindness. This new substance could be used in eye drops, greatly simplifying the treatment and making it accessible to the general population at a low price and without intrusive procedures. A cataract is a clouding of the lens in the eye leading to a decrease in vision. It can affect one or both eyes, generally evolves slowly, and causes about 50% of all the blindness cases in the world. Catara...

Jellyfish and lampreys have among the most energy-efficient swimming motions of any animal. From a long time, researchers have assumed that in order to move forward, fly or swim, humans and animals exert pressure on surface, air or water around them. But a new study published in the journal Nature Communications has revealed that two sea animals do not follow the general theory. Jellyfish and lampreys pull their way through the water, as per the study. A Stanford led team shows how these anci...

The Large Hadron Collider began its second run of experiments in June after a two-year hiatus from being the world’s largest particle accelerator. And the results are promising, achieving the highest energy ever achieved in a laboratory by colliding subatomic particles at 13 teraelectronvolts (TeV), physicists hope that these high-energy collisions may produce entirely new particles and simulate conditions seen in the early universe, according to an MIT statement.Soon to be published in Physics ...

The analysis of MRI scans of the ageing hearts of nearly 3,000 adults was led by investigators at Johns Hopkins.' Our results are a striking demonstration of the concept that heart disease may have different pathophysiology in men and women and of the need for tailored treatments that address such important biologic differences,' said João Lima of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, who led the research. Published in the journal Radiology, this is believed to be the first long-term ...

The brainchild of aerospace engineer, RMIT alumnus and senior research associate Dr James Waldie, the SkinSuit has been worn by an astronaut inside the International Space Station (ISS) for the first time. Denmark’s first astronaut, Andreas Mogensen, spent 10 days in the ISS last month and pulled on the SkinSuit to test its effectiveness in the weightless conditions. Inspired by the striking bodysuit worn by Cathy Freeman at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, Waldie and his collaborators have spent more ...

Researchers at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) have designed the first on-chip metamaterial with a refractive index of zero, meaning that the phase of light can travel infinitely fast.,This new metamaterial was developed in the lab of Eric Mazur, the Balkanski Professor of Physics and Applied Physics and Area Dean for Applied Physics at SEAS, and is described in the journal Nature Photonics. “Light doesn’t typically like to be squeezed or manipula...

Tellspec Food Sensor is the world’s first consumer handled device able to scan food at a molecular level. It provides you with the most relevant and useful information about what is in your food so you can make an informed decision that better matches your health needs. The technology includes a three-part system ,a pocket-sized sensor, a cloud-based analysis engine, and a mobile app that work together to scan foods, identify calories, macronutrients, allergens, fiber, sugars, and also provide r...

People who have more than 11 moles on their right arm could have a higher risk of skin cancer. Researchers at King’s College London have investigated a new method that could be used by GPs to quickly determine the number of moles on the entire body by counting the number found on a smaller ‘proxy’ body area, such as an arm. Naevus (mole) count is one of the most important markers of risk for skin cancer despite only 20 to 40 per cent of melanoma arising from pre-existing moles. The risk is thoug...

Scientists are developing next-generation battery-free implantable pacemakers that may be powered by an unlikely source, the heart itself. The advancement is based upon a piezoelectric system that converts vibrational energy, created inside the chest by each heartbeat, into electricity to power the pacemaker. "Essentially, we're creating technology that will allow pacemakers to be powered by the very heart that they are regulating," said M Amin Karami, assistant professor of mechanical engineeri...

Parts produced by some commercial 3D printers may be toxic, according to a new study that raises concerns about how to dispose of parts and waste materials from the devices which are becoming increasingly popular. Researchers at the University of California, Riverside studied two common types of 3D printers, one that melts plastic to build a part, and another that uses light to turn a liquid into a solid part. They found that parts from both types of printers were measurably toxic to zebrafish e...

Tanvas’ surface haptics technology allows you, for the first time, to feel what you see on a touchscreen, the edges of keys, the snap of a toggle switch, the swipe of a turned page or the direction and magnitude of impacts in a game. The company is poised to change the way people interact with touchscreens across essentially every industry, from automotive to education, from retail to medical, from consumer electronics to industrial applications. The technology sends ultrasonic sound waves th...

For the first time ever, molecular oxygen has been found on a comet. Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, currently being orbited by the European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft, is the subject of a study published in Nature. According to ESA researchers, the oxygen present in the comet's surrounding gasses has likely been there since the formation of the comet. "It is the most surprising discovery we have made so far, because oxygen was not among the molecules expected in a cometary coma," the Un...

New research finds that one night of sleep deprivation and six months on a high-fat diet could both impair insulin sensitivity to a similar degree, demonstrating the importance of a good night’s sleep on health. This study, conducted by Josiane Broussard, PhD, and colleagues from Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, CA, used a canine model to examine whether sleep deprivation and a high-fat diet affect insulin sensitivity in similar ways. When the body becomes less sensitive to insulin (i...

The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2015 has been awarded to Tomas Lindahl, Paul Modrich and Aziz Sancar “for mechanistic studies of DNA repair.” The three scientists outlined chemical pathways that cells in living things, including human beings, use to repair damaged DNA. "Their work has provided fundamental knowledge of how a living cell functions and is, for instance, used for the development of new cancer treatments," the academy said. The organization tweeted graphics explaining the scientists'...

NASA’s Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) mission has identified the process that appears to have played a key role in the transition of the Martian climate from an early, warm and wet environment that might have supported surface life to the cold, arid planet Mars is today. Scientists studying Mars’ atmosphere say solar storms probably played a big role in transforming the Red Planet from the warm, hospitable place it was billions of years ago to the cold world it is today. The miss...

A team of astronomers, led by Istvan Dékány of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, has used data from the survey, taken between 2010 and 2014, to make a remarkable discovery, a previously unknown component of our home galaxy, the Milky Way. “The central bulge of the Milky Way is thought to consist of vast numbers of old stars. But the VISTA data has revealed something new, and very young by astronomical standards!” says Istvan Dékány, lead author of the new study. Analysing data fro...

A toxin in Polybia paulista's sting reportedly kills tumor cells without harming healthy ones. It seems like an oxymoron, but scientists say the venom of Polybia paulista, a wasp native to Brazil, fits that description. According to a study published in the Biophysical Journal this week, the wasp’s venom contains a toxin, named MP1, that selectively destroys tumor cells without harming normal ones. The BBC called the venom a potentially powerful “weapon against cancer.” In lab tests, MP1 was ...

Lack of adequate sleep can do more than just make you tired. It can short-circuit your system and interfere with a fundamental cellular process that drives physical growth, physiological adaptation and even brain activity, according to a new study from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Albrecht von Arnim, a molecular biologist based in the Department of Biochemistry and Cellular and Molecular Biology, studied plants but said the concepts may well translate to humans. His team examined h...

Scientists from Stanford University and the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have made the first direct images showing that electrical currents can flow along the boundaries between tiny magnetic regions of a material that normally doesn’t conduct electricity. The results could have major implications for magnetic memory storage. "This can provide a more straightforward way to use magnetic material as memory,” said Eric Yue Ma, a graduate student in the laboratory of Z...

A research led by scientists from the University of the Pacific holds new possibilities for the treatment of cancer and other diseases using peptide drugs. The researchers concocted a technique to considerably enhance the lifespan of peptides such that they could be used more efficiently. Peptides are small chains of amino acids, the building blocks of proteins. Treating diseases like cancer by using peptides is thought to be effective because they can be more potent, and safer to use than large...

Researchers from the University of Alexandria have developed a cheaper, simpler and potentially cleaner way to turn seawater into drinking water than conventional methods. This could have a huge impact on rural areas of the Middle East and North Africa, where access to clean water is a pressing issue if social stability and economic development is to improve. Right now, desalinating seawater is the only viable way to provide water to growing populations, and large desalination plants are now a f...

Astronomers announced that they have spotted a large, rocky object disintegrating in its death spiral around a distant white dwarf star. The discovery also confirms a long-standing theory behind the source of white dwarf “pollution” by metals. “This is something no human has seen before,” said lead author Andrew Vanderburg of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA). “We’re watching a solar system get destroyed.” The evidence for this unique system came from NASA’s Kepler K2 miss...

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers at the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) are looking to take human intuition out of big data analysis by letting computers choose the feature set used to identify predictive patterns in the data. This effort is called “Data Science Machine”. Big Data represents a huge, complex ecosystem that brings together innovative processes from across the spectrum of data analysis, storage, networking, curation, search,...

Developed by researchers at the University of Cambridge in collaboration with Cambridge-based Technology Company Novalia, the method allows graphene and other electrically conducting materials to be added to conventional water-based inks and printed using typical commercial equipment. This is the first time that graphene has been used for printing on a large-scale commercial printing press at high speed. A low-cost, high-speed method for printing graphene inks using a conventional roll-to-roll p...

Sleep Number just announced the x12, which packs a variety of sensors to monitor your sleeping habits, movement, heart rate and breathing rate. The bed has two sections, each of which are independently adjustable, so that once the bed knows your sleeping patterns, it can suggest ways you might want to change, say, the head incline. Additionally and this is perhaps our favorite feature a Partner Snore feature allows you raise your partner's headrest to help ease snoring. Having a lumpy mattres...

Mars has acid fog which eats away rocks and is caused by volcanic eruptions on the red planet, a new study suggests. A planetary scientist has pieced together a compelling story about how acidic vapors may have eaten at the rocks in a 100-acre area on Husband Hill in the Columbia Hills of Gusev Crater on Shoshanna Cole. An assistant professor at Ithaca College in New York, used a variety of data gathered by multiple instruments on the 2003 Mars Exploration Rover Spirit to tease out informatio...

Scientists have developed a 3D-printing method capable of producing highly uniform blocks of embryonic stem cells. These cells are capable of generating all cell types in the body and could be used as the ‘Lego bricks’ to build tissue constructs, larger structures of tissues, and potentially even micro-organs. They could also be used for stem cell regulation and expansion, regenerative medicine, drug screening studies, and potentially even for the construction of micro-organs. “It was really ...

A newly launched mobile eye-test device could lead to prescription virtual-reality screens. After five years of development and about 40,000 tests worldwide, the smartphone-powered eye-test devices developed by MIT spinout EyeNetra is coming to hospitals, optometric clinics, optical stores, and even homes nationwide. But on the heels of its commercial release, EyeNetra says it’s been pursuing opportunities to collaborate with virtual-reality companies seeking to use the technology to develop “vi...