Whether you find driving over speed bumps painful could help doctors work out whether you are suffering from acute appendicitis.

While the link between speed bump pain and appendicitis was already suspected — some doctors even use anecdotal reports of the discomfort in their diagnostic procedure — evidence for the idea had not been produced until now.

“It may sound odd, but asking patients whether their pain worsened going over speed bumps on their way in to hospital could help doctors in a diagnosis,” said Dr Helen Ashdown of the Department … Read More → "Speed bumps can help diagnose appendicitis"

Most functional jetpacks aren’t really jetpacks. They’re rocket belts, or ducted-fanpacks. To make an actual jetpack, you need some jet engines, and two guys have stuck four (barely) hobby-grade engines together into what they hope will become a working strap-on flying device.
via DVICE

< … Read More → "A couple guys are trying to Kickstart an actual jetpack"

So you’re quitting Instagram. Good for you! It’s your right as a consumer. Vote with your wallet, as the saying goes – and if you’re not actually paying money for something, then vote with your data.

As a refresher, here’s a look at some other tech-related products, companies and services people have threatened to quit recently.

Facebook

Why? The new Timeline layout, the confusing privacy controls, the IPO that – gasp! – made some bankers rich at … Read More → "A bunch of tech things people have threatened to quit recently"

Professional football players receive as many as 1,500 hits to the head in a single season, depending on their position. That’s 15,000 in a 10-year playing career, not to mention any blows they received in college, high school, and peewee football. And those hits have consequences: concussions and, according to recent research, permanent brain damage. It’s not just football, either. Hockey, lacrosse, and even sports like cycling and snowboarding are contributing to a growing epidemic … Read More → "The helmet that can save football"

As we move out of the dark ages of simple computing devices and cellphones without Facebook on them, we see our science fiction dreams coming true in everyday life. The question becomes, at that point, what is real and what remains fiction.

After looking around, the answers range from exciting to impressive to downright weird. Nonetheless, there’s something sci-fi for everyone here, from the … Read More → "15 geeky gifts that sound like science fiction"

A spider that builds elaborate, fake spiders and hangs them in its web has been discovered in the Peruvian Amazon.

Believed to be a new species in the genus Cyclosa, the arachnid crafts the larger spider from leaves, debris and dead insects. Though Cyclosa includes other sculpting arachnids, this is the first one observed to build a replica with multiple, spidery legs.
via Read More → "Spider that builds its own spider decoys discovered"

Two years ago this weekend, Jeff Kaffee (pictured above) took possession of his keys and became the very first person in the U.S. to buy a Chevrolet Volt.

Since then, the retired pilot from Parsippany, New Jersey, has put almost 12,000 miles on his range-extended electric car–using just 26.1 gallons of gasoline while doing so.

That works out to a lifetime average of about 460 mpg, since most of those miles were covered on grid electricity.
via Venture Beat</ … Read More → "After 2 years in a Chevy Volt, this guy is averaging 460 mpg"

Lots more here

via neatorama

As if getting to Mars and establishing the first colony there wasn’t dangerous enough, a new analysis of cratering rates suggests that over a three-year expedition to Mars, the planet will likely get hit by at least one asteroid large enough to cause an impact explosion in the megaton range. Good times.
via DVICE

</ … Read More → "Mars explorers will probably experience megaton asteroid strikes"

Unlike traditional bitmap graphics, which are made up of an array of pixels, vector graphics consist of lines, curves and shapes that are based on geometric formulas. Not only do they take up far less memory than bitmaps, but sections of them can also be enlarged without any loss of resolution. Currently, however, vector graphics aren’t well-suited to photorealistic applications, such as video. That may be … Read More → "Vector-based video could mean no more pixels"