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March 27, 2003
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Scientists identify killer virus
Experts say they have now confirmed the identity of a virus which may have killed more than 50 people worldwide.
The US Centers for Disease Control says that a Corona virus - possibly a strain never before seen in humans - is to blame.
Other types of Corona virus can cause the common cold.
The results came as increasing concern over the infection prompted the closure of all Hong Kong schools for more than a week.
The Hong Kong government has ordered people who believe they have been exposed to the virus to stay away from work - or be fined or jailed.
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Behold, the Invisible Man, if Not Seeing Is Believing
 Enveloped in a green plastic raincoat, Kazutoshi Obana slowly raised his arms. Then, with a click of a button, Mr. Obana, a graduate student at Tokyo University, faded away.
In his place, a ghostly image of the cityscape directly behind him came into view.
Graduate students may be resigned to some invisibility, particularly in the eyes of their advisers, but this was something else entirely: an "invisible" raincoat, under development at the university.
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Al-Jazeera.net Hacked / Replaced by Pro U.S. Message
Visitors to both the Arabic and English versions of the Al-Jazeera Web site on Thursday were greeted with an American flag and a pro-U.S. message, the work of an apparent online vandal.
The controversial Middle Eastern news service was the victim of a domain hijacking. The actual defacement appeared on a free Web site service provided by NetWorld Connections. Technically known as a "redirect," the hack causes Web browsers that attempt to go to www.aljazeera.net--as well as the English site--to be surreptitiously redirected to the content hosted on NetWorld's servers.
The service detected a spike in traffic early this morning, and an e-mail from a security specialist confirmed that visitors to Al-Jazeera were being redirected to NetWorld's service, said Ken Bowman, CEO of the Salt Lake City company.
"We pulled down the content immediately," Bowman said. He added that VeriSign, which administers the domain registry, eliminated the redirect later in the morning. "They never even touched (Al-Jazeera's) site," he said.
A representative of VeriSign couldn't immediately answer questions regarding how the domain had been hijacked.
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Windows XP SP1 glitch could slow systems
Microsoft has acknowledged and patched a glitch with its Windows XP Service Pack 1 (SP1) update that can cause system slowdowns, but has not yet made its still-developing fix widely available.
Because of changes made in SP1 to Windows XP's memory management system, programs that affect large blocks of memory may take up to ten times longer to load on a system running SP1 than on one without, Microsoft said. The company detailed the problem on its support Web site in a recently posted Knowledge Base article, "Programs Run Slower After You Install Windows XP SP-1" (article #815411).
The bug affects both the Professional and Home Edition versions of Windows XP. SP1, released in September, includes fixes for a number of security flaws and bugs discovered since Windows XP's release.
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Panel delays look at Webcast royalties
A U.S. House of Representatives panel has indefinitely postponed a meeting, set for Thursday, that would have focused on a different method for setting copyright royalties for radio and Internet broadcasts.
A new bill, titled the Copyright Royalty and Distribution Act, calls for the Library of Congress to hire a full-time judge who would hear disputes over "reasonable" royalty rates.
The bill makes dozens of changes to one of the most convoluted portions of U.S. copyright law, which essentially says the federal government will set rates for compulsory licenses for broadcasts and Webcasts of music. Because it is backed by Reps. Lamar Smith of Texas, and Howard Berman of California, the top Republican and Democrat on the House subcommittee overseeing copyright law, the measure had been expected to receive a favorable reception at Thursday's hearing.
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Airport virus checks urged
Countries with large numbers of cases of a virulent pneumonia should screen passengers at airports for the illness, say experts.
The World Health Organisation says that air passengers leaving Hong Kong, Taiwan, Hanoi, Singapore, Toronto and Guangdong province in China should be asked a series of questions to try to spot those carrying the SARS virus.
The illness looks likely to have killed more than 50 people worldwide, and air travellers have carried it to more than a dozen different countries in the space of a week.
A WHO spokesman said that the illness seemed to be spread by "close contact", meaning an infected passenger could spread the disease to anyone sitting within a few rows of seats on the plane.
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Key to Strains of Anthrax Is Discovered
Scientists have discovered why different strains of the bacterium that causes anthrax differ so much in virulence, a finding that in theory could produce more effective vaccines and better tools for distinguishing and tracking the lethal germ.
But the finding could also aid the creation of designer varieties of anthrax that are potentially deadlier to humans. Because of that potential danger, a debate occurred over whether the discovery should be kept secret, scientists said. In the end, it was decided that the benefits of publication outweighed the risks.
The discovery was made by six scientists at Louisiana State University, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, the nation's top center for studying germ defenses. It is published in the current Journal of Clinical Microbiology.
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New Proteomic Techniques Reveal Workings Of Bacteria Linked To Cystic Fibrosis
Researchers have identified a cell signaling system that may help the bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa establish itself in the lungs of cystic fibrosis patients. The researchers used a new technology to seek insights into an important and elusive enemy, and say the findings are important for biology and potentially important for therapy.
The researchers identified the activation of this signaling system by the use of new quantitative proteomic technology that analyzed Pseudomonas samples from the lungs of children with cystic fibrosis. Proteomics is the method for analyzing and cataloguing a complete cellular complement of proteins, which are produced based on information encoded by genes and are the workhorses of all living cells.
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Fujitsu invents neural learning system for robots
Japanese combine Fujitsu said it will demonstrate a robot soon which uses configurable neural networks to learn movement and motor coordination.
The firm will demonstrate the system at Robodex 2003 in Yokahama on April 3rd, but it has already shown off the system earlier this month in the Robotica Symposium in Japan.
According to Fujitsu, the system is a breakthrough for humanoid robots and will make generating motion far faster and simpler than before.
The technology uses a central pattern generator (CPG) network to simulate neural oscillators in creatures with spines. It will also use a numerical perturbation method to quantify the configuration and connection weight status of the network.
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Is the Earth preparing to flip?
It is not just the plot for a far-fetched science-fiction disaster movie. Something unexplained really is happening to the Earth's magnetic field.
In recent years, the field has been behaving in ways not previously seen in the admittedly short time it has been monitored.
Some researchers think it may presage a geomagnetic reversal when the north and south magnetic poles flip.
Such speculation takes place as the science-fiction movie The Core goes on release. In the film, the Earth's core stops rotating and our planet's magnetic sheath collapses.
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Anti-war protesters go digital
As bombs blasted Baghdad last week, dozens of cell phones in China buzzed with messages about where to stage an anti-war protest.
In Cairo, activists tapped out text messages to summon 5,000 demonstrators to a central square. And in San Francisco, technophiles beamed live footage from protests to anti-war Web sites.
Throughout the world, technology is allowing activists to stage spontaneous rallies in reaction to the war.
Prohibitively expensive only a few years ago, gadgets ranging from the cell phone to the mini digital video camera simplify protests from Brussels to Manila.
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Report: 80 percent of U.S. to log on
The number of Internet users in the United States will peak at 80 percent of the country's citizens, or about three-fourths of American households, according to a report from researcher eMarketer.
Right now, 55 percent of the U.S. population uses the Internet, according to Ben Macklin, senior analyst at New York-based eMarketer. That's about 58 percent of U.S. households. At the end of last year, about 153 million people were online in this country, and about 10 million are expected to adopt the Net this year. The U.S. Web population will peak in the next 10 years, Macklin said.
According to a February survey of Internet holdouts released by UCLA's Center for Communication Policy, people cite not having a computer as the No. 1 reason they won't go online. About 23 percent of people surveyed simply have no interest in the Internet; other reasons given include the expense of computers, fear of or ineptitude with technology, and privacy/security issues.
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Rare Blood Disease Shown To Be A Form Of Treatable Cancer
Genetic Mechanism Of Disease Is Discovered
In the process of figuring out why an anti-cancer drug is effective in treating patients with a rare blood disorder known as hypereosinophilic syndrome, or HES, researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have shown that the condition may in fact be a form of cancer.
Their findings appear in the March 27 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
HES develops when the level of eosinophils, a white blood cell, rises to abnormal levels in the bloodstream. Sometimes the body produces large amounts of eosinophils as a reaction to allergies or parasites, but why eosinophil levels increase in those patients with HES has remained elusive, until now. Elevated eosinophil levels can lead to heart failure and negatively impact other vital organs, often leading to death.
Imatinib (tradename Gleevec), a drug that has already shown promise in the treatment of chronic myelogenous leukemia, or CML, a form of cancer that involves the overabundance of another kind of white blood cell, was used by Dana-Farber's Daniel DeAngelo, MD, PhD, and Richard Stone, MD, to treat patients with HES. The idea to use this drug derived from both a notion that the mechanism of HES might be similar to CML as well as early reports, ultimately published in the journal Lancet in May 2002, of its utility in HES. The HES patients at DFCI, including one who was very ill, responded extremely well to the drug, although exactly how the drug kept the otherwise aggressive disease at bay was unclear.
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IBM breaks silence on server speed
IBM posted long-awaited performance scores Wednesday for its x440 server with 16 Intel Xeon processors, a system Big Blue is using to try to impose itself on a key part of the server market.
The system was able to perform 151,000 database transactions per minute, according to the scores. That's ahead of a rival 8-Xeon Hewlett-Packard DL760 G2 that clocked in at 115,000, but still behind the 32-Xeon Unisys Orion 230 that racked up 234,000 transactions.
The $1.7 million IBM system's score was about one-third of that posted by the highest-ranked system overall, a huge 128-processor Unix server from Fujitsu that comes with a $12 million price tag.
The benchmark, or speed measurement, test was designed by the Transaction Processing Performance Council. Server makers can spend millions of dollars preparing for the widely watched TPC-C test. Although the benchmark results can be somewhat inflated through careful tuning and the use of unusual storage systems on the part of manufacturers, a good score can't be achieved without a good system.
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Hubble Watches Light From Mysterious Erupting Star
In January 2002, a dull star in an obscure constellation suddenly became 600,000 times more luminous than our Sun, temporarily making it the brightest star in our Milky Way galaxy.
The mysterious star has long since faded back to obscurity, but observations by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope of a phenomenon called a "light echo" have uncovered remarkable new features. These details promise to provide astronomers with a CAT-scan-like probe of the three-dimensional structure of shells of dust surrounding an aging star. The results appear tomorrow in the journal Nature.
"Like some past celebrities, this star had its 15 minutes of fame," says Anne Kinney, director of NASA's Astronomy and Physics program, Headquarters, Washington. "But its legacy continues as it unveils an eerie light show in space. Thankfully, NASA's Hubble has a front row seat to this unique event in our galaxy."
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Oracle Bets $150M on Unbreakable Linux
Oracle Corp. plans to spend some $150 million this year on a new initiative designed to greatly increase the number of applications available to customers on the Unbreakable Linux platform.
This latest initiative follows the announcement last June of the Unbreakable Linux campaign, in which the Redwood Shores, Calif., company committed to deliver an enterprise operating environment by providing all of its products on Linux and giving full front-line technical support.
Oracle on Wednesday will announce the new initiative, aimed at Independent Software Vendors (ISVs), which will see Oracle provide technical and financial incentives for the development, marketing and sale of ISV applications on Unbreakable Linux.
The incentives, which Oracle plans to continue well into the future, include an online marketing "campaign developer" that will allow ISVs to create print advertising and e-mail campaigns that they can run using the Unbreakable Linux brand name.
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Sunscreen for your computer?
An ingredient in sunburn lotion may help improve computer displays and bring about some futuristic devices sooner than expected.
Zinc oxide, often used as a heavy sunscreen, also can be used to create transparent transistors, according to researchers at Oregon State University.
The nearly microscopic transistors that control the image in current liquid crystal displays -- the kind common in laptop computers and now TVs and desktop monitors -- require material that blocks light.
Finding a transparent material that can act as a transistor -- a basic electronic circuit -- opens up an entire new range of applications in electronics, said John Wager, an OSU electrical engineer who led the research.
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Prehistoric art 'no longer under threat'
Experts have managed to control a mysterious mould that threatened to destroy one of the world's most famous cave paintings.
The primitive art of the Lascaux cave in south western France survived untouched for nearly 18,000 years but became extremely vulnerable when the cave mouth was widened in the 1950s to accommodate up to a thousand daily visitors.
Two years ago experts noticed a fungus spreading gradually along the floor, walls and part of the ceiling.
They tackled it with antifungal and antibiotic chemicals, but it was extremely resilient, and only now have scientists stopped it in its tracks.
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Linux gains modestly in retail systems
The number of computerized cash registers using the Linux operating system grew by 185 percent in 2002, according to a study released Wednesday, but Linux still has only 4 percent of the overall market.
Linux lags Microsoft Windows, which has 69 percent of the total market for point-of-sale terminals, and IBM's 4690 operating system, with 17 percent, according to a study by IHL Consulting Group.
"Linux is starting to gain traction in several segments, such as restaurants...but at only 4 percent of total shipments in 2002, it still has a long way to go before being a serious contender," IHL President Greg Buzek said in a statement. In addition, few companies that embraced Linux decided to do so across their entire chain of stores, the study said.
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Dolphins clear mines the natural way
Two animals trained by the US Navy are helping to clear mines from the waters around the southern Iraqi port of Umm Qasr.
The coalition says the dolphins will help to make the port safe for aid cargoes and for other vessels.
The Navy says they are well cared for, and face little danger.
The dolphins are from the US Navy's Explosive Ordnance Disposal Mobile Unit Three (Eodmu 3), based in Coronado, California.
Nine have been flown to the Gulf, with a number of trained sea lions from the Navy's Mammal Maritime Unit in San Diego.
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When a Free Download Isn't Free
An author hoping to spur sales of his book is facing a gigantic bill after an online publishing experiment went horribly awry.
Last week, writer Glenn Fleishman offered his book, Real World Adobe GoLive 6, as a free download.
But instead of the few hundred downloads Fleishman expected, the book was downloaded about 10,000 times in just 36 hours. And because he's charged incrementally for bandwidth, Fleishman estimates he could be billed $15,000 at the end of the month -- possibly a lot more.
"It's a financial catastrophe," said Fleishman. "I'm a working stiff with a mortgage ... I never suspected the penalty would be so high for giving something away.... It's like living in Singapore and getting 15 years in jail for chewing gum."
The book, released over a year ago and co-authored with Jeff Carlson, hadn't been selling well in hard copy, and as a software manual it was nearing the end of its shelf life.
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Antipiracy pamphlets head to college
The music industry has begun dropping pamphlets on universities across the globe in its latest blitz against online piracy.
The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), a global trade group representing major and independent music labels and publishers, said Thursday it has begun issuing brochures to universities in 29 countries in Europe, South America, Asia and Australia spelling out the legal and technological snares of online file-sharing networks.
"In Canada and Europe, we have found institutions where users are uploading thousands of files using university computer networks," said Allen Dixon, general counsel at IFPI in London. "At times, you can't even get on the Internet in some places because (peer-to-peer file-sharing) traffic is hogging the bandwidth."
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Microsoft antitrust case still has bounce
As expected, a federal appeals court said it will consider whether a settlement inked between Microsoft, the U.S. Department of Justice and some state attorneys general was consistent with the public interest. The judges are required by law to hear appeals from the lower court.
In November, U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly approved a consent decree in the long-running antitrust case, which the Justice Department and the states filed in 1998. Kollar-Kotelly rejected stricter remedies proposed by some of the state attorneys general, saying the restrictions on Microsoft were so outlandish that they amounted to an "unjustified manipulation of the marketplace" designed to give competitors such as Sun Microsystems, Apple Computer and Red Hat an "artificial advantage."
Two states, Massachusetts and West Virginia, decided to appeal Kollar-Kotelly's decision.
A Microsoft representative on Thursday said, "This is a procedural matter. The parties have a right to appeal, and there is no question that the appeal would be heard.... Our focus right now is on full and complete compliance with the final judgments."
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NT4.0 too flawed to fix - official
There's a nasty rider with Microsoft's latest security problem for NT users.
Although a denial of service risk exists in an "important" security vulnerability, publicised yesterday affecting NT 4.0, Redmond tells users not to expect a patch for that operating system anytime soon.
"The architectural limitations of Windows NT 4.0 do not support the changes that would be required to remove this vulnerability," Microsoft says. "Windows NT 4.0 users are strongly encouraged to employ the workaround discussed in the FAQ in the bulletin, which is to protect the NT 4.0 system with a firewall that blocks Port 135."
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Microsoft RPC hole could lead to DoS attacks
Remote Procedure Call (RPC) hacks seem to be flavour of the month. Only a week ago a major vulnerability was found in the Sun XPR RPC. Now one has been found in Windows 2000, XP and NT. The hole doesn't allow an attacker to gain control but it would effectively stop the machine working.
Microsoft has released patches for Windows 2000 and XP. Windows NT users aren't so lucky. Microsoft claims that NT's architecture makes a patch for this impossible. The company says that blocking port 135 at your firewall will stop attackers from being able to use the exploit.
That does leave a large question of what to do with NT servers which are actively executing RPCs. From the looks of the information on the Microsoft site, the only safe option would be to move to 2000 or XP.
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UK sets sights on spam
The UK Government is determined to crack down on the menace of unwanted and unsolicited e-mail.
It is proposing a fight back against the spammers with strict new rules about how personal e-mail details are used.
From October, a European Union directive will make unsolicited e-mails illegal across member states and the UK Government is planning to have its legal framework in place at the same time.
Spam accounts for as much as 40% of global e-mail traffic and is causing a headache for businesses, costing them billions in lost productivity.
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