24 May 2006
Amendment to Defund NAIS Fails

The amendment offered by Rep. Ron Paul of Texas to defund the NAIS scheme has failed. Only 34 members of the House voted for it - you can see the complete roll call here. In the Indiana delegation it appears that only Dan Burton and John Hostettler supported it: the rest, including such politically diverse personalities as Steve Buyer, Julia Carson and Mike Pence, voted to put the small farmer out of business.

Read the roll call. Remember in November.

15:43 /Agriculture | 2 comments | permanent link

Finding computer files hidden in plain sight

An interesting application, but as the researchers note, it only detects the possible presence of a hidden bitstream - it can't even explain the methodology to reconstruct it, and it can't decrypt it.

One interesting application would be for the detection of "watermarks" in digital photos. A lot of graphics posted on the web are innocently reused by folks who have no idea where they originated. An application constructed from this technology could tell them with some certainty if the photo was watermarked, even if it couldn't tell you by whom or with what graphics application.

Check out more on steganography at Wikipedia.

Criminals and terrorists are using innocent-looking digital images as a cover to send hidden data. Researchers at the Ames Laboratory's Midwest Forensics Resource Center have developed a method to detect those hidden messages.

(link) [EurekAlert]

14:35 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

Mice inherit trait without the gene

This bit of news could add an interesting twist to a lot of genetics "common knowledge". Of immediate concern to me would be the implications for genetically modified crops. Interesting stuff ...

AP - Mice in a lab experiment inherited the effects of an aberrant gene without inheriting the gene itself, a bizarre-sounding result that may someday help scientists understand aspects of diabetes, infertility and other problems.

(link) [Yahoo! News: Top Stories]

14:20 /Agriculture | 0 comments | permanent link