Scientists Have Discovered Booze That Won't Give You A Hangover

Scientists Have Discovered Booze That Won't Give You A Hangover - Alcohol - io9

Doctors Kwang-il Kwon and Hye Gwang Jeong of Chungnam National University studied the properties of oxygenated alcohol - booze with oxygen bubbles added - which is a popular concoction in their country. In these drinks, oxygen is added the way carbonation is usually added to soda, and the scientists wanted to know if these oxygenated beverages affected people differently than non-oxygenated ones. The answer was a resounding yes.

So why does adding O2 to booze lessen the nasty after effects? When you drink ethanol, you body needs to oxidize it to water and carbon dioxide in order to process it. This occurs via hepatic oxidation, where the liver does its thing to counteract the liquor you've just poured down your gullet. The enzymes that process alcohol require oxygen to function, and it's thought that by storing the oxygen in the alcohol itself, the system functions more quickly and efficiently.

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Hydrofloors' Swimming Pools Belong In the X-Men's Danger Room - Hydrofloors

Hydrofloors' Swimming Pools Belong In the X-Men's Danger Room - Hydrofloors

I don't know who has the pockets and the space to install Hydrofloors—mechanically operated tiles that sink into the ground slowly, revealing a swimming pool already full of water—but I want to meet them. Watch them in action:

More: Gizmodo [video]

Skinput: Skin Touch Interfaces

Skinput: skin touch interface

Microsoft looks to be on a bit of a hot streak with innovations lately, and though this here project hasn't received much hype (yet), we'd say it's one of the most ingenious user interface concepts we've come across. Skinput is based on an armband straddling the wearer's biceps and detecting the small vibrations generated when the user taps the skin of his arm. Due to different bone densities, tissue mass and muscle size, unique acoustic signatures can be identified for particular parts of the arm or hand (including fingers), allowing people to literally control their gear by touching themselves. The added pico projector is there just for convenience, and we can totally see ourselves using this by simply memorizing the five input points (current maximum, 95.5 percent accuracy), particularly since the band works even if you're running.

More: Engadget

World's Largest Solar Powered Yacht Unveiled

World's Largest Solar Powered Yacht Unveiled

Sunshine is all Raphael Domjan, the skipper of a catamaran-style yacht that sports some 5,382 square feet (500 square meters) of solar panels, will need to power the PlanetSolar.

The boat – nearly 102 feet long, almost 50 feet wide and standing 24-1/2 feet high (31 meters by 15 meters by 7.5 meters) was unveiled Thursday at the Knierim Yachtbau shipyard in the northern city of Kiel where it took 13 months to build.

The next step is the formal launching which is slated for April and, beyond that, said spokeswoman Christel Varone, are plans to take the yacht on an around the world journey in 2011.

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The First Test That Proves General Theory of Relativity Wrong - A spinning top increases its weight much more than expected

The First Test That Proves General Theory of Relativity Wrong - A spinning top increases its weight much more than expected - Softpedia

According to Einstein's theory of general relativity, a moving mass should create another field, called gravitomagnetic field, besides its static gravitational field. This field has now been measured for the first time and to the scientists' astonishment, it proved to be no less than one hundred million trillion times larger than Einstein's General Relativity predicts.

A spinning top weights more than the same top standing still. However, according to Einstein's theory, the difference is negligible. It should be so small that we shouldn't even be capable of measuring it. But now scientists from the European Space Agancy, Martin Tajmar, Clovis de Matos and their colleagues, have actually measured it. At first they couldn't believe the result.

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Photo: Armadillo-like Crocodile Fossil Found in Brazil

Photo: Armadillo-like Crocodile Fossil Found in Brazil

An ancient crocodile with armadillo-like body armor (above, a reconstruction of the fossil in an undated picture) roamed the arid interior of Brazil about 90 million years ago, say researchers who found the fossil in Sao Paulo state."

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The Most Accurate, Highest Resolution Earth View to Date - Nasa

The Most Accurate, Highest Resolution Earth View to Date - Nasa - Gizmodo: "This is the most accurate, highest resolution true color image of planet Earth to date. And at 2048 x 2048 pixels, you should put it in your desktop background now. You can get America too:

Via Gizmodo

Wiimote-Controlled Robot Drum Circle Makes Human Hippies Obsolete

Wiimote-Controlled Robot Drum Circle Makes Human Hippies Obsolete | Popular Science

Each of the Wiimote buttons can control higher or lower tones on certain drums, while tiling down or up controls volume. Tilting the Wiimote to the side and holding down a button can increase or decrease the repeating beat, ranging from quarter notes to 32nd notes.

Dually wielded Wiimotes also allows Flanagan to reverse the drum patterns on two drum machines, speed up one drum machine faster than the other, and do other neat tricks that alter the rhythm. Music geeks and curious readers alike can check out a full explanation below.

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IDC's new "skin-on-bone"-mimicking motorcycle helmet

IDC's new "skin-on-bone"-mimicking motorcycle helmet - Core77: "Traditionally, motorcycle helmets have been rigid in design. We needed to introduce a dynamic element of movement to dramatically reduce the rotational impact which often causes life-threatening injuries. On impact, the outer membrane is able to stretch and slide over the main helmet shell to prevent these dangerous rotational forces being transmitted to the head and brain.
...The revolutionary product design required careful selection of materials. A strong synthetic sits on top of the gel-like lubricant to form a protective layer across the surface of the helmet. State-of -the-art vacuum casting was used to create prototypes and the materials tested for resistance and strength. The chosen synthetic stretched up to eight times its original length."

More: Core77

Low IQ among strongest predictors of cardiovascular disease -- second only to cigarette smoking in large population study

Low IQ among strongest predictors of cardiovascular disease -- second only to cigarette smoking in large population study

While lower intelligence scores -- as reflected by low results on written or oral tests of IQ -- have been associated with a raised risk of cardiovascular disease, no study has so far compared the relative strength of this association with other established risk factors such as obesity, smoking and high blood pressure. Now, a large study funded by Britain's Medical Research Council, which set out to gauge the relative importance of IQ alongside other risk factors, has found that lower intelligence scores were associated with higher rates of cardiovascular disease and total mortality at a greater level of magnitude than found with any other risk factor except smoking.

More - Science Daily