S. Korean researchers find new way to watch 3-D movies

Researchers in South Korea have created a convenient way to watch 3-D movies without the glasses, according to news reports.Humans see the world in three dimensions because of the spacing between our eyes. The brain takes in the visual input from both eyes and is able to generate depth perception. The trick to achieving 3-D movies is to slightly offset the images for each eye. Therefore, in typical 3-D theaters, two different projectors display two images on the same screen. This is why the movi

Aug. 22, 2012

The Face-Kini: A new way to avoid the sun’s rays

A new way to avoid the sun’s dangerous rays is by covering your head with a Face-Kini and your body with its matching body suit. The Face-Kini is like a thin balaclava, and covers the whole head, with holes for the eyes and mouth. This product is popular with beach-goers who want to protect their skin from the sun at the coast in China’s Shandong province, according to news reports.The Face-Kini is unisex and comes in a wide range of colors and patterns. Although this article of clothing was inv

Aug. 22, 2012

Cosmetics from jellyfish’s collagen?

The government unveiled on Wednesday an unusual plan to fight the threat of jellyfish to the country’s bathers: turning the sea creatures into cosmetics. The Ministry of Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said that it aims to eradicate the jellyfish by exploring ways to extract collagen from the creatures to produce commercial cosmetics.To that end, the ministry has asked the National Fisheries Research and Development Institute to conduct research to find a way to carry out the plan. If

Aug. 22, 2012

Obese may lose memory sooner

(123rf)People who are obese lose their memory and thinking ability faster than thinner people, British and French researchers say. Researchers at University College London said the study was based on data from 6,500 federal British civil servants, whose health was monitored from the ages of 50 to 60, The Daily Telegraph reported. The study participants were weighed, measured, blood pressure and ch

Aug. 22, 2012

Star Wars slowly becoming a reality?

The hoverbike made famous by the “Return of the Jedi” has been recreated and tested by California firm Aerofex, according to news sources. The vehicle is made from two ducted fans facing the ground. Pilots can move it by controlling the angle of these fans with two control sticks and can control the direction of flight by simply leaning in the desired direction.Initial plans to recreate the hoverbike were called off because of the complex control system. However, Aerofex was able to create a sys

Aug. 22, 2012

New Ebola outbreak reported in DRC

Digital illustration of the ebola virus. (123rf)A new outbreak of the Ebola virus has been reported in Africa, this time in the Democratic Republic of Congo. At least 10 people are reported to have died of the disease in Orientale province in eastern Congo, CNN reported. Two cases of the disease have been confirmed and 13 are suspected. Orientale borders the area in Uganda where 16 deaths have bee

Aug. 22, 2012

NASA announces new Mars mission

This image provided by NASA shows an artist rendition of the proposed InSight (Interior exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) Lander. (AP-Yonhap News)WASHINGTON (AP) ― After driving all around Mars with four rovers, NASA wants to look deep into the guts of the red planet. The space agency decided Monday to launch a relatively low-cost robotic lander in 2016 to check

Aug. 21, 2012

Promise of update spurs Diablo 3 resurgence

Diablo 3’s sagging popularity has rebounded dramatically thanks to news of an upcoming major content and gameplay system update slated for Thursday.Blizzard Entertainment, the developer and distributor of Diablo 3, recently announced the 1.0.4 update plan, which is expected to drastically change the overall game system and upgrade its content. After the announcement, GameNote said the popularity rank of Diablo 3 in Korea jumped to 4th place, climbing 16 steps as of the third week of August. Game

Aug. 21, 2012

Astronomers describe death of planet

(Casey Reed/NASA)An international team of astronomers says they've seen the first evidence of a planet's destruction as its aging star became a red giant at the end of its life."A similar fate may await the inner planets in our solar system, when the sun becomes a red giant and expands all the way out to Earth's orbit some 5 billion years from now," team member Alex Wolszczan, a professor of astro

Aug. 21, 2012

U.S. Rep: Pregnancy from rape is 'really rare'

Missouri Congressman Todd Akin, the conservative Republican U.S. Senate candidate, said in a television interview that it is “really rare” for women to become pregnant when they are raped.Akin, a six-term congressman running against incumbent Democrat Sen. Claire McCaskill, was asked in an interview that aired Sunday on St. Louis television station KTVI if there were any circumstances in which he would support a woman's decision to have an abortion.Akin, who has said he's Missouri's most conserv

Aug. 21, 2012

After marriage: Men drink less, women more

Men who drink tend to stem their alcohol use once they marry, while women tend to increase their drinking after marriage, U.S. researchers found. Corinne Reczek of the University of Cincinnati, Tetyana Pudrovska of Pennsylvania State University, Deborah Carr of Rutgers University and Debra Umberson of the University of Texas at Austin found married men reported consuming the lowest number of drinks compared with single, divorced and widowed men.The researchers analyzed survey data from the Wisco

Aug. 20, 2012

NASA rover Curiosity shoots a Mars rock with laser

NASA’s Curiosity rover has zapped its first Martian rock, aiming its laser for the sake of science.During the target practice on Sunday, Curiosity fired 30 pulses at a nearby rock over a 10-second window, burning a small hole.Since landing in Gale Crater two weeks ago, the six-wheel rover has been checking out its instruments including the laser. During its two-year mission, Curiosity was expected to point the laser at various rocks as it drives toward Mount Sharp, a 3-mile (5-kilometer)-high mo

Aug. 20, 2012

Near-speed-of-light collisions fundamental to rare isotope generation

Since opening the Korea-U.S. Cooperation Center for Accelerator Science and beginning work on the design of the rare isotope accelerator, the Institute for Basic Science has sped up preparations for the country’s first particle accelerator of its kind. The purpose of a rare isotope accelerator is to produce isotopes of elements that do not or rarely occur naturally. An isotope is a variant of an element that has a different number of neutrons in the nucleus.Under the plans the IBS’ accelerator,

Aug. 19, 2012

Star births seen on cosmic scale in distant galaxy

WASHINGTON (AP) ― Scientists have found a cosmic supermom. It is a galaxy that gives births to more stars in a day than ours does in a year.Astronomers used NASA’s Chandra X-Ray telescope to spot this distant gigantic galaxy creating about 740 new stars a year. By comparison, our Milky Way galaxy spawns just about one new star each year.The galaxy is about 5.7 billion light years away in the center of a recently discovered cluster of galaxies that give off the brightest X-ray glow astronomers ha

Aug. 19, 2012

‘Basic science research key to nation’s advancement’

New research institute hopes to bring big changes for nation’s science communityThe Institute for Basic Science will change the way Korea carries out research and development to allow creative and original research, according the organization’s first chief Oh Se-jung. The institute launched in November seeks to hire top-class scientists from across the world.“Our target is not just for Korea, but a research institution that can compete on the international stage,” Oh said. Oh said that while Kor

Aug. 19, 2012

New spider family found in U.S. caves

A team of amateur cave explorers and arachnologists has found a new family of spiders in caves and old-growth redwood forests in Oregon and California, US researchers said Friday.Entomologists at the California Academy of Sciences said the spider, named Trogloaptor -- or "cave robber" -- for its lethal front claws, had such unique evolutionary features that it represented not just a new genus or s

Aug. 19, 2012