If you are unfamiliar, please refer to this Wikipedia page. La la la la.

[Rather Good via Improbable Research]

Robot Ostrich. Yes.

[Improbable Research]

In the pantheon of Weird Things heroes, Craig Venter stands among the most revered. His controversially sequenced the human genome faster than the most aggressive estimations. His swagger and braggadocio wrankle rivals who seem him as a publicity hound putting himself before the science.

In the parlance of our modern era, he balls so hard motherf—ers want to fine him.

Venter’s newest quest is completely redefine the world’s energy supply by creating fuel from algae. Although this is not a new idea, Venter’s approach is unique in that he wants forgo searching for a magic naturally occurrence of algae that can be replicated in favor of sequencing his own from scratch.

So how long will this take? He talked to Live Science.

We don’t have the final answer to anything. We’re evaluating thousands of strains and large numbers of genetic changes. The long-term solution is to make the entire genetic code from scratch and control all the parameters. To us, this is a long-term plan. It’s a 10-year plan. We’re not promising new fuel for your car in the next 18 months.

In comparison to the human genome challenge, Venter adds he completed that “in nine months.”

Swag.

[Live Science]

Pictures of a strange plot of land in China’s western Gansu province could a secret weapons testing facility and if one weapons expert is to be believed, it’s very similar to American installations in Nevada. Including the famed Area 51.

Tim Ripley, a defence expert from Jane’s Defence Weekly, compared the structures to similar grids in Area 51, the secret United States military test base in Nevada. “The picture of the circle looks very like a missile test range, with target and instrumentation set out to record weapon effects. The Americans have lots of these in Nevada – Area 51!” he said.

This region is known to be used by the Chinese military for secret weapons test and this kind of grid could be used to simulate city streets, presumably to test the accuracy of missiles.

[Telegraph]

Like a zombie whose brain has been cleaved in twain by a last minute arrow, this episode of The Walking Dead was of two minds. The first, let’s continue to put our characters on the path of the most boring, pointless plot arc in history. The second, let’s continue to give the audience slight glimmers of the promise that this show once found bursting out of every seem.

Also, Michael Rooker is back. Or is he.

Find it all, AFTER THE JUMP… Read the rest of this entry »

If you thought that we’d never create a feedback loop with yeast that could help us control it’s organic nature using a computer, you are dead wrong.

This work, performed by scientists at the Automatic Control Laboratory at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich, is exceptional because of its simplicity: The computer turns the yeast on by flashing a red light, and it turns the yeast off by flashing a deeper red light. Connected to the yeast is a “reporter” molecule that fluoresces when the protein is produced. The computer can see this fluorescence and alter the light it emits, thus creating a full feedback loop.

This is the first step toward manipulating organic material by way of cell signaling which could lead to us making anything from fuel to pills from a vat ooze. Which is awesome.

[Extreme Tech]

Simone Allyne is the Weird Things eBook reviewer focusing on readily available, affordable Science Fiction and Fantasy. If you have a book you’d like reviewed, please email WeirdThingsMail@Gmail

The gift giving season is upon us and I thought I’d give you my top five favorite books I’ve read so far for Weird Things in case you’re in need of a great book for someone on your shopping list.

Honestly it’s hard for me to pick just a few, but I’ve narrowed it down to my top five books and short stories that I’ve read.  Hopefully you will agree!

My first suggestion would be The Old Man and the Wasteland. This stands as far and away my favorite story that I have read since starting doing these reviews.

It’s not often that a book brings me to tears, but The Old Man and the Waste Land by Nick Cole did just that.  Cole’s writing is so incredibly beautiful you cannot help but cry over the awe inducing descriptions of a sunset… only to realize that it’s a sunset in post apocalyptica.

Dead Dwarves Don’t Dance is an awesome read! It is a fantastic mash up of the pulp fiction and sci-fi genres.   Action abounds as you join Noose on his mission to hunt down neo human terrorists who attacked a dwarven dance club and in the process killed someone close to him.

After enjoying Dead Dwarves Don’t Dance so much, it should come as no surprise that I love to read detective stories.

That’s why I enjoyed Hard Day’s Knight by John Hartness so much! Plus it’s about vampires!!! Hartness writes a story that feels like a cross between Moonlight and Cara Lockwood’s Every Demon Has His Day.  His writing is witty, culturally relevant and has a good dose of pop culture references to keep you turning the pages to see just how bad it can get for these two self-professed nerdy, permanently college-aged vampires.

Another book I really enjoyed was Deadly Intent by Laura Eno.  In fact I’ve continued to read her work for my own personal enjoyment.

Deadly Intent is a story with emotionally driven characters that are very easy to relate too.  You can’t help but feel for Jonathon and sympathize with his granddaughter Abbie as they both fight for what they hold dear.

And if I am being totally honest with you I love a good story with a strong female lead, hence my love for the short story Freak Show by Richard Jones.

Jones creates a world of horrible wonder with Frankenstein heads in boxes, mysterious eggs, and an otherworldly beautiful man that is hell bent on tempting Natalie to join him and his nefarious ends.

If you have a book lover on your Christmas shopping list who is into science fiction or fantasy, then these books would make a great choice for a gift!

We’ve talked at length on the podcast about the intelligence and possible threat presented by Octopi. This will do nothing to bury those very real, justified fears.

Two deep-ocean species of cephalopod, an octopus and a squid, can go from transparent to opaque in the blink of an eye, a new study finds.

This impressive camouflage swap is an adaptation that likely keeps the cephalopods safe from two different types of predators. The first are deep-sea creatures that hunt by looking upward for prey silhouetted against the light filtering down through thousands of feet of water. The second are fish that spotlight prey in “biological” headlights. These fish use bioluminescence, their own body-driven light source, to hunt for food.

They can go invisible now? Maybe it is time to align with the sharks…

[Live Science]

Would you rather an adaptation of a source material be a literal copy or a totally new story with the same characters and themes?

It’s a fundamental question, which I believe is at the heart of the ever raging debate amongst The Walking Dead viewers and fans of the Robert Kirkman funny book. Do you want to see actors portray stories you know on sets that resemble what you’ve seen before? Or do you want the story to surprise you, like the source material once did, with new twists and turns?

If your answer is the latter, then there is nothing that could shake up the story in the AMC series than to kill our hero Rick Grimes. I explain AFTER THE JUMP… Read the rest of this entry »

Houdini was a hack.

The following photo comes from a new campaign by the World Wildlife Fund. In an effort to save endangered black rhinos from rampant poaching, the WWF is trying to expand their range. The problem? Getting the big lugs from one place to another.

Thankfully for fans of awesome things, the safest way is also the most hilarious. Workers sedate the beasts and hook their legs up to a waiting helicopter. They then transport them in a 10-minute flight before depositing the gigantic creatures in their new homes.

[Live Science]

A modern day tale of Icarus! The burning need to see an asteroid pass between the Earth and the moon led one man to do his best impression of Father Christmas one and a half months early.

Translated from French paper Est Republicain:

A madman who wanted to see the passage of the asteroid “grazing” the earth from the top of a disused factory chimney Crevéchamps in Meurthe et Moselle got stuck in “altititude” last night in Lorraine.
The young man, named Yoan, guided by an indescribable curiosity, climbed the chimney in the dark, with a backpack and his computer.

Unfortunately for him, in his rise to dominate the stars and make the transition from the “asteroid”, he did give rungs of the ladder under his weight. The man found himself a prisoner of his observation site. Impossible indeed down: 5 meters separated him from other levels…

It could be worse. Just ask Pheobe Cates in Gremlins.

[Improbable Research]

A 45-year-old Russian historian kept a collection of 29 human-sized dolls comprised of mummified corpses wearing the clothes they were buried in. The man was a well renown expert on cemeteries in the region and was published in the local newspapers.

Police began investigating the string of grave robbing two years ago, believe it was an extremist political organization.

Video released by police showed an eerie collection of what looks like life-sized dolls, outfitted in shabby dresses and headscarves, their hands and faces wrapped in fabric. Authorities say the man also stole clothes from the graves when he took the bodies.

Check out the video below…

Thanks to Weird Things reader David.

[CNN]

The Obama administration has formally responded to an online petition signed by over five thousands respondents demanding the acknowledgement of alien visitation.

Here is what they said…

“The U.S. government has no evidence that any life exists outside our planet, or that an extraterrestrial presence has contacted or engaged any member of the human race,” said Phil Larson from the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy, on the WhiteHouse.gov website.

“In addition, there is no credible information to suggest that any evidence is being hidden from the public’s eye.”

So, no big bombshell. But it would have been really funny if they slipped in one last line like “unless you’re talking about Grornorp, in that case we have no comment.”

But don’t get soured on the White House’s new petition initiative. You can always sign on to the ““We Demand a Vapid, Condescending, Meaningless, Politically Safe Response to This Petition” petition.

[UFO Casebook]

The Canadian Loch Ness Monster equivalent Ogopogo is back in the news with this curious clip. A man on vacation gets the shot from an elevated perspective which seems to depict a large, if unmoving, object just underneath the gentle lapping water. But what could be that big and that still? Was Ogopogo playing hide and seek?

[MSNBC]

A resident of Washington DC suburb Woodbridge, VA called the cops when a werewolf was sighted last night.

There wasn’t even a full moon Monday night, but an anxious neighbor on Colchester Road told police he saw a werewolf. Police responded to the scene and searched the woods, but there was no sign of the mythical creature, or even a coyote.

Gives new meaning to the phrase Vote Or Die.

[WMAL]

In a story about a band of survivors in constant peril the sin of safety is major one. Thankfully, this episode did a little bit to shake things up in this frustratingly slow season but some major issues still remain.

Well… one issue. Which is driving me insane.

Seriously crazy.

Glen causes a clean up on aisle four, Daryl picks a lovely metaphor for a lady in need and splish splash someone is taken a bath AFTER THE JUMP… Read the rest of this entry »