|  Amy's Kitchen Recall: Some Products May Be Contaminated with Listeria The organic food company Amy's Kitchen is recalling a number of its frozen food products because the spinach in them may be contaminated with Listeria bacteria, according to a press release from the company. Amy's Kitchen said it was notified by one of its suppliers that some of the spinach the company received may have been contaminated with the bacteria Listeria monocytogenes. The company said it is so far not aware of anyone becoming sick after eating one of the recalled products. A full list of recalled products, along with their UPC codes, can be found on the Food and Drug Administration's website. Read More » U.S., SpaceX focus on second stage engine to wrap up certification  | By Andrea Shalal WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Air Force said on Monday it was on track to certify privately held SpaceX to launch U.S. military and spy satellites by June, with the final efforts focused on qualifying the second stage engine and structure of its Falcon 9 rocket. The Air Force said it had worked closely with Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, to map out the "relatively small amount of work" that needs to be done before completing the certification process. Once certified, SpaceX will be allowed to compete for some of the launches now carried out solely by United Launch Alliance, a joint venture of Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co, the two largest U.S. weapons makers. Officials also are looking at contamination control as they wrap up the SpaceX certification process, the Air Force said.
| Read More » 'Cereal Fibers' May Help You Live Longer Whole grains are known to be good for you, but it may be the part of those grains that researchers call "cereal fiber" that is particularly important for reducing the risk the risk of disease and early death, a new study suggests. People in the group that consumed the most whole grains were 17 percent less likely to die over a 14-year period, compared with those who ate the least amount of whole grains. But the people who consumed the most cereal fiber were 19 percent less likely to die during the study period, compared with those who ate the least cereal fiber. The results "indicate that intake of whole grains and cereal fiber may reduce the risk of all-cause mortality and death from chronic diseases," the researchers said. Read More » Car-Size Salamander with Toilet-Seat Head Ruled Ancient Rivers  | An international team of scientists found several skulls and various other bones — including those of the arm, shoulder and backbone of the amphibian, now called Metoposaurus algarvensis — in an ancient lake bed in southern Portugal. This creature, along with most metoposaurids and half of Earth's species, died out at the end of the Triassic period, about 201 million years ago.
| Read More » From Rocket Science to Low Rider: Former Engineer Builds Adult Big Wheels  | Now, a Big Wheel-style bike is available for adults, thanks to the work of a former aerospace engineer. As a kid, Matt Armbruster dreamed of being an astronaut. It may not seem quite as noble as building things that expand humanity's understanding of the universe, but Armbruster said the power of these trikes — which look like adult-size versions of the Marx Big Wheel for kids — is something to behold. "The original Marx Big Wheel was kind of like the best toy ever for entire generations," Armbruster said.
| Read More » How Real-Life AI Rivals 'Ex Machina': Passing Turing  | From the Turing-bashing "Ex Machina" to old friends R2-D2 and C-3PO, and new enemies like the Avengers' Ultron, sentient robots will demonstrate a number of human and superhuman traits on-screen. In this five-part series Live Science looks at these made-for-the-movies advances in machine intelligence. The Turing test, a foundational method of AI evaluation, shapes the plot of April's sci-fi/psychological thriller "Ex Machina." But real-life systems can already, in some sense, pass the test. In fact, some experts say AI advances have made the Turing test obsolete.
| Read More » Robot racing sparks scientific enthusiasm in U.S. students  | The robots, designed by student teams at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute, will be racing a lineup ranging from commercial available machines weighing hundreds of pounds to remote control cars jerry-rigged by teenage hobbyists. The 100-meter out-and-back course, where the robots will accept a cup full of confetti at the turnaround, has no ambitions of attracting competitors on par with those in the U.S. Defense Department-funded Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Robotics Challenge, where some of the world's top minds in the field will show off creations that cost tens of millions of dollars. Rather, the competition sponsored by robotics company Vecna Technologies is part of a growing breed of lower-key robot races sprouting up across the United States that experts contend could play a powerful role in attracting young students into the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. I'm all for it," said Massachusetts Institute of Technology associate professor Russ Tedrake, who helped lead the school's fourth-place DARPA team in 2014.
| Read More » Huge Underwater Canyon Is Home to Amazing Deep-Sea Creatures  | A two-week-long seafaring mission off the coast of western Australia has helped illuminate a deep and dark underwater abyss the size of the Grand Canyon. During the trip to Perth Canyon, researchers encountered countless deep-sea organisms, including Venus flytrap anemones and golden coral. They then used a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) to explore the underwater canyon, which extends from the continental shelf for more than 2.5 miles (4 km) to the ocean floor. Back then, it appears that an ancient river cut the canyon during rifting that separated western Australia from India.
| Read More » Mars Rover Opportunity Gets Memory Fix Ahead of Marathon Milestone  | Engineers have troubleshot the memory issue affecting NASA's Opportunity Mars rover, just in time for the long-lived robot to complete its Red Planet marathon. A software upgrade has restored the use of Opportunity's flash memory — the kind that can store data even when the power is off — NASA officials announced Monday (March 23). The Opportunity rover had been doing without flash memory since late 2014 in the wake of a glitch. "Opportunity can work productively without use of flash memory, as we have shown for the past three months, but with flash we have more flexibility for operations," Opportunity Project Manager John Callas, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, said in a statement.
| Read More » Robot stays on its feet despite punishment It's another day of abuse for this poor robot named Atrias. If not being kicked around, Atrias spends hours being pummeled by balls. Unlike most bipedal robots which are designed to move like humans, engineers from the Dynamic Robotics Laboratory at Oregon State University modeled Atrias on a bird, creating what is basically a robotic ostrich that conserves energy while maximizing agility and balance. Atrias is fitted with two constantly moving pogo stick-like legs made of carbon fiber. Read More » Want an affordable earthquake warning system? Use animals, scientists say By Kieran Guilbert LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Wild animals can predict earthquakes several weeks before they strike, and motion-activated cameras that track their movements could be adopted in quake-prone countries as an affordable early warning system, scientists said on Tuesday. Scientists using a series of cameras in an Amazon region of Peru noticed changes in animal behavior three weeks before a 7.0 magnitude quake hit the area in 2011, according to a study published in the journal Physics and Chemistry of the Earth. Scientists have long believed that animals can predict earthquakes, but have until now relied on anecdotal evidence of changes in animal behavior, they said. Rachel Grant, lead author of the report and lecturer in Animal and Environmental Biology at Britain's Anglia Ruskin University, said the study was the first to document a fall in animal activity before an earthquake. Read More » Your Ideas Wanted to Help Name Parts of Pluto  | You can help put names on the Pluto maps that scientists will draw up after the first-ever flyby of the dwarf planet this summer. Researchers working on NASA's New Horizons mission, which will zoom through the Pluto system on July 14, are asking the public to propose and vote on names for geological features the probe will identify on Pluto and its largest moon, Charon. "Pluto belongs to everyone," New Horizon science team member Mark Showalter, of the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute in Mountain View, California, said in a statement. The SETI Institute is leading the "Our Pluto" naming campaign.
| Read More » Solid Gold: Poop Could Yield Precious Metals  | Instead of flushing millions down the toilet, humans could be mining their poop for gold. That's at least what some researchers with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) think. When poop arrives at a wastewater treatment plant, it is separated into biosolids and treated water. There are two good reasons to try to pull these metals out of poop, according to Smith, who's presenting her research on the subject at an American Chemical Society meeting this week.
| Read More » Want an affordable earthquake warning system? Use animals, scientists say By Kieran Guilbert LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Wild animals can predict earthquakes several weeks before they strike, and motion-activated cameras that track their movements could be adopted in quake-prone countries as an affordable early warning system, scientists said on Tuesday. Scientists using a series of cameras in an Amazon region of Peru noticed changes in animal behaviour three weeks before a 7.0 magnitude quake hit the area in 2011, according to a study published in the journal Physics and Chemistry of the Earth. Scientists have long believed that animals can predict earthquakes, but have until now relied on anecdotal evidence of changes in animal behaviour, they said. Rachel Grant, lead author of the report and lecturer in Animal and Environmental Biology at Britain's Anglia Ruskin University, said the study was the first to document a fall in animal activity before an earthquake. Read More » Electric fault delays relaunch of CERN collider after two-year refit  | By Robert Evans GENEVA (Reuters) - Scientists at Europe's CERN research center have had to postpone the imminent relaunch of their refitted 'Big Bang' machine, the Large Hadron Collider, because of a short-circuit in the wiring of one of the vital magnets. "Current indications suggest a delay of between a few days and several weeks," a statement from the world's leading particle physics research center said on Tuesday. Engineers had been expected to start on Wednesday pumping proton beams in opposite directions all the way round the two 27-km (17-mile) underground tubes in the LHC, closed down for the past two years for a refit. The smashing-together of particles inside the LHC is designed to mimic conditions just after the Big Bang at the dawn of the universe.
| Read More » Electric fault delays relaunch of CERN collider after two-year refit  | By Robert Evans GENEVA (Reuters) - Scientists at Europe's CERN research centre have had to postpone the imminent relaunch of their refitted 'Big Bang' machine, the Large Hadron Collider, because of a short-circuit in the wiring of one of the vital magnets. "Current indications suggest a delay of between a few days and several weeks," a statement from the world's leading particle physics research centre said on Tuesday. Engineers had been expected to start on Wednesday pumping proton beams in opposite directions all the way round the two 27-km (17-mile) underground tubes in the LHC, closed down for the past two years for a refit. The smashing-together of particles inside the LHC is designed to mimic conditions just after the Big Bang at the dawn of the universe.
| Read More » Astronaut Scott Kelly Will Test His Limits on Epic One-Year Space Mission  | An American astronaut is about to embark on a mother of a space mission. NASA astronaut Scott Kelly is counting down to launch to the International Space Station Friday (March 27) for a yearlong mission that will test his endurance like never before. Usually, space station missions last about six months, so Kelly's one-year mission will present a unique set of challenges for the astronaut. "On a six-month flight, your mindset is you're going to go up there, and you're going to be up there for a period of time, and you're going to come home," Kelly said in January.
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