Month: October 2017

Enlarge / Pox. (credit: CDC)

Smallpox is the first and only human disease we have ever successfully eradicated—thanks to the very first vaccine ever developed. It’s quite the medical triumph. The very word “vaccine,” which we use to describe all other forms of protective inoculations, is an homage to the smallpox vaccine.

Yet, we don’t know what the vaccine is, exactly. For decades, researchers have mulled its sordid and muddled origins. Now, a recent report in the New England Journal of Medicine finally offers a genetic glimpse of its true identity—and it’s not what you might expect.

Most people know the general tale of the vaccine’s origin, which started with key observations: smallpox survivors obtained immunity; infection through a scratch spurred a milder sickness; and milkmaids, who sometimes developed pustules on their hands, seemed conspicuously above the fray. These observations fortuitously fused in the mind of Edward Jenner, who, in 1798, reported protecting a brave eight-year-old named James Phipps from smallpox with an inoculation from the lesioned hand of a cowpox-infected milkmaid, Sarah Nelmes. The inoculation was dubbed a vaccine, a term that stems from the Latin word vacca, for cow.

Enlarge / Facebook is a popular social media site you may have heard about. (credit: Dan Kitwood / Getty Images)

A 28-year-old Ohio man is suing police for arresting him and putting him on trial for felony charges in connection to a fake Facebook page he created. The Facebook page mocked the local police department.

Anthony Novak alleges federal civil rights violations in the aftermath of his 2016 arrest by the Parma Police Department, just south of Cleveland. The agency issued an advisory last year to citizens saying the page wasn't real and that "The public should disregard any and all information posted on the fake Facebook account."

Novak was acquitted by a jury of the felony charge of disrupting a public service. The fake Facebook page, which has been removed, replaced the agency's slogan of "We know crime" to "We no crime." A job advertisement seeking recruits on the fake page said: "The test will consist of a 15- question, multiple-choice definition test followed by a hearing test. Should you pass you will be accepted as an officer of the Parma Police Department."

Enlarge / Documents being hauled into the federal courthouse in Wilmington, Delaware, in 2004. Delaware looks to become the top venue for US patent disputes following the Supreme Court's decision in TC Heartland. (credit: Mike Mergen/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

New lawsuits are down—way down—in the mostly rural district that was once the national hotspot for patent disputes.

For several years, the Eastern District of Texas hosted more patent lawsuits than any other judicial district in the country. Last year, East Texas saw more patent lawsuits filed than the next four judicial districts combined. But in May, the Supreme Court sharply limited where patent owners can choose to file their lawsuits, in a case called TC Heartland. That's leading to a sharp change in the geography of patent litigation.

Statistics published today by the IP litigation research company Lex Machina show the dramatic effect the decision has had on the litigation landscape. Lex Machina compared patent filings in the 90 days before the TC Heartland decision came down on May 22 to the 90-day period directly after the decision. What the company found is that the two top districts changed places.

Lee Hutchinson

HOUSTON—After carrying Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins to the Moon in 1969, the Apollo 11 command module splashed into the Pacific Ocean. The spacecraft then returned to Houston with the astronauts before embarking on a tour to all 50 states in 1970 and 1971. An estimated three million people visited the spacecraft along the way as it stopped in one city per state, usually the capital.

Following that tour, the historic capsule was installed at Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum, and it remained there as one of the institution's most prized artifacts. Now, finally, the 3.9-meter wide spacecraft is going on tour again. It won't be visiting all 50 states but instead a select few cities—Houston, St. Louis, Pittsburgh, and, lastly, for the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing in 2019, Seattle. The latter city gets the honor because Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is among those underwriting the tour.

Enlarge / An Uber driverless Ford Fusion in Pittsburgh in 2016. Cars like this will soon be legal for commercial use in California. (credit: Photo by Jeff Swensen/Getty Images)

Car and technology companies are now just a few years—possibly even a few months—away from launching commercial services built around driverless cars. And state regulators are facing pressure to get ready by clarifying the rules of the road for fully autonomous vehicles.

On Wednesday, California published new draft rules that give us our clearest look yet at how the driverless car industry will be regulated in California. The new rules, which are subject to a 15-day public comment period before they become final, address a wide range of issues. But perhaps the most significant change is that the new rules formally recognize that companies will be deploying fully driverless vehicles, not just testing them.

That means it will likely be legal to operate commercial taxis with no driver in California as soon as next year.

Enlarge / Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook, walks to a meeting with members of the Congressional Black Caucus at the US Capitol, October 12, 2017 in Washington, DC. (credit: Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

A top Facebook executive said Thursday that the company regrets how Russian influence on the social network played out in the run-up to last year's presidential election.

"We know we have a responsibility to prevent everything we can from this happening on our platforms," COO Sheryl Sandberg told Axios. "So we told Congress and the Intelligence committees that when they are ready to release the ads, we are ready to help them."

On Wednesday, leaders of the House Intelligence Committee, which has been investigating the connections between the ads and the election, said it would publicly release thousands of ads.

Enlarge (credit: Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Alphabet's self-driving car company Waymo wants at least $1 billion—and a public apology—to end its trade secrets lawsuit against Uber, according to a report from Reuters this morning. The report cites sources "familiar with the proposal," and it doesn't specify the exact dollar amount or when the proposal was tendered. Waymo (and Google) parent Alphabet also sought independent oversight to be sure that Uber doesn't use its technology.

Uber rejected the demands, and no further settlement talks are currently scheduled, according to the story.

The lawsuit began in February, when Waymo accused Anthony Levandowski, the chief of Uber's self-driving car project, of stealing more than 14,000 files shortly before he resigned from Google. Levandowski, who is not a defendant in the case, has pleaded the Fifth Amendment and avoided answering questions about the accusations. Uber denies that any secrets ended up on the company's servers and says its lidar technology was built independently.