News: Sleeping with the Fishes — Decay in Wastewater Damages Aquatic Life
Everything from disposed of drugs to hormones and disease-causing bacteria — anything that is rinsed or flushed down the drain — can contaminate wastewater.
Society Disconnects Search Results
News: 'Useless' Antibiotics Work When Matched Up in Threes
The search is on to find antibiotics that will work against superbugs — bacteria that are rapidly becoming resistant to many drugs in our antibiotic arsenal.
News: What Is All This Stuff About Augmented Reality? A Primer for the New Enthusiast
We are in a pretty major technology boom at the moment. One that will likely make the industrial revolution look tiny. And one of these technologies that are building up to lead the way is something called augmented reality.
News: Tired of Long, Pointless Conversations on Dating Apps? 'First' Can Help
We're all looking to meet someone, and in this day and age the easiest way to do that is through one of the various dating apps out there. But we can all admit it can get disheartening swiping through all of those people for the frustration of someone not answering your messages after matching. The fact is, we could be missing out on great people just because they don't have time in their busy lives to answer their dating apps every day. Not to mention the fact that we as a society are becomi...
News: Organic or Not, Your Produce Is Loaded with Bacteria, Inside & Out
We know that healthcare-related facilities can be fertile ground for antibiotic-resistant bacteria, but recent research suggests your produce aisle might be too.
News: To Stop Local Measles Outbreaks, International Travelers Need to Get Vaccinated — But Only 47% Do
In the worst measles outbreak in the state since 1990, the Minneapolis Department of Heath races to contain the spread of an infection believed to have originated from an infected traveler. Mistaken attitudes and unvaccinated travelers are creating a world of hurt and disease for Americans. A recent study found that more than half of eligible travelers from the US are electing to skip their pre-trip measles vaccine.
News: Step Aside Penicillin — A Deep Dive into Fungus Genes Reveals Over 1,300 Potential Antibiotics Waiting to Be Discovered
On October 17, 1943, a story in the New York Herald Tribune read "Many laymen — husbands, wives, parents, brothers, sisters, friends — beg Dr. Keefer for penicillin," according to the American Chemical Society. Dr. Chester Keefer of Boston was responsible for rationing the new miracle drug, penicillin.
News: The Latest in HIV Prevention — Syringe Vending Machines in Vegas & On-Site Testing at Walgreens
It's about time people acknowledged that judging drug users would do nothing productive to help them. In the US this week, two new programs are launching that should help addicts be a little safer: Walgreens Healthcare Clinic will begin offering to test for HIV and hepatitis C next week, and Las Vegas is set to introduce clean syringe vending machines to stop infections from dirty needles.
Brief Reality: AR Hits the Conference Circuit
Every Tuesday, Next Reality will give readers a rundown of the augmented and mixed reality news briefs from the preceding week that we didn't cover already. This way, you'll never miss anything of importance in the Next Reality landscape, and will always know what's going on with new augmented and mixed reality tech and applications.
News: Livestock Antibiotic Use Increases Threat of Resistant Microbes to Humans
Antibiotics used to prevent diseases in livestock are creating a world of hurt for humans and the soil we depend on for food. Bacterial resistance to antibiotics is a global health issue. The overuse, underuse, and poor use of these life-saving drugs is rapidly removing them as a treatment option for serious infections in humans—plus bacteria are naturally adaptive.
News: World's Largest Fleet of Driverless Cars Will Be Launched by GM
General Motors Co. (GM) is set to expand their fleet of driverless cars in San Francisco, Detroit, and Scottsdale, according to documents filed by the company.
News: Researchers Have Found Zika's Sweet Spot & Potential Key to Fetal Infections
An advance in the race to stop birth defects caused by Zika-infected mothers has been made by a team of researchers from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. They have identified the process Zika uses to gain entry into the placenta, and published their findings in the journal Biochemistry.
News: Scientists Are Using the Special Physics of Dragonfly Wings to Create Surfaces That Shred Bacteria on Contact
As drug-resistant bacteria become more commonplace, researchers are looking for new antibacterial strategies to disrupt disease-causing microbes. Some scientists are working to create new drugs, while others are trying out drug combinations. Another group, however, are ditching pharmaceuticals altogether and experimenting with non-drug alternatives.
Bye Bye, OJ: How a Blue-Bellied Insect Helps Bacteria Kill Off Citrus Crops
A tiny louse is responsible for decimating the citrus industry. Diaphorina citri, the louse in question, better known as the Asian citrus psyllid, harbors and spreads the "Candidatus Liberibacter asiaticus" bacteria that causes citrus greening disease.
News: Wine Research Study Reveals How to Make Better Booze by Dosing Yeast with Nitrogen
Ah, wine. The bouquet fills your nose. The rich finish fills your mouth with soft flavors of oak and raspberries. The wine warms your belly and soothes your mind. Yeast and their biochemical factory help create this feast for your senses. Thanks to a research group from France, we now have a little more information on how that process works and a little more appreciation for yeast's contribution.
News: Dangerous Bacterial Films Communicate with Electric Pulses, Which Means We Could Zap Them to Interfere
Lighthouses and signal fires may have been the first social media. Without the ability to share language, a distant light meant "humans here." A new study from the University of California, San Diego, finds that bacteria can also send out a universal sign to attract the attention of their own, and other bacterial species.
How To: Test for Adups' Spyware on Your Phone—& Disable It
Mobile security researchers at Kryptowire recently uncovered spyware preinstalled on hundreds of thousands of Android smartphones by FOTA provider Adups which was gathering personally identifiable information (PII) such as call logs, app usage data, and even the full contents of text messages and sending these to a third-party server—all without the users' knowledge.
News: The 5 Most Useful File-Sharing Apps for Android
Heads up! We've done a new, more thorough review of the best Android file-sharing apps. You can check that out here. Our old file-sharing app roundup can still be viewed below for posterity.
How To: Watch the 2015 Super Bowl XLIX Commercials Online Right Now
Super Bowl Sunday is just around the corner. With 111.5 million viewers tuning in last year (112.6 if you count streaming), which broke another record that it previously set for the most-watched television event in U.S. history, it's safe to say that most of us will be watching Super Bowl XLIX on February 1st, 2015, whether via TV, web, or mobile.
How To: Recognize the Tricks of a Salesman (And Overcome Them)
Have you ever fallen victim to a clever Jedi mind trick? Don't worry. It happens. There are evolutionary reasons as to why our brains sometimes give into the oldest tricks in the book. Fortunately, the more you understand the tricks of a salesman, the easier it is to avoid their gripping psychological influence. Clue #1: Too Much Specificity
How To: Repel Mosquitoes Naturally Using Just Plants & Oils
While we've already covered several good ways to tame the itch of a mosquito bite, you're much better off preventing them from biting in the first place than dealing with the itchy aftermath.
News: Have a Little More Christmas in Your Steampunk
Religion is one of the most-ignored topics when it comes to Steampunk, which is surprising given how important religion was in Victorian England. Even the hot-button issues of race and gender are confronted with a greater awareness than religion.
News: Treat Yourself (Or Someone Else) to Steampunk Sex for the Holidays
A Steampunk's Guide to Sex was the subject of a recent successful Kickstarter campaign, and I now hold the finished book in my hands. As such, I can say (mostly) unreservedly that you should buy this book. Allow me to tell you why, before I get into the nitty-gritty about the book itself. Sex is something of an odd topic in America because it's perfectly legal, and yet taboo. Unlike things that are illegal and not taboo, like drug use, murder, theft, etc. What this means is that children can ...
How To: The 11 Most Deliciously Absurd Thanksgiving Day Meals Ever
Thanksgiving is pretty much the only day out of the year when you can be a complete fatass. It's totally expected, if not encouraged. In fact, if you aren't stuffing your face with a bunch of delicious and unhealthy food, people start to look at you funny.
How to Hack Restaurant City: Money cheat (09/30/09)
Restaurant City is a Facebook game that allows you to create your own restaurant. Watch this video tutorial to learn how to hack Restaurant City: Money cheat (09/30/09).
How To: Turn Your Samsung Galaxy Smartphone or Tablet into a Second Display for Your Computer
An iPad can serve as a second screen for a Mac via Sidecar, available since iPadOS 13, but Apple isn't the only manufacturer to support such a feature. Samsung has had a similar tool since One UI 3.1 that lets you turn certain Samsung Galaxy tablets into second displays for your PC — and there's a hidden feature that expands it to more tablets and even Samsung Galaxy smartphones.
How To: Use Your Rooted Phone to Root Another Phone
The biggest hurdle to rooting is that it usually requires a computer. Things get complicated when you're trying to use a desktop operating system to exploit a mobile OS, and the connection isn't always reliable. But with the help of Magisk, you can now use one Android phone to root another.
How To: Spy on SSH Sessions with SSHPry2.0
SSH, or the secure shell, is a way of controlling a computer remotely from a command-line interface. While the information exchanged in the SSH session is encrypted, it's easy to spy on an SSH session if you have access to the computer that's being logged in to. Using a tool called SSHPry, we can spy on and inject commands into the SSH sessions of any other user logged in to on the same machine.
News: Apple's iOS 13.4 GM for Public Beta Testers Includes New Memoji Stickers, Updated Mail Toolbar & More
Apple released iOS 13.4 to public beta testers on March 18. The update comes the same day we learned that iOS 13.4 would be made available March 24. The sixth beta is iOS 13.4's GM (golden master), even though Apple refers to it as "beta 6."
News: Apple's iOS 13.4 GM for Developers Includes New Memoji Stickers, Updated Mail Toolbar, CarKey API & More
Apple released iOS 13.4 to registered developers on March 18. The update comes just hours after news broke that iOS 13.4 would hit all compatible devices on March 24. The update is the GM (golden master), which makes it the same build as the official release we expect to see on March 24, although Apple does refer to it as "beta 6" on the dev site.
News: Billionaire Silicon Valley Tech Leader Wants Businesses to Stay Open, but Healthy Public Must Come First vs. Coronavirus
There are times when leadership is tested. This is one of those times. As government and business leaders around the world are grappling with the unfolding coronavirus pandemic, the real-time responses to the crisis from many leaders have been great and, at times, less-than-optimal.
News: The Mechanics of Panic — Why You Shouldn't Look to Elon Musk & Social Media Experts for Coronavirus Pandemic Advice
MIT artificial intelligence researcher Lex Fridman recently asked SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk possibly the best question he's ever been asked: What would he ask a hypothetical AGI system (an AI system with human-level intelligence and understanding) if he only had one question?
How To: 7 Tips to Improve Your Privacy & Safety on Twitter
As fun as Twitter is, it can also quickly turn scary. Anonymous, aggressive, and troll accounts can attack you for your tweets and stalk your every move. While you could make your profile private and block users, there are lesser-known privacy and security features that you can switch to improve your safety online.
How To: 7 Ways to Use Android's Digital Wellbeing Feature to Improve Your Stress Levels
It seems like each day our phones become more integrated into our lives. School, work, shopping — so many tasks either require a phone or heavily benefit from one. But our phones are a double-edged sword that can easily distract us and harm our mental health as well.
How To: Hack UnrealIRCd Using Python Socket Programming
UnrealIRCd is an open-source IRC server that has been around since 1999 and is perhaps the most widely used one today. Version 3.2.8.1 was vulnerable to remote code execution due to a backdoor in the software. Today, we will be exploiting the vulnerability with Metasploit, examining the underlying code to understand it, and creating our own version of the exploit in Python.
How To: Hack MacOS with Digispark Ducky Script Payloads
The USB Rubber Ducky and the Digispark board both suffer from the same issue when attacking macOS computers: a keyboard profiler pop-up which tries to identify any non-Apple USB keyboards. While it's an annoying setback, the solution is a simple modification that allows Mac computers to be targeted, which affects the ability to target Windows and Linux devices.
How To: Spot Fake Businesses & Find the Signature of CEOs with OSINT
Businesses leave paper trails for nearly every activity they do, making it easy for a hacker or researcher to dig up everything from business licenses to a CEO's signature if they know where to look. To do this, we'll dig into the databases of government organizations and private companies to learn everything we can about businesses and the people behind them.
Hands-On: Hands-On with Magic Leap's Undersea, an AR Experience That Transports You to Another World
The latest immersive production from Magic Leap Studios finally got its debut on Monday at Siggraph, during which the company also released the app to the general public, so we took it for a spin.
How To: Turn Your Galaxy Note 9 into an iPhone
For some Android users, this guide is sacrilege — but for others, iOS is just an attractive operating system that can be admired without feeling like you've betrayed your own phone. If you're one of those Galaxy Note 9 owners that have peeked across the aisle and desired an interface as clean as the one on the iPhone XS Max, you can configure your Note 9 to look like its rival with some tinkering.
How To: Unlock the Bootloader on the Essential PH-1
Although the Essential PH-1 got off to a rocky start, thanks to steady updates, it has slowly become one of the best Android phones to come out in recent years. For $499, the Essential Phone is a cheaper Pixel, receiving updates almost as soon as the Pixel lineup does. What's more, you get a phone with an easily unlockable bootloader, which is the first step to rooting.