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'Pop-Up' 3D Structures Can Mimic Brain Circuits
 | By mimicking children's pop-up books, scientists can now make complex microscopic 3D shapes that model brain circuitry and blood vessels, researchers say. Materials scientist John Rogers, at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and his colleagues want to create similarly complex devices that can wrap around these biological structures, potentially supporting or improving their function. To manufacture these structures, the scientists fabricate 2D patterns of ribbons on stretched elastic silicone rubber. The 2D patterns are designed so that there are both strong and weak points of stickiness between the patterns and the silicone rubber they sit on.
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This Computer Program Can Beat Anyone at Poker
 | Computers have figured out how to win at chess, checkers and tic-tac-toe, and now, a computer program has conquered the game of poker. A research team led by Michael Bowling, a professor of computer science at the University of Alberta in Canada, developed a computer program that can outplay humans at a two-player poker game — specifically, heads-up limit hold 'em.
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Venus Points the Way to Mercury in Night Sky This Week
 | Mercury is one of the brightest planets in the sky, but very few skygazers ever see it. This week, for five evenings, Mercury will be within 1 degree of the brilliant planet Venus, making it easy to spot. Venus is the brightest object in the sky other than the sun and moon, so is easily spotted low on the western horizon about half an hour after sunset. This week it will be joined by the tiny planet Mercury.
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Hubble Telescope Captures Best View Ever of the Andromeda Galaxy
 | The Hubble Space Telescope has captured an amazing new photo of the Andromeda Galaxy. The new mosaic image represents the sharpest and largest mosaic image of the Milky Way's galactic neighbor ever taken, Hubble officials said.
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Retro NASA Travel Posters Invite You to Real Alien Worlds
 | The three posters — created by Joby Harris and David Delgado, visual strategists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California — feature artistic renderings of what it might be like to stand (or fly) on one of a trio of imagination-capturing alien worlds. The planet is the first small planet discovered in what might be its star's habitable zone — the area around a star that would allow a planet to support liquid water on its surface. NASA officials don't know if the planet is rocky or has a surface "buried beneath thick layers of gas and ice," according to the poster. "Prospects for life on this unusual world aren't good as it has a temperature similar to dry ice," the NASA poster says.
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Japan reorients space effort to bolster security, drive exports
TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan is shifting its space program toward potential military uses in a new policy hailed on Friday as a "historic turning point" by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who wants to strengthen defence and boost exports. The move comes as emerging powers such as China and India join the United States to expand space activities for commercial and security purposes. Last year, Abe eased a postwar curb on arms exports and on allowing troops to fight overseas, as part of a more robust military and diplomatic posture for Japan. ...
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'Invisibilia' Podcast Explores Bizarre Workings of the Human Mind
From how people deal with their deepest, darkest thoughts to the experience of living in a world without fear, a new podcast explores the hidden forces that shape human behavior. Hosted by Alix (pronounced Ah-LEES) Spiegel and Lulu Miller, contributors to the popular radio programs "This American Life" and "Radiolab," the show is produced by National Public Radio.
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Easter Island's Demise May Have Surprising New Explanation
 | The downfall of Easter Island may have had more to do with preexisting environmental conditions than degradation by humans, according to a new study of the remote speck of land made famous by its enormous stone-head statues. Easter Island, also known as Rapa Nui, was first settled around A.D. 1200, and Europeans landed on its shores in 1722. Scientist and author Jared Diamond argued in his 2005 book "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed" (Viking Press) that prior to European contact, the indigenous people of the island degraded the environment to the extent that they could no longer thrive. The new study suggests that Easter Island's people were, indeed, suffering before Europeans came along.
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Coolest Eco-Friendly Technologies at CES 2015
 | Companies from around the globe are debuting technologies here at CES that aim to remedy today's most pressing environmental problems. Electronics company LG announced a whole line of "greener" home appliances that use less energy and water than the company's previous models, and Mercedes announced a new luxury vehicle powered by hydrogen fuel cells. Here are some of the coolest green tech products being showcased at CES.
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10,000 Steps? New Trackers Go Beyond the Data Dump
"Lots of data from our wearables and beyond is just data," said Dr. Daniel Kraft, a pediatrician and the founding executive director of Exponential Medicine, at a talk here at the 2015 CES. For example, a wearable device called StoneCrysus, which will be available in February 2015, says it can calculate people's metabolic rate based on measures like their heart and respiration rates. StoneCrysus allows users to track the food they're eating with a user-friendly picture of their meal— they can place portions of common foods on an image of a plate, said Dr. David Landers, a cardiologist and co-founder of the Edgewater, N.J., company that makes the device.
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New Implant Lets Paralyzed Rats Walk Again
 | An experimental flexible implant that connects directly to the spinal cord might someday lead to a treatment for people with spinal cord injuries, and could possibly help people with paraplegia move again, researchers say. They call the soft, stretchable device "e-dura," after the dura mater, which is one of the layers of protective membranes that surround the brain and spinal cord. The researchers implanted the device into rats — it rests on the spinal cord, and delivers electric signals, as well as drugs, to the surrounding nerves, triggering them to fire impulses. One obstacle is that electronics are made of stiff materials, whereas the spinal cord and its protective covering are more flexible.
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So Long, Ugly Fitness Trackers: Fashionable Devices Debut
The makers of the Mira band clearly took fashion into account when designing this fitness tracker, which is aimed at women. Like the Activité, the Activité Pop has two hand dials: one that shows the time of day, and a smaller dial that shows users' progress toward their activity goals.
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Weather Looks Good for Bold SpaceX Launch on Saturday: Watch Live
 | Mother Nature appears to be cooperating for the planned launch Saturday (Jan. 10) of SpaceX's next robotic cargo mission to the International Space Station, a launch that will also include a potentially epic demonstration of reusable rocket technology. Weather forecasters are predicting an 80 percent chance of good conditions Saturday morning at Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. SpaceX aims to bring the Falcon 9's first stage back to Earth for a precision landing on an "autonomous spaceport drone ship" in the Atlantic Ocean. The bold and unprecedented maneuver is part of SpaceX's ongoing effort to develop fully and rapidly reusable rockets, which the company's billionaire founder, Elon Musk, has said could slash the cost of spaceflight by a factor of 100.
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When You Stray From a Trail, Invasive Species Follow
 | Rachel DeSantis is a junior at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland (UMD), College Park. Deep (and even not so deep) in the Frederick City Watershed in Frederick, Md., the Japanese stiltgrass grows in thick, luscious bunches. The watershed, a popular destination for mountain bikers and hikers, offers 9.5 miles (15.3 kilometers) of sanctioned trails for public use. "These [unsanctioned] trail networks can help spread invasive species into areas where they'd otherwise be excluded," said Kiel Edson, a graduate student researching the plants as part of a University of Maryland partnership with the city of Frederick.
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Magnetic Pulses May Reboot Stroke Recovery (Op-Ed)
More than 750,000 Americans experience a stroke each year in the United States. When one side of the brain is damaged by stroke, the healthy side tends to generate much more activity to compensate for the immobile side. Often, stroke patients can have a rapid partial recovery in the first few months after a stroke, then the spontaneous healing process slows down after about three to six months, and then slows even further after a year. Up to this point, doctors have not known how to reset the brain back into the state of rapid recovery that we see in the initial months after a stroke.
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Will People Ever Trust E-Signatures?
Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.
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Cosmic Renaissance: Why Space Is Popular Again (Op-Ed)
Nicholas Thurkettle is a lifelong outer-space enthusiast and co-author, with M.F. Thomas, of the acclaimed sci-fi thriller "Seeing by Moonlight" (BookBaby, 2013). He contributed this article to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. The first British group to top the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States was not The Beatles but a group that went by the name The Tornados.
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Anti-Flu Meds Are Especially Important This Flu Season, CDC Says
This year's flu season is severe. So far, at least 26 children in the United States have died of influenza, and thousands of elderly people have been hospitalized, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It might even save your life," CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said today (Jan. 9).
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