Photo: Stella Yodo/Flickr CC
From my Boston Globe column, User Friendly…
I’m told the decor at Abby Park in East Milton is enough to make it worth visiting.
But a new, free iPhone app might soon help you decide whether the place has enough booth seating, or if its Kobe beef burger is worth $11.
via The Boston Globe.
Call it the democratization of wind, sun, and rain: You catch it, you keep it. With a residential turbine on your roof or in your backyard, subsidized in part by tax rebates, you (and your accountant) might find a way to break even in a few years.
In a year or so, for example, you might want to charge your Chevrolet Volt, without paying NStar for the privilege.
Enter Envision Solar International Inc. (envisionsolar.com), which this year plans to market a carport, called the LifePort, which has solar panels on its roof.
Read my Boston Globe column this week: Power up, with juice from the yard – The Boston Globe.
Photo: Eneas de Troya/Flickr CC
Air pollution is driving-up the blood pressure of the average urban dweller, German scientists report:
“‘Both, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, are higher in people who live in more polluted areas, even if we take important factors that also influence blood pressure like age, gender, smoking, weight, etc. into account. Blood pressure increases were stronger in women than in men.’”
via Higher Blood Pressure Found in People Living in Urban Areas.
Thanks Adam Gaffin, at Univeral Hub… Thank goodness, bottled water sales are not yet prohibited in the towns affected by this catastrophic main break.
The 10-foot wide main, by the way, was only six years old. — MB
via Aquapocalypse has a theme song | Universal Hub.
Photo: D. Sharon/Flickr CC
Here’s to hoping that resveratrol, which mimics the life-extending benefits of severe caloric restriction, might do the same. — MB
Tufts scientists recently deprived a group of chubby men, for six months, of about one-third of their daily caloric intake.
The result: The subjects’ white blood cells, central to the body’s immune response systems, performed better:
“Scientists funded by the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) found that volunteers who followed a low-calorie diet or a very low-calorie diet not only lost weight, but also significantly enhanced their immune response. The study may be the first to demonstrate the interaction between calorie restriction and immune markers among humans.”
The study might also help scientists determine whether resveratrol, which is found in red wine and other foods, mimics the immune regulating effects of caloric restriction — an impractical lifestyle change for millions of Americans.
via Less is More When Restraining Calories Boosts Immunity.
Photo: Sarah G/Flickr CC
Silk-based implants that stretch, and stick to the brain’s contours and folds like shrink wrap, will monitor patient’s brains and other organs, without damaging sensitive tissues.
Tufts University biomedical engineering professors David Kaplan and Fiorenzo Omenetto created the silk substrate, which causes less inflammation than one with sharp edges.
“The implants contain metal electrodes that are 500 microns thick, or about five times the thickness of a human hair. The absence of sharp electrodes and rigid surfaces should improve safety, with less damage to brain tissue. Also, the implants’ ability to mold to the brain's surface could provide better stability; the brain sometimes shifts in the skull and the implant could move with it. Finally, by spreading across the brain, the implants have the potential to capture the activity of large networks of brain cells, Dr. Litt said.”
Important note to Heretic readers: I receive no compensation for maintaining this blog. I do, however, get paid to write this column (below). Please click, read and comment, to support my work!
Thanks! — MB
“Last week, I showed my buddy Sean, a plain-spoken woodworker from Westwood, the soon-to-be released Droid Incredible. He immediately noted the red screen covering the phone’s speaker and its garishly bright, white, touch-sensitive control buttons.”
‘It’s like the iPhone without the cool,’’’ Sean said.
via Processing power, OLED touch screen shine on Incredible – The Boston Globe.
Good glass will cost you. Photo: Igor Bespamyatnov/Flickr CC
From UH (link below), a short while ago:
Wicked Local Allston/Brighton reports the owner of a Comm. Ave. shop that sells high-quality bongs nailed one of the men who allegedly stole several of them by posting photos on Facebook – which resulted in tips leading to a Saugus man – with tattoos showing on his own Facebook page that matched those seen on surveillance video.
via Bing bong: Facebook helps head-shop owner catch a thief | Universal Hub.
Find your way to the whole comic, by Andy Carolan, at Binnall of America. (Click on the image to get to the BoA site. You will find a link to the column at the lower right-hand side of the page.)
The latest installment of Andy Carolan’s web comic, Disclosure, is dedicated to Hub esotericist and podcasting sensation, Tim Binnall.
It tells the story of the discovery of an anomalous, narrow-beam radio signal detected by Earth-based observers in the early 1970s.
via binnallofamerica.com.
Targeted; Paul Rosenberg received a bomb in the mail from, police at the time suspected, Amy Bishop. Photo: Children's Hospital.
UAH alleged shooter Amy Bishop may have had a singular way of settling scores — by the bullet, or the bomb.
The Globe reports today that the nutty professor was suspected, too, of sending pipe bombs to a supervisor at Children’s Hospital.
Many great quotes in this story, such as this one:
“We knew she had a beef with Paul Rosenberg. And we really thought it was a really unbelievable coincidence that he would get those bombs.”