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A technique looks at tiny variations in the DNA code and converts these into probabilities for hair and eye color.

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A new DNA test can restore at least part of the identity of long-dead people who left no trace of their image, scientists reported on Monday.

The technique has revealed the hair and eye colours of unknown individuals slaughtered as sub-humans by the Nazis and of a mystery woman buried alongside monks in a mediaeval crypt, they said.

“This system can be used to solve historical controversies where colour photographs or other records are missing,” said Wojciech Branicki from Poland’s Institute of Forensic Research in Krakow.

The system, called HIrisPlex, is a fine-tuned version of a tool presented two years ago that looks at tiny variations in the DNA code, and converts these into probabilities for hair and eye colour.

It can be used on teeth and bones, whose DNA survives better than soft tissues, and which explains the interest in using it for ancient forensics.

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‘Lumpy’ Tablet Grows Keyboard When Touched, Unveiled at CES 2013

By I-Hsien Sherwood | i.sherwood@latinospost.com | First Posted: Jan 14, 2013 12:48 PM EST

by Don Reisinger

Sicily’s governor has halted the installation of a US military satellite communication system, demanding guarantees it isn’t a threat to people’s health. The decision, taken independently from Rome, comes after activists clashed with police.

The governor of the autonomous region, Rosario Crocetta, said more research has to be done on how the US operated Mobile User Objective System (MUOS) ground station, affects health and the environment.

The MOUS network, developed for the US Department of Defense, is aimed at providing the next-generation military communications system. When complete, it will consist of four ground stations around the world. One such station is being currently constructed in Sicily’s Sughereta Nature Reserve in Niscem, raising criticism from people there.

Locals are concerned about the possible increase in radiation levels caused by the electromagnetic waves emitted by the system. People fear that it may cause diseases such as cancer and leukemia. Activists insist that located within the Sughereta Nature Reserve, the satellite ground system also threats Sicily’s unique park with rare plants and cork forest.

Besides health and environment concerns, Crocetta’s ruling also raised questions on whether the station’s electromagnetic waves would impact air navigation, with the airport of Comiso (RG), just a few kilometers away.The airport is set to start operating in just a few months.

The construction of MUOS, an ultra-high frequency narrow-band satellite communication network, has been driving locals onto the streets for months now.

Since the construction began in July 2011, people of the small town of Niscemi, near which MUOS is to be eventually installed, have been embroiled in protest. They claim it was “illegally placed in the middle of a nature reserve”.

Friday night’s clashes were reported to be the culmination of months of peaceful protests; the violence is thought to have greatly influenced Crocetta’s decision.

Protesters from ‘NO MUOS’ movement, launched by activists, clashed with police forces 48 hours after the announcement of the works being resumed, months after Silicy’s public prosecutor’s office ordered a halt to operations.

Officers arrived at the scene to disperse demonstrators who blocked the US operated construction site, trying to prevent convoys laden with building materials from entering.

In October 2012 prosecutors ruled that the construction violates environmental legislation governing the nature reserve.

Crocetta said that before formally halting the construction of MOUS, he had met some American diplomats in the US embassy and warned them to act with caution.

“We would not want it to lead to clashes with local people. Besides that no study of the impact on the environment and human health has been conducted by Higher Institute of Health,” an Italian newspaper Il Messaggero (The Messenger) quoted the governor of Sicily as saying.

In negotiations with the US he argued that the study was made by an engineering company, and “does not seem all that competent”.

“An engineering company can study the level of emissions but definitely not the impact on public health,” he said.

“We are not against the Americans and are not against the MOUS. But we want all the guarantees for the protection of public health,” Crocetta told journalists explaining his ruling.

Here’s one exciting consumer gadget at CES 2013 that isn’t a television: The PaperTab, which looks and feels just like a sheet of paper, may one today overtake today’s tablets.

Developed by researchers at the Human Media Lab at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada, the PaperTab features a flexible, high-resolution 10.7-inch plastic touchscreen display built by Plastic Logic, the company borne from Cambridge University’s Cavendish Laboratory, and relies on a second-generation Intel Core i5 processor to turn what looks like a sheet of white paper into a living, interactive display.

“We are actively exploring disruptive user experiences,” said Ryan Brotman, an Intel research scientist. “The ‘PaperTab’ project, developed by the human media lab at Queen’s University and Plastic Logic, demonstrates innovative interactions powered by Intel core processors that could potentially delight tablet users in the future.”

Unlike typical tablets akin to Apple’s iPad, the idea of PaperTab is to use one app at a time, per Papertab. To make tasks easier, users would own 10 or more PaperTabs at once and lay them out to their liking — think the police department in “Minority Report,” but with paper — with one app running in each interactive “window.”

“Plastic logic’s flexible plastic displays are completely transformational in terms of product interaction,” said Indro Mukerjee, CEO of Plastic Logic. “They allow a natural human interaction with electronic paper, being lighter, thinner and more robust compared with today’s standard glass-based displays. This is just one example of the innovative revolutionary design approaches enabled by flexible displays.”

With multiple tablets to separate applications, PaperTab relies on an interface that lets the user combine and merge elements from disparate applications with intuitive dragging, dropping, pointing and folding. For example, to reply to an email within the inbox on one PaperTab, one simply touches the email  with another PaperTab and curl the top right corner. A keyboard instantly appears on the PaperTab to type the message; to add a photo, find the photo on another PaperTab and touch it directly to the email reply. The photo instantly appears within the email message. Users also can instantly pick up documents by touching one PaperTab to another distant PaperTab with a group of PDF icons.

While the PaperTab is a touchscreen display, it doesn’t accept typical gestures users will know from the iPad. Instead, using the PaperTab is a much more physical experience. To flip through pages in a book or article, one can fold your PaperTab in half or curl the right side of the page. To fast-forward or rewind a video, simply bend the top corners of the tablet. To see a picture in a bigger frame, the user can put two PaperTabs next to each other, and they’re smart enough to create one big picture. Even when two Papertabs are “attached,” since everything is editable, it’s easy to drag and drop icons or objects from one PaperTab to the other.

“Using several PaperTabs makes it much easier to work with multiple documents,” said Roel Vertegaal, the director of Queen’s University’s Human Media Lab. “Within five to 10 years, most computers, from ultra-notebooks to tablets, will look and feel just like these sheets of printed color paper.”

While the PaperTab is not yet ready for prime time — the Intel i5 processor is housed in an outside unit, which connects to all of the PaperTabs, as seen in the video provided by Queen’s University –  the technology is very promising. Since PaperTab is both lightweight and robust, they can be bent, thrown around and collected, which isn’t so easy to do with today’s tablets. Intel’s Brotman believes this particular product could be ready “within five to 10 years.”

To learn more about the PaperTab, watch the video below and check out Queen’s University’s human media lab.