Coming soon: Spider robots

When science is doing anything involving spiders, you know it’s a bad thing. But this news is twice as bad: researchers have taught a spider to jump so they can make robots.

Kim the regal jumping spider has been taught by scientists to jump on command, so that her agility can be studied, and one day, copied. The spider can jump six times its body length without a running start, and that’s something the researchers want to figure out, so that one day they can create robots that can do the same.

Folks, animals are dangerous enough as it is. Making robots that are like animals is even worse. One day you could have a robo-spider jump on you and take your freedom.

Study: The Brits would rather watch TV than shag

We live in a world where there is endless entertainment right at your fingertips. Unfortunately, it comes at the cost of our sex lives.

According to a new study in the U.K., people are increasingly using video streaming services between 10 and 11 p.m. That may not sound like anything special, but typically that’s around the time most couples are going to bed and getting it on. The study suggests that rather than sexing each other, people are streaming videos in bed.

On the other hand, good job for having such good programming, British media.

Pew! Pew! You can shoot lasers from your eyes now

Science has finally given us the ability to shoot laser beams from our eyes. It’s a wonderful future, everyone.

It’s been the dream of mankind since the dawn of comic books, and now it’s a reality, thanks to Scottish researchers. They have created a flexible plastic membrane that can be put on a contact lens, and can shoot a laser beam when it’s hit with a laser beam itself.

OK, so it’s not quite X-Men level yet. But researchers say the technology could be used for identification and security purposes, kind of like a personal bar code. Which isn’t creepy at all.

Apparently spiders can live for 43 years

Most people aren’t sad when a spider dies. But scientists aren’t most people.

Australian scientists are in mourning today following the report that a spider they had been observing died at 43. It is the oldest a spider has ever lived. Number 16, a trapdoor spider, was born in the wild in 1974, probably with a bunch of brothers and sisters. It was the subject of scientific observation for so long because it lived in the same burrow its entire life. Researchers, and this is true, have expressed sadness at Number 16’s passing.

Fellow spiders said Number 16 always thought he was being watched, until he couldn’t take the stress anymore and killed himself.

Study: Horses judge you for your RBF

Horses are always watching and judging you, which means they truly are nags.

According to a recent study, horses are constantly studying your expressions, and will remember and judge you if you make an angry face around them. Scientists knew that horses could recognize facial expressions, but the fact that they can remember these expressions and base their future reactions to the makers of those expressions is new.

If you’ve ever wondered what a horse is thinking, now we know it’s, “You should smile more.”

Scientists grow human brains in mice, doom us all

Science is fun and all, but it’s widely accepted that it’s slowly marching us all to the end of civilization. Consider this one step on that march.

Researchers have grown tiny human brains inside of mice, which are known to carry disaease. That’s not us punching up some boring study, they really did it. It’s the first time that scientists have been able to grow a human brain in another species, so, congrats? The researchers, who are deluding themselves, say this is a major breakthrough in stem cell research.

What is really means is that science is that much closer to making animals as smart as us. And when that happens, we’re in for it.

If you give a mouse E. coli

Be on the lookout for diseased NYC mice. They’re somewhere out there.

Who among us hasn’t cried watching An American Tail? (It’s OK, the Internet can’t see you nodding.) Fievel Mousekewitz, a young mouse from Russia, emigrates to America to escape Cossack cats and ends up separated from his family in New York City. Of course it’s sad — because Fievel is an illegal immigrant carrying superbugs.

A study of mice throughout New York City reveals that Fievel’s great-great-great-great-great … (mouse generations are ridiculous) … great-grandchildren are carrying disease-causing bacteria, including a few antibiotic-resistant germs.

Three percent of the mice carried Salmonella bacteria, 14 percent carried disease-causing Shigella, 12 percent carried the food poisoning germ Clostridium perfringens, 4 percent carried enteropathogenic Escherichia coli and 4 percent carried Clostridium difficile, a notorious cause of often-fatal chronic diarrhea.

“Often-fatal chronic diarrhea.” Clearly, crying our lungs out at their songs wasn’t enough for these Trojan mice.

If you see signs of mice in your domicile, it is critical to take steps to either catch or kill them and clean up all possible surfaces with bleach to disinfect contagion due to urine and feces. And we have to act fast before these vermin go west.

Study: There’s poop on your clothes

If you’re the type of person who likes to go to a store and try on clothes before buying them, rather than just purchasing them online, the dying retail industry thanks you. But you should also know that you’re wearing some nasty germs.

Researchers have found that a lot of garments in stores have some nasty stuff on them. Because people touch them, try them on, and put them back, these things just sit there growing bacteria and viruses on them — even fecal remnants. You don’t even have to buy the garments, just by touching them, you pick up all of that stuff on your hands. And it sits there waiting for you to touch your eye, or your nose, or to eat something.

Worst of all, if you wear the clothes without washing them first, it’s all over you. And that’s our excuse for not going shopping with our significant others.

All the cool beer geeks are drinking dairy waste now

If there’s one thing we’ve proven here over the years it’s that we should not be considered a trusted news source. If there are two things that we’ve proven here, the second would be that beer is basically a miracle drink. But watch out, craft beer fans, we hear that dairy waste is the hot new trend.

Researchers at Cornell are brewing up an alcoholic beverage made from dairy waste — you know, appetizing stuff like that watery stuff at the top of your yogurt when you open it up. Who doesn’t love drinking that? Now you can drink it and get a buzz off of it.

The thinking is that if dairy waste can be turned into a marketable product, it will make the dairy industry that much cleaner and profitable.

Or you could just drink that month-old milk in your fridge. Probably some kind of fermentation in there, too.

 

Voodoo dolls are key to a happy workplace, study says

It’s Friday. You’re nearly through the work week. Are you exhausted? Has your boss been getting you down? Science says you need a voodoo doll.

According to a recent study of American and Canadian, having a voodoo doll of the boss can do wonders for morale around the office. Workers seemed to enjoy blowing off steam by symbolically punishing their bosses. Stabbing a fake boss was found to lower feelings of workplace injustice by one third.

So don’t steam over the latest work stress this weekend. Don’t drink until you finally feel free from the yoke of your office. Start sewing. You’ll feel better when you’re done.