INews Lab

“The argument that the moon is a dry, desolate place no longer holds water,” says a press release from NASA. A Moon mission launched by the agency has confirmed the presence of water on the moon. The discovery comes a year after a NASA instrument on an Indian lander indicated there were water molecules on the surface of our satellite. On September 24, 2008 the Indian Space Research Organisation had stated Chandrayaan-1 had discovered water based on readings from NASA’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper, one of eleven instruments carried by the probe. Those results indicated water was widespread in low quantities. That probe, launched in October 2008, had to be abandoned on August 30 when contact was lost with it on [...]

Researchers have found a crucial genetic difference between humans and chimps that could help explain our language and speech abilities. The difference lies in a gene called FOXP2 which encodes for a protein of the same name. This acts as a transcription factor, controlling the activity of other genes.The human and chimp versions of the protein differ in only two of their 740 amino acid components, but when researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, replaced the human gene with the chimp version in neurons grown in the laboratory, they found it affected the expression of at least 116 other genes. The results are detailed in a paper published on Thursday in the scientific journal Nature. Author of the [...]

Microsoft has announced they will launch web versions of their popular Office software in 2010. It will be included in all versions of Office 2010 when it ships next year. All Windows Live customers will also reportedly have access. Testers will be given access at the end of this year.The service will go into direct competition with Google Docs, launched three years ago. Last week Google announced they were going to launch a new operating system, called Google Chrome OS. Like Google Docs, Microsoft Office will be compatible with Firefox, Safari, Google Chrome and Internet Explorer.
Microsoft’s group product manager for Office stated, “We believe the web has a lot to offer in terms of connectivity. We have over a half [...]

The world’s Large Hadron Collider accelerated its protons to an energy of 1.18 TeV at 00:44 GMT+1 today. This set a new world record, surpassing the 0.98 TeV record set at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory’s Tevatron collider, which was commissioned in Chicago in 2001. The event came ten days after the LHC collider restart. Yesterday at 20:48 UTC, one proton beam was accelerated to 1050 GeV (1.05 TeV) in LHC. Three hours later, the next record was set by two beams of opposite direction, 1.18 TeV each. The CERN researchers are delighted with the quick progress and are happy with the excellent performance of the machine. Steve Myers, director of accelerators and technology at the Cern particle physics laboratory [...]

Rumours have increased over the possible release of a Google branded smartphone in the New Year, running its Android mobile operating system. Speculation has been rife after it was reported that Google have distributed handsets to its employees for testing worldwide. It is believed to be being built by the Taiwan based manufacturer HTC, who have already released two phones based on the Android operating system and will feature the newly released Android 2.0. It is currently named the Nexus One. On their official blog, Google have confirmed the existence of a handset and the fact that it is currently being tested, but have relased no more details. It is also understood that it will be sold directly to consumers [...]