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When it works correctly, data backup is a triumph of redundancy over unpredictability. All electronic and mechanical devices eventually fail, and computer hard drives (even solid-state drives) are no exception. If you knew exactly when or how this was going to happen, you could plan a precise solution. But because you don’t, redundancy is key. So if the one hard drive in your computer is prone to mechanical failure, it makes sense to have another drive on your desktop with duplicate data....

andre.myhai/eBayThe “Odhner Arithmometer” is a pinwheel style mechanical adding machine that was invented in Russia by Swedish immigrant W. T. Odhner in the 1870s and produced until 1917 when, during the revolution, the factory was nationalized and closed down. The Odhners relocated to Sweden to continue business and in the 1920s, Russia restarted production, renaming the machine the “Felix” in honor of “Iron” Felix Dzerzhinsk, Polish Bolshevik war hero and founding director of “Cheka,” the infamous Soviet secret police....

Following in the steps of the wildly popular Impossible Burger, a team of researchers has found a way to create lab-grown edible muscles. The research was published in the journal NPJ Science of Food.Kit Parker, the lead study author, was inspired to create the new faux muscle after judging a competition on Food Network.Bioengineered meat is fast becoming this era’s “It” food, with the Impossible and Beyond burgers battling it out for lab-grown supremacy....

Today, Microsoft announced it is acquiring the company GitHub for $7.5 billion. If you’re at all plugged into the broader world of tech, you’ve no doubt heard of both companies. But unless you’re a developer yourself, you probably haven’t had much experience with GitHub itself. So what is it, and why would Microsoft want to buy it? GitHub, ExplainedIn simple terms, GitHub is a website and service that allows software developers to store their code in a centralized location and offers tools that let coders from all over the world make changes to that code without overwriting each other by accident....

Though it isn’t the same adolescent bad boy it once was, the all-new Evo X is still a thrill to drive. Not only is it sporty, fast and agile, now it has a more refined, more sophisticated look–and the tech hardware to match. The most notable change is the all-new 2.0-liter turbocharged and intercooled inline Four, rated at 295 hp and 300 lb.-ft. of torque. A new six-speed Twin-Clutch Sportronic Shift Transmission, similar to VW’s Direct Shift Gearbox, delivers quicker shifts than most manuals, but with the smoothness of an automatic....

As the government shutdown stretches into a historical deadlock, scores of Transportation Security Administration (TSA) workers are reporting to airports with no clear indication of when they’ll be paid. The TSA says the impasse hasn’t really affected security checkpoint wait times throughout the country, but the shutdown has coincided with a gross security oversight: A passenger carrying a firearm boarded a Delta Air Lines flight from Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport to Tokyo’s Narita Airport on January 3, according to CNN....

Before easing out of the fast-food’s parking lot, you grab a sip of the hot coffee you picked up at the drive-thru. You take your time as you place the cup in its holder in the center console. No hurry. The approaching traffic may be moving fast, but it’s far enough away for you to accelerate up to cruising speed. Good thing, because at about half-throttle you feel the engine misfire....

The contents of a 16th century scroll left unreadable by severe burns have been uncovered by scientists, who used X-rays to piece together the 400-year-old message. The withered scroll was discovered in Diss Heywood Manor in Norwich, England, left in a crumpled heap of charred paper that was fused together, rendering the text unreadable. But by employing advanced medical-grade X-ray techniques, researchers at the University of Cardiff were able to decipher the obscured message, once thought completely lost to history....

A new robot meant to handle search-and-rescue operations has adjustable wheels that allow it to reposition itself to deal with changing conditions. The Rising Sprawl-Tuned Autonomous Robot (RSTAR) can switch between moving over flat surfaces, climbing large obstacles and walls, and crawling through tunnels, pipes and narrow gaps.“The RSTAR is ideal for search and rescue operations in unstructured environments, such as collapsed buildings or flooded areas, where it must adapt and overcome a variety of successive obstacles to reach its target,” says David Zarrouk of the Israeli Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, which built the RSTAR, in a press statement....

Three decades ago, a group of Swedish fighter pilots who were trained to intercept America’s high-flying SR-71 suddenly became guardian angels for the crew of one stricken Blackbird. This week, the pilots were awarded U.S. Air Medals for bravery.Related StoriesHere’s an SR-71 Story That’ll Make You LaughBoeing Reveals Hypersonic Concept to Replace SR-71The incident happened in 1987 in the skies over the Baltic Sea. Back then, SR-71 Blackbirds based at RAF Mildenhall in the United Kingdom flew weekly missions out over the Baltic Sea, toward Soviet bases in Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, and Kaliningrad....

Media Platforms Design Team"Do you want to see the gooey?" Team North’s Kevin Muise asked, or so PM thought, on a recent visit to the Ontario/British Columbia team’s Solar Decathlon house. He was referring to the school’s Graphic User Interface (GUI), which monitors the home’s electric and water usage. Turns out the GUI isn’t gooey at all; it’s a series of screens mounted conspicuously throughout the building to deliver breaking news of energy production and consumption....

Sixteen teams are competing for $30 million in prize money, with the bulk going to the first team to successfully land a rover on the moon, have it travel 500 meters, and transmit high-definition video and images back to Earth. The Google Lunar XPRIZE has inspired engineers from around the world, physics professors and backyard hobbyists alike, to build lunar rovers with hopes of sending them to the moon. The two teams who have actually secured contracts from rocket companies to launch their rovers have a slightly different approach from the rest—they’ll use a single vehicle that can hover or fly across the moon’s surface, rather than a landing vehicle that deploys a traditional rover....

HQ-9 Surface to Air Missile System in China.DigitalGlobe//Getty ImagesA university team trained a deep learning algorithm to recognize surface-to-air missile sites in China and detect them among terabytes of digital imagery. The artificial intelligence program was able to find such sites not only just as accurately but faster than human beings. The news sheds insight into how AI could be used to supplement human intelligence specialists, helping them sort through thousands of square miles of satellite imagery to find the proverbial needle in a haystack....

Of all the robots designed to induce cold sweats, a locomotive snake wiggling its way up a ladder might make you the chilliest. You can thank Japanese researchers at Kyoto University and the University of Electro-Communications for the video below, which shows the robotic serpent in action. It was presented at the International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems in Spain last week. View full post on YoutubeUnlike its humanoid counterparts, which cover both cute and cuddly and demonic-looking variants, the smooth, black robot snake is controlled remotely by a PC and a Playstation controller....

The 2020 Tokyo Olympics is doing its best to embrace Japan’s heritage of technology. Toyota, an official Olympic partner, is leading the charge with what it calls the “Tokyo 2020 Robot Project.” Robots are going to be front and center at the Olympics, including special-use bots that will be helping out during the events. Known as Field Support Robots (FSRs), they will carry javelins, shot-puts, and other items that can be thrown to athletes in the Olympic stadiums....

The U.S. Navy’s fleet of ballistic missile submarines will soon carry tactical nuclear weapons, as Congress prepares to fund development of a new, low-yield nuclear warhead. The submarines, which form a functional invulnerable retaliatory force in case of surprise nuclear attack, will soon be able to launch missiles with less powerful tactical nuclear weapons. Not everyone is sold on the new weapon, which critics charge is unnecessary and could lower the threshold for nuclear war....

New research, published in Science Advances, proposes that dinosaurs were actually warm-blooded creatures.A team of scientists from Yale University studied the arrangement of atoms in dinosaur eggshells to determine that the mothers who carried the eggs had warmer body temperatures than their surrounding environment.The research may also help shed new light on why dinosaurs evolved to grow feathers.Ancient history holds many secrets that we haven’t yet discovered, and sometimes, those secrets come from fossilized dinosaur eggshells....

View full post on YoutubeLately, Baltimore’s inner harbor has been receiving a new visitor: copious amounts of floating garbage. Rainstorms in the city force the trash into the harbor, where it floats along for all residents and tourists to see. John Kellet was bugged by this eyesore, and so he devised the Water Wheel, a big turning wheel in the river that since May has collected over 40 tons of trash....

For the second time in less than a month, flights at a major London airport have been halted by drone activity. On Monday evening, departures from Heathrow Airport were stopped for about an hour after a drone sighting nearby with the British military investigating the situation. But at a time when the number of drones—hobbyist and commercial—will only increase, is there anything airports and governments can do to safeguard against delays, and, in the worst circumstances, fatal collisions?...

The world’s first picture of a black hole captured imaginations around the globe. Now comes the next challenge for scientists: taking better, sharper photos, in hopes that they will be able to test Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity. To get there, they want two or three satellites orbiting the planet looking for black holes.The scientists are calling their creation the Event Horizon Imager (EHI). “There are lots of advantages to using satellites instead of permanent radio telescopes on Earth, as with the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) [the consortium that captured the first image of a black hole],” says Freek Roelofs, a Ph....