Easily digestible tech news... http://www.techdirt.com/ en-us http://www.techdirt.com/images/td-88x31.gifhttp://www.techdirt.com/ Tue, 2 Oct 2012 17:00:00 PDT Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101004/02161811270/dailydirt-love-will-find-way.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101004/02161811270/dailydirt-love-will-find-way.shtml

French researchers devised an experiment to determine what would happen if shrimp could time travel -- re-animating preserved brine shrimp eggs from 1985, 1996 and 2007 to mate with each other. Shrimp specimens that mated with shrimp from the past or future died more quickly than contemporary mating... so Sarah Connor should be a bit wary of the pickup line, "Come with me if you want to live." [url]

Little kids might ask where babies come from, but real scientists ask, "Where did plant sex come from?" Apparently, the answer is low oxygen levels in the atmosphere that trigger some plant cells to become sex cells. This discovery could lead to new ways to manage plant seeds -- as well as a patent for plant sex under varying oxygen concentrations. [url]

Plans for colonizing other planets could be derailed by the sterilizing effects of radiation from outer space. Cosmic rays are difficult to shield away from astronauts, so there need to be a few more studies to figure out how humans will reproduce without the Earth to protect us. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20101004/02161811270 Fri, 4 Nov 2011 17:00:00 PDT Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110909/04255515875/dailydirt-growing-food20.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110909/04255515875/dailydirt-growing-food20.shtml

It probably shouldn't be too surprising that artificial meat grown in a lab has the potential to significantly reduce the carbon emissions of the livestock industry. Getting people to eat cultured meat might be a bit difficult, though. [url]

The company Shelf Reliance sells freeze-dried food that can last indefinitely -- so you can survive underground while the zombies roam the surface of the Earth. Based on taste tests: stick to the freeze-dried fruits and vegetables. [url]

A shrimp production facility in Texas can grow record-setting amounts of shrimp using an indoor system of recirculating water. This technology also avoids the use of antibiotics and could make US shrimp production competitive with shrimp farms in countries like Thailand, India and Vietnam. [url]

Growing vegetables on thin films of hydrogel polymers is a reality, producing commercially sold tomatoes. These thin film farming techniques also seem to work with melons, cucumbers, strawberries, lettuce and paprika. [url]

To discover more food-related links, check out what's floating around in StumbleUpon. [url]  

By the way, StumbleUpon can also recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

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