Bruxism (teeth clenching or grinding)

Some of us will have had the experience of sleeping next to a person who grinds their teeth. Occasional teeth grinding is not a big deal, but if this happens regularly, it causes inconvenience for both the person and those around them.Bruxism often occurs during sleep and it seems to be one of many known sleep disorders. The mechanism of bruxism is believed to be similar to that of kicking your leg during sleep.There are several hypotheses to explain the possible causes of bruxism. Traditional v

Oct. 18, 2012

Korea on propofol alert

The 2009 death of pop legend Michael Jackson brought propofol, the anesthetic that killed him, to the world’s attention. Before the tragic incident, people knew little about the drug and how dangerous it could be when administered for non-medical purposes and by unqualified personnel.Korea is no longer safe from the threat of propofol too, as a series of the drug abuse cases involving the anesthesia drug have been reported. Propofol has been classified as a psychotropic drug since last year in K

Oct. 18, 2012

Anipang boom boosts mobile game growth

South Koreans have a thing for lining up objects. Omok, a traditional board game in which two players compete to first line up five baduk stones, has flourished as a favorite pastime throughout generations.A similar game that requires nimbler hands, smartphones and mobile messenger friends, is now sweeping South Korea, one of the world’s most digitalized countries, as a new pastime.Whether it be a commuter subway or a lunchtime cafeteria queue, it’s easy to spot people squinting their eyes and c

Oct. 18, 2012

NHN selects game literature winners

NHN Corp., the nation’s leading Internet portal operator, hosted its literature awards ceremony in Seoul on Thursday to foster creative talent shedding light on the genre. NHN Game Literary Award, an annual event taking place for the third time, was presented to 24 teams of awardees this year, including grand-prix winner Lee Byung-ha, whose work was chosen from a total of 1,500 long and short game scenarios. “At first we were unsure whether we could carry on, but now we see that the game literat

Oct. 18, 2012

“GenieTalk” tops app chart to mixed reviews

 As the automatic translation application “GenieTalk” has taken the No. 1 spot on AppStore’s free popular app chart just one day after launching, early adopters across the nation and overseas are busy posting reviews on social network services -- on both the good and the bad.“GenieTalk,” a free Korean-English translation app developed by the Electronics and Telecommunication Research Institution w

Oct. 18, 2012

Planet found at sun's closest neighbor

(ESO-UPI)European astronomers say they've discovered a planet about the mass of the Earth orbiting a star in the Alpha Centauri system, the nearest star system to Earth.Alpha Centauri, only 4.3 light-years away, is actually a triple star -- a system consisting of two stars similar to the Sun orbiting close to each other, designated Alpha Centauri A and B, and a more distant and faint red component

Oct. 18, 2012

‘Housework’ makes female dragons die young

(UPI)Female Komodo dragons live just half as long as males on average and it's all down to physically demanding "housework," Australian researchers say.Females tied to tasks of building huge nests and guarding eggs for up to six months live for around 32 years, as compared to 60 years as an average lifespan for a male dragon, they said.A research team that included scientists from the University o

Oct. 18, 2012

Giant smashup created the Moon, say scientists

(NASA-UPI)A chemical quirk found in lunar soil backs a 37-year-old theory that the Moon was born from an apocalyptic collision between Earth and a huge space rock, scientists said on Wednesday.Way back in 1975, astronomers proposed at a conference that billions of years ago, our satellite was created through a smashup between the infant Earth and a Mars-sized body they named Theia, in Greek mythol

Oct. 18, 2012

Tablet owners reading more publications

Nearly 2 in 5 U.S. tablet owners read newspapers and/or magazines on their device, with 1 in 10 reading publications almost daily, a survey found.The poll by comScore for the three-month period ending August 2012 found 37.1 percent of tablet owners read a newspaper on their device at least once during the month, with 11.5 percent of tablet owners reading newspapers almost every day.Kindle Fire users displayed the strongest activity in reading newspapers and magazines on their device, a comScore

Oct. 18, 2012

Free Korean-English translation app introduced

The Ministry of Knowledge Economy unveiled Wednesday a smartphone application that automatically translates Korean and English to help ease the language barrier. “GenieTalk” offers translation services through both speech recognition and text. The application is designed to help out those who face difficulties communicating when visiting Korea and Koreans who travel abroad. The app contains 270,000 Korean and 65,000 English words.“GenieTalk senses Korean better and shows higher translation accur

Oct. 17, 2012

LG Display rolls out new 84-inch displays for electronic boards

LG Display announced the launch of an 84-inch ultra definition liquid-crystal display panel to be used for next-generation electronic bulletin boards on Wednesday.Claiming to be the world’s first to introduce such displays, the new 8 million pixel LCD panel is 3.5 times brighter and 8 times more vivid than existing electronic boards that use projectors, its officials said.This indicates that electronic bulletin boards will be similar to a television, enabling users to even view 3-D videos. Peopl

Oct. 17, 2012

Electronics firms go ‘mini’

Critics raise concerns over strategy of making devices in several sizesWith the rising trend of bigger is better, are wireless gadgets getting too big for the global consumer market?That is the question that comes to mind as major electronics makers push mini versions of their already-released wireless gadgets.Samsung Electronics unveiled the Galaxy S3 mini at an event in Germany last week.The 4-inch Galaxy S3 mini is 0.8 of an inch smaller than the firm’s flagship smartphone Galaxy S3 but has t

Oct. 17, 2012

Secrets of mysterious asteroids plumbed

(NASA)U.S. scientists say they have uncovered new clues in the ongoing mystery of the Jovian Trojans -- asteroids that orbit the sun on the same path as Jupiter.The asteroids are unusual in that they travel in packs, with one group leading the way along the orbit in front of the gas giant planet, with a second group trailing behind.Data from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer has revealed

Oct. 17, 2012

‘Predator X’ not as fearsome as thought

A monstrous prehistoric marine reptile that had been hailed as one of the biggest and most fearsome creatures ever is smaller than expected, Norwegian scientists said.Paleontologists Espen Knutsen, Patrick Druckenmiller and Jørn Hurum from the University of Olso discovered the remains of two big pliosaurs -- marine reptiles from the Jurassic and Cretaceous period with short-necks and large jaws -- between 2004 and 2012 on the Arctic island of Svalbard.The specimen, dubbed “Predator X” and “The M

Oct. 17, 2012

Flip-flop of Earth‘s magnetic field probed

 Some 41,000 years ago a complete reversal of the Earth’s magnetic field occurred and compass needles would have pointed south not north, German scientists say.Researchers at the Helmholtz Center Potsdam -- GFZ German Research Center for Geosciences report the most remarkable feature of the phenomenon was the speed of the reversal.“The field geometry of reversed polarity, with field lines pointing into the opposite direction when compared to today‘s configuration, lasted for only about 440 years

Oct. 17, 2012