Fungi thriving on radioactivity in Chernobyl could help astronauts, sent to ISS

The nuclear reactor explosion that happened at Chernobyl, Ukraine, in 1986 resulted in 31 deaths and affected thousands of lives. What’s worse is that the nuclear plant is still pumping out dangerous levels of radiation into the environment because of which there’s a 19-mile exclusion zone in place. The entire affected area will be unusable for hundreds of years because of hazardous levels of radiation. However, a fungus called Cryptococcus neoformans was discovered in the area five years after the nuclear explosion, in 1991. The fungi not only survived amidst intense radiation but thrived and is still growing. NASA scientists are reportedly researching the fungi to understand how it works and hope they can use it for our benefit. 

The fungi is said to store large quantities of melanin, a skin pigment. These melanin levels apparently absorb the harmful nuclear radiation and convert it chemical energy. The process is deemed similar to photosynthesis, which plants employ to convert CO2 and chlorophyll into oxygen and glucose. The fungi in question uses a process known as radiosynthesis, which NASA scientists hope to understand better. Alongside applications like helping patients undergoing chemotherapy and protecting nuclear power plant workers, the fungi could be used to develop a sunscreen that protects against harmful solar radiation. If it can store energy, the fungi could be used to develop an alternative to solar panels. 

The NASA research team states in a blog post, “The fungi that grow in there (Chernobyl reactor) are radiotrophic fungi, that are rich in melanin. Melanin absorbs radiation and converts it into other forms of energy (including electric).” Lead scientist of the research, Kasthuri Venkateswaran notes, “My research is into the use of melanin in conjunction with water to convert electromagnetic radiation into electrical energy. This technology will probably find its place in biotechnology as it is non-toxic and biocompatible.”

Radiation exposure in space is a big concern for astronauts since there’s no magnetic field like we have here, on earth. NASA scientists have sent melanin samples from the Cryptococcus neoformans fungi to the International Space Station in order to study how it reacts to space radiation. 

Via

from Latest Technology News https://ift.tt/2HcGfl0

Samsung airs Galaxy Z Flip commercial ahead of the official unveiling

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip official unveiling is just around the corner, but it seems like Samsung is very keen to show what it has in store for us. Ahead of the February 11 unveiling, Samsung has aired the commercial of its next foldable phone at this year’s Academy Awards. It leaves little to the imagination as the company basically showed off the whole phone. The commercial also confirms the colour variants of the Galaxy Z Flip.

Samsung took to the Academy Awards to air the commercial of the unannounced Galaxy Z Flip. It confirms that the foldable phone will have a crease as there is a copy that says “You may notice a small crease in the center of the main screen, which is a natural characteristic of the screen.” The commercial also gives us our first look at the outside screen, which is tiny. However, it can be used to view time, caller ID and also has sliders for accepting or rejecting a call.

Samsung just showed off the entire Z Flip during its Oscars ad. Small print says screen crease is normal, heh pic.twitter.com/uBesJ0FonT

— nilay patel (@reckless) February 10, 2020

According to previous rumours, Samsung Galaxy Z Flip will feature a 6.7-inch Super AMOLED Dynamic screen that supports 1080 x 2636 full HD+ resolution and an aspect ratio of 22:9. It will have an Infinity-O notch as shown in the commercial. The outside screen will be of 1.06-inches. The foldable phone is tipped to be powered by the Snapdragon 855+ chipset, paired with 8GB RAM and 256GB of UFS 3.0 storage. It is rumoured to pack a 3300mAh battery that is likely to support 15W fast charging.

As for the optics, Galaxy Z Flip is seen to sport a dual rear camera setup that is said to have a 12MP primary shooter and a 123-degree f/2.2 aperture 12MP ultrawide sensor. It is tipped to have features like dual pixel autofocus, OIS and 60fps 4K video recording. The punch-hole display could have a 10MP selfie shooter.

The Galaxy Z Flip is said to run Android 10 and come equipped with AKG tuned and Dolby Atmos powered stereo speakers. The rear side of the phone is likely to be covered by Gorilla Glass 6. The foldable phone may cost nearly 1,500 Euros. 

from Latest Technology News https://ift.tt/38dS2eL

Microsoft Surface Duo public sighting suggests front-only camera

When Microsoft announced its new generation of Surface devices in October 2019, it also announced—to everyone’s surprise—a new smartphone called Surface Duo. As the name suggests, it’s a dual-screen device that folds out like a book. Even though there are at least nine months to go before Microsoft rolls the Surface Duo out in the market, it was recently spotted in a train in the hands of an unknown user (thought to work for Microsoft) in Vancouver, Canada.

The photos and videos taken by Twitter user Israel Rodriguez reveal that the Surface Duo has a round white dot on the top bezel, which, when compared with today’s smartphones, is far from being slim. The white dot could be a temporarily masked front flash. Rodriguez’s material also suggests that the Surface Duo does not have any rear cameras. Since it’s a dual-screen device that can be flipped around, the front camera is expected to double as the rear camera.

This suspicion that the Surface Duo has a camera only on the front side can be confirmed by the teaser video that Microsoft released last year, which also shows a camera-free back panel on the Surface Duo. If that is the case, the Surface Duo will not be a photographer’s phone. It most likely won’t have separate sensors for macro and telephoto photography, the way many flagships these days do. At any rate, we’ll have to wait for a few months before any verifiable information about the device starts flowing in.

On the inside, the Surface Duo is believed to feature a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 chip. Each of the two screens on board is said to measure 5.6 inches diagonally, although their resolution is not known. Microsoft’s teaser video clearly showed that the device runs Android with support for apps from the Google Play Store, and not Windows 10. Though the Surface Duo runs Android, we can expect Microsoft to layer it with the Microsoft Launcher. You can take a look at that here.

 

Here internet: Full video, no trollinghttps://t.co/4bcE0gzzUO#seeya

— Israel Rodriguez (@yzraeu) February 8, 2020

 

from Latest Technology News https://ift.tt/2SvD3Gm

Facebook Warns of Hit to Oculus Production From Coronavirus

Facebook said on Friday production of its Oculus virtual reality headset would be hit by the recent coronavirus outbreak, which has weighed on businesses dependent on Chinese supply lines.

from RSS Feeds | GAMES - RSS Feed - NDTV Gadgets360.com https://ift.tt/31Cur4C

Nvidia Pulls Out of MWC 2020 Over Coronavirus, Despite Being a Major Sponsor of the Trade Show

After South Korean company LG electronics and the Swedish telecommunication giant Ericsson, now graphics giant Nvidia has announced that it is not sending its employees to the Mobile World Congress 2020 in Barcelona due to the public health risks around the coronavirus.

from RSS Feeds | GAMES - RSS Feed - NDTV Gadgets360.com https://ift.tt/3blffNV

Facebook, Messenger social media accounts hacked, company admits

Facebook became the butt of a laugh riot when a number of its corporate social media accounts were hacked by an online attacker named OurMine in the early hours of February 8. The Twitter and Instagram feeds of Facebook and Messenger were repeatedly populated with what appears to be the hacker’s calling card. Facebook eventually put out an official statement on Twitter to assure its followers that it had regained control over its accounts. In the meantime, users shared screenshots of the attack on Twitter.

While the Twitter timeline of Facebook and Messenger was repeatedly populated with a message from the attacker in the form of a text post, the Instagram feed of both accounts was flooded with images of the attacker’s logo. According to users on Twitter, this attack was the result of a security breach in Khoros, an American community and social media management software. The attacker, who called themselves OurMine in the posts, reportedly hacked the Twitter accounts of the NFL and ESPN late last month.

Despite these recent attempts at cybervandalism on social media that can prove to be a nuisance for big brands like Facebook and ESPN, OurMine call themselves a group of “professional” white hat hackers with “no bad intentions”. Their earliest attacks go as far back as 2016, when they hacked into the Twitter accounts of Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, and Google CEO Sundar Pichai. 

Popular Hong Kong-based app researcher Jane Manchun Wong was one of the many who captured the attack on Facebook’s corporate social media accounts on video. “It was fun watching this battle between Facebook and hackers where hackers keep posting tweets and Facebook keeps deleting them,” she wrote in her tweet. Her video shows Facebook making frantic efforts to delete the hacker’s offending tweets. You can see more such videos here.

 

It was fun watching this battle between Facebook and hackers where hackers keep posting tweets and Facebook keeps deleting them pic.twitter.com/c7APEJn38I

— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) February 8, 2020

 

from Latest Technology News https://ift.tt/39goZHe

Xiaomi confirmed to launch Mi 10 on February 13 online

Smartphone launch events often happen at exotic locations with a lot of fanfare. Media from around the globe are invited to cover them in live broadcasts. But that will not be the case with the launch of Xiaomi’s upcoming flagship, the Mi 10. Owing presumably to the growing concerns of the spread of a novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) from China, Xiaomi will launch the Mi 10 at an online-only event on February 13. Xiaomi co-founder Lei Jun confirmed the official launch date on Weibo yesterday.

At the annual Qualcomm Tech Summit last year, Xiaomi President Lin Bin announced that the Xiaomi Mi 10 would be one of the first few smartphones to be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 Mobile Platform. If things go according to plan, we can expect to see the upcoming Mi 10 powered by the recently developed Snapdragon 865 chip. We can also expect to see 16GB of RAM and 512GB of internal storage space on the smartphone. One variant of the Mi 10—the Mi 10 Pro 5G—is expected to have 5G connectivity.

Going by previously leaked information, we expect the Xiaomi Mi 10 to feature a 6.4-inch screen with a Full HD+ resolution. We also expect it to pack a 4800mAh battery, and the Mi 10 Pro 5G, a slightly smaller 4500mAh battery. According to a Weibo user named Technology B, the Xiaomi Mi 10 will have support for 48W fast charging. In the optics department, we expect the handset to have as many as four cameras on the back panel with the primary sensor being either a 64MP unit or a 108MP unit.

When it is launched next week, the Mi 10 will succeed the outgoing Mi 9. Launched a year ago, the Mi 9 features a 6.39-inch Super AMOLED screen with a resolution of 1080 x 2340 pixels. Powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 chip with up to 8GB of RAM and 256GB of internal storage space, it runs the proprietary MIUI 11 software that is based on Android 10. The handset has a 3300mAh battery with support for 27W fast charging. On its back panel, there’s a triple camera setup with the primary sensor having a resolution of 48MP. You can see our first impressions of the Mi 9 below:

Note: Cover image represents outgoing Xiaomi Mi 9

from Latest Technology News https://ift.tt/2SeQo77