In The Daily Mail, Stephen Hawking writes that time travel may be possible. Since time and space are "wrinkled", people might use these wrinkles as shortcuts in time:

Nothing is flat or solid. If you look closely enough at anything you'll find holes and wrinkles in it. It's a basic physical principle, and it even applies to time. Even something as smooth as a pool ball has tiny crevices, wrinkles and voids. Now it's easy to show that this is true in the first three dimensions. But trust me, it's also true of the fourth dimension. There are tiny crevices, wrinkles and voids in time. Down at the smallest of scales, smaller even than molecules, smaller than atoms, we get to a place called the quantum foam. This is where wormholes exist. Tiny tunnels or shortcuts through space and time constantly form, disappear, and reform within this quantum world. And they actually link two separate places and two different times. [...]

Given enough power and advanced technology, perhaps a giant wormhole could even be constructed in space. I'm not saying it can be done, but if it could be, it would be a truly remarkable device. One end could be here near Earth, and the other far, far away, near some distant planet.

Theoretically, a time tunnel or wormhole could do even more than take us to other planets. If both ends were in the same place, and separated by time instead of distance, a ship could fly in and come out still near Earth, but in the distant past. Maybe dinosaurs would witness the ship coming in for a landing.

Link via Geekologie | Image: NASA

Tracy Woodhouse and Graham Peck found a century-old abandoned public bathroom on the shore of Scarborough, UK and decided to turn it into a home:

The £35,000 project is now finished and the couple have settled down in their new home, which they have named The Lookout. Their television is situated where the men's urinals used to be, and their bathroom is in the former ladies' toilets. [...]

Metal gates at the separate entrances for Gentlemen and Ladies are signs of the building's original use as well as the bay window – which used to be the toilet's kiosk, but once they started digging much of its past was revealed.

The couple filled six skips with maroon glazed earthenware bricks and dug out the drains of the old urinals and a dozen cubicle

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/propertynews/7674061/Couple-set-up-home-in-disused-public-lavatory-with-sea-view.html | Photo: Ross Parry/Daily Telegraph

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Most organs that are removed from bodies for transplants can last only four to eight hours before they become useless. But Harvard researcher Hemant Thatte and his team have developed what they call "Somah" -- a chemical mix that can preserve organs. The above video shows a pig heart being revived using this process a day after it was removed from the pig.

The researchers harvested hearts from female pigs, stored them in one of the two solutions, then biopsied them at several points over the next four hours. They observed the function of the cardiomyocyte and endothelial cells--both of which must be preserved in order for the transplanted heart to survive over the long term. By measuring key proteins, they determined that the rate of cell death was significantly slower in the Somah-preserved hearts than it was in those stored with Celsior. Their experiments in pigs suggest that Somah keeps hearts and livers viable for at least 10 days. By contrast, solutions such as Celsior can only be counted on to preserve hearts and livers for about four and 12 hours, respectively.

Link via Popular Science

Grey Van Kuilenburg is a custom guitar builder. Pictured above is a body for a seven-string guitar that he carved and assembled from ash, bubinga, and rock maple. In an interview about his work, Kuilenburg described how involved is carving a guitar body that is not only beautiful, but functional:

The process is a long one, but the readers digest version is you select the tone wood, find the centerline, route out the cavities for the pickups, electronics, and the neck pocket (lot's of slow caution there. it needs to be as perfect, as straight, and as tight as possible. This is where a great deal of tone is either lost or gained.) Do whatever drilling is necessary for the bridge you're using, I do a lot of mock ups with the parts to make sure everything fits and has room. You cannot measure enough times, or be careful enough!!! Then shape it, and break out the chisels. After its finished, I do a great deal of sanding, then finish it or send it to the paint shop depending on the piece. In this case I went with a three part oil finish that I like to use. It's very protective, but it feels like raw wood so it plays fast and feels more natural.

Link | Interview

A research team led by Mark Changizi of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute proposes that hospital patients be given gowns that match their skin color when they're admitted. Changes in that color during the stay, contrasted by the gown as a constant, could alert caregivers to a decline in patient health:

Human eyes evolved to see in color largely for the purpose of detecting skin color changes such as when other people blush, Changizi said. These emotive skin color changes are extremely apparent because humans are hard-wired to notice them, and because the background skin color remains unchanged. The contrast against the nearby "baseline" skin color is what makes blushes so noticeable, he said.

Human skin also changes color as a result of hundreds of different medical conditions. Pale skin, yellow skin, and cyanosis – a potentially serious condition of bluish discoloration of the skin, lips, nails, and mucous membranes due to lack of oxygen in the blood – are common symptoms. These color changes often go unnoticed, however, because they often involve a fairly universal shift in skin color, Changizi said. The observer in most instances will just assume the patient's current skin color is the baseline color. The challenge is that there is no color contrast against the baseline for the observer to pick up on, as the baseline skin color has changed altogether.

Link via Digg | Photo: CDC

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The opening to last night's episode of The Simpsons parodied "Tik Tok", a song by American pop singer Ke$ha (that's how she spells it). Featuring Groundskeeper Willy brushing his teeth with a bottle of Jack.

via Comics Alliance | Another Tik Tok Parody

RC car maker Losi has released what's being called the most advanced radio controlled car ever built. The Ten-T has a single-cylinder 3.4 cc gas engine that burns a mixture of methanol, nitromethane and lubricant and provides 1.8 hp. It has dual disk brakes, front and back, and adjustable suspension. Even though it's only 18 inches long and weighs just 6.2 pounds, it's built like a race car. Eric Adams of Popular Science has all of the details:

With the Ten-T you just hit "start" on the remote. That turns on the car's own electric motor, powered by a 7.4-volt lithium-polymer battery. The motor turns a starter shaft behind the engine, which spins the crankshaft until the engine's suction draws in fuel. Meanwhile, the battery also lights a glow plug, similar to a spark plug, in the engine. The plug's hot element, combined with the compression of the fuel-air mixture when the piston rises, ignites the fuel. Then the plug keeps glowing, and the fuel keeps burning, until you're ready to call it quits.

Article Link and Manufacturer Link | Photo (unrelated) via flickr user SteelCityHobbies used under Creative Commons license

This famous photo by Nick Ut of the Associated Press was shot on June 8, 1972, after South Vietnamese forces used napalm on an area where they suspected Communist forces were hiding. The little girl in the center, Kim Phúc, and the terror that she expressed in photo came to symbolize the war in the eyes of many Americans.

Kim Phúc was badly burned and suffered permanent nerve damage. She tried to study medicine when she grew up, but was forced drop out in order to become a propaganda tool of the Vietnamese government. Later, she was able to begin medical studies in Cuba. While traveling back from Cuba in 1992, her plane stopped in Canada to refuel. Kim and her husband used the opportunity to defect, and they became Canadian citizens in 1997.

In the years since she's escaped, Kim Phúc has spoken to thousands of US veterans, established a foundation to help children hurt by war, and served as a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for Peace. In the links, you can read a biography of her and read or hear her life in her own words, courtesy of NPR.

Biography and Personal Narrative via Ace of Spades HQ | Images: AP and CBC, respectively

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Why would anyone want to get hit the face with a cupcake fired out of a 120 psi cannon? Wrong question. The correct question is: why wouldn't everyone want to get hit the face with a cupcake fired out of a 120 psi cannon?

The above video is a viral advertisement for Johnny Cupcakes. The cannon was built by Kamp Grizzly, a marketing studio in Portland, Oregon.

Link via Gizmodo

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The Facade Printer is a computer-controlled paintball gun. It was developed by the German design group Sonice Development GmbH and can paint images onto a wall:

It consists of a two-axis turntable and a print head which is powered by compressed air. The printer shoots the picture dot by dot from a remote distance on a selected surface. Particularly inaccessable, formatless and uneven surfaces can be printed on. For example a building can be printed from the street, without having a complex scaffolding.

Gallery and Technical Info (in German) via GearFuse

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It's called the "Better Marriage Blanket" and is supposed to absorb noxious bodily odors. The advertisement claims that the carbon fabric lining of this blanket keeps flatulence beneath the covers. It also suggests that the blanket would make a great wedding or anniversary gift.

http://www.bettermarriageblanket.com/ via Geekologie

We've previously featured the optical illusions of artist Leando Erlich. One that we've missed is this installation at the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art in Kanazawa, Japan. It looks like a swimming pool, but is actually two sheets of acrylic with a few inches of water between them. Visitors to the exhibit at the lower level appear to be walking around at the bottom of a swimming pool. More pictures at the link.

Link via DudeCraft | Artist Website | Museum Website

No, it's not a picture of Neatorama's corporate offices (we don't get a mobile shower unit). It's an office design proposal by artist, designer, and inventor Steven M. Johnson. He has all sorts of creative if questionable suggestions to improve everything from cubicles, to RVs, to bedroom slippers.

His Nod Office, for example, is an ingenious piece of furniture that integrates a bed into a desk. Who among us has not wished for such a thing? He takes the idea of integration further — much further — with concepts such as Road Office (“for those wishing to catch up on work at the roadside … or [in a] traffic tie-up,” he says), the Treadmill Workstation (now that’s productivity!), and any number of mobile workspaces, such as the chauffer-driven executive suite or the Real Life Vehicle, an SUV that features rotating seats, pull-out computer stations, file cabinets, and laundry facilities.

At the link, there's a thumbnail gallery of his work, an article about him, and if you keep scrolling down, an interview.

http://designmind.frogdesign.com/articles/work-life/searching-for-value-in-ludicrous-ideas.html#/images/dm/issues/work---life/articles/rv/rv_1.gif via Fast Company

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Researchers at Tohoku Gakuin University in Japan have developed a robot that stays balanced on a ball, even when it's pushed or heavy loads are placed on top.

Three independent rotors spin to keep the robot's balance atop the ball, and it can move in any direction, using an "omniwheel" akin to the one under Honda's U3-X.[...]

Dynamically stable robots like this one are better than static bots, which use three or more wheels, researchers say.

They can have smaller bases, allowing them to navigate tight corners. And their omnidirectional abilities allow them to quickly go in any direction without having to turn around.

via Popular Science

I've sat on this story for a week because it seemed like an obvious hoax. But Prahlad Jani, who claims to have consumed no food or drink for seventy years, has spent six days in a hospital in India under strict observation:

So far, Mr Prahlad appears to be standing up to scrutiny. He has not eaten or drunk any fluids in six days, and similarly has not passed urine or a stool in that time. He remains fit and healthy and shows no sign of lethargy. Doctors will continue observing him for 15 days in which time they would expect to see some muscle wastage, serious dehydration, weight loss,and fatigue followed by organ failure.

It is common in India for Jains and Hindus to fast, sometimes for up to eight days, without any adverse affects, as part of their religious worship. Most humans cannot survive without food for 50 days. The longest hunger strike recorded is 74 days.

Link via technabob | Photo: AFP