Today on New Scientist: 21 December 2012

Cadaver stem cells offer new hope of life after death Stem cells can be extracted from bone marrow five days after death to be used in life-saving treatmentsApple's patents under fire at US patent office The tech firm is skating on thin ice with some of the patents that won it a $1 billion settlement against SamsungHimalayan dam-building threatens endemic species The world's highest mountains...

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S'pore students set for workforce & world: global quiz host

SINGAPORE: Singapore students have a hunger for knowledge and are ready to face the workforce and the world, observed a key partner of the Tata Crucible Campus Quiz.Mr Giri Balasubramaniam, more popularly known as "Pickbrain", is the host of the global business quiz.He said the world looks up to Singapore in many ways, and one of them is quality education.The Tata Crucible Campus Quiz...

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On truths, dreams, confessions -- and the iPhone

Oddly emotional.(Credit:Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)Sometimes I just wander into places. No reason I should. No reason I shouldn't.Tonight it was a fascinating North Vietnamese restaurant called Khong River House in Miami Beach. It's been open only four days and the staff have that staring-eye look that reminds you of exam day at college.Still, for reasons of sheer art, they have an installation near the...

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Pictures: Fungi Get Into the Holiday Spirit

Photograph courtesy Stephanie Mounaud, J. Craig Venter InstituteMounaud combined different fungi to create a Santa hat and spell out a holiday message.Different fungal grow at different rates, so Mounaud's artwork rarely lasts for long. There's only a short window of time when they actually look like what they're suppose to."You do have to keep that in perspective when you're making these creations,"...

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'Fiscal Cliff' Leaves Boehner a Wounded Speaker

John Boehner is a bloodied House speaker following the startling setback that his own fractious Republican troops dealt him in their "fiscal cliff" struggle against President Barack Obama.There's plenty of internal grumbling about the Ohio Republican, especially among conservatives, and lots of buzzing about whether his leadership post is in jeopardy. But it's uncertain whether...

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Himalayan dam-building threatens endemic species

The Himalayas, the world's highest mountain range, may soon hold another record: it could become home to the greatest density of dams in the world. More than a thousand are either already operating, under construction or being planned in northern India, Nepal and Bhutan. Besides providing clean energy, they could...

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N. Korea confirms arrest of US citizen

SEOUL: North Korea confirmed Friday that it had arrested a US citizen in November, saying legal action would be taken against him but giving no details of the charges.The man, identified as Pae Jun-Ho, entered North Korea on November 3 as a tourist, and "committed a crime" against the country, the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said."He was put into custody by a relevant institution,"...

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Dish faces challenges ramping up its LTE network

Dish was recently given a thumbs up by the FCC to build its own LTE network, but the company is up against some stiff obstacles along the way.Last week, the Federal Communications Commission granted Dish's request to allow it to use 40 MHz of spectrum in the 2 GHz band to create a 4G LTE network. At the time, the FCC indicated that some restrictions would apply, though it didn't reveal the specifics...until...

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Winter Solstice 2012: Facts on the Shortest Day of the Year

Today is the winter solstice and the first day of winter in the Northern Hemisphere. It's all due to Earth's tilt, which ensures that the shortest day of every year falls around December 21.Some predicted that today would also mark Earth's doomsday, thanks to a longstanding rumor that the Maya calendar ends on December 21, 2012. But earlier this year, National Geographic grantee William...

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Amid Protest, NRA Calls for Armed Guards in Schools

The National Rifle Association stood its ground today in arguing that the answer to gun violence in schools is an armed security force that can protect students, while blaming the media and violent entertainment and video games for recent deadly shootings."The only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun," NRA executive vice president Wayne LaPierre...

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Data show how US gun control will cut shooting deaths

It is tragic that it took the deaths of 20 children, but it seems that the horrific massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown has finally shifted the debate about guns and violence in the US. In focusing on Newtown, Connecticut,...

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'Erin Brockovich' toxin found at Japan plant

TOKYO: The toxic chemical made infamous by campaigning single mother Erin Brockovich has been found at up to 15,800 times safety limits in groundwater at a Japanese iron plant, the factory's operator said Thursday.Excessive amounts of hexavalent chromium were discovered at Nippon Denko's plant in Tokushima in the country's west as it prepared to halt production of chromium salts at the...

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Start-Ups: Silicon Valley Ep. 8 -- the grand delusion

Sarah. Who is working. On herself.(Credit:BravoTV Screenshot by Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)Last night saw some history in "Start-Ups: Silicon Valley."Yes, given its rather tawdry ratings -- 20 percent of those of "Real Housewives," so rumor has it -- this could be the last episode ever. So the excitement was more palpable than that for the discovery of the tomb of a hitherto unknown ancient Egyptian king.We...

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Detecting Rabid Bats Before They Bite

A picture is worth a thousand words—or in the case of bats, a rabies diagnosis. A new study reveals that rabid bats have cooler faces compared to uninfected colony-mates. And researchers are hopeful that thermal scans of bat faces could improve rabies surveillance in wild colonies, preventing outbreaks that introduce infections into other animals—including humans.Bats are a major reservoir...

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Schools Threatened Nationwide After Sandy Hook

Schools across the country, already on edge following last week's massacre of 20 students and six adults at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school have been further unnerved following a series of copycat threats, sometimes yielding arrests and caches of deadly weapons.From California to Connecticut, police in the past five days have arrested more than a dozen individuals in Indiana,...

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Cassini captures spectacle in Saturn's shadow

Flora Graham, deputy editor, newscientist.com(Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI)Like a Christmas bauble hanging in the night, this view ofa backlit Saturn shines in the darkness. The image was taken during a rare chancefor NASA'sCassini spacecraft to observe the planet's rings while in Saturn's shadow. Conveniently,Saturn blocks the sun and the rings are illuminated from behind. As well as providing...

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Bank of England votes 8-1 to maintain stimulus

LONDON: Bank of England policymakers voted 8-1 to maintain their quantitative easing stimulus programme at their December meeting, repeating the voting pattern from the previous month, minutes showed on Wednesday.The BoE's nine-member monetary policy committee (MPC) had voted earlier this month to keep the QE stimulus amount at 375 billion pounds ($611 billion, 460 billion euros).Polcymakers...

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FTC, EU to postpone Google antitrust decisions, report says

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission's final decision on its 20-month long antitrust probe of the search giant will be delayed until next year, Bloomberg reported late yesterday after speaking with unnamed sources.The results of the probe were expected to be announced this week.The Mountain View, Calif.-based company has been in talks with the FTC over the past two weeks, and according to Bloomberg,...

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Race Is On to Find Life Under Antarctic Ice

A hundred years ago, two teams of explorers set out to be the first people ever to reach the South Pole. The race between Roald Amundsen of Norway and Robert Falcon Scott of Britain became the stuff of triumph, tragedy, and legend. (See rare pictures of Scott's expedition.)Today, another Antarctic drama is underway that has a similar daring and intensity—but very different stakes.Three...

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Inside One School's Extraordinary Security Measures

While schools across America reassess their security measures in the wake of the tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., one school outside of Chicago takes safety to a whole new level.The security measures at Middleton Elementary School start the moment you set foot on campus, with a camera-equipped doorbell. When you ring the doorbell, school employees inside are...

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Gaming chair mimics a full-motion simulator

Paul Marks, chief technology correspondent(Image: Greg Pease/Getty)Multi-million-dollar full-motion flight simulators give trainee pilots a good approximation of the ups and downs of real flight, but the powerful hydraulic rams they are mounted on make them far too big, expensive and dangerous for the home. Gamers should take heart, though: a novel kind of gaming chair called a haptic seat might...

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Coal use set to surpass oil in a decade: IEA

PARIS: Coal is set to surpass oil as the world's top fuel within a decade, driven by growth in emerging market giants China and India, with even Europe finding it hard to cut use despite pollution concerns, according to a report published Tuesday."Thanks to abundant supplies and insatiable demand for power from emerging markets, coal met nearly half of the rise in global energy demand...

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Gangnam Style, Barack vs Mitt among YouTube top 2012 videos

The Gangnam style craze grabbed the top spot among YouTube's most popular videos of 2012.(Credit:YouTube/Screenshot by Lance Whitney/CNET)YouTube watchers kept busy this year checking out videos related to Gangnam Style, the presidential elections, and Facebook parenting for the troubled teen.Rewinding back through 2012, YouTube yesterday posted its list of the top ten trending videos for the year.A...

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GRAIL Mission Goes Out With a Bang

Jane J. Lee On Friday, December 14, NASA sent their latest moon mission into a death spiral. Rocket burns nudged GRAIL probes Ebb and Flow into a new orbit designed to crash them into the side of a mountain near the moon's north pole today at around 2:28 p.m. Pacific standard time. NASA named the crash site after late astronaut Sally Ride, America's first woman in space.Although the mountain...

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