Scientists Discover Gold Literally Growing on Trees in the Outback

Every parent's favorite line about how money doesn't grow on trees just became a little more irrelevant, thanks to a fascinating find down under. Researchers in Australia recently found gold—yes,real gold—in eucalyptus trees growing in the outback.

A team of unlikely prospectors recently ventured into the arid land of the Goldfields-Esperance region in Western Australia, hoping to learn more about what was underneath its soil. The area earned its name for being rich in gold deposits—that were, however, notoriously difficult to find. So the researchers looked in an unlikely place: The trees.

Eucalyptus trees in this region are known for their resiliency, and for roots that reach impossibly deep to find the groundwater needed to keep themselves alive. It just so turns out that the elusive gold deposits are down there, too.

Chasing a longstanding rumor that the trees' leaves get their gold luster from the deposits, the scientists analyzed the leaves of eucalyptus trees in the area—and sure enough, they found traces of gold. Apparently, the trees' roots grew ten stories deep into the soil and absorbed gold particles from nearby deposits. To confirm that these particles came from the soil under the roots, they grew eucalyptus trees in gold-laced potting soil in a greenhouse. And sure enough—they found gold in those leaves, too.

The idea that plants absorb minerals from the soil around them is hardly new, but this is an extraordinary case. "Gold is probably toxic to plants and is moved to its extremities (such as leaves) or in preferential zones within cells in order to reduce deleterious biochemical reaction," reads a study about the research published today in Nature Communications. The authors also point out that this is "the first evidence of particulate gold within natural specimens of living biological tissue." That's a hell of a first, even for you alchemy nerds out there.

Don't go thinking you can get rich by cutting down eucalyptus trees, though. Each tree contains such a small amount of gold—46 parts per billion, to be exact—that it would take hundreds to compile enough for a wedding ring. But the trees could be used to scout the location of underground gold deposits. And since approximately 30 percent of the world's gold reserves are thought to lie underground in the Goldfields-Esperance region, the search may be well worth the trouble. More here.

A Headphone Jack Laser Pointer That No One Will Be Able To Spot

Don't let anyone tell you otherwise; highlighting a character's crotch on-screen at the movies is hi-larious, and always will be. But getting caught with a laser pointer in your hand and tossed out of the theater isn't. So thankfully red lasers have been around for decades, and have been miniaturized to the point where they can hide inside your smartphone's headphone jack.

Designed strictly for safe work purposes like highlighting information during a presentation, the iPinsips power from your iPhone but shouldn't drain its battery unless left on for endless hours. Speaking of which, the laser is activated using a free accompanying app, and it even has a safety to ensure it can't be accidentally turned on when you don't need it. You just turn the laser 90 degrees when it's inserted in the headphone jack and it will remain inert until you turn it back.

At just over $40 it is considerably expensive given red laser pointers are almost as cheap as penny candy these days. But what you're mostly paying for here is a covert way to harass and annoy people. Note: please don't harass and annoy people with this. More here.

Scientists Just Took a Huge Step Towards Curing Baldness

Hair plugs, comb overs and toupées beware; a team of researchers from Columbia has developed a way to induce new human hair growth for the first time ever. It’s not just the fact that they can just grow hair that’s so exciting, though. It’s that they can grow yourhair.

The technique centers on the behavior of human dermal papilla cells, the ones that make up the base of hair follicles. While the idea of using dermal papilla cells to generate new hair growth has been around for about 40 years, scientists have had a hard time doing it since the cells simply revert back to basic skin cells when they’re put into a culture. Rodent papillae, however, don’t have that problem, because they clump together and make it easier for the cells to communicate with each other.

Taking a cue from the rodent example, the Columbia researchers figured out how to encourage the human papillae to aggregate in a culture. After harvesting samples from human donors, the researchers transplanted the cells between the dermis and epidermis of human skin and grafted them onto the backs of mice. After a few days, scientists found that the hair was growing like normal. Sure, the human hair was growing on the backs of mice, but they matched up with the donors perfectly.

A magical hair growth tonic is probably still at least a few years away, if it's coming at all. But at least we’re headed in the right direction. More here.

Use a Laser Pointer to Turn Your iPhone Into a Microscope

Would This Bike With Storage Inside the Front Wheel Even Be Rideable?

Weighing in at around 25 pounds, you're not going to find many cyclists adopting the Transport, but its creators claim that's about as heavy as your average road bike, so it's perfect for commuters.

They also point out that since the modified front tire is made from lightweight plastic, it weighs the same as a standard road bike tire too—except that doesn't take into account the weight of the extra crap you toss in there. Once a backpack filled with a laptop, clothing, and other daily accessories is stuffed inside, that front wheel is bound to feel quite a bit different, particularly when cornering. What do you think? More here.

This Thermal Wristband Tricks You Into Never Being Too Warm or Cold

We all know someone who can never seem to get comfy, no matter the temperature. They're always pulling off sweaters because they're too hot, or cranking up the heat because they're too cold. But soon, salvation for these folks could come in the form of a special wristband that uses a copper heatsink to fool your body into thinking it's just been warmed or cooled—when in reality, the ambient temperature hasn't changed.

The technology—developed by researchers at MIT and dubbed Wristify—relies on a phenomenon where rapid external temperature changes on a person's skin can actually affect how their whole body feels. So the wristband—powered by a lithium polymer battery for up to eight hours—delivers rapid but subtle thermal pulses that change at a rate of 0.4 degrees celsius every second.

Raising or lowering the temperature of those thermal pulses will actually make the wearer's entire body feel as if it's getting warmer or cooler, allowing them to get comfy without having to touch a thermostat or change their wardrobe. It would also allow a building to reduce its heating or cooling needs if everyone inside had a Wristify strapped to their arm, which might not seem so implausible if the technology was built into the many smartwatches on the horizon. More here.

You'll Barely Notice the World's Smallest USB 3.0 Flash Drive

When it comes to prolonging the life of your laptop, there's no easier upgrade than adding an ultra-compact USB flash drive to expand its storage capacity—particularly if it's got a small SSD on board. And a company called PKparis is now laying claim to the title of 'world's smallest USB 3.0 flash drive' with its new K’1 that more than looks the part.

Available in 32GB and 64GB capacities for $48 and $89 respectively, the aluminum drives offer read and write speeds up to 140 MB/s, and they even include a tiny LED activity light. You'll of course want to make sure your laptop is already equipped with USB 3.0 to take full advantage of the K'1's capabilities, and once it's plugged in you'll never have to worry about losing it—or even noticing it for that matter. More here.

Why Exercise When You Can Buy a $50 Fake-Muscle T-Shirt?

Fifty bucks might sound expensive for an undershirt, but not when it means you can cancel your gym membership, stop buying gallons of protein powder, and sell all of your home gym equipment. Because not only does the Funkybod t-shirt promise to camouflage manboobs, it also creates the illusion you've got a muscular toned physique, no matter how frail you might be in real life.

It's all thanks to a set of subtle plates—presumably made of a comfortable foam—that accentuate your shoulder, bicep, lat, pectoral, and shoulder muscles. Worn by itself the fake muscles are easy to spot, but when worn under another shirt no one will be able to tell you don't spend every morning at the gym. And the plates supposedly even feel like real muscle, so no one will be the wiser until you're forced to take your shirt off. Which means that if you spill on yourself, you'll be wearing that stained shirt all day until you get home. More here.

How a Lost Boy Used Google Earth to Find His Way Home After 25 Years

In the video, Brierly recounts how 1987, after a day of begging for money on the street, he boarded a train for home, but he never got there because he fell asleep and missed his stop. Instead, he ended up on the other end of the country. He was labeled lost, adopted and shipped off to Australia. But thanks to the Google, he found his way home—as if you needed another reason to love Google Maps.

I Have Seen the Future and It's a One-Handed Magnetic Zipper

Under Armour is making the bold claim that it's finally "fixed zippers." And while its innovative new Magzip feature probably isn't going to change the entire world, it's still a vast improvement to clothing technology that hasn't evolved in in almost 100 years. It's also voodoo magic.

If you've ever fumbled trying to connect the two loose ends of a zipper—and really, who hasn't?—you'll immediately see the value in Under Armour's new approach that uses a strong magnet and a re-engineered clasp to automatically guide the two ends of a zipper together, allowing you to do up a coat with just one hand.

The idea for the Magzip actually came from an engineer named Scott Peters, who originally designed it to allow those dealing with conditions that inhibit their fine motor control and coordination to more easily dress themselves. Perfecting the mechanism required about 25 different prototypes, but the final version was patented and eventually licensed by Under Armour for a new line of clothing and jackets destined for a fall 2014 release. More here.

These Rorschach Ink Tests Could Replace the Good Old CAPTCHA

The CAPTCHA is a wonderful thing, but it's not without its failings. And as hackers get better and better at cracking them, a team of CMU engineers are proposing an alternative: Inkblot tests.

It's called a GOTCHA (of course), and it stands for Generating panOptic Turing Tests to Tell Computers and Humans Apart. The test was developed by three CMU researchers named Jeremiah Blocki, Manuel Blum, and Anupam Datta, who wanted to capitalize on our natural predilection to visual pattern recognition. Their test is a variant of a HOSP, or a Human-Only Solvable Puzzle, which defend against offline dictionary attacks by requiring human interaction with each password. In other words, these puzzles defend against attacks where hackers will try millions of different passwords in an attempt to access your account.

Here's how GOTCHA would work: When a user signs up for a service—a new email account, let's say—they'll be shown a series if inkblot tests and asked to describe them in a few words. Then, when they come back a few days later to sign in, they're presented with the same inkblot tests plus their original answers. They simply have to match up the answers with the correct images. That way, it's tougher for a computer to replicate not only the uniquely human ability to see visual patterns, but also to replicate that ability in the same way twice.

According to the team's October 7 paper—creatively titled GOTCHA Password Hackers!—the CMU team tested their design using a small sample of 70 through Amazon's Mechanical Turk. And while some participants didn't match their answers up correctly, there was good evidence that most users could trust their memories, and it's likely that the test could be tailored to be more consistent. More here.

It's Raining Diamonds on Saturn and Jupiter

We're a little late to the party on this one, but it's just too fascinating to pass up. A team of planetary scientists recently claimed that the mix of methane, carbon and lightning in Saturn's atmosphere is causing diamonds to be forged in the planet's atmosphere. Like, a lot of diamonds.

"The bottom line is that 1,000 tons of diamonds a year are being created on Saturn," Dr. Kevin Baines of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory recently told the BBC. "People ask me, 'How can you really tell? Because there's no way you can go and observe it.' " Baines explained, "It all boils down to the chemistry. And we think we're pretty certain."

The chemistry is actually pretty simple. Saturn's atmosphere is mostly made up of hydrogen and methane, but when storms crop up, the lightning fries the methane, producing pure hydrogen and burnt carbon, a.k.a. soot. As the clouds of soot fall towards the planet, they clump together forming graphite, and as the pressure builds up closer to the planet's core, that graphite is compressed into pure diamond. So it's literally raining diamonds on Saturn. The scientists think the same thing might be happening on Jupiter.

Does this do us any good? Not right now. It's pretty hard to get to Saturn and Jupiter and to get down to where the diamonds are would be pretty tough since the pressure there is about 100,000 times what it is at sea level on Earth. And if we don't catch them fast enough, the diamonds eventually fall into the core and melt. Nobody wants a melted diamond necklace. More here.

Sleeping In Public Just Keeps Getting Easier

Like ostriches themselves, the Ostrich Pillow is enigmatic and generally fascinating. Who would use it? Is it appropriate for children? Is it a sex toy? Hard to say! But it looks downright comfortable for napping. The only issue is carrying it.

With that thing hanging out of your bag it's pretty obvious that you're getting read to rob a bank and then sleep it off. That's why Ostrich Light is lifting its head out of the sand.

Ostrich Light is a sort of fleece earband/VISOR combo by Studio Banana Things that you can wear around your neck and then move onto your face when it's time to pass out. Or you can keep it in a bag until you're ready to use it like a reasonable person. It looks soft and cushy, but also packable which is the whole point of this redesign. Ostrich Light raised more than $6,000 in its first day on Kickstarter and its goal is $40,000 (£25,000).More here.

This Bronze Candle Will Burn Forever and Never Melt Away

Given how important it's been to our development, mankind will always be drawn to open flames. But if you're tired of buying tea light candles in bulk for a little bit of accent lighting,Fabien Gerlier's Caviar might be better suited to adding accent lighting to your home. Made of sintered bronze, the lamp stays lit without ever burning away.

So what exactly is sintered bronze? Think of it kind of like a metallic styrofoam, but instead of being composed of thousands of tiny granules of foam, it's made of endless tiny specks of bronze. And since the material isn't solid, it allows gas from a fuel reservoir to seep through, and that's what's actually seen burning, not the lamp itself.

Want to buy one? That's unfortunate, because the Caviar lamp is sadly just a thesis project by Gerlier who's working towards getting his masters in product design. But while you can't buy one now, there's no reason to think the lamp couldn't one day go into production. More here.

Adding a Little Heat Could Give Us a 40 TB Hard Drive in a Few Years

When it comes to cramming as much data as possible on a platter, hard drive manufacturers will use every trick in the book to maximize capacity. Including turning up the heat as TDK plans to do with a new technique that could deliver 40 terabyte hard drives by 2020.

In layman's terms, it's actually easier to induce and reverse a magnetic field—which is how data is written and read in a hard drive—as the temperature increases. So TDK has developed a laser system to temporarily heat the area where data is being written, which in turn allows them to squeeze more bits onto a platter.

The breakthrough that made this new approach possible was the development of a laser, which TDK refers to as a near-field light generator, that creates a beam that's just tens of nanometers wide—any larger and you risk erasing data around the area where it's being written. And for comparison, that beam's about 1/10 as wide as the lasers used to read a Blu-ray disk—so we're talking seriously tiny.

The technology could very well be the next big leap needed to push hard drive capacities to the next level, and TDK is confident it could be implemented in commercial products as early as late 2015. More here.

This Dongle Lets You Use Your Laptop's Keyboard With Your Phone

There are almost as many wireless Bluetooth keyboards on the market as there are Bluetooth speakers. But why spend money on yet another keyboard for your mobile devices when there's probably already a perfectly good one on your laptop? With this Bluetooth USB transmitter dongle from Buffalo, the keyboards you already have can also work on your smartphone or tablet.

Using a small application that runs under OS X and Windows, you can choose to have your computer's keyboard work with your PC, or re-route every keystroke to a mobile device connected over Bluetooth instead. It's that easy, and for $43 it means you don't have to travel with a separate keyboard. And as an added bonus, your laptop's tilting display makes for a perfect smartphone stand when you're pounding out longer messages.

Of course, why anyone would actually need to type on their smartphone or tablet while their laptop is out and powered up is another question, so perhaps this is a solution still looking for a problem to solve—but it's still a neat trick. More here.

The Only Acceptable Way To Shovel Food Into Your Mouth

Your parents probably weren't too keen when you were cramming food in your mouth at the dinner table like a feral child. But you're all grown up now; you can eat however you want. And if that includes the use of a spoon that looks like the heavy-duty scoop you'll find on a construction site backhoe, so be it.

The only problem with the $10 Dinner Digger is that you might have a hard time cramming it into your mouth. But you lived off Doritos and Fanta through four years of college, as far as dining challenges go, this is a tiny speed bump—not a brick wall. With the right angling you can simply dump a massive scoop of corn flakes right into your gaping maw. More here.

Disney Lets You Feel Textures On a Touchscreen By Zapping Your Fingers

In an attempt to give touchscreens another level of interactivity, researchers at Disney have come up with a remarkable way to generate tactile feedback as fingers slide across a smooth glass display. And all without deforming or changing the shape of the display in the process. Imagine a touchscreen keyboard where you can physically feel every key and you'll realize the potential of this research.

So how is such sorcery even possible? The researchers realized that the sensation of feeling a bump on a surface largely came from the skin on a fingertip being pulled and stretched as it moved across the raised area. And it turns out that this same sensation can be artificially created on a perfectly flat surface using electrovibration to generate electrostatic forces that create friction against a moving finger.

The other half of this breakthrough is a custom algorithm developed by Disney's research team that generates these frictional forces on the fly, based on what's being displayed on screen. So a stack of DVD cases would feel like a series of bumps, where as a ball would feel more like a large gradually curved surface. The technique is basically fooling the brain into thinking its experiencing something it really isn't, but the results are apparently remarkably convincing.

And the applications for this technology go well past just a cute interactive picture book that kids can also touch. This could make typing or playing joystick-based games on a phone or tablet actually enjoyable, and it would most definitely revolutionize how those with visual impairments use mobile devices. More here.

This 3D-Printed Web of Plastic Caps Turns Water Bottles Into a Vase

If your recycling bin overfloweth with empty plastic water bottles and you're just too lazy to take them to the curb, why not turn them from an eyesore into a lovely centerpiece with this 3D-printed web of bottlecaps? All you need to do is scrounge up twelve similarly sized bottles and you've got yourself a one-of-a-kind vase that can hold an entire bouquet of flowers.

Available in black or green, the Screw You Vase does require you to add flowers and water for your centerpiece to take shape, but that's it. Well, flowers, water, and $175 since after all these are 3D printed which is a time consuming process. More here.

Keep Your Desk Clutter-Free With These Clever Magnetic Doodads

Both holders are handcrafted from maple and walnut wood, and can be applied using the accompanying adhesive-backed washers. That way, the holders will lie flush with whatever surface you stick 'em on. While you could stick any metal pen to the holder, DropCatch does provide you with a Zebra-designed pen and pencil, which is a nice little touch.

Of course, neither of these things are really necessary—a headphone holder actually seems like a little more trouble than its worth. But they sure are pretty. You can pick up the headphone holder and pen holder for $20 and $35, respectively. More here.

Flexible Displays Don't Mean Flexible Phones

LG unveiled the "world's first flexible OLED panel for smartphones" on Monday morningand bragged about how products with "enhanced performance and differentiated designs" would follow next year. A fully flexible smartphone is probably not going to be among those exciting new things, however.

Flexible displays are new and exciting, and there's no reason to trash talk them. But the arrival of flexible displays does not equal the arrival of flexible devices. In fact, there are still some pretty legitimate hurdles to clear before such a thing would be possible. The guts of a smartphone aren't exactly designed to be twisted, bent or rolled up, as some might like. The battery, in particular, is not an easy part to make flexible. CNET's Jessica Delcourt listed a few reasons why flexible phones were a long ways off earlier this year and also highlighted other challenges of flexible electronics like the extent to which they should be flexible and the inevitably prohibitive price. That's just inevitable for now, though. They'll get cheaper.

None of this means that LG's breakthrough isn't impressive or important. The appeal of a flexible display for the time being is to build curved phones which most people expect LG to showcase in a few months if Samsung doesn't beat them to the punch. The new display does look pretty awesome in the meantime. It's built on plastic substrates instead of glass which makes the flexibility issue a little less of an issue and is so thin—0.44 millimeters thin—that it rivals even the non-bendable displays currently on the market. LG also brags that it's the lightest display in the world, weighing in at a mere 7.2 grams for a six-inch display. And since it bends, it won't shatter and break as easily as a glass display, though it might be prone to scratches. More here.

This Leaked Manual Lists Literally All the Nexus 5's Specs

Nexus nerds, we may have just hit the jackpot. Android Police just got its hands on what appears to be a leaked service manual for the as-yet-unreleased Nexus 5. If this is real, we now know everything about the Nexus 5. Every. Thing. OK, except price.

The document—which came to Android Police's attention via anonymous tipster—is some 281 pages long, but fortunately Android Police has already dug out the really juicy bits:

• 4.95" 1080p display
• 32GB internal storage
• 2GB RAM
• Snapdragon 800 at 2.3GHz
• 8MP OIS rear camera, 1.3MP front camera
• 2300mAh battery
• Sensors: Accelerometer, Gyroscope, Compass, Proximity/Ambient Light, Pressure
• Micro SIM slot
• Notification light
• Wireless charging (duh)
• NFC (duh)

Now of course, as with any leak it's important to take this with a grain of salt. It could all be fake. But god damn look at that thing! There is so much data here. It's seems virtually impossible that this is bogus. If it's a fake it's an ABSURDLY detailed one.

Of course there are still other possibilities, like LG keeping false manuals on-hand for leaking, or Google/LG purposefully leaking a fake manual as some sort of cruel prank. But so far we've got no good reason to suspect this isn't accurate despite its status as a "draft."

There was one little discrepancy Android Police found, which is that the Bluetooth is listed as 3.0, when it'd be absurd for it to be anything other than Bluetooth Low Energy (i.e. 4.0). So that's either a bummer or a mistake.

Only time will tell, but in the meantime this is prooobably a pretty good guess at what we'll be seeing soon. More here.

Microsoft Asked HTC to Put Windows Phone in HTC Android Phones

According to Bloomberg, Microsoft has asked HTC to put Windows Phone in more HTC phones. Specifically, HTC Android phones. The report says that the head of Microsoft's operating systems unit Terry Myerson asked HTC last month to "load Windows Phone as a second option on [Android] handsets."

Apparently, Microsoft has discussed either cutting or even removing the licensing fee that comes with Windows Phone to make it a more attractive option for HTC. It smells like desperation and well, it sort of is. But Microsoft needs to shake up something in order to get Windows Phone in more hands. The talks with HTC are still in its early stages so no one is sure what the deal will end up looking like. Bloomberg says:

The technical details have yet to be ironed out. It wasn’t clear whether an HTC phone would run Windows and Android at the same time, or let users choose a default.

Seeing Windows Phone and Android on the same phone at the same time would just be crazy. Seeing a phone like the HTC One run Windows Phone would be quite awesome. HTC has made Windows Phones before (like the 8X) but it's clear most of its efforts have been dedicated toward Android phones. More here.

"I'm the Actor Who Provided the Voice for Siri"

Siri has provided iPhone users around the planet with everything from weather forecasts to restaurant reviews, whilst fending off dumb-ass questions along the way. But if you ever wondered who whispered all those sweet nothings, here's your answer.

This woman claims to have voiced the original version of Siri, which appeared on the iPhone 4S back in October 2011. Her name is Susan Bennett, and she lives in suburban Atlanta. While she won't reveal her age, she admits she fell into voice acting "by accident" in the 70s.

The arrival of a new Siri voice in iOS 7 means that Bennett is able to step forward and reveal herself to the world. And, if you're skeptical that she's the real deal—which you perhaps should be—co-workers and audio-forensics experts say they're "100 percent" confident it's the case, reports CNN.

In the video embedded below, Bennett talks about the gig, what it entailed, and how she was forced to keep the fact a secret. Until now. More here.

Your Instagram Feed Is About to Get Ads

Instagram's been planning this for a while, but now your Insta-feed is officially no longer just yours. Over the next few months, you'll start seeing photos and videos from #bold #brands all up in your stream of sepia-toned pics.

In its announcement, Instagram claims to want to make the ads "feel as natural to Instagram as the photos and videos many of you already enjoy." Which is probably true. With the speed most people scroll through their feed, it's doubtful they'll really notice that another vintage shot of a sunset was actually posted by Clorox. More here.

This SD Card Is Hiding a Mifi Inside

The last thing you want to do after buying yourself a sleek, ultra-slim laptop is muck up its lovely form factor with an ungainly mobile WiFi hotspot hanging off a USB port. So taking inspiration from the Eye-Fi, Huawei has cooked up its own SD card that's gutted to make room for a nano SIM slot and a HSPA+ 3G radio to give your laptop mobile internet wherever you roam.

You'll obviously lose the functionality of your laptop's built-in SD slot as long as you want to stay connected, but occasionally hooking up your camera over USB to offload photos is a small price to pay for a MiFi-like device that's almost impossible to lose. More here.

KFC Spent Two Years Making a Take-Out Container That Fits Cupholders

In an effort to bolster its standing amongst the fast food giants, KFC is introducing what is the easily one of the greatest innovations in take-out containers since the pizza box. The fried chicken chain's new snack-size Go Cups are specifically designed—after two years of development—to easily sit in your vehicle's cup holders, letting you dine without having to pull over and stop.

Billed as mini value meals, the Go Cups will sell for just $2.49 apiece and come in five different varieties that include varying mixes of chicken wings, chicken fingers, and chicken sandwiches with potato wedges on the side across the board. It's a little unfortunate to see that KFC isn't also including little shot glasses of its neon green coleslaw or gravy, but if cups of fried chicken can become a reality, who's to say what the future does or doesn't hold? More here.

Flexible Folding Flat Kitchen Utensils That Do More Than Just Scrape

It doesn't matter what you're buying, everyone wants to get as much bang for their buck as possible. And what looks like a set of three pieces of plastic cookware actually turns into six with nothing more than a gentle squeeze. It's like having the Transformers in your kitchen, minus the epic Michael Bay level of destruction.

Made from food-grade nylon and flexible silicone so they're dishwasher safe, these flat spatulas—sold separately at $16 a pop—easily transform into a spoon, a slotted ladle, and a spaghetti scoop. Which means that not only are they extra-functional, they also easily slip into even the most jam packed of utensil drawers. Now if only the toaster and tea kettle crowding your kitchen counters could do that. More here.

Researchers Bioengineer Bacteria That Can Produce Gasoline

Korean researchers have engineered a new strain of E. coli that can produce a suitable substitute for gasoline. And as they quite rightly point out, bacteria that poops out petroleum could be some valuable shit.

Digging up fossil resources carries tremendous environmental, monetary, and geopolitical costs, which means figuring out a way to feed the world's huge addiction to gasoline without unearthing crude could have a tremendous impact.

Bacteria, meanwhile, has already proven itself capable of amazing things. It's responsible for making your booze boozy, and in recent years it has been used to produce everything fromgold to diesel fuel. When it comes to producing biofuels, we're probably most familiar with bacteria that produce ethanol, but as the Korean researchers point out in a new study published in Nature, petroleum has a 30-percent higher energy content than traditional biofuels.

The new bioengineering process leverages existing E. coli strains to produce short-chain Alkanes molecules, which they claim is a chemically identical replacement for the combination of short-chain hydrocarbons commonly known as gasoline. In other words, you could put this bacterial excretion into your car and it would run. The WSJ reports:

When the modified E. coli were fed glucose, found in plants or other non-food crops, the enzymes they produced converted the sugar into fatty acids and then turned these into hydrocarbons that were chemically and structurally identical to those found in commercial fuel...

Unfortunately, as the WSJ points out, one liter of glucose produces just 580 milligrams of gas, which is a highly unfavorable yield to say the least. The tech's too new to power cars anytime soon, but it's an important step towards motoring the highways, powered by poop. More here.

Watch Every Model of iPhone Get Speed Tested at the Same Time

Ever wonder if your iPhone 4 really was weirdly slow? Or if iOS 7, despite its bells and whistles, just has a longer boot time than your old 3G? Well wonder no longer. You're about to find out for sure.

EverythingApplePro ran an absurdly comprehensive speed test using every iPhone ever made (and a whole bunch of hands). The results might surprise you.

This Grapefruit Sectioner Might Be the Most Specific Kitchen Gadget

No longer do those wanting to eat healthy at breakfast have to live in fear of the backlash from the grapefruit they're digging into. This Citrus Sectioner replaces your spoon with a purpose-built contraption that safely and easily removes a wedge from your favorite morning fruit—minus any geysers of blinding juice.

Despite being what is possibly the most specific kitchen gadget ever created, the sectioner is just $10, and the stainless steel beak that does all the slicing is dishwasher-friendly, so breakfast cleanup is just as easy as prep. It's also promised to work with all manner of citrus fruits, including oranges, heftier tangerines, and even lemons, and limes. More here.

How Mercedes Benz Uses Cameras to Stabilize the Road While You Drive

You'll never feel a bump again. Hopefully.

The magic in the, um, Magic is the combination of stereo cameras on the windshield and an adaptive suspension system. The cameras can scan a road's surface 50 feet ahead in real time while going 80mph to analyze the condition of the surface. It then passes on its measurement data of the road onto the suspension system which adjusts itself right as the car is driving over the uneven road. It supposedly prevents oscillating and reduces vibration. Smooth sailing. Or driving.

The system can recognizes 'obstacles' at 3mm or better so it gets pretty damn detailed. From the looks of the video (which is put out by Mercedes), there seems to be a legit difference when a car is equipped with the Magic Body Control and when it's not. Who knows what that's like in real life (only rich people will know). More here.

Beats Has Ended Its Relationship With HTC

Beats has had enough: it's walking out of its relationship with HTC and buying back the 25 percent stake currently held by smartphone manufacturer.

HTC ponied up $300 million back in 2011 for a 50.1 percent stake in Beats. Then, the headphone manufacturer paid $150 million to buy back 25 percent last year. Today, it takes back full control for an extra $265 million.

It's unclear what the future now holds for the pair: while HTC says Beats will remain an important partners, the headphone manufacturer hasn't bothered to make any noises in agreement. With HTC's profits dwindling and Beats' performing strongly, it could be the end of all that audio branding being splashed over the back of the Taiwanese handsets. Thank goodness. More here.

Scientists Found a New Way to Turn Plastic Bags into a Supermaterial

Have you ever had a roommate who saves plastic grocery bags just in case they ever have the need to reuse the dang things? Like, hundreds of plastic grocery bags? Well, thanks to some Australian engineers, those extra bags can not only have a purpose, they can become technology of the future.

A team from the University of Adelaide recently developed a method for turning plastic bags into carbon nanotubes. Specifically, they grew the nanotubes on alumina membranes by vaporizing the plastic bags in a furnace and then layering the isolated carbon molecules onto the membranes. Carbon nanotubes are among the strongest and stiffest materials known to man and can be used for everything from electronics to wind turbines. And this new process creates the nanotubes while also doing away with problematic waste.

This actually isn't the first time that scientists have built carbon nanotubes from the remnants of plastic bags. Back in 2009, a team from the Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois came up with a process that converted plastic bags into carbon nanotubes using a cobalt acetate catalyst. The scientists then used the nanotubes to build lithium ion batteries. The problem with that method, however, was that the cobalt used was rather expensive, and only one fifth of the material from the plastic bags was actually converted for use in the carbon nanotube.

The new Australian method is both cheaper and more efficient. And both methods make those nasty pieces of trash into something that we can actually use, instead of just taking up space space in your kitchen cabinet. More here.

Trade Your Swiss Army Knife For This Multi-Function iPhone Case

Your smartphone has already replaced everything from your digital camera to your alarm clock, so why not the pocket knife clipped to your keyring too? The creators of the IN1 feel you should demand more from your iPhone case than just a way to protect it from falls, and so have packed theirs with a multitude of removable tools sure to make any wannabe MacGyver happy.

The IN1's polycarbonate casing includes a pop-up kickstand for easier hands-free viewing, but that pales in comparison to its built-in tool chest that boasts pens, screwdrivers, files, tweezers, scissors, and even a toothpick.

And before you start decrying this case as a good way to miss your flight, the lack of a sharp blade means the IN1's actually designed to be completely TSA compliant. So you don't have to worry about security making you toss your iPhone case and being out $45. More here.

Chromosomes Actually Look Like an Insane Ball of Spaghetti

Remember back in high school biology class when you had to sketch the structure of a cell? Chromosomes were always fun because you know they'd be these smooth X's stuffed with DNA. Well, I hate to break it to you, but science doesn't actually work like that.

Researchers from the Babraham Institute and the University of Cambridge have just completed detailed 3D models of chromosomes that look less like the 24th letter of the alphabet and more like technicolor pasta. As the Babraham Institute's Dr. Peter Fraser explains:

The image of a chromosome, an X-shaped blob of DNA, is familiar to many but this microscopic portrait of a chromosome actually shows a structure that occurs only transiently in cells—at a point when they are just about to divide.

The vast majority of cells in an organism have finished dividing and their chromosomes don't look anything like the X-shape. Chromosomes in these cells exist in a very different form and so far it has been impossible to create accurate pictures of their structure.

It wasn't easy to create the images, either. To do it, the researchers used the latest DNA sequencing technology to track the movement of chromosomes on a molecular level. When combined using computers, the measurements translated into the complex 3D image.

Frankly, it all makes sense. Life is an incredibly complicated thing, so why would graphic representations of it be so simple. The only problem now is that instead of neat lines tucked into cell walls high school students all across America will have to draw blobs of psychedelic spaghetti. More here.

An Old Clipboard Makes For a Brilliantly Simple Bird Feeder

Rarely does anyone want the last slice found at the bottom of a bag of bread. But instead of just tossing it on the ground for birds and squirrels to fight over, Israeli-based designerNitsan Hoorgin has created a simple feeder that lets birds perch and nibble on that last slice.

The Clip and Tweet easily attaches to the side of a tree or a house with a single screw, and as long as you keep it low enough to be in reach, attaching a slice of bread is as easy as securing a notepad to a clipboard.

And speaking of which, it doesn't appear as if the Clip and Save is going into production any time soon. But if you have an old clipboard and a coat hanger you don't need any more, creating one of these yourself looks like it only requires basic crafting skills, and a disdain for that last crusty piece of bread. More here.

Scientists Successfully "Erase" Fear Using Scent Therapy

Have you had trouble shaking that fear of snakes or dogs or spiders? Researchers from Northwestern University have developed a new technique to rechannel memories while subjects sleep—by blasting them with various odors. It's like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind in Smell-o-Vision.

For the experiment, scientists conditioned patients to be afraid of a certain face by showing them a picture of the face along with a specific smell and then administering an electric shock. Patients would eventually learn to fear not only the image of the face but also the associated smell. The smell would trigger fear even when the patient was asleep and not being shocked, but after so many exposures, the fearful reaction would fade away. In effect, the exposure to the smell would do away with the fear.

This study sheds more light on the strong relationship between emotion and smell. Some scientists suggest that this is because the olfactory bulb where smells are processed is close to the amygdala and hippocampus, where emotion and memory are processed. Other experiments have been conducted that confirm the relationship, too. Last year, for instance, scientists showed 70 women a traumatic video while the smell of cassis was pumped into the room. A week later, the women were asked to recall the contents of the video, and some were exposed to the cassis again. Those who smelled the cassis could recall more from the video than those who were not exposed to the scent.

The relationship gets even more interesting. A few years ago, Norwegian artist Sissel Tolaas collected the sweat of various men after they'd been exposed to fear-inducing stimuli and chemically reproduced it. The resultant smell was then installed in a gallery setting using a process called microencapsulation, which is similar to how Scratch'n'sniff products are made. In the gallery, people could scratch or rub the walls and literally smell fear. The public's reaction to the art varied widely as many had visceral reactions to the smell, some of whom couldn't even walk into the room. Scientists are increasingly learning that people can't help but have visceral reactions to smell. Our brains are just wired that way. More here.

Android Turns 5 Years Old Today

Today in 2008, Google executives stood on stage and announced the much-rumored T-Mobile G1 (also known as the HTC Dream). It was the first commercial product to run a new, Linux-based operating system called Android. It turned out pretty OK.

Des Smith, one of the members of the original Android team, shared some of his recollections on Google+. Things were different then.

When Was the Last Time You Switched Cell Carriers?

Everyone hates their carrier, right? That's just a thing. They're either so huge that you get ripped off and can't get any customer service, or they're so small that their service coverage is weird and their handset options are lousy. But it increasingly seems like there are viable alternative options. Like Republic Wireless's $20-a-month unlimited plan. It's actually solid and now the company is offering the Moto X. Is that tempting? Do you have some crazy grandfathered plan from the late 90s or do you move from deal to deal every few years? Jump ship or stay loyal below.

iPhone 5 vs. iPhone 5C Teardown: Just How Different Are They?

This video tears down the 5 and 5C simultaneously, to see exactly how they differ. Maybe it'll help you decided which one to plump for.

First iPhone 5S and 5C Drop Test: Only One of Them Shatters

Android Authority tested the two devices by dropping them from chest level on their backs, sides, and fronts. In the end, no surprise here—the cheaper phone ended up being less sturdy and its face shattered. On the other hand, with its aluminum housing, the 5S looks like it can take a little more abuse.

This Bicycle's Frame Acts As a Shock Absorber

When you ride your bike to and from work every single day, you're going to want to make sure it's as comfy as possible. And that's exactly what Alter Cycles is promising commuters with its unorthodox take on shock absorbers. Instead of integrating them into the front forks, the company's replaced the down tube on its bikes with a flexible bow that promises varying degrees of comfort.

By swapping in interchangeable down tubes of varying flexibility, a biker can fine tune their cycle's ride—from soft to stiff—depending on the terrain they face on their commute. When eventually available to the public, the Alter Cycles bike should sell for around $800, while the various down tube options should run anywhere from $75 to $100, with off-road versions also enroute.

So what do you think? Could this actually be a better alternative to front fork suspension systems? Or is this just another novel design that doesn't quite offer enough innovation to take the biking world by storm? More here.

A Salad Spinner With a Turbo Button—Who Wants To Wait For Salad?

The allure of a shiny new gadget is easy to overcome when it costs hundreds of dollars and comes with a multi-year contract. But cheaper contraptions, like the stuff you'll find in a kitchen store, are almost impossible to resist. Does anyone really need a salad spinner with a turbo button that promises 50 percent faster rotation speeds? No. But anything with a turbo option is just too tempting. Whether it's cars, computers, or EMSA's new Turboline salad spinner.

You can't go wrong with a stylish stainless steel bowl, but it's the pull string spinning mechanism—complete with that turbo mode which switches up the gearing on the fly—that suddenly has gadget fiends interested in drying produce. And at $45 without a contract—except maybe a personal contract to eat more healthy—salads suddenly seem a lot more appealing. More here.

Why Does Arm Exercise Make Your Legs Tired?

Strenuous activity wears you out. No news there. But it turns out that exercising your biceps will make your legs just as tired as working out your quads. And for the first time, researchers seem to know why.

Researchers at Britain's Nottingham Trent University tested subjects on two different exercise setups: one group did two rounds of intense leg exercises, the other did arms followed by legs. Each group's second set of exercises showed about a 33% decline in performance — despite half of the subjects starting with fresh legs. Physiologically, this is puzzling: each muscle contains its own fuel (glycogen, ATP and phosphocreatine, for you science types), and your arms can't steal energy stored away in your legs. So what gives?

The hypothesis is that, while fuel use is contained to the muscle being exercised, the buildup of metabolites in the blood affects the whole body. In other words, the lactate, hydrogen and potassium your arms spit out while you're blasting curls will slow down your "fresh" legs almost as much as if you were grinding out squats, despite your quads having a full tank of fuel. So while exercise enthusiasts tend to work on each muscle group as its own ecosystem, it turns out the human body operates more like one integrated machine. More here.

Is the Data on Your SSD Secure?

SSDs are wonderful things that take up next to no space and are incredibly fast to boot. But while most people understand the basics data security on HDDs, the same isn't necessarily true of solid state storage.

Deleting files may not mean they're gone, overwriting them isn't safe, and a thorough scrub is at the whim of a micro controller, not the user. In this video, Professor Derek McAuley explains just how secure the data on your SSD is.

How Do You Like iOS 7 So Far?

iOS is out. Provided you made it through updating purgatory, your iPhone is up and running on the new software. How do you like it so far?

iOS 7 is beautiful and colorful, and everything looks different—like your apps. But a new operating system takes some getting used to. There are going to be things you notice right off the bat that you really like, and others that you just don't, and there might be some bugginess you have to deal with. More here.