The First Trailer for Stephen Hawking Biopic 'Theory of Everything' is now available

Now it’s time to bring science and love together with the movie on Stephen Hawking. The very first trailer of ‘The Theory of Everything’ teases romance, tragedy.

“The Theory of Everything,” in which the famed physicist is played by Eddie Redmayne, is a movie that appears to meld science and romance.

The full-length trailer for the Hawking biopic, called “The Theory of Everything,” was unveiled on 6th august. The 2.5-minute trailer suggests that the film, which comes out in November, focuses heavily on the relationship between Stephen Hawking and his first wife Jane, whom he met while a graduate student at Cambridge University in England.

“The Theory of Everything” is directed by James Marsh, the British film-maker behind Man on Wire and Shadow Dancer, the film is due to be screened in the special presentations section at the upcoming Toronto international film festival. It stars Les Miserables’ Eddie Redmayne as Hawking, with Like Crazy’s Felicity Jones as his wife Jane.

Marsh shows us Hawking and Jane’s first encounter at Cambridge University in 1964 and his early academic successes, culminating in a doctorate after he advanced theories about spacetime singularities at the centre of black holes. He is diagnosed with motor neurone disease and told he may have just two years to live.

It is not entirely clear from the trailer which periods the biopic covers, though it appears to run until at least 1985, when the physicist became desperately ill with pneumonia and was given a tracheotomy by doctors to save his life. The trailer shows him hearing his now-famous synthesized voice for the first time, the dramatic moment lightened when Jane expresses alarm that the computer program features an American accent.

The trailer of “The Theory of Everything” does not touch on Hawking’s later personal travails, which included divorce from Jane in 1995 and a second marriage to his former nurse, Elaine Mason, which also ended in divorce. Cambridge police investigated allegations that the second Mrs. Hawking had abused her husband in 2004, but the case was dropped when the scientist issued a statement saying they were false.

An earlier television film about the physicist’s early life, Hawking, starred Benedict Cumberbatch in the title role. It was produced by the BBC and screened on BBC2 in 2004. Last year’s biographical documentary, also titled Hawking, featured Nathan Chapple as the scientist, with Hawking himself discussing his life from childhood, struggle with illness and later worldwide fame.

The Theory of Everything also stars David Thewlis, Emily Watson and Harry Lloyd. It is due in US cinemas on 7 November, timing which suggests an awards-season run, and arrives in the UK on 1 January.

Now we have to wait to see the combination of classic themes — love, tragedy, defying the odds will work or not.

The First Trailer for Stephen Hawking Biopic 'Theory of Everything' is now available

Origami robot is self-assembled and moves without human intervention

For years, a group of researchers has been working on origami robot — reconfigurable robot that would be able to fold itself into arbitrary shape.

Folding robot is nothing new, but scientists from Harvard and MIT (MIT recently successfully developed robotic fingers & 3D ice cream printer) have taken it to the next level, by designing one that assembles itself and walks away to do its job with zero human input. Starting from a flat plane, the tiny robot can fold itself into a three-dimensional form, and start traveling in less than five minutes.

“Getting a robot to assemble itself autonomously and actually perform a function has been a milestone we’ve been chasing for many years,” researcher Robert J. Wood said in a press release.

“We have achieved a long-standing personal goal to design a machine that can assemble itself,” Daniela Rus, an MIT roboticist and one of the study’s authors, said about the robot.

Origami (from ori meaning “folding”, and kami meaning “paper” (kami changes to gami due to rendaku) is the traditional Japanese art of paper folding, which started in the 17th century AD at the latest and was popularized outside of Japan in the mid-1900s. It has since evolved into a modern art form. The goal of this art is to transform a flat sheet of paper into a finished sculpture through folding and sculpting techniques, and as such the use of cuts or glue are not considered to be origami.

The robots start out as a flat sheet of paper and polystyrene plastic (which you most likely know as Shrinky Dinks) etched with strategically placed hinges. Since those materials aren’t enough to make a full-fledged robot, the scientists also placed a flexible circuit board in the middle (with circuits extending to every hinge), two motors, a microcontroller and two batteries. It’s the microcontroller that’s in charge of activating the circuits to produce heat on command, which then leads to the flat sheet folding itself like an origami. When the hinges cool after a few minutes and the polystyrene hardens, the microcontroller commands the robot to scuttle away and do its thing.

The same team of scientists created a foldable robot worm and a robot lamp in the past years, but this is their first creation that’s capable of performing a function after it builds itself. It’s far from being perfect, though, and still has a ways to go before anyone can use it for a particular purpose. For instance, the assembly process is triggered by slotting a battery in, but the researchers plan to modify the robot so that it starts folding itself based on environmental cues like changes in pressure or temperature. Also, the mechanical critters could use a different polymer other than polystyrene, one that requires less heat to start folding. At this point in time, the prototypes are prone to bursting into flames, since they use so much energy — in fact, just the assembly itself depletes a whole AA battery.

0ne fascinating thing about this process is how cheap it is. The robot itself, all told, only costs about $100 to make as a prototype. And building a robot to function in a particular way takes little more than an hour. The research team also plans on experimenting with other polymers to enable different types of folding and function.

When more applications have been developed for the robot, the team envisions a commercial application in which people are able to buy cheap, functional robots on demand, which can be easily stored in a flat shape until they need to be used.

“You would be able to come in, describe what you need in fairly basic terms, and come back an hour later to get your robotic helper,” Wood noted in the release.

Another potential application discussed by the team might be for space applications, where many of the robots are stored easily in their flat shape, then deployed into orbit or to other planets, autonomously fold themselves and go about the tasks they need to complete. recently researchers also focusing on self-assembled furniture.

Now it’s just a matter of time to build the fiction transformers in real.

Origami robot is self-assembled and moves without human intervention

A new green energy plant at St Asaph will be powered by food waste

Wales’ largest anaerobic digestion (AD) plant, powered by food waste from three North Wales counties, has begun generating renewable electricity.

Anaerobic digestion specialist Biogen has successfully completed commissioning of the plant which will process an impressive 22,500 tonnes of food waste every year, at the Waen, near St Asaph.

Biogen Waen will process the food waste collected weekly from Conwy, Denbighshire and Flintshire, generating 1MW of green energy, enough to power 2,000 homes.

The AD plant has the largest capacity for food waste anaerobic digestion in the country, and is Biogen’s second plant in North Wales following the completion of its GwyriAD plant in Llywyn Isaf near Caernarfon last year.

As well as generating renewable energy, the plant will also produce a biofertiliser as part of the process, which will be supplied for use on nearby farmland.

Julian O’Neill, chief executive of Biogen, said: “We’re delighted to be working in partnership with Denbighshire County Council, Conwy County Borough Council and Flintshire County Council to help the authorities, and Wales as a whole, lead the way in recycling food waste.

“It’s great to see separate food waste collections operating successfully for residents and businesses across all three local authorities, which has contributed to Wales reaching its food recycling target ahead of schedule.

“The Waen plant and our other projects in Wales are also making a significant contribution to the target of meeting 15 per cent of the UK’s energy demand through renewable sources by 2020.”

Construction work on the plant, which is located on the site of a former abattoir, began in 2012, taking just over a year to complete.

The anaerobic digestion plants will help councils prevent food waste from being lost at landfill, as well as helping Wales and the UK reach its target of producing 15 per cent of electricity from renewable sources by 2020.

Sam Bates, waste operations manager at Denbighshire County Council, said: “We are very proud of the AD plant and also pleased that residents across the three counties will have access to the scheme. We’ll be encouraging householders to make full use of the kitchen caddies with the knowledge that their food waste is being put to such good use to create renewable energy.”

The plant brings the total amount of food waste processed by Biogen in Wales to approximately 34,000 tonnes per year, with a third plant due to begin operations in Rhondda Cynon Taff next year.

Case study

The Twamley family, from Rhuddlan, are one of the households across Conwy, Denbighshire and Flintshire whose waste will be turned into renewable energy at the Biogen Waen plant.

Lyndsey Twamley and her two children have made recycling food waste a part of their everyday routine, and are excited at the prospect of their waste being transformed into renewable energy just a few miles away from their home.

“Recycling food waste has become a normal part of our routine now,” Lyndsey said.

“We’ve recycled ever since it was introduced, but I hadn’t really given much thought to what happens after it’s been collected. It’s good to know that leftover food from within the county is being recycled and turned into energy locally, which is so much better than it going to waste.

“I have two children aged four and seven, who both know that their leftovers goes into the kitchen caddy under the sink. It’s good that recycling is second nature to them now, they also learn about recycling in school and just do their little bit to recycle any waste that’s left over.

“Recycling food has made me think more about what we throw away, and I think in some ways it’s even helped us save money by shopping smarter, so there’s less waste at the end of the week.

“It’s also great that there’s no longer leftover food that can start to smell bad in the main kitchen bin because my food waste bin gets emptied weekly and knowing that it is not being lost at landfill can only be positive.”

A new green energy plant at St Asaph will be powered by food waste

Recently Rosetta spacecraft became the first probe to rendezvous with a comet

Euro spacecraft Rosetta prepares to land on icy comet after 250 million mile journey.

After a 10-year chase taking it billions of miles across the solar system, the Rosetta spacecraft made history on 6^th august as it became the first probe to rendezvous with a comet on its journey around the sun.

“We’re at the comet,” Rosetta’s flight operations manager, Sylvain Lodiot, declared in a webcast from mission control in Darmstadt, Germany.

“After 10 years, five months and four days travelling toward our destination, looping around the Sun five times and clocking up 6.4 billion kilometers, we are delighted to announce finally ‘we are here’,” ESA‘s director general Jean-Jacques Dordain announced.

“Europe’s Rosetta is now the first spacecraft in history to rendezvous with a comet, a major highlight in exploring our origins. Discoveries can start.”

Some facts about the mission and Rosetta:

*Total cost of the mission is said to be 1.3bn euros

*Paris-based Esa is preparing for Rosetta’s arrival at its target on Wednesday

*It has released images showing the comet’s surface in unprecedented detail

*Images confirm ‘rubber duck’ shape of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko

*They were taken from a distance of just 620 miles (1,000 km) away

*Publication of images follows controversy over Esa’s release policy

*One science writer had compared Esa’s refusal to make images and data publicly available to not showing the World Cup live on TV

*But a compromise has been reached with Esa releasing an image a day

*The probe weighed in at 3,000kg at liftoff back in 2004, with over half of that made up of propellant

*It has two 14m long solar panels to provide electrical power

• The orbiter carries 11 experiments
  


• 
  

  The lander, Philae, carries nine experiments including a drill to sample beneath the surface

  
  

Starting now, Rosetta is no longer chasing a comet, it is traveling along with it.

 

“We have been approaching 67P for such a long time, it is almost surreal to now actually be there,” Holger Sierks of the Max Planck Institute in Germany said in a statement. “Today, we are opening a new chapter of the Rosetta mission. And already we know that it will revolutionize cometary science.”

Rosetta and its comet are currently out between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, about 250 million miles from Earth. Together at last, they are hurtling through space at 34,000 mph along one stretch of 67P’s 6.5 year orbit around the sun.

Rosetta has flown a long way to get to this moment. It blasted off from Earth in March 2004, and has followed a convoluted and looping path through the solar system before finally meeting up with the comet 10 years later. Along the way, it picked up three gravity assists from the Earth, one from Mars, and passed through the asteroid belt twice. All told, the spacecraft has flown 4 billion miles so far. And yet, in some ways, its work has just begun.

Other spacecraft have made comet flybys in the past, but a mere flyby is not what Rosetta is after. The ambitious mission first concocted in the 1970s and approved in 1993, entails not only escorting the comet along part of its orbit, but actually landing on it as well. To that end, Rosetta is carrying a lander called Philae that the ESA hopes to send down to the comet’s surface in November.

“Arriving at the comet is really only just the beginning of an even bigger adventure, with greater challenges still to come as we learn how to operate in this unchartered environment, start to orbit and, eventually, land,” said Sylvain Lodiot, ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft operations manager in a statement.

As Rosetta got closer to the comet in the first days of August, it sent back intriguing images of the comet’s bizarre landscape.

“It’s incredible how full of variation this surface is,” Sierks said. “We have never seen anything like this before in such detail.”

Rosetta is currently maintaining a distance of about 60 miles from the comet, but in the coming weeks and months it will trim that orbit down to 30 miles, and then to 18 miles. As it flies closer, the spacecraft will continue to gather more information about the comet’s surface, as well as scout potential sites for Philae to land.

After Philae begins its work on the comet’s surface, Rosetta will continue to tag along with 67P until the end of December 2015. Using its suite of instruments, the spacecraft will measure how the comet changes as it nears the sun, and what gases it will expel from its icy nucleus, and at what rate.

Ultimately, scientists hope that by studying the comet, they may learn more about the building blocks of the solar system, and whether bodies like this were responsible for bringing water and complex molecules to Earth.

Recently Rosetta spacecraft became the first probe to rendezvous with a comet

Google admits it scans your Gmail accounts for child porn to identify criminals

Google Catches Sex Offender with Gmail Scan, But Raises Privacy Concerns.

Recently Google’s automatic email scanning technology has tipped off authorities about a 41-year-old man in Texas who was allegedly distributing explicit images of children via his Gmail account.

It has revealed the identity of a user after discovering child abuse imagery in the man’s Gmail account in Houston, Texas, according to a local news report.

According to a local TV station news report, Google detected a Houston man using Gmail allegedly to send explicit images of a “young girl” to his friend.

The Mountain View, Calif., tech giant reportedly alerted the authorities, who then allegedly found more child pornography on the suspect’s phone and tablet after obtaining a search warrant, KHOU reported.

The suspect, identified as John Henry Skillern, is being held on a $200,000 bond, according to the TV report, which said Skillern is a registered sex offender.

The arrest raises questions over the privacy of personal email and Google’s role in policing the web. It raises the controversy: How did Google scan the man’s inbox for child porn? And more importantly, does this mean Google is scanning everyone’s inbox for child porn and other illegal materials? Is there some gross invasion of privacy going on here?

David Drummond, the chief legal officer for Google, has previously said that Google helps fund the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), which is tasked with “proactively identifying child abuse images that Google can then remove from our search engine”.

Google works with the IWF and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children extensively, he said, adding: “We have built technology that trawls other platforms for known images of child sex abuse. We can then quickly remove them and report their existence to the authorities.”

Google automatically scans email accounts to provide ads within Gmail, which has more than 400 million users worldwide.

In April, Google updated its terms and conditions to say: “Our automated systems analyze your content (including emails) to provide you personally relevant product features, such as customized search results, tailored advertising, and spam and malware detection. This analysis occurs as the content is sent, received, and when it is stored.”

In April Google also stopped scanning more than 30 million Gmail accounts linked to an educational scheme following reports that the scans might have breached a US privacy law.

Google claims it doesn’t divulge information on individual queries or cases, and they remain adamant that this system is only actively searching Gmail for child pornographic content.

This occurred after a class-action lawsuit against the company over email scanning was dismissed earlier this year. At the time, Google said that “a person has no legitimate expectation of privacy in information he voluntarily turns over to third parties”.

Google admits it scans your Gmail accounts for child porn to identify criminals

6 advices of experts to prevent your phone to blow up

Don’t want your phone to blow up? This article is for you.

We recently covered the story of a young Texas girl’s Samsung Galaxy smartphone incinerating near her head as she slept. Her phone was ruined, but the fire didn’t spread beyond the underside of her pillow, so she and her family were not harmed. Of course, not all chargeable electronics fires end without injury.

Obviously, these are extraordinary circumstances. Your smartphone isn’t just going to up and explode on you in 99 percent of scenarios.

Still, we were curious as to what you, dear reader, could do to prevent similar smartphone combustion. And so we talked to the device experts at iFix, a New York-based gadget repair service.

Here’s the advice to avoid battery meltdown and smartphone explosion:

 

1. Stay away from low-quality batteries.

One of the potential issues pointed out with the Samsung Galaxy S4 that caught fire in Texas was that the phone’s battery was swapped for an aftermarket model. The expert says low-grade smartphone batteries can be a bad idea because, in terms of quality and care in construction, “they do not follow the same standards as original manufacturers.”

When replacing your phone’s battery, you’ll probably want to skip the cheapest option on eBay or Amazon and instead seek out the same one with which your Samsung, HTC, or LG phone came (from what is often referred to as the “OEM,” or original equipment manufacturer).

If you must go with a third-party replacement battery, we consider Anker a trusted brand.

2. Keep your phone in a well-ventilated place while charging.

The second no-no with the Texas case: The charging phone was under a pillow.

Our experts’ advice: “Do not cover a charging phone with a pillow.”

For obvious reasons, this isn’t good for the goal of keeping your phone from overheating. A rule of thumb would be to place a charging phone in an area away from insulating fabrics or other heat-emitting electronics (maybe not on top of a cable box, for example).

 3. If you get your phone wet, have it checked by a professional.

We all know it’s possible to bring a soggy smartphone back to a working condition, but the iFix team says that, despite your rescue attempts, corrosion or short circuiting can still occur inside the phone, undetectable to the naked eye. These conditions could lead to dangerous overheating of the device.

 

The solution: Most repair services like iFix offer diagnostics services (sometimes for free) that can detect these types of problems for you. Of course, don’t expect the actual repair of corroded parts or shorted circuits to be free. Still better than waiting for an accident to happen, we say.

4. Don’t overuse your phone while it’s charging.

Juicing up draws a great amount of heat to your phone, making it plenty hotter than it is during normal use. Because of this, our iFix experts say that hardware-heavy activities like graphic-intensive games, WiFi tethering, or even searching for service in a low-signal area — processes that will also warm your phone up — shouldn’t be done while your device is plugged in.

Overusing the phone while charging “can create additional stress on the device and the charger,” iFix says.

A good rule of thumb: If you are Crushing some Candy while your phone is charging, and you feel the back get toasty, put the thing down. And not under your pillow, either.

 5. If your phone takes a nasty drop, don’t just dust it off and move on.

Similar to the “wet phone” scenario, you shouldn’t just assume that your phone is A-OK because it still powers on after an unfriendly meeting with the concrete.

Some possible problems caused by a nasty drop: a small crack in an internal component, a damaged or split battery, or exposed internals via a cracked display.

Having your phone taken apart by a specialist after it’s suffered some trauma is going to be the best way to go. And as smartphone screen repair by third-party services gets cheaper and cheaper, the option is now both safe and budget-friendly.Oh, and also, you won’t be constantly made fun of by your friends.

 6. If you notice any overheating or sudden battery drain, you may have a problem.

iFix also filled us in on a problem that’s becoming more common among its customers. Phone owners are contacting its service and complaining that phones “suddenly start overheating. No water damage. No dropping.”

In the recent case of a year-old iPhone 4s, the phone suddenly began heating up and losing “a couple percent [charge] every minute.”

Since the phone was not covered under AppleCare, the team assessed the possible problems and eventually decided to resolder parts of the phone’s main chip board and install a new battery.

“So far it works just fine. We don’t quite know what the problem was, maybe a micro-crack on the board or chip, a loose connection, or a defective battery,” iFix said.

Much the way you want a good mechanic for your car, it’s not a bad idea to have a good phone repair shop in your Rolodex for when problems like the above surface. No one is fond of the thought of forking over hard-earned money for “smartphone maintenance.” But the alternative may be too hot to handle.

6 advices of experts to prevent your phone to blow up

NASA’s Mars 2020 Rover will attempt to make oxygen on Mars

NASA has revealed details about the highly anticipated Mars 2020 rover.

According to NASA, Mars 2020 rover will give us a way to know the red planet better. The rover that NASA is sending to Mars in 2020 will carry seven instruments geared including a device that produce oxygen.

NASA has sent a series of robotic vehicles to Mars — the latest is the Curiosity rover which launched in 2012 — and hopes to have people exploring the surface of Earth’s neighboring planet by the 2030s.

Six years from now, there will be a new NASA robot heading to the Red Planet: the Mars 2020 rover. On 31^st July, NASA announced the seven instruments that will be carried on the unnamed rover to Mars in six years. These instruments were selected out of a whopping 58 proposals received last January, and include technologies developed in international partnerships.

“Today we take another important step on our journey to Mars,” NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said in a recent statement. “Mars exploration will be this generation’s legacy, and the Mars 2020 rover will be another critical step on humans’ journey to the Red Planet.”

“While getting to and landing on Mars is hard,” he added, “Curiosity was an iconic example of how our robotic scientific explorers are paving the way for humans to pioneer Mars and beyond.”

Facts about Mars 2020 Rover:

*New Curiosity rover set will feature seven powerful instruments

*Vehicle will journey to Mars in 2020 to take incredibly detailed images that will ‘knock your socks off’ with an improved MastCam

*SuperCam and Sherloc will detect organic compounds in rocks

*Next generation rover will also include ‘Moxie’ – a machine that converts carbon dioxide to pure oxygen for rocket fuel

*Vehicle will bring intact samples back to Earth without crushing them

*Rover will have a life span of one full Martian year – 687 days on Earth

*Nasa hopes the  Mars 2020 rover will demonstrate technology for a human exploration of the planet and look for signs of life

About the instruments:

One of the scientific payloads is called Mastcam-Z, a camera with panoramic, stereoscopic and zoom abilities. Another called SuperCam can analyze the chemical and mineral composition of rocks, while the Planetary Instrument for X-ray Lithochemistry (PIXL) can determine the elemental composition of surface minerals. The third one called Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics and Chemicals (SHERLOC) uses UV light to detect organic compounds, while Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment (MOXIE) will attempt to produce oxygen from Martian carbon dioxide. Then there’s the Mars Environmental Dynamics Analyzer (MEDA) that will monitor the environmental conditions on the planet, and finally, the Radar Imager for Mars’ Subsurface Exploration (RIMFAX) equipped with a ground-penetrating radar that’ll give us a glimpse of what’s beneath the planet’s surface.

Michael Meyer, Lead Scientist for NASA’s Mars Exploration Program, offers an analogy: Say you want to analyze a slice of Boston cream pie. The coring system would preserve the carefully laid layers of custard and chocolate, whereas the grinding system would provide you a light brown paste. By maintaining the structure of the rock, scientists can learn more about the history and environment of the rock’s formation, explains Meyer. There are currently no definitive plans to retrieve the samples Mars 2020 collects, but sealed samples can be stored for upwards of 20 years.

Mars 2020 is an international effort involving more than 50 institutions around the world. The entire mission will cost approximately $1.9 billion U.S., with $130 million devoted to developing the seven instruments onboard. That’s a big chunk of change, but it’s worth noting that the Curiosity mission cost nearly $2.5 billion. NASA mission planners explain that reproducing the basic infrastructure of Curiosity for Mars 2020, including using leftover parts; will significantly decrease the cost of the new mission.

On the other hand NASA hopes to eventually have a man on Mars within the next two decades, but SpaceX founder Elon Musk recently expressed his confidence that humanity will reach Mars by 2026.

NASA’s Mars 2020 Rover will attempt to make oxygen on Mars