News: Google's Verily Trying to Debug Fresno with Bacteria-Treated Mosquitoes
For a company more associated with debugging computer programs, Google's parent company, Alphabet, is making a name for itself by taking on the real thing — mosquitoes.
Critical Situations Search Results
News: Game Dev Superstar Leaves Windows Mixed Reality Team to Return as GM of Bioware
Casey Hudson, the one-time project director for games like Star Wars: The Knights of the Old Republic and the original Mass Effect trilogy, has announced his return to his former home, Bioware as the General Manager. Of course, that also means he is leaving his role at Microsoft Studios as Creative Director, where he was reportedly working on both Xbox One and HoloLens projects.
News: Bacteria-Based Fuel Cell Aims a One-Two Punch at Global Warming
About a third of the methane released into the environment comes from the production and transport of natural gas. The gas leaks as it moves along the transport chain from gas wellheads to market.
News: One Drop of Blood Could Save Your Life from Sepsis with New Test
With a death rate of one in five, sepsis is a fast-moving medical nightmare. New testing methods might improve your odds of survival if this infection ever hits you.
Heart Patients Beware: More Than One-Third of Bypass Equipment Potentially Contaminated with Deadly Bacteria
More bad news for patients who have undergone heart surgery in the past five years. A new study suggests about one-third of heater-cooler units used in cardiac procedures remain contaminated with a slow-growing, potentially fatal bacteria.
News: Deadly or Deliberate? Diarrhea Is Actually Your Immune System in Overdrive
Montezuma's revenge, the runs, the trots, or just diarrhea — everyone gets it sooner or later. What exactly is diarrhea good for, if anything?
News: Chemical Cocktail on Mars Makes Microbial Life There Unlikely
A new study casts real suspicion on the possibility of life on Mars. Why? It seems the surface of the planet may be downright uninhabitable for microbial life as we know it.
News: Have a Dog? Be Careful of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever
Dangerous to humans and dogs, Rocky Mountain Fever, along with several other tickborne infections, is on the rise.
News: A Common Cancer-Causing Mono Virus Has a Special Trick to Hide from the Body's Defenses
Most of us have already had an encounter with the Epstein-Barr virus, or EBV, for short. As part of the herpes family, it's one of the most common disease-causing viruses in humans. We get the disease with (or without) some nasty symptoms, then we recover. However, EBV stays in our body after the illness has ended, and it's one of the few viruses known to cause cancer.
The Good Stuff: Breastfeeding Delivers Beneficial Bacteria to Baby
Breastfeeding is the ultimate in farm-to-table dining. It is sustenance prepared just for the baby and delivered with a very personal touch. Along with bonding, breastfeeding provides powerful protection to infants and young children in the form of beneficial bacteria, hormones, vitamins, protein, sugar, and antibodies manufactured on site to support infant health.
News: Termite Guts May Hold the Key to More Efficient Biofuels
Termite poop and biofuels — what's the connection? New research into termites' intestinal comings and goings describes a process that may speed the development and lower the cost of fuels made from plant matter.
News: This Asymptomatic Virus Can Damage the Immune System & May Trigger Celiac
Viral infections have been the focus of attention in the development of autoimmune diseases—diseases where the body's immune system reacts to the body's own cells—because they trigger the immune system into action.
News: Unexplained Link to Hepatitis Infections Could Inform Parkinson's Mysterious Causes
Two viral liver diseases could help us find the path toward the cause of Parkinson's disease. Researchers from the University of Oxford and UCL Institute of Neurology in London have reported an association between hepatitis B and C infections and an increased risk of Parkinson's disease. Their findings were published early online in the journal Neurology.
News: Microbes Lost from Corals Due to Global Warming Cause 90% of Great Barrier Reef to Bleach
The Great Barrier Reef in Australia is the largest living system on the planet. Yet more than 90% of the reef is bleaching because of the loss of a tiny algae that lives within the coral.
News: Anthrax Outbreak in Tanzania Brings a Dangerous Bioterror Threat Back to the World Stage
An outbreak of anthrax from contaminated meat in Tanzania sickened dozens of people and moves the danger of this deadly bacteria back into focus.
News: How Humanity's Choices in Brazil Brought Together Bats & Pigs in a Melting Pot of Diseases
Ecosystem changes caused by agricultural choices in Brazil are creating a dangerous microbe mix in exploding populations of vampire bats and feral pigs.
News: Bye Bye, French Bread & Pasta—There's a Fungal Outbreak Killing Europe's Wheat Crops
We may not fully appreciate all the important roles wheat plays in our lives until it's gone—or at least, when it's in very short supply. What would a world be like without bread, cakes, cereal, pasta, or wheat beer? If the dire warnings about an impending stem rust fungus come to pass, we may know all too soon.
News: HIV Co-Opts the Body's First Line of Defense—Using It as a Shuttle to Take Over
A new study just out reveals that HIV takes hold in the human body with the help of cells that usually work to heal, not kill.
News: Researchers Have Just Discovered How a Hospital Fungus Forms Slime, Becomes Drug Resistant & Kills Patients
It hasn't even been eight years since Candida auris was discovered—cultured and identified from the ear canal of a patient in Japan—and now it's drug-resistant, setting up residence in hospitals, killing patients, and wreaking havoc across the globe.
News: Genetically-Modified Parasites Could Save People from Malaria
You might feel the bite, you might not, but an infected mosquito has injected you with a parasite named Plasmodium falciparum, a single-cell protozoa that quickly takes up residence in your body.
News: The Unusual Stomach-Survival Mechanisms of Ulcer-Causing Bacteria Could Be Its Achilles Heel
The story of Helicobacter pylori is a real testament to the tenacity of medical researchers to prove their hypothesis. It took decades before the scientific world would accept that the bacteria H. pylori caused ulcers.
Hack Like a Pro: How to Get Facebook Credentials Without Hacking Facebook
Welcome back my, tenderfoot hackers! Many people come to Null Byte looking to hack Facebook without the requisite skills to do so. Facebook is far from unhackable, but to do so, you will need some skills, and skill development is what Null Byte is all about.
How To: Give Your MacBook's Battery a Longer, Healthier Life with These Power Tips
Apple's MacBook line of laptops is quite famous for their extensive battery life, thanks to various technologies that Apple has utilized. However, all things must pass, and over time your MacBook's battery will degrade. Certain use scenarios can accelerate the degradation of the battery—from excessive usage to high temperatures to overloading the system—and this can all lead to the untimely obliteration of your battery.
The Panama Papers Hack: Further Proof That Hacking Is Changing the World
Welcome back, my novice hackers! You have probably heard of the Panama Papers hack by now. This was a hack of the servers at Mossack Fonseca, a major law firm in Panama. This law firm specializes in assisting the rich and powerful to hide their wealth from taxes and scrutiny by creating tax havens overseas.
News: Why Samsung & Other Phone Makers Need to Stop Messing with Android
On the list of problems with Android, manufacturer tinkering ranks near the top. Slow or nonexistent updates, poor performance, excessive bloatware apps—all of these things can be attributed to manufacturer skins like TouchWiz or Sense, and none of them are issues with unmodified, Vanilla Android devices like the Nexus series.
How To: Make a Sequel to a Game
If your company has already released some popular and addictive game and you're thinking about creation a sequel, this article is just what you need. We gathered the main tips and advices that will be useful for the building a strategy and a sequel itself. Check out the following instructions and recommendations that can lend you a hand in making a sequel for your game.
Hack Like a Pro: How to Hack Web Apps, Part 6 (Using OWASP ZAP to Find Vulnerabilities)
Welcome back, my tenderfoot hackers! Web apps are often the best vector to an organization's server/database, an entry point to their entire internal network. By definition, the web app is designed to take an input from the user and send that input back to the server or database. In this way, the attacker can send their malicious input back to the servers and network if the web app is not properly secured.
Android Basics: What Is Root?
If you're completely new to Android, you're in for a treat with all of the software tweaks and customization options that your smartphone or tablet offers out of the box. But if you really want to take things to the next level, the ability to mod your device expands exponentially when you're rooted.
How To: Make the Best Deviled Eggs Ever
The first time I encountered a deviled egg, the name freaked me out. Why was it called a deviled egg? Was it the spawn of some demonic chicken? If I ate it, would my soul be at risk?
How to Hack Databases: Running CMD Commands from an Online MS SQL Server
Welcome back, my hacker novitiates! There are many ways to hack databases, and most of these techniques require SQL injection (SQLi), which is a way of sending SQL commands back to the database from a web form or other input. In this tutorial, we will use SQL injection to get access to the underlying server. So instead of getting access to the database and its data, we will use the database as an intermediary to gain access to the underlying server.
How to Train Your Python: Part 4, Basic User Input
In the last iteration of how to train your python, we covered basic string manipulation and how we can use it to better evaluate user input. So, today we'll be covering how to take user input. User input is very important to scripting. How can we do what the user says if we can't tell what the user wants? There are multiple ways to take input, we can give the user a prompt and take input from them directly, or we could use flags/switches, and take their input before the script is even execute...
How To: 10 Hidden Windows 10 Features You Should Know About
If you've been using Windows 10 for a while, you already know that Microsoft incorporated lots of new features into it. So you're probably familiar with Cortana (the new voice assistant), the Edge browser (their replacement for Internet Explorer), the newly resurrected Start menu, and all of the other big changes.
How to Hack Bluetooth, Part 2: Using MultiBlue to Control Any Mobile Device
Welcome back, rookie hackers! We recently began an exploration of ways to hack using the Bluetooth protocol. As you know, Bluetooth is a protocol that connects near field devices such as headsets, speakers, and keyboards. Its minimum range is a 10-meter radius (~33 feet) and maximum is at 100 meters (~328 feet).
How To: The Ultimate Guide to Deleting Apps & Bloatware on Android
As Android owners, we ultimately have to look at our device and ask the difficult question: "Where the hell did all these applications come from?"
News: Chinese Hack of U.S. Employment Records Reveals the Weakness of Signature-Based Defense Systems
With each day that dawns, there is a new, major hack that makes the news headlines. If you are paying attention, there are usually numerous hacks each day and far more that never make the news or are kept private by the victims. Every so often, a hack is so important that I feel compelled to comment on it here to help us learn something about the nature of hacking and IT security. This is one of those cases. Last week, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) revealed that they had been ...
Hack Like a Pro: How to Hack Web Apps, Part 2 (Website Spidering with WebScarab)
Welcome back, my tenderfoot hackers! Now that we have begun this trip down web app hacking lane, we need to first address target reconnaissance. Like any hack, reconnaissance is critical. (Are you tired of me saying that yet?)
How To: Create a Persistent Back Door in Android Using Kali Linux:
OR rather How to make the Backdoor Persistent: Hello, my Cold and Merciless Hackers,
Hack Like a Pro: Linux Basics for the Aspiring Hacker, Part 23 (Logging)
Welcome back, my amateur hackers! When you are using and administering Linux, it is important to be conversant in the use of the log files. As you know, log files are the repository for much information about our system, including errors and security alerts.
How To: Turn Your Smartphone into a Wireless Mouse & Keyboard for Your Computer
While you can do a lot of things on your smartphone that were once only done on a computer, having a laptop is still necessary and critical for many tasks. Often times, the two devices work very well together.
Hack Like a Pro: Metasploit for the Aspiring Hacker, Part 5 (Msfvenom)
Welcome back, my hacker novitiates! Eluding and evading antivirus software and intrusion detection systems is one of the most critical tasks of the hacker. As soon as a new exploit is developed and discovered, the AV and IDS developers build a signature for the attack, which is then likely to be detected and prevented.