Weird Crystal Can Absorb All The Oxygen In A Room — And Then Release It Later

Researchers from the University of Southern Denmark say they've invented a crystal that pulls oxygen out of the air and even water. Apparently, just a spoonful of the stuff can suck up all the oxygen in a room. The crystal is a salt made from cobalt*, and it appears to be capable of holding oxygen at a concentration that is 160 times higher than the air we breathe. The paper notes that "an excess" of the substance would bind up to 99 percent of the oxygen in a room. But what's more remarkable is that the crystal can later release the oxygen when exposed to heat or low-oxygen conditions. In a press release, study author Christine McKenzie likens it to the hemoglobin in our blood, which uses iron to bind and release oxygen in the human body.

If the substance lives up to its promises, it could have a lot of really cool applications—for example, feeding high concentrations of oxygen into hydrogen fuel cells, and lightening the load for lung patients who have to lug around heavy oxygen supplies. Also, scuba divers could potentially leave their tanks at home, says McKenzie. "A few grains contain enough oxygen for one breath, and as the material can absorb oxygen from the water around the diver and supply the diver with it, the diver will not need to bring more than these few grains."

Hong Kong Protesters Are Furious About A 30-Year-Old Broken Promise

Seemingly out of nowhere, images of tens of thousands of protesters in the streets of Hong Kong confronting tear gas with umbrellas are dominating the media. "Occupy Central" is what those in Hong Kong are calling the movement to maintain democratic rule on the island. It has been able to assemble hundreds of thousands to demonstrate since July, when Beijing publicized that it would no longer tolerate independent rule in Hong Kong. It said that Hong Kong's constitutional autonomy was not "an inherent power." Instead of allowing free and fair elections as it has for the past 20 years, Beijing wants to select candidates who can run for political office in Hong Kong.


In a closed-door meeting with Hong Kong leaders in August the guy named Zhang Xiaoming, Beijin's liasion to Hong Kong, told Hong Kong leaders supportive of Occupy Central, "The fact that you are allowed to stay alive, already shows the countr'y inclusiveness." So what is happening now says more about changesin Beijing under President Xi Jinping that in does about any revolution on the island. To the contrary, protesters on the ground aren't fighting for change, but rather a return to the commitment that was made to them in 1997 -- that they would be able to govern themselves.

Superintelligence Could Come Into Existence

Biological brains are unlikely to be the final stage of intelligence. Machines already have superhuman strength, speed and stamina – and one day they will have superhuman intelligence. The only reasons this may not occur is if we develop some other dangerous technology first that destroys us, or otherwise fall victim to some existential risk .But assuming that scientific and technological progress continues, human-level machine intelligence is very likely to be developed. And shortly thereafter, superintelligence. 

Predicting how long it will take to develop such intelligent machines is difficult. Contrary to what some reviewers of my book seem to believe, I don't have any strong opinion about that matter. (It is as though the only two possible views somebody might hold about the future of artificial intelligence are "machines are stupid and will never live up to the hype!" and "machines are much further advanced than you imagined and true AI is just around the corner!").

New Chemical Signals From The Middle Of Our Galaxy Are A Good Sign For Alien Life

Aliens, once again. The recent discovery of molecular compounds integral to life on Earth in dusty clouds located deep in interstellar space is an encouraging sign that aliens could exist out in the universe. All amino acids make up the proteins in the human cells; Muscles, other tissues, and contain a type pf organic compound called iso-propyl cyanide, which consists of other elements. Meaning, without amino acids, there would be no life on Earth as we know it. Since amino acids were first discovered in meteorites in the early '70s, it's been clear that life on Earth got a little help from space. Just how much, however, remains unclear.

Now, scientists have taken one step further and discovered where i-propyl cyanide likely originates in our very own galaxy — the Milky Way. Located 27,000 light years from Earth toward the center of our galaxy is one of the largest molecular clouds in the Milky Way. 

New Particle Discovered After 80 Years Of Searching

A team of physicists at Princeton University and the University of Texas at Austin announced on October 2 that they have observed a new particle that has eluded detection for nearly 80 years! It only took scientists 48 years to detect the Higgs boson. No one really knew how they would go about searching for this particle until 2001, which is why it's taken the better half of a century to detect it. Meet the Majorana fermion. This new particle was first predicted by Italian physicist Ettore Majorana in 1937, and is unique because it is the only particle in existence that can adopt both matter and antimatter characteristics simultaneously without annihilating itself in the process.

This is kind of exciting and can only be practically beneficial. Because it allows scientists to manipulate exotic particles for potenetial applications, such as quantum computing. In order to observe these particles, the team had to use a very large microscope -- a two-story tall microscope to be exact that is located at Princeont's Jadwin Hall. Pretty cool, huh?

More Than 7 Billion People Populate Earth And Each One Has A Unique Face — Here's Why

Over 7 billion people populate Earth and each one has a unique face, which is pretty atsonishig when you think about it. Why do human faces have such great diversity? A new study suggest it isn't just because we are more attuned to human faces -- it's also because humans actually have more diverse and unique faces than another animals species. When you meet someone new, what do you do you notice about them? Their clothes, height, and hair color are some of the traits that set us apart, but it's the person's face that you remember and recognize in the future.

We can thank our brains and our advances social structure for this diversity. A crucial evoltuionary trait in our brain has played a part in generating more diverse, complex, and unique faces in human beings. That's in comparsion to most other animals that do not rely on sight to recognize one another -- instead they use sound or smell; King penguins spot one another in a crowd with a unique vocal call while dogs use their incredibly sensitive noses to sniff.

Here's The Most Terrifying Thing About Ebola

As the Ebola epidemic in West Africa has spiraled out of control, affecting thousands of Liberians, Sierra Leonians, and Guineans, and threatening thousands more, the world’s reaction has been glacially, lethally slow. Only in the past few weeks have heads of state begun to take serious notice. To date, the virus has killed more than 2,600 people. This is a comparatively small number when measured against much more established diseases such as malaria,HIV/AIDS, influenza, and so on, but several factors about this outbreak have some of the world’s top health professionals gravely concerned: 

• Its kill rate: In this particular outbreak, a running tabulation suggests that 54 percent of the infected die, though adjusted numbers suggest that the rate is much higher.
• Its exponential growth: At this point, the number of people infected is doubling approximately every three weeks, leading some epidemiologists to project between 77,000 and 277,000 cases by the end of 2014.
• The gruesomeness with which it kills: by hijacking cells and migrating throughout the body to affect all organs, causing victims to bleed profusely.
• The ease with which it is transmitted: through contact with bodily fluids, including sweat, tears, saliva, blood, urine, semen, etc., including objects that have come in contact with bodily fluids (such as bed sheets, clothing, and needles) and corpses.
• The threat of mutation: Prominent figures have expressed serious concerns that this disease will go airborne, and there are many other mechanisms through which mutation might make it much more transmissible.
  
  

In truth; This virus does scare me, because we don't have a cure for it and its spreading fast, and apprantely the 'World' haven't taken precautions such as; Closing air ports, before things turn nasty. I mean, if this outbreaks in America it would probably spread throughout the entire Country in no time.