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Author Archives: MSNBC.com: Technology & Science

Abdulmutallab could not have blown up plane

An experimment recreating what might have happened over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009 indicates that the would-be bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, would not have brought down the plane. Even if the “Underwear Bomber” Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab had exploded his device on Christmas day, 2009, the Airbus A330 would have survived, according to an experiment conducted by a BBC documentary team.

Funky chickens have sexual-identity issues

Sex cells in the bodies of chickens can lead to some individuals that appear half male and half female. The female side is brown with a small wattle and slight build, while the male side is white with a large wattle, large breast musculature and heavy bone structure. Some chickens have sexual-identity issues, waddling around with half-male and half-female plumage.  Now researchers have figured out the cause of the gender-confusing traits: Half of their bodies are full of female sex cells, while the other half contains mostly male cells.

Einstein was right: General relativity confirmed

An image of a galaxy cluster in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, showing some of the 70,000 bright elliptical galaxies that were analyzed to test general relativity on cosmic scales. 



  Score one more for Einstein. A new study has confirmed his theory of general relativity works on extremely large scales.

Conan’s lone Twitter followee: ‘It’s totally nuts’

Conan O'Brien.Conan O’Brien decided last week to pick Killen as the only person he would follow on Twitter, turning the 19-year-old’s life upside down.

Doomsday seed vault hits 1/2 million mark

This Feb. 25, 2008 file photo shows the frozen door handle to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. The vault has the capacity to store 4.5 million seed samples from around the globe, and recently hit the half-million mark. Two years after receiving its first deposits, a “doomsday” seed vault on an Arctic island has amassed half a million seed samples, making it the world’s most diverse repository of crop seeds, the vault’s operators announced Thursday.

Palm teeters in crowded smart phone market

Last year, Palm Inc. thought it had all the right pieces for a rebirth in the market it helped create. Now Palm might be the latest company to learn that great technology and an accomplished leader don't guarantee success. Last year, Palm thought it had all the pieces for a turnaround in the market it pioneered: A new CEO known for making the iPod a household name, a sleek new smart phone called the Pre and fresh, intuitive operating software.

Google chief sees outcome ’soon’ in China row

Google said in January that it had detected a cyber attack originating from China, and threatened to pull out of the country. Google expects an outcome soon from its talks with China over a censorship and hacking dispute, Chief Executive Eric Schmidt said on Wednesday.

Officials: Ex-TSA worker tried to sabotage PCs

Federal prosecutors have charged a former Transportation Security Administration employee with attempting to sabotage terror watch list computers and by attempting to introduce a virus into the computer system, according to news sources.

Global agency reconsiders address for porn sites

A global Internet oversight agency is reopening discussions about whether to create a “.xxx” domain name. It would be an online red-light district where porn sites can set up shop away from the wandering eyes of children and teenagers.

Can MySpace overhaul lure users back to site?

An undated image courtesy of MySpace. The new site recasts MySpace more strongly around its music and media content, with features such as the ability to listen to a music playlist based on songs that other MySpace users are sharing in their stream of updates.