Month: October 2017

Bethesda, publisher of the upcoming shooting game Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus, has issued a formal response to decidedly informal (and largely anonymous) criticisms surrounding the anti-Nazi game. In doing so, however, the company has made the curious decision to try to absolve itself of particularly political overtones.

The game's latest advertising campaign, which launched this week, appropriates President Trump's "Make America Great Again" slogan by using the tagline "Make America Nazi-Free Again." This message could be read one of two ways: as an isolated reference to the game's conceit, which makes players battle through an alternate-universe United States overrun by Nazis; or as a pointed comment about high-profile neo-Nazi demonstrations in the USA over the past few months.

The campaign, unsurprisingly, was followed by vitriolic comments from unconfirmed social media accounts. It's a tactic that shouldn't shock anybody who has followed recent, fascinating studies about Russian campaigns of disinformation and political-bubble exploitation that rely on similar social media actions. One of the most visible anonymous complaints directed at Bethesda, carried by "WTF really" retweets, described the ad campaign as an attempt to "tap into hysterical leftist power fantasy." (To clarify: these anti-Wolfenstein posts do not appear to have a clear connection to Russian disinformation campaigns.)

General Motors

On Monday, General Motors gave us a quick look at a new fuel cell EV platform it's developing, called SURUS. It stands for Silent Utility Rover Universal Superstructure, and it's a large driverless vehicle—about the size of a shipping container—that GM thinks could work in a range of applications, including mobile and emergency power generation, cargo delivery, and even military use. We weren't allowed to take any photos of it, but on Friday GM made it public.

SURUS is powered by GM's latest hydrogen fuel cell system. The company has been working with Honda since 2013 on the technology, and it plans to commercialize it within the next five years, targeting commercial and military buyers. "SURUS redefines fuel cell electric technology for both highway and off-road environments," said Charlie Freese, executive director of GM Global Fuel Cell Business. "General Motors is committed to bringing new high-performance, zero-emission systems to solve complex challenges for a variety of customers."

The asphalt-derived material before (left) and after it has been coated with lithium. (credit: Tour Group, Rice University)

Most of the batteries we use, from our cell phones to our cars, rely on using lithium ions. As a result, their capacity is largely a product of how much lithium you can stuff into a given volume. Obviously, using a pure lithium electrode would provide the highest density possible. But there has been no way to control where the lithium ends up as a battery goes through charge/discharge cycles. The typical result is a set of lithium metal spines that short the whole system out.

As a result, a lot of effort has been put into finding other materials that can incorporate lithium into their structure. This lowers the total lithium content but keeps the battery from shorting out. However, a new paper suggests an intriguing alternative, describing a material that ensures lithium forms a smooth coating on its surface with new spines. What's this wonder material? A slightly modified version of asphalt.

Pavement from a chemistry perspective

Although the term "asphalt" is often used as a general term for blacktop pavement, it has a technical meaning as well: a viscous, semi-liquid hydrocarbon that's one of the components of the paving material. There are several different types of asphalt, but the team here worked with something called gilsonite, which is close enough to a solid to be mined. Like other hydrocarbons, it's a complex mix of molecules rather than a pure substance, and it contains things like nitrogen and sulfur due to its origin in biological material.

Enlarge (credit: Volvo)

Infotainment systems in new cars are getting too complex, according to a study commissioned by the AAA Foundation. The research, which tested 30 different 2017 model year vehicles, found that many functions—most notably entering a new navigation destination—are so distracting that they should not be performed by the driver while the vehicle is in motion.

So it's good to know that advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS), like blind spot monitoring and lane departure warnings, are saving lives, according to the findings of another study, this time from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS). The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration just announced, however, that the number of road deaths in the US has increased for the second year running.

The first study was conducted by David Strayer and colleagues at the University of Utah and is part of a long-running research program funded by the AAA Foundation on distracted driving. The report, which was published this week, sought to answer several questions about current infotainment systems, which it notes are getting ever more complex. Among these were which types of tasks are the most distracting and if it's more work to interact with a screen in the center of the dashboard, buttons between the front seats, or voice commands.

Enlarge / A man wearing a face mask works in Antananarivo, Madagascar, as plague spreads rapidly in cities across the country. (credit: Getty | Anadolu)

An unusually deadly seasonal outbreak of plague has gripped the island nation of Madagascar. As of Friday, 258 have been sickened and 36 have died just since August, according to Madagascar’s Ministry of Public Health.

To try to stifle the spread, the government has forbidden public gatherings, including sporting events, and schools have closed for insecticide treatments that kill plague-spreading fleas. People have swarmed pharmacies, desperately seeking face masks and any antibiotics they can get. The World Health Organization on Friday announced that it has released $1.5 million in emergency funds and delivered nearly 1.2 million antibiotic doses to help combat the outbreak.

Enlarge (credit: Microsoft)

Depending on which analysts you choose to believe, Windows Mixed Reality headsets will either sell strongly, outselling the Oculus Rift by two-to-one and the HTC Vive by ten-to-fifteen percent in the fourth quarter... or get off to a slow start, with VR remaining niche.

On the more upbeat side is market research firm SuperData. SuperData points to the advantages of Microsoft's platform: low-price headsets (ranging from $299 to $499) and lower hardware specs (a basic experience will work on machines with Skylake-integrated graphics, though more advanced titles will require discrete GPUs). The inside-out tracking of the Windows headsets also makes for easier installation: no need to mount base stations on the walls or anything like that; just plug the headset in and go.

The Windows platform will also have a good range of content; Microsoft has its own IP such as Halo and Minecraft, and the platform will also be compatible with SteamVR, giving access to two VR ecosystems with a single headset purchase.