- Email: [email protected]
UK fracking could come out carbon neutral
For daily news stories, visit newscientist.com/news
Frack away UK
limited availability would mean a dearth of skilled coders. So they connected a quantum chip made in their lab to a web interface. Would-be quantum coders can first practise with an online simulator, and can then ask to connect to the real chip and run basic algorithms. The simulator is already online, and the chip will be from 20 September. The chip only has two qubits, so it cannot outperform a regular PC. Still, the project should be a fun way to publicly demonstrate the technology, says Scott Aaronson at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
60 Seconds
of dirtier fossil fuels. No commercial fracking operations have yet been given the go-ahead in the UK. But huge amounts of gas could be available, according to the British Geological Survey. In a report
APPARENTLY, the UK can frack without busting its climate targets. That’s the message from a UK government report released this week. It explores the potential impact of fracking – short for “In the north of England hydraulic fracturing – on alone there is enough shale greenhouse gas emissions. gas to meet UK demands But there is a catch: methane for more than 40 years” leaks are a concern, and fracking will only remain carbon-neutral if last year, it estimated that in the companies come up with ways to north of England alone, there are limit them – by flaring off leaked 37.7 trillion cubic metres of gas gas, for instance. The extracted trapped in shale – enough to meet natural gas must also displace, UK needs for more than 40 years. rather than add to, consumption
Kenya’s watery roots discovered
Back door for spies
SIMON MAINA/AFP/Getty Images
THE internet is full of holes. Spy DON’T judge a book by its cover. Kenya’s Turkana County is notoriously agencies in the US and UK have dry, but a survey now shows that it is forced technology suppliers to sitting on a total of 250 trillion litres introduce “back doors” into the of groundwater. That is enough to online systems everyone uses. support 40 million people if it is These revelations come from extracted sustainably. the latest batch of files leaked by Over the last year, a firm called former National Security Agency Radar Technologies International contractor Edward Snowden. (RTI) has surveyed 36,000 square The files show that the kilometres of Turkana on behalf of agencies have forced tech firms the government. to deliberately weaken built-in Most of the water bonanza it computer security measures, discovered lies in five deep aquifers though exactly how is still that had not been spotted before. unknown. They might be RTI estimates that these reservoirs, tinkering with the encryption in combination with shallower ones algorithms that require a random already exploited, could provide number generator to produce 3.45 trillion litres of water per year, secure keys. in perpetuity. “One of the oldest tricks in the book is to modify the random number generator so it outputs only a tiny subset of all the random numbers it normally should,” says Markus Kuhn of the University of Cambridge – a bit like subtly weighting a die to roll 6 more often than it should. Nothing will be obvious, but cracking encrypted messages is easier if you know the vulnerability exists. German magazine Der Spiegel also claimed this week that the NSA can hack iPhones, Android smartphones and BlackBerrys to look at contact –Not as dry as it looks– lists, notes and SMS traffic.
It could be very good news for the region: Turkana County is prone to drought, and struggles to support the Kakuma refugee camp, which is currently home to 120,000 people. Before the deep extraction can begin, the Kenyan government must check the quality of the water, says Alan MacDonald of the British Geological Survey in Edinburgh, UK. It might contain too much fluoride to be drinkable. He says it is also crucial to figure out how long it takes for the aquifers to refill, to avoid taking the water out faster than it is replaced. MacDonald has found that other regions of Africa are rich in groundwater, too, a discovery that could help alleviate the continent’s chronic water-supply problems.
This way LADEE NASA’s latest moon shot is on its way to orbit after a technical hitch left it briefly pointing in the wrong direction. The LADEE spacecraft, which launched on 7 September, will reach the moon in about a month and will test a lunar broadband connection as well as collect data on the moon’s meagre atmosphere.
Mars hopefuls The submission period is closed, and about 200,000 people have applied to join Mars One, the private project that claims it will send humans on a one-way trip to the Red Planet by 2023. Applicants are now being screened by a selection committee, and those who make the cut will be notified by the year’s end.
That Szechuan buzz The delicious tingle you get from eating Szechuan pepper is not just down to taste buds. The spice stimulates your sense of touch, too. Experiments show people do not feel the tingle if the nerves that sense vibration have been turned off – and the feeling is identical to a gentle vibration of 50 hertz (Proceedings of the Royal Society B, DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2013.1680).
Mouse rewind Adult cells can be turned into pluripotent stem cells within the body, suggests a study in mice. Researchers induced the stem cells – which can differentiate into many different cell types – by using the same “recipe” of factors they use in the lab (Nature, DOI: 10.1038/ nature12586).
Two for SpaceshipTwo SpaceshipTwo, Virgin Galactic’s purpose-built tourist vehicle, made its second rocket-powered flight on 5 September. The rockets burned for 20 seconds and the craft ascended to 21 kilometres. That is longer and higher than on the first trip but a 70second burn is needed to reach space. Virgin plans to fly tourists in 2014.
14 September 2013 | NewScientist | 7
Frack away UK
limited availability would mean a dearth of skilled coders. So they connected a quantum chip made in their lab to a web interface. Would-be quantum coders can first practise with an online simulator, and can then ask to connect to the real chip and run basic algorithms. The simulator is already online, and the chip will be from 20 September. The chip only has two qubits, so it cannot outperform a regular PC. Still, the project should be a fun way to publicly demonstrate the technology, says Scott Aaronson at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
60 Seconds
of dirtier fossil fuels. No commercial fracking operations have yet been given the go-ahead in the UK. But huge amounts of gas could be available, according to the British Geological Survey. In a report
APPARENTLY, the UK can frack without busting its climate targets. That’s the message from a UK government report released this week. It explores the potential impact of fracking – short for “In the north of England hydraulic fracturing – on alone there is enough shale greenhouse gas emissions. gas to meet UK demands But there is a catch: methane for more than 40 years” leaks are a concern, and fracking will only remain carbon-neutral if last year, it estimated that in the companies come up with ways to north of England alone, there are limit them – by flaring off leaked 37.7 trillion cubic metres of gas gas, for instance. The extracted trapped in shale – enough to meet natural gas must also displace, UK needs for more than 40 years. rather than add to, consumption
Kenya’s watery roots discovered
Back door for spies
SIMON MAINA/AFP/Getty Images
THE internet is full of holes. Spy DON’T judge a book by its cover. Kenya’s Turkana County is notoriously agencies in the US and UK have dry, but a survey now shows that it is forced technology suppliers to sitting on a total of 250 trillion litres introduce “back doors” into the of groundwater. That is enough to online systems everyone uses. support 40 million people if it is These revelations come from extracted sustainably. the latest batch of files leaked by Over the last year, a firm called former National Security Agency Radar Technologies International contractor Edward Snowden. (RTI) has surveyed 36,000 square The files show that the kilometres of Turkana on behalf of agencies have forced tech firms the government. to deliberately weaken built-in Most of the water bonanza it computer security measures, discovered lies in five deep aquifers though exactly how is still that had not been spotted before. unknown. They might be RTI estimates that these reservoirs, tinkering with the encryption in combination with shallower ones algorithms that require a random already exploited, could provide number generator to produce 3.45 trillion litres of water per year, secure keys. in perpetuity. “One of the oldest tricks in the book is to modify the random number generator so it outputs only a tiny subset of all the random numbers it normally should,” says Markus Kuhn of the University of Cambridge – a bit like subtly weighting a die to roll 6 more often than it should. Nothing will be obvious, but cracking encrypted messages is easier if you know the vulnerability exists. German magazine Der Spiegel also claimed this week that the NSA can hack iPhones, Android smartphones and BlackBerrys to look at contact –Not as dry as it looks– lists, notes and SMS traffic.
It could be very good news for the region: Turkana County is prone to drought, and struggles to support the Kakuma refugee camp, which is currently home to 120,000 people. Before the deep extraction can begin, the Kenyan government must check the quality of the water, says Alan MacDonald of the British Geological Survey in Edinburgh, UK. It might contain too much fluoride to be drinkable. He says it is also crucial to figure out how long it takes for the aquifers to refill, to avoid taking the water out faster than it is replaced. MacDonald has found that other regions of Africa are rich in groundwater, too, a discovery that could help alleviate the continent’s chronic water-supply problems.
This way LADEE NASA’s latest moon shot is on its way to orbit after a technical hitch left it briefly pointing in the wrong direction. The LADEE spacecraft, which launched on 7 September, will reach the moon in about a month and will test a lunar broadband connection as well as collect data on the moon’s meagre atmosphere.
Mars hopefuls The submission period is closed, and about 200,000 people have applied to join Mars One, the private project that claims it will send humans on a one-way trip to the Red Planet by 2023. Applicants are now being screened by a selection committee, and those who make the cut will be notified by the year’s end.
That Szechuan buzz The delicious tingle you get from eating Szechuan pepper is not just down to taste buds. The spice stimulates your sense of touch, too. Experiments show people do not feel the tingle if the nerves that sense vibration have been turned off – and the feeling is identical to a gentle vibration of 50 hertz (Proceedings of the Royal Society B, DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2013.1680).
Mouse rewind Adult cells can be turned into pluripotent stem cells within the body, suggests a study in mice. Researchers induced the stem cells – which can differentiate into many different cell types – by using the same “recipe” of factors they use in the lab (Nature, DOI: 10.1038/ nature12586).
Two for SpaceshipTwo SpaceshipTwo, Virgin Galactic’s purpose-built tourist vehicle, made its second rocket-powered flight on 5 September. The rockets burned for 20 seconds and the craft ascended to 21 kilometres. That is longer and higher than on the first trip but a 70second burn is needed to reach space. Virgin plans to fly tourists in 2014.
14 September 2013 | NewScientist | 7