It’s money to burn. Looks like a warehouse in Thailand full of Bitcoin-mining machines caught fire. Local media and Bitcoin websites suggest that the facility, packed with over 2000 computers connected to the Bitcoin network, went up in flames on 7 November. Equipment worth an estimated &dollar;2 million was destroyed. The machines mined Bitcoins by solving cryptographic puzzles. The fire has been blamed for a sudden slowdown in activity on the Bitcoin network.
Make yourself invisible. That’s the idea behind software that removes moving objects from video imagery. The uncensored images are then only viewable when an authorised person watches the recording. Developed by Prism Skylabs, based in San Francisco, the system uses machine-learning to identify movement belonging to foreground elements, like a person walking across the camera’s field of view. The software recognises the stationary background and can then paint over foreground objects to neatly hide human activity.
Call it roach-and-rescue. Alper Bozkurt at North Carolina State University built sound-sensing “backpacks” that can be strapped to Madagascar hissing cockroaches. With a computer processing the microphone data, the cockroaches are guided towards the sound source via automated electric pulses to their antennae&colon; the nerve stimulation causes the insects to turn left or right. Such roaches might be used to look for disaster victims under rubble, the team suggests.