A B C D E F G H I J K L
  SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, R&D, AND HEALTH NEWS: 1-JAN-11 - 31-DEC-11    
From 01-Jan-11 Copyright © 2011 by Macroknow inc. All Rights Reserved.
To 31-Dec-11  
Days 365  
News Items 2076
Date Event Category Authors Title X Event Source URL Item
7-Jan-11 ACC CHEM HEAL Frederik Pleitgen Charges filed as farm quarantines grow in German tainted egg scandal
 Germany: tainted egg scandal; 4,709 pig/poultry farms quarantined CNN International 1
8-Jan-11 MIL TECH Elisabeth Bumiller U.S. Will Counter Chinese Arms Buildup Pentagon to investment in new weapons/technology to counter Chinese military buildup in the Pacific NYT 2
12-Jan-11 POL TECH Michael Holden WikiLeaks' Assange: China is our real enemy WikiLeaks' Assange on China's censorship of the Internet Reuters 3
13-Jan-11 SCIE S. Jay Olson; Timothy C. Ralph Extraction of timelike entanglement from the quantum vacuum S. Jay Olson and Timothy C. Ralph, University of Queensland, on "teleportation in time": "Extraction of timelike entanglement from the quantum vacuum"; time correlation required for extraction: "e.g. if the past detector was active at a quarter to 12:00, then the future detector must wait to become active at precisely a quarter past 12:00 in order to achieve entanglement" Cornell University Library 4
16-Jan-11 MIL TECH Thom Shanker; Matt Richtel In New Military, Data Overload Can Be Deadly Art Kramer, neuroscientist: “There is information overload at every level of the military — from the general to the soldier on the ground" NYT 5
18-Jan-11 MIL TECH Aries Poon; Fanny Liu Taiwan Missiles Miss Targets in Test Taiwan: 6 out of 19 missiles tested missed their targets WSJ 6
18-Jan-11 ECO RES Alexandra Giese 2010 Hits Top of Temperature Chart Earth Policy Institute: "2010 experienced a global average temperature of 14.63 degrees Celsius (58.3 degrees Fahrenheit), tying 2005 as the hottest year in 131 years of recordkeeping. . . The human cost of these events was not small: the Russian heat wave and forest fires claimed 56,000 lives, while the Pakistan floods took 1,760" Earth Policy Institute 7
23-Jan-11 SCIE H-II rocket launched to refresh ISS 22-Jan-11: Japan: successful launch of H-IIB rocket carrying the HTV2 cargo transporter to the International Space Station (ISS) The Japan Times: Kyodo-AP 8
6-Feb-11 M&A HEAL Sanofi-aventis to Acquire Genzyme for $74.00 in Cash per Share Plus Contingent Value Right Sanofi-Aventis to acquire Genzyme for $74.00 per share in cash, or ~$20.1 billion Sanofi-Aventis; Genzyme 9
7-Feb-11 M&A HEAL Danaher to Acquire Beckman Coulter, Inc. Danaher to acquire Beckman Coulter in a transaction valued at ~$6.8 billion, including debt assumed and net of cash acquired PR Newswire: Beckman Coulter, Inc. 10
15-Feb-11 SCIE Enormous solar flare in AR 1158 NASA, Solar Dynamics Observatory Mission: enormous solar flare in AR 1158 NASA 11
16-Feb-11 M&A HEAL Sanofi-aventis to Acquire Genzyme for $74.00 in Cash per Share Plus Contingent Value Right Sanofi-aventis to acquire Genzyme Corporation for ~$20.1 billion plus contingent-value right Sanofi-aventis-Genzime 12
17-Feb-11 GOV TECH ELITE Top Silicon Valley Execs to Meet with Obama USA: President Barack Obama to dine with top Silicon Valley executives at the home of a venture capitalist NYT-Bits 13
17-Feb-11 SCIE Scientists Build the World’s First Anti-laser Yale University: Yale physicist A. Douglas Stone and the experimental group of Hui Cao built a functioning anti-laser, a coherent perfect absorber (CPA); "CPAs could one day be used as optical switches, detectors and other components in the next generation of computers, called optical computers, which will be powered by light in addition to electrons"
 Yale University 14
4-Mar-11 HEAL REL Jewish groups oppose circumcision ban in US city Activist Lloyd Schofield wants to criminalize infant circumcision in San Francisco. Schofield : "This is a human rights issue. . . This is a painful and irreversible surgery. . . It's a man's body. It's his right to choose and we're trying to preserve that choice." Abby Porth of the Jewish Community Relations Council: "This is one of the most fundamental practices to our tradition of over 3,000 years. . . It's symbolic of our covenant with God." AFP 15
7-Mar-11 M&A TECH Hitachi Transfers Hard Disk Drive Business to Western Digital Western Digital to acquire Hitachi Global Storage Technologies in a cash and stock transaction valued at ~$4.3 billion Hitachi 16
9-Mar-11 SCIE SPACE Suzanne Presto Farewell, Discovery,' as Shuttle's Space Career Ends U.S. space shuttle Discovery completes successfully its last space mission VOA News 17
12-Mar-11 AOG QUAK SCIE Japan Earthquake Alters Coast Line, Changes Earth's Axis Japan magnitude-8.9 quake on 11-Mar-11 shifted: part of Japan's land mass by ~2.5 meters; and earth off its axis point by ≥8 centimeters VOA News-Reuters 18
14-Mar-11 AOG QUAK SCIE USGS Updates Magnitude of Japan’s 2011 Tohoku Earthquake to 9.0 USGS: magnitude of Japan’s 2011 Tohoku quake updated to 9.0 USGS 19
17-Mar-11 SEC TECH Art Coviello (Executive Chairman, RSA) Open Letter to RSA Customers RSA, security division of EMC: " . . . an extremely sophisticated cyber attack . . . resulted in certain information being extracted from RSA's systems. Some of that information is specifically related to RSA's SecurID two-factor authentication products" EMC-RSA 20
28-Mar-11 SCIE TECH Internet pioneer Paul Baran passes away US scientist Paul Baran died aged 84; Baran pioneered technology aimed at increasing the survivability of data communications networks (data packs and node redundancy: precursors of the Internet) BBC News 21
4-Apr-11 M&A TECH TI to acquire National Semiconductor Texas Instruments to acquire National Semiconductor in an all-cash transaction valued at ~$6.5 billion Texas Instruments 22
8-Apr-11 M&A HEAL Sanofi-Aventis Completes Acquisition of Genzyme Corporation Sanofi-Aventis completes the acquisition of Genzyme Corporation in a deal valued at ~$20.1 billion [see 6-Feb-11] Sanofi-Aventis; Genzyme 23
18-Apr-11 GOV RES BANK The Orderly Liquidation of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. under the Dodd-Frank Act FDIC releases a paper examining "how the government could have structured a resolution of Lehman under the orderly liquidation authority of Title II of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank Act) and how the outcome could have differed from the outcome under bankruptcy" [FDIC Quarterly, 2011, Vol. 5, No. 2] FDIC 24
19-Apr-11 BUS TECH FIN IBM Reports 2011 First-Quarter Results IBM 2011Q1 results: revenue, $24.6 billion (up 8% YOY): net income (GAAP), $2.9 billion (up 10%) IBM 25
19-Apr-11 BUS TECH FIN Patrick Darling Enterprise Strength and New Products Drive Record Intel Results Intel 2011Q1 GAAP results: revenue, $12.8 billion (up 25% YOY); net income $3.2 billion (up 29% YOY)
 Intel 26
2-May-11 BUS TECH Jeff Bruner Intel 22nm 3-D Tri-Gate Transistor Technology Intel announced "a major breakthrough and historic innovation in microchips: the world's first 3-D transistors in mass production"; key benefits: improved performance and reduced power Intel 27
3-May-11 UN SCIE World Population to reach 10 billion by 2100 if Fertility in all Countries Converges to Replacement Level UM: 2010 Revision of World Population Prospects: world's current population, ~7 billion; projected population in 2100, 10.1 billion UN 28
15-May-11 MIL TECH UN: North Korea, Iran Share Ballistic Missile Technology United Nations report: North Korea and Iran shared ballistic missile technology VOA News-AFP 29
16-May-11 RES FIN ECON Chairman Ben S. Bernanke Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, At the Conference on "New Building Blocks for Jobs and Economic Growth," Washington, D.C.: Promoting Research and Development: The Government's Role Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, on promoting R&D: "A growth rate of output per person of 2-1/2 percent per year doubles average living standards in 28 years--about one generation--whereas output per person growing at what seems a modestly slower rate of 1-1/2 percent a year leads to a doubling in average living standards in about 47 years--roughly two generations. Compound interest is powerful! . . . In the United States, total R&D spending (both public and private) has been relatively stable over the past three decades, at roughly 2-1/2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP). However, this apparent stability masks some important underlying trends. First, since the 1970s, R&D spending by the federal government has trended down as a share of GDP, while the share of R&D done by the private sector has correspondingly increased. Second, the share of R&D spending targeted to basic research, as opposed to more applied R&D activities, has also been declining." Federal Reserve Board 30
1-Jun-11 HEAL Alan Cowell; William Neuman. Contributors: James Kanter; Victor Homola; Stefan Pauly; Judy Dempsey; Raphael Minder Virulent E. Coli Strain Spreads in Germany and Puzzles Health Officials Germany: E. coli 0104:H4 bacteria has infected >1,500 people and killed 16 NYT 31
5-Jun-11 HEAL Bean Sprouts Likely Source of Europe's E. coli Outbreak That Killed 22 Germany and Sweden: E.coli outbreak infected ~2,000 and killed 22 people; likely cause: bean sprouts [see 1-Jun-11] VOA News 32
12-Jun-11 HEAL Wang Guanqun (ed.) Over 600 people, including 103 children, poisoned by lead in east China China: >600, including 103 children, are suffering from lead poisoning Xinhua 33
15-Jun-11 BUS TECH Charlotte Raab US computer pioneer IBM turns 100 IBM turns 110 on 16-Jun-11; market capitalization statistics: IBM, $197 billion; Microsoft's $201 billion; Apple, $304 billion AFP 34
19-Jun-11 MIL RES MON Elisabeth Bumiller; Thom Shanker War Evolves With Drones, Some Tiny as Bugs The Pentagon requested ~$5 billion for drones (including sensor-and-camera equipped "spy flies") in 2012; since 11-Sep-2001, the time alloted to "flying missions for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance" swelled increased 3,100% NYT 35
20-Jun-11 RES TECH COMP Supercomputer "K computer" Takes First Place in World: Achieves world's best performance of 8.162 petaflops to lead TOP500 list 26th International Supercomputing Conference (ISC'11), Hamburg, Germany: the K Computer, a supercomputer jointly developed by Fujitsu Ltd. and the RIKEN research institute, is the world's fastest computer; the K Computer is capable of 8.162 petaflops (1 pertaflop=1 quadrillion calculations per second) Fujitsu; RIKEN 36
21-Jun-11 ECO RES Mass Extinction of Ocean Species Soon to Be 'Inevitable' International Programme on the State of the Ocean and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, meeting held at Oxford University, 11-13-Apr-11 : "A deadly trio of factors - warming, acidification and lack of oxygen - is creating the conditions associated with every previous major extinction of species in Earth's history, the panel warned" ENS 37
23-Jun-11 RES TECH COMP Bruce Goodwin; Thomas Zacharia The supercomputing race Supercomputing race: Japan's K Computer is the world's fastest computer; Japan and China hold 4 of the top 5 positions on the Top 500 list Washington Post-Opinions 38
24-Jun-11 RES VIO Allen McDuffee Google Ideas think tank gathering former extremists to battle radicalization Google Ideas: Summit Against Violent Extremism (SAVE), Dublin, 26-28-Jun-2011. Google Ideas is a Google think tank headed by Jared Cohen, a former State Department official. Washington Post 39
25-Jun-11 VIO HEAL Deadly suicide attack on Afghan hospital Afghanistan: suicide bomb attack at a hospital killed ≥30 people, including patients and medical staff Al Jazeera-Agencies 40
25-Jun-11 HEAL Scott Sayare; William Neuman German E.Coli Sickens 8 in France Germany: E. coli strain that killed ≥45 people spread to France NYT 41
26-Jun-11 RES HEAL Ben Hirschler; David Cowell (ed.) Drug R&D spending fell in 2010, and heading lower Global drug industry R&D spending was cut to ~$68 billion in 2010 (down ~3% YOY) [source: Thomson Reuters] Reuters 42
30-Jun-11 BUS TECH TEL Nortel Announces the Winning Bidder of its Patent Portfolio for a Purchase Price of US$4.5 Billion Nortel Networks Corporation to sell Nortel’s >6,000 patents and patent applications to a consortium consisting of Apple, EMC, Ericsson, Microsoft, Research In Motion and Sony for $4.5 billion; Nortel common shareholders or preferred shareholders will receive no value from Nortel’s creditor protection proceedings Nortel 43
13-Jul-11 M&A FIN HEAL Apax Partners, CPPIB and PSP Investments to acquire Kinetic Concepts, Inc. A consortium including funds advised by Apax Partners (Apax), affiliates of Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and the Public Sector Pension Investment Board, to acquire Kinetic Concepts, Inc. (KCI); the transaction is valued at ~$6.3 billion, including KCI's outstanding debt Apax Partners 44
14-Jul-11 TECH FREE LAW Dominic Basulto Just How Dangerous is Facial Profiling? U.S.: state law enforcement agencies to implement facial profiling technology; faces can be scaned via a Mobile Offender Recognition and Information System (MORIS) plus an iPhone Big Think 45
15-Jul-11 GOV RES MON Wang Guanqun (ed.) China pledges to boost funding for scientific research China: Ministry of Science and Technology to increase funding of scientific research to 2.2% of GDP by 2015 (up from 1.74% in 2010); China's volume of research papers in the field of materials science has exceeded those of the U.S. and Japan Xinhua: China Daily 46
17-Jul-11 FOOD NUC HEAL Nuclear-Contaminated Beef Scare Spreads in Japan Japan: reports of meat contaminated with radioactive material VOA News 47
18-Jul-11 BUS TECH IBM Reports 2011 Second-Quarter Results IBM 2011Q2 results: revenue, $26.666 billion (up 12.4% YOY); GAP net income, $3.664 billion (up 8.2% YOY) IBM 48
18-Jul-11 BUS TECH Q2 2011 Quarterly report and Semi-annual report Philips Group 2011Q2 results: sales, €5.213 biliion (down 2% on Nominal basis; up 4% on Comparable basis); net loss, €1.345 billion ($1.9 billion) Philips 49
18-Jul-11 BUS TECH JOBS An Update on Cisco's Action Plan Cisco: to reduce costs from FY2012 expense by $1 billion; to terminate ~6,500 jobs Cisco 50
19-Jul-11 BUS TECH FIN Apple Reports Third Quarter Results: All-Time Record Revenue and Earnings Apple F2011Q3 results: revenue, $28.571 billion (record; up 82% YOY); net profit, $7.308 billion (record; up 125% YOY) Apple 51
20-Jul-11 BUS TECH FIN Intel Reports Fifth Consecutive Quarter of Record Revenue Intel 2011Q2 GAAP results: revenue, $13.0 billion (record; up 21% YOY); net income, $3.0 billion (up 2% YOY) Intel 52
21-Jul-11 M&A HEAL Express Scripts and Medco Health Solutions Sign Definitive Merger Agreement; Medco Shareholders to Receive $29.1 Billion Express Scripts, Inc. to acquire Medco Health Solutions, Inc. in a cash and stock transaction valued at $29.1 billion Express Scripts: PRNewswire via COMTEX 53
21-Jul-11 BUS TECH FIN Microsoft Reports Record Fourth-Quarter and Full-Year Results Microsoft Corp. 2011Q2 (fiscal Q4) results: revenue, $17.37 billion (up 8% YOY); net income, $5.87 billion (up 30% YOY) Microsoft 54
22-Jul-11 BUS TECH FIN GE Delivers $0.34 Operating Earnings Per Share (EPS) up 17%; Industrial Segment Revenue Growth of 10%; Infrastructure Orders up 24% GE 2011Q2 results: revenues, $35.6 billion (down 4% YOY); operating earnings, $3.7 billion (up 18% YOY); GE Capital earned $1.7 billion after tax (up >100%) General Electric 55
25-Jul-11 BUS TECH FIN Research In Motion Provides Management Update and Details On Cost Optimization Program Research in Motion (RIM), of BlackBerry fame, to cut ~2,000 jobs Research in Motion 56
26-Jul-11 GOV SCIE TECH Jeremy Page China Completes Record Dive China: Jiaolong, China's 3-person deep-sea submersible completed a dive to 5,057 meters, exceeding current U.S. capabilities; Jialong can potentially access mineral resources from 70% of the ocean floor WSJ 57
27-Jul-11 SCIE O. Adriani et al. The discovery of geomagnetically trapped cosmic ray antiprotons A team of scientists observe for the first time antiprotons trapped in Earth’s inner radiation belt as part of the PAMELA satellite-borne experiment The Astrophysical Journal Letters 58
28-Jul-11 BUS TECH LAW Bill Slawski Google Acquires Over 1,000 IBM Patents in July 11-12-Jul-11: Google acquired 1,030 patents from IBM, including, according to SEO by the Sea, patents on fabrication and architecture of memory and microprocessing chips, computer architecture (servers and routers), relational databases, object oriented programming, and business processes SEO by the Sea 59
3-Aug-11 SCIE TECH Jim Brown [The Swirling Brain] SOINN Robot Learns to Adapt Japan: scientists have created an Artificial Intelligence robot named Self-Organizing Incremental Neural Network (SOINN) that "can react and adapt to new situations based on what it has learned in the past" Robots.net 60
4-Aug-11 SCIE SPACE NASA Spacecraft Data Suggest Water Flowing on Mars NASA: "Observations from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have revealed possible flowing water during the warmest months on Mars" NASA 61
9-Aug-11 BUS TECH MKT Robert Cyran Why Apple might just be the first $1 trillion company Apple Inc.'s market value briefly surpassed that of Exxon Mobil on 9-Aug-11 Reuters 62
10-Aug-11 M&A TECH ENER Technology Mergers and Acquisitions Value Nearly Doubles in 2Q 2011: Cloud computing, smart mobility, internet video, the smart grid and solar energy drive big-ticket deals for growth and innovation Ernst & Young's :Global Technology M&A update, April – June 2011": the aggregate value of global technology mergers and acquisitions (M&A) climbed to $52.1 billion in 2011Q2 (up 92% QOQ and 69% YOY) Ernst & Young-PRNewswire 63
15-Aug-11 M&A TECH TEL Google to Acquire Motorola Mobility Google Inc. to acquire Motorola Mobility for ~$12.5 billion Google 64
17-Aug-11 SCIE TECH Ted Thornhill Running robot hits 6.8mph: MABEL becomes the world's fastest two-legged machine MABEL: fastest running robot Daily Mail 65
18-Aug-11 BUS FIN TECH HP Reports Third Quarter 2011 Results and Initiates Company Transformation HP 2011Q3 results: net revenue of $31.2 billion (up 1% YOY); GAAP net earnings, $1.926 (up 9%) Hewlett-Packard 66
18-Aug-11 SCIE TECH COMP IBM Unveils Cognitive Computing Chips IBM: "IBM researchers unveiled a new generation of experimental computer chips designed to emulate the brain’s abilities for perception, action and cognition . . .IBM’s first cognitive computing prototype chips use digital silicon circuits inspired by neurobiology to make up what is referred to as a “neurosynaptic core” with integrated memory (replicated synapses), computation (replicated neurons) and communication (replicated axons). . . This architecture represents a critical shift away from traditional von Neumann computing to a potentially more power-efficient architecture that has no set programming, integrates memory with processor, and mimics the brain’s event-driven, distributed and parallel processing" IBM 67
19-Aug-11 BUS TECH Benjamin Pimentel H-P faces a potentially painful exit from PCs H-P reportedly planning to exit the PC business; and to shut down its webOS hardware operations MarketWatch 68
24-Aug-11 ACC SPACE SCIE Russia likely to suspend space deliveries over loss of Progress freighter Roscosmos: the Progress M-12M space freighter failed to separate from the Soyuz-U carrier rocket engine RIA Novosti 69
24-Aug-11 BUS TECH COMP Steve Jobs Resigns as CEO of Apple; Tim Cook Named CEO and Jobs Elected Chairman of the Board Steve Jobs resigned as CEO of Apple Apple 70
24-Aug-11 BUS TECH JUST Google Forfeits $500 Million Generated by Online Ads & Prescription Drug Sales by Canadian Online Pharmacies U.S. Department of Justice: "Google Inc. has agreed to forfeit $500 million for allowing online Canadian pharmacies to place advertisements through its AdWords program targeting consumers in the United States, resulting in the unlawful importation of controlled and non-controlled prescription drugs into the United States" U.S. Department of Justice 71
25-Aug-11 RES ECON VIO Solomon M. Hsiang; Kyle C. Meng; Mark A. Cane Civil conflicts are associated with the global climate Research indicates a correlation of "planetary-scale climate changes with global patterns of civil conflict" [Nature 476,438–441(25 August 2011); doi:10.1038/nature10311] Nature 72
28-Aug-11 POL SCIE Paul Krugman Republicans Against Science Paul Krugman on "anti-intellectualism of the political right": "the odds are that one of these years the world’s greatest nation will find itself ruled by a party that is aggressively anti-science, indeed anti-knowledge. And, in a time of severe challenges — environmental, economic, and more — that’s a terrifying prospect" NYT-Op Ed 73
31-Aug-11 GOV SCIE SPACE Ivan Broadhead China Moves Toward Permanent Space Presence China to launch its Tiangong 1 space laboratory within days; in its annual report on China’s military capabilities, the U.S. Defense Department concluded that China is developing “extensive space warfare technologies" VOA News 74
1-Sep-11 M&A FIN TECH IBM to Acquire Algorithmics: IBM Accelerates Business Analytics into Financial Risk Management IBM to acquire Algorithmics, a risk analytics firm, for $387 million IBM 75
4-Sep-11 SCIE RES Heather L. Tierney; Colin J. Murphy; April D. Jewell; Ashleigh E. Baber; Erin V. Iski; Harout Y. Khodaverdian; Allister F. McGuire; Nikolai Klebanov; E. Charles H. Sykes Experimental demonstration of a single-molecule electric motor Scientists report that "a butyl methyl sulphide molecule adsorbed on a copper surface can be operated as a single-molecule electric motor" [Nature Nanotechnology (2011); doi:10.1038/nnano.2011.142] Nature Nanotechnology 76
12-Sep-11 M&A TECH Broadcom to Acquire NetLogic Microsystems, Inc., a Leader in Network Communications Processors Broadcom to acquire NetLogic Microsystems for ~$3.7 billion Broadcom-PRNewswire 77
12-Sep-11 BUS TECH HEAL WellPoint and IBM Announce Agreement to Put Watson to Work in Health Care WellPoint, Inc. and IBM "to develop and launch Watson-based solutions to help improve patient care through the delivery of up-to-date, evidence-based health care for millions of Americans"; Watson can analyze ~200 million pages of data [medical literature, population health data, patient's health record] and provide answers to health questions in <3 seconds IBM 78
14-Sep-11 SCIE RES SPACE NASA Announces Design For New Deep Space Exploration System NASA announced it selected the design of a new Space Launch System (SLS): a heavy-lift launch architecture capable of lifting initially 70-100 metric tons and ultimately 130 metric tons for deep space exploration; goals for SLS include creating "good-paying American jobs," ensuring "continued U.S. leadership in space," reduced developmental risk, and flexible design NASA 79
18-Sep-11 PRO BUS HEAL Hundreds Demonstrate Against China Solar Panel Factory China: ~500 accused Jinko Solar factory of dumping carcinogenic pollution VOA News-AP-AFP-Reuters 80
19-Sep-11 MIL RES TECH Peter Finn A future for drones: Automated killing U.S: lethally autonomous robotics (with pattern recognition, artificial intelligence software) can be used in war for "sutomated killing" Washington Post 81
20-Sep-11 AOG SCIE JUST Nicole Winfield. Contributor: Alicia Change Trial opens against scientists for Italy quake Italy: 7 scientists are on trial for allegedly failing to sufficiently warn residents of a magnitude-6.3 quake that killed 308 people in 2009 AP 82
21-Sep-11 M&A TECH United Technologies To Acquire Goodrich Corporation - Complements And Strengthens Position In Aerospace And Defense Industry United Technologies to acquire Goodrich Corporation; the total enterprise value of the deal is $18.4 billion, including $1.9 billion in net debt assumed 83
23-Sep-11 SCIE RES OPERA experiment reports anomaly in flight time of neutrinos from CERN to Gran Sasso CERN: OPERA experiment "appears to indicate that the neutrinos travel at a velocity 20 parts per million above the speed of light, nature’s cosmic speed limit" -- if correct, this result challenges Einstein's theory of relativity CERN 84
29-Sep-11 RES TECH SPACE Special Report: China Launches Tiangong-1 China: successful launch of Tiangong-1 space lab module propelled by Long March-2FT1 rocket Xinhua 85
29-Sep-11 SCIE RES TECH Brian Vastag Tevatron atom smasher’s close ends era of big science The Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory will shut down the Tevatron on 30-Sep-11; the Tevatron was used to discover 3 of 17 fundamental particles, including the top quark; the development of MRI machines benefited from Tevatron technology, including especially superconducting, super-cooled magnets Washington Post 86
29-Sep-11 HEAL Is cantaloupe safe to eat? U.S.: cantaloupes tainted with listeria killed 13 people; the outbreak was first reported 12-Sep-2011 [Centers for Disease Control] CNN 87
3-Oct-11 SCIE HEAL "The 2011 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine - Press Release". Nobelprize.org. 10 Oct 2011 The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet decided that The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2011 shall be divided, with one half jointly to Bruce A. Beutler and Jules A. Hoffmann for their discoveries concerning the activation of innate immunity and the other half to Ralph M. Steinman for his discovery of the dendritic cell and its role in adaptive immunity The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet 88
4-Oct-11 SCIE RES "The 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics - Press Release". Nobelprize.org. 10 Oct 2011 The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to award the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2011 with one half to Saul Perlmutter (The Supernova Cosmology Project, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and University of California,  Berkeley), and the other half jointly to Brian P. Schmidt (The High-z Supernova Search Team, Australian National University), and Adam G. Riess (The High-z Supernova Search Team, Johns Hopkins University and Space Telescope Science Institute) "for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the Universe through observations of distant supernovae" The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences 89
5-Oct-11 SCIE CHEM "The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2011 - Press Release". Nobelprize.org. 10 Oct 2011 The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2011 to Dan Shechtman (Technion - Israel Institute of Technology) "for the discovery of quasicrystals" The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences 90
10-Oct-11 SCIE ECON "The Prize in Economic Sciences 2011 - Press Release". Nobelprize.org. 10 Oct 2011 The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to award The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel for 2011 to Thomas J. Sargent (New York University) and Christopher A. Sims (Princeton University) "for their empirical research on cause and effect in the macroeconomy" The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences 91
10-Oct-11 SCIE WWW SEC John Markoff Government Aims to Build a ‘Data Eye in the Sky’ IARPA, the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity, to finance projects to scan automatically massive Internet data ("big data") and extract intelligence and meaning; some social scientists are concerned about privacy implications and abuse in the form of a "Total Information Awareness" system NYT 92
17-Oct-11 BUS TECH FIN IBM Reports 2011 Third-Quarter Results IBM, 2011Q3: total revenue, $26.157 billion (up 7.8% YOY, up 3% adjusting for currency); net income (GAAP), $3.839 billion (up 7% YOY) IBM 93
18-Oct-11 BUS TECH FIN Intel Reports Record Revenue and Profit: 3.1 Billion Year-Over-Year Revenue Increase Fueled by Double-Digit PC Unit Growth and Data Center Strength; Buyback Authorization Increased by $10 Billion Intel, 2011Q3 GAAP results: revenue, a record $14.2 billion (up 28% YOY); net income, a record $3.5 billion (up 17%, YOY)  Intel 94
18-Oct-11 LAW HEAL Michele Sinner; Sebastian Moffett A process which involves removal of a stem cell from a human embryo at the blastocyst stage, entailing the destruction of that embryo, cannot be patented [Judgment in Case C-34/10 Oliver Brüstle v Greenpeace e.V.] European Court of Justice (ECJ): "A process which involves removal of a stem cell from a human embryo at the blastocyst stage, entailing the destruction of that embryo, cannot be patented. The use of human embryos for therapeutic or diagnostic purposes which are applied to the human embryo and are useful to it is patentable, but their use for purposes of scientific research is not patentable" Court of Justice of the European Union 95
20-Oct-11 BUS TECH FIN Microsoft Reports Record First-Quarter Results: $17.37 billion of revenue driven by solid business and consumer demand Microsoft, Q1: revenue, $17.37 billion (record; up 7% YOY); net income, $5.74 billion (up 6% YOY) Microsoft 96
21-Oct-11 BUS TECH FIN GE Delivers $0.31 Operating EPS Excluding Effects of Preferred Redemption, Up 11%; GE Reports Net EPS of $0.22, Up 22%; Industrial Segment Revenue Growth of $23.4 billion, Up 19%; Industrial Orders Up 16%; GE Capital Earns $1.5 billion, Up 79% General Electric (GE), 2011Q3: total revenues, $35.4 billion (up 0% YOY); net earnings attributable to GE, $3.2 billion (up 57% YOY) General Electric 97
24-Oct-11 M&A BUS HEAL Cigna to Acquire HealthSpring Cigna Corporation to acquire HealthSpring, Inc. in a deal valued at ~$3.8 billion Cigna 98
24-Oct-11 M&A BUS TECH Oracle Buys RightNow: Adds Leading Customer Service Cloud Offering to Oracle’s Public Cloud Oracle to acquire RightNow Technologies, Inc., a leading provider of cloud-based customer service, for ~$1.5 billion net of RightNow's cash and debt Oracle 99
28-Oct-11 RES TECH COMP John Markoff China Has Homemade Supercomputer Gain China announced Sunway BlueLight MPP, China's first supercomputer based on Chinese microprocessor technology; the Sunway can perform ~1 petaflop; it has 8,700 ShenWei SW1600 microprocessors manufactured in Shanghai NYT 100
30-Oct-11 SPACE SCIE Russia Launches Spacecraft to ISS Russia: Roskosmos launched successfully unmanned Progress cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS) VOA News-AP-AFP 101
3-Nov-11 BUS TECH JOBS AMD Optimizes Cost Structure to Enhance Competitiveness and Accelerate Growth Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) to reduce its global workforce by approximately 10% (~1,107 jobs) AMD 102
13-Nov-11 BUS TECH RES Claire Cain Miller; Nick Bilton Google’s Lab of Wildest Dreams Top-secret Google X laboratory with heavy emphasis on automation, robotics, and artificial intelligence (AI) revealed NYT 103
14-Nov-11 MKT TECH ELITE Alex Crippen What Has Warren Buffett Been Buying? 'Harold' Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway bought $10.7 billion worth of IBM common stock (~5.5% of IBM) CNBC 104
3-Dec-11 M&A COMP TECH SAP to Accelerate Cloud Strategy with Acquisition of SuccessFactors SAP AG to acquire SuccessFactors [cloud-based human capital management solutions] in a deal valued at ~$3.4 billion SAP AG 105
8-Dec-11 SCIE RES Nicholas J. McConnell; Chung-Pei Ma; Karl Gebhardt; Shelley A. Wright; Jeremy D. Murphy; Tod R. Lauer; James R. Graham; Douglas O. Richstone Two ten-billion-solar-mass black holes at the centres of giant elliptical galaxies [Nature 480,215–218(08 December 2011); doi:10.1038/nature10636] Nicholas McConnell et al. "report that NGC 3842, the brightest galaxy in a cluster at a distance from Earth of 98 megaparsecs, has a central black hole with a mass of 9.7 billion solar masses, and that a black hole of comparable or greater mass is present in NGC 4889, the brightest galaxy in the Coma cluster . . ." Nature 106
9-Dec-11 ACC HEAL Anjana Pasricha 89 Die in India Hospital Blaze India: fire at a hospital in Kolkata killed 89 people VOA News 107
12-Dec-11 GOV WEATH SCIE Canada pulls out of Kyoto Protocol Canada's Conservative government to withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol and save ~$14 billion in penalties CBC News 108
14-Dec-11 M&A TECH Lam Research and Novellus Systems to Combine in $3.3 Billion All-Stock Transaction Lam Research Corp. to acquire Novellus Systems Inc.in an all-stock deal valued at ~$3.3 billion Lam Research 109
14-Dec-11 RES ECON EDU D’Vera Cohn; Jeffrey Passel; Wendy Wang; Gretchen Livingston Barely Half of U.S. Adults Are Married – A Record Low: New Marriages Down 5% from 2009 to 2010 Pew Research Center: the percentage of all adults ages 18 and older who are married tumbled from 72% in 1960 to 51% in 2010; in the same time period, the percentage of adults ages 18 to 29 who are married, tumbled from 59% to 20%; in a 2010 survey, 4-in-10 Americans say marriage is becoming obsolete Pew Research Center 110
26-Dec-11 PRO RES POL CNN Wire Staff. Contributor: Barbara Starr Hackers target global analysis company Stratfor, a provider of "global intelligence," was hacked ["stratfor private client list" was posted on 24-Dec-2011 at http://pastebin.com/8MtFze0s; "Press Release: Stratfor hack NOT Anonymous" was posted on 25-Dec-2011 at http://pastebin.com/8yrwyNkt; "On Stratfor" was posted by 9. Barrett Brown, Project PM, on 26-Dec-2011 at http://pastebin.com/WPE73rhy]
 		 CNN International 111