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This Is What Photosynthesis Looks Like From Space

Plants grown and sustain themselves through photosynthesis—a seemingly invisible process that converts sunlight into energy. Now, NASA scientists have developed a way to measure photosynthesis from satellites with unprecedented detail. When plants photosyntehsize, they actually re-emit some of the light they absorb as a faint but measurable glow called fluorescence. The more healthy the plant,…

Just how closely will Avengers 2 follow the Age of Ultron storyline?

Also, how long will Loki keep popping up as a villain in Marvel movies? And how will Scarlet Witch’s movie costume pay tribute to her comics outfits? Plus José Padilha insists that his RoboCop is not a remake. Also, check out some X-Men: Days of Future Past set video and learn about the first Avatar…

These Dumb Insurance Claims For Lost Cell Phones are Hilarious

We’ve all misplaced our cell phone and spent what seems like hours searching for it—but some people take losing handsets to a whole new level. Chances are, you’ve never lost a phone as impressively as the people that feature in these stories. A UK-based mobile phone insurance company has released a list of its most…

House Defeats Amendment, Allowing NSA to Keep Spying on You

An amendment designed to stop the NSA from collecting phone records of millions of Americans has been narrowly defeated, 205 votes to 217, in the House of Representatives. The amendment, attached to an annual defense budget bill, was led by Michigan Congressman Justin Amash and sought to defund the NSA’s collection of phone records. Clearly,given…

Google Translate now accepts handwriting as an input—so you can offer your scrawl up to be converted.

How to Make YouTube Look Like Unix

YouTube has decided to celebrate its upcoming Geek Week event by giving its site an, um, underhaul—and making it look like Unix. If you head to the site and type “/ geekweek” into the search field, you’ll be presented with a site full of fixed width fonts and, simple colors and ASCII art. Just don’t…

The Fountain of Youth Is in Florida and It’s Radioactive

The history of the fountain of youth starts somewhere before Ponce de Leon and has ended up somehow to a water fountain in Florida. National Geographic tells a fascinating tale of how though one water fountain in Florida is radioactive, it may actually be extending the life of its drinkers. Located in the town of…

The Weirdest Thing on the Internet Tonight: Stars

So what did you do this weekend? If it was anything less than fighting space pirates from the back of an interplanetary slingshotting clay golem, you are wasting your life. Progressive house duo and real-life siblings Alexander and Yury (aka Matisse and Sadko) are quickly taking the Russian club scene by storm with Sadko acting…

What Death Looks Like: A Fast-Spreading Glowing Blue Wave

Dead is dead, some famous TV show about vacationing on an island once said. But how does dead, well, look? How do billions of cells shut off at once? An international team of researchers found that it comes in a wave. Death spreads through a special necrosis pathway that leaves dead cells as it passes…

What the Inside of Google’s Chromecast Looks Like

Curious as to what’s hiding inside the Google Chromecast dongle? Thanks to the FCC, we don’t have to wonder what the Chromecast is packing anymore. There’s a Marvell DE3005 chip and an AzurWare chip to take care of Wi-Fi duties, according to Anandtech. FCC documents actually show Chromecast details in May, with pictures of its…

I’m Going to Turn All My Instagram Pictures Into Oil Paintings

How much do you like your Instagram pictures? Enough to get a few likes? Enough to think you’d kick ass as a photographer? Enough to convert them into amazing oil paintings that you can hang on your wall? Pixelist is a company that’s trying to turn your Instagram photos into hand-made oil paintings that will…

The Depressing Truth About Being a Superhero

Whenever we watch our favorite superhero movies, we can’t help but wish we had their powers. Superhuman strength, superhuman speed, superhuman ability. It all sounds so great! But in reality, it wouldn’t be always awesome like saving pretty actresses and wearing spandex. Day to day life would suck. AndrewMFilms created a short about ‘Superhero Depression’…

These Honeycomb Sculptures Made by Bees Are Simply Majestic

Bees are amazing creatures. The yellow-and-black-striped little things make honey and royal jelly and, given a little bit of guidance, completely stellar sculptures made out of wax. In recent years, artists have picked up on the talent. The unofficial sage of honeycomb sculptures is Tomáš Libertíny. This 34-year-old Slovakian designer has perfected a method for…

Comic-Con Wrap Up: The Shiniest Things We Saw in San Diego!

Going to San Diego Comic-Con is like stepping into an alternate universe, where superheroes and monsters are everywhere. We witnessed enough brilliance in five days to keep us psyched for the next few months. Here’s our complete guide to the shiniest things we saw at Comic-Con 2013. Top image: Jesus Diaz/Kinja.com MOVIES We saw so…

Check Out the Floor Plans For the NSA’s Huge New Data Center in Utah

Construction is underway for a sprawling and seriously expensive National Security Agency data center in the Utah desert, and a set of floor plans just hit the web. It all looks appropriately intimidating. Wrapped in what we’re guessing is going to be a heavily policed perimeter row, the facility contains four data halls over several…

Loom for iOS: The Better, Cloud-Based Mobile Camera Roll

Cloud storage services are a dime a dozen these days, and just the thought of sifting through the mass to find the one that works best for you can be overwhelming. But when it comes to not just mobile-specific but also photo-specific storage, your options are pretty much cut entirely. That’s what makes Loom (which…

The Brilliantly Simple 3D-Printing Program You Never Realized You’d Need

As the days of affordable, technologically sound at-home 3D printing loom ever nearer, creative minds around the world have been dripping with the wondrous possibilities these plastic-spewing, magic machines hold. Unfortunately, magic or not, the laws of physics still apply—and your liquid plastic dreams probably don’t take into account the fact that your models are…

Elysium concept art shows the super unsanitary bioware of the future

One thing you can definitely expect to see in Neill Blomkamp’s lastest movie is a mixture of dirt and blood. No one does filthy futuristic mech suits quite like Blomkamp, and this new collection of concept art from Elysium is showing off all his dirty wares. These are taken from The World of Elysium —…

What is this mysterious rat-kangaroo-primate? Meet the Aye-Aye!

For more than a century after Europeans first encountered the mysterious aye-aye of Madagascar in the 1780s, scientists and biologists just could not figure out if the weird beast was a rodent or a kangaroo or some bizarre type of primate. Guess what it really is ….

Next season’s Vampire Diaries is all doppelgangers all the time

Things on Vampire Diaries are about to get awkward. Everybody has a doppelganger, and that means all the love triangles have become lust polygons. At Comic-Con we caught up with the writers and cast and asked how things are shaping up in the new season. Co-executive producer Caroline Dries confirmed that the new season is…