New research suggests women can make sperm, and men can make eggs

What started as an investigation into developmental mouse biology has become a lot more than that. Biologist Katsuhiko Hayashi discovered a way to turn mouse skin cells into sperm and egg cells — and actually used these modified cells to create a living baby mouse. The question is, can it work in humans? Illustration via…

This brilliant robot horror short is becoming a full-length film

Add another example to the ongoing trend of short films being expanded to full length features — back in April we featured this terrifying short movie Abe, about a robot who becomes a serial killer. Now MGM is turning it into a full-length creepfest.

A dentist wants to clone John Lennon from his rotten tooth

All you need is DNA. A Canadian dentist says he’s working with “American scientists” to clone John Lennon from a rotten molar the Beatles singer had extracted in the 1960s. According to the press release (warning: it autoplays a weird parody song, “Love Me Tooth”) dentist Michael Zuk bought the tooth at auction for $31,000…

And now, a stop motion short film about a magic beard

After growing out a full mop of facial hair, Ben Garvin decided that a good beard should never go to waste. So he picked up his iPhone and carefully stitched together this remarkable stop motion film. Garvin used the Stop Motion Studio app to edit the film. [Neatorama]

The Weirdest-Looking Time Machines in All Science Fiction

If you’re going to travel through time, you’ve got to do it in style. Here are some of the most eye-poppingly great time machine designs from pop culture history. The Project Tic-Toc, a secret experimental time machine of the U.S Army in Time Tunnel (1966-1967) (via Friday87central and xtimeline) The Time Sled from Time Machine…

This is one of the scariest (and wrongest) pterosaur pictures ever

Quetzalcoatlus is an azhdarchid pterosaur, an enormous Cretaceous-era animal with a 10-meter wingspan. And for decades, most people believed it looked like this blisteringly Satanic creature — despite all evidence to the contrary. How did so many people get it so wrong? Illustration by Richard Orr Over at Tetrapod Zoology, paleontologist Darren Naish gets to…

Time Warner will briefly lift its CBS programming blackout on Thursday night, just long enough to air the Democratic NYC comptroller debate. It’s a small victory for democracy in a feud that’s been grinding on since August 2nd. [WSJ]

Quite possibly the best human vs. robot competition in history

Last month saw the debut of R2B2, a button-mashing robot that can unlock a phone in hours, just by randomly pushing buttons. But the real question is, can this little pin-typing hacker robot beat a human hacker? R2B2 was invented by a team of security engineers at io9 pals iSEC Partners — and iSEC security…

Could a new Star Trek TV show about Worf actually happen?

There have been tons of ideas batted around for a new Star Trek show, including Bryan Fuller and Bryan Singer collaborating on a show tying in with the J.J. Abrams films. But apparently one idea has gotten as far as actual discussions: a show about Worf, the Klingon who appeared in TNG and DS9. https://gizmodo.com/j-j-abrams-is-the-guardian-of-star-trek-including-o-5904078…

Cyclopean sunglasses, blocky rolling pins and other improbable objects

From Italian artist Giuseppe Colarusso comes an outlandish collection of both handmade objects and digital creations that he describes as “unlikely… but not impossible.” All images featured by permission of Giuseppe Colarusso Each of the items featured in the series (an ongoing project that Colarusso has titled “Improbabilità,” or “Improbability”), is improbable for a different…

What’s your favorite (or least favorite) disaster porn?

This is the era of disaster porn. From Transformers: Dark of the Moon to 2012 to Man of Steel to Star Trek Into Darkness, every movie shows cities being trashed. Sometimes the whole planet gets borked. So what’s the most satisfying disaster porn of all time? Or the most gratuitous? Please include a picture or…

The Fukushima radiation nightmare isn’t over. Japanese officials have upgraded from a level 1 to a level 3 “radiological event” alert after discovering that highly radioactive water is leaking from the plant into the ground nearby.

How to Turn Cutting-Edge Science into a Page-Turning Thriller

Author James Rollins has been compared to Michael Crichton, and his latest book The Eye of God includes biohacking, DIY mad science and other current ideas. In this essay, he talks about visiting Fermilab and explains the secrets of transforming science into a cracking good read. Turning Science into Fiction By James Rollins “Tell me…

How The World’s End rejects ‘drunken, misogynistic’ manchild films

In The World’s End, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost gather their former best friends to drink their old hometown dry. But when we talked to Pegg, Frost and director Edgar Wright, they told us how this apocalyptic comedy isn’t like your usual “drunken midlife crisis” film. Plus the secret of using genre to tell a…

Germany is the first European country to recognize a third gender

Starting this November, German parents will be able to select male, female, or “indeterminate” when filling out their newborn’s birth certificate. This means that parents won’t have to label their baby’s gender, thereby allowing those born with intersex characteristics to make a decision later in life. Or not. The new law, which goes into effect…

Jon Snow is a half-naked sex volcano in the first Pompeii pic

Jon Snow apparently knows one thing, and that’s ab crunches. That’s the only way to explain Kit Harrington’s super-ripped, half-dressed body as seen in this first picture from the historical epic Pompeii. Hell, he looks like he’s in danger of burning the city down on his own. Harrington plays Milo, a slave turned gladiator, who…

10 Things You Didn’t Know About Lying

You’re surrounded by lies, but most of what you think you know about them is probably — you guessed it — a lie. 1. You can’t tell somebody is lying from their eyes A liar always has shifty eyes and can’t look you in the face. It’s one of our most commonly-held beliefs, and it’s…

Ethereal photos capture rare “red lightning” phenomenon

Jason Ahrns has had a very unusual summer. For the last several weeks, the University of Alaska-Fairbanks grad student has been studying sprites – a rare form of red lightning that appears high above thunderclouds. And he’s been doing it from a plane. Above: Sprites over Red Willow County, Nebraska, on August 12, 2013 //…

Word of the Day: Now there’s a word for that thing where a planet has a single climate, ecosystem or culture: a Monocosm.

Fright Night 2 is totally just Fright Night 1 with breasts

The threatened sequel to the Fright Night remake slinks out on October 1st, but only on DVD and Blu-ray. This is no great loss, because as you’ll see if you watch the trailer, Fright Night 2: New Blood is another remake of the original, but this time “Gerri Dandrige” is a sexy lady vampire! Here’s…