technical updates

Aging may trigger the appearance of specialized stem cells that supercharge the body's ability to create new belly fat. The discovery reveals a potential biological driver of middle-age weight gain and a promising target for future anti-obesity treatments. from Latest Science News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/25pwoXP

The 1970s were truly when science fiction cinema made astronomical leaps into the public's consciousness and catapulted out of the B-movie bin to become a respected entertainment genre. Aside from a few serious science fiction standouts like "The Andromeda Strain," "Silent Running," "Soylent Green," "Westworld," and "Rollerball," the pre-" Star Wars " era of Hollywood sci-fi was mostly forgettable fare. But before we all travelled to a galaxy far, far away, experienced close encounters of the third kind, or set down on LV-426, MGM Studios gifted us with "Logan's Run," a lavish futuristic spectacle that offered a colorful peek into a dystopian future. It delivered with provocative themes about the suppression of truth, the inevitability of aging and death, violence as sport, and the complicated nature of freedom. First...

At some point next year, when planets and stars momentarily align, we’ll hopefully be getting what’s sure to be the most anticipated sci-fi RPG in recent memory — Wizards of the Coast and Archetype Entertainment's " Exodus ", which is coming to PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. This far future "Mass Effect"-like saga follows the daring time-traveler Jun Aslan as he and his companions hop about the cosmos searching for ancient artifacts to ward off the destruction of their worlds. This threat comes from an evolved group of transhumans called Celestials, with the whole affair taking place within the Centauri Cluster, 16,000 light-years from an abandoned planet Earth. As part of Archetype’s ambitious cross-media marketing plan, the dev team enlisted the help of celebrated British sci-fi author Peter Hamilton ("The Salvation Sequence") to fortify the game’s worldbuilding...

About a month has passed since the first launch of SpaceX's "Version 3" Starship rocket, and the spaceflight company has already begun testing on its next such vehicle. SpaceX recently transported Ship 40, the upper stage in line to launch Starship's upcoming Flight 13 demonstration mission, to the Massey test site at its facilities in Starbase , Texas. Secured at its base, Starship performed a full-duration burn of one of its central Raptor 3 engines that lasted about 15 seconds. The test, called a static fire, is meant to confirm that the spacecraft's engines are in working order ahead of an actual launch. SpaceX posted a video of the test on X today (June 26). The Ship upper stage is equipped with six Raptor 3 engines — three sea-level engines, and three configured for optimized flight in the vacuum of space. The vehicle uses all six during ascent, but only a single se...

If you've been looking for a good time to take the leap into the drone world, the 30% discount on this sub-250 g beginner drone might be enough to tempt you. Before the release of the DJI Neo 2, we ranked the DJI Neo as the best DJI drone for simplicity. Our drone expert, James Abbott, gave it four out of five stars in his hands-on DJI Neo review , noting that not only is it a lot of fun to operate, but it also makes drone flight as simple or as complicated as you would like, thanks to the multiple control options. Get the DJI Neo drone on sale for one more day at Amazon for $139 . Because the DJI Neo is sub-250g, you don't have to worry about registering it under the current drone regulations . At this price, you can't go wrong, even if you're a seasoned drone pilot looking for a backup or just something that tracks you and your adventures autonomously. Save $60 on this sub-250 ...

What is rarer than discovering a "super-puff" planet with densities much (much) lower than those of the solar system gas giants? Discovering two orbiting the same star. That is exactly what astronomers have done, finding two extrasolar planets, or exoplanets , that are super-puff siblings orbiting the same star. Both planets, designated TOI-791 b and TOI-791 c, have densities lower than that of cotton candy, making them the lightest exoplanets ever seen. "Only a handful of these super-puffy planets are known, and it is even rarer to find two in the same system," team leader George Dransfield of Oxford University said in a statement. "Their extremely low densities make them fascinating targets for understanding how planetary systems form and evolve." The two planets orbit a dwarf star called TOI-791, which is located around 1,110 light-years from Earth. Both plane...