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Great Apes Might Experience Mid-Life Crises Just Like HumansGrand Award Winner: Tesla Model SFYI: Can You Make An Authentic Twinkie At Home? And don’t forget to check out our other favorite stories of the week: How Israel’s ‘Iron Dome’ Knocks Almost Every Incoming Missile Out Of The SkyAre People Getting Dumber? One Geneticist Thinks SoThe Deep-Space SuitNintendo Wii U Review: Sounds Gimmicky, But Makes Good Games More GoodBeerSci: How To Drink Your Thanksgiving MealFYI: How Much Weight Can You Gain From Thanksgiving Dinner?...

When Glasziou first started weighing the evidence for homeopathy, he writes, he had an open mind: “I had begun the journey with an “I don’t know” attitude, curious about whether this unlikely treatment could ever work.” But after considering 57 review studies that covered a total of 176 trials, he found no evidence that any of the experiments showed any positive results beyond the placebo effect. And while the placebo effect is certainly powerful enough in its own right, it can’t stop the spread of infectious diseases like HIV or malaria....

At the time of the disaster, Popular Science was of course very interested in the U.S. space program and the launch. However, as a monthly print magazine unable to respond in real-time to breaking news events, the first mention of the disaster came in the April 1986 issue. And it was mentioned only briefly in the “What’s News” section at the end of the magazine, in an update from then editor-in-chief C....

“It can’t have other sources of heat,” says James Cooper, a NASA engineer. “It’ll just swamp the science you’re trying to get.” The telescope’s mirror and instruments need to be kept below about -370°F (-223°C)—cold enough to freeze nitrogen. That’s no easy task when the sun’s rays and the spacecraft bus, which contains JWST’s central computer and communications, can heat the telescope and its instrumentation up to a tropical 230°F (110°C)....

By now, you’ve probably seen the vibrant swirls of mythic castles and fantasy lands generated by AI art tools like DALL-E. You might have even been fooled by images that looked like they were painted from the brush of Matisse or van Gogh but were, in fact, created by a computer that was fed a few samples of the artist’s original work. And if you were critical, you may have wondered how the styles of these or other artists can be taken and mimicked without some type of repercussion....

This notion is based on quantum chromodynamics, which is the idea that describes how the strong nuclear force binds quarks and gluons together into protons and neutrons–and thus binds everything else together. We’re talking about very fundamental physics here, the process by which elementary particles form larger particles which form larger particles which form life, the universe, and everything. Researchers have long sought to model quantum chromodynamics on supercomputers, but the problem is that these kinds of simulations take place at such a small scale and are so dazzlingly complicated that even the biggest supercomputers can only simulate an extremely small swath of our infinitely massive universe–something just a few femtometers across (a femtometer is one million nanometers, which is still really, really small)....

The education ministry released a nation-wide preliminary report last week, defining “obese” children as kids who are 20 percent heavier than average. In Fukushima, the obesity rate among 6-year-old boys was 11.4 percent, up from 6.3 percent in 2010. For 8-year-old girls in the prefecture, the rate doubled to 14.6 percent. After the disaster, 449 schools set limits on how much time kids could be outdoors, and as of September, restrictions were still in place at 71 schools....

The Nexus Q creates a unique home-theater experience. Users connect the 4.6-inch sphere, which has a 25-watt amplifier, to a set of speakers or a TV. Each member of a group taps the top of the orb with his Android phone or tablet, and an NFC chip signals the device to automatically open Google Play, the app for the company’s cloud-based media storage. From there, group members can cue up songs saved to one another’s Google Play accounts....

Trying one out recently, I was a little worried I’d bite it on a hard Manhattan sidewalk. The systems that keep the board balanced aren’t apparent when you look at it, after all, so getting on requires a small leap of faith. But save for one awkward and undignified dismount from this electric one-wheeled skateboard, I successfully navigated around pedestrians and experienced zero disasters while riding the Onewheel Pint on New York City’s crowded public walkways....

There are a few tools in here not everyone is going to have access to (a soldering iron, for example), but if you’ve got them, it’s a relatively simple 22 steps to your sword of the future. Make the handle out of PVC, put on some spray paint for flair, and add LEDs for the glow. If you’re proficient with the tools, there’s also enough wiggle room in the instructions to personalize, letting you toy with the handle width and, of course, the color....

It’s common knowledge that the tech company monitors your browsing habits to paint a picture of who you are, then uses that portrait to show you ads you might be interested in while you search the web, watch videos on YouTube, or find your way home on Google Maps. But what’s not well-known is how easy it is for you to see that profile for yourself and opt out of some or all of the company’s data-collection process....

Before getting started, let’s make one thing clear: Exercise is a panacea for a lot of problems, and most people aren’t getting enough. The U.S. government recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity activity a week—that could be walking, jogging, swimming, or biking—but many people struggle to find the time to do so. Exercise reduces your risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes, some cancers, and other health issues. It improves your mood and mental health, and helps you sleep better....

It’s not too time-consuming or complicated, and following these steps will ensure your home movies, video tape collection, and rare audio tracks can be preserved for years to come. The hardware you need First of all, you’re going to need something to play the old tapes you’ve got. If you’ve long since got rid of your cassette or VHS player, you’ll have to head to eBay or Craigslist to try and pick up a second-hand one....

You probably do a lot of sharing from your phone—photos, files, links—which is why both Android and iOS have a sharing button prominently displayed on most parts of their interfaces. As a refresher, on Android phones, the “share” button looks like a “less-than” sign, with a circle at each point, whereas on iPhones, it’s an arrow pointing out of a square. But no matter which platform you’re using, the purpose of the button is the same: to share whatever you’re looking at with other people....

Ask Spotify for help Spotify is serious about podcasting, and that extends to recommendations, too. Next time you open up the Spotify app on your laptop or phone, look on your home screen for the Daily Podcasts playlist that the streaming service has created for you. And you’ve got a wide choice of ways to find podcasts, too—some of which you might not have considered before. If you’ve already gone through all the episodes of PopSci’s The Weirdest Thing I Learned This Week and Ask Us Anything, there are simple ways to ensure your podcast well never runs dry....

But some components cannot keep up with the longer lives of our devices, which has resulted in more and more people having to deal with major battery problems. “Batteries are consumable”, explains Craig Lloyd, head of content operations at iFixit, “and more people are starting to realize that.” A few years ago if your battery died it made more sense to just get a new smartphone. But people are starting to realize that getting a new battery will leave their phones as good as new....

I was burned out. “I feel like I sprained my brain,” I told my friend over the phone. When I wasn’t working, I felt fine; when I tried to use my head, it felt like putting weight on a bum ankle. I know I’m not alone. At this moment, when work is isolating some people at home while putting others in danger, burnout seems particularly rampant. In a survey of 1,500 workers from Indeed in March 2021, 53 percent said they were burned out—up by nearly 10 percent from the previous year....

Gmail Gmail has a confidential mode, though it’s easy to overlook. This tool lets you give your sent messages an expiration date, so your words won’t stick around in the recipient’s inbox forever. To make this work, Google hosts your self-destructing messages on its own servers instead of shooting them to another one. That allows the company to retain control and delete them after a set period of time. From email to instant messaging, know your options when it comes to self-destructing missives—you’ll certainly be able to find one that suits your need to be utterly inconspicuous....

Why we need good sleep habits Catching Z’s is critical for many functions of the human body, and current guidelines recommend adults consistently get at least seven hours of sleep per night. Previous research has shown that decreased sleep is associated with an elevated risk of cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, and depression. More recent research has linked a lack of sleep in adults in their 50s to 70s to the development of dementia....