Martin Shkreli’s other pharma company files for bankruptcy

After firing indicted CEO, company now fights to keep shares listed on NASDAQ.

Martin Shkreli, chief executive officer of Turing Pharmaceuticals LLC, exits federal court in New York, US, on Thursday, December 17, 2015. Shkreli was arrested on alleged securities fraud related to Retrophin Inc., a biotech firm he founded in 2011. (credit: Louis Lanzano/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

On Tuesday, KaloBios Pharmaceuticals Inc., which recently fired its indicted CEO, Martin Shkreli, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in Delaware.

The South San Francisco-based firm has faced a string of bad news since Shkreli’s December 17 arrest on securities fraud charges. The charges related to an alleged Ponzi-like scheme Shkreli was said to have orchestrated with another of his pharmaceutical companies, Retrophin, as well as two hedge funds he managed. After the arrest, KaloBios fired Shkreli, who pled not guilty to the charges and was released on a $5 million bond.

On December 18, the NASDAQ stock exchange notified KaloBios that it intended to delist the company's shares from the exchange, citing Shkreli’s arrest and the arrest of Evan Greebel, the company’s former outside counsel. Next, the company’s interim CFO, Christopher Thorn, resigned, as did the company’s certifying accountant.

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New York City: Telefonzellen werden durch WiFi-Hotspots ersetzt

Wie angekündigt werden zum Ersatz von 7.500 Telefonzellen in New York City erste moderne WiFi-Hotspots errichtet. Geboten werden auch kostenlose Telefonie und USB-Ladestationen. Google ist an dem Projekt beteiligt. (WLAN, PC-Hardware)

Wie angekündigt werden zum Ersatz von 7.500 Telefonzellen in New York City erste moderne WiFi-Hotspots errichtet. Geboten werden auch kostenlose Telefonie und USB-Ladestationen. Google ist an dem Projekt beteiligt. (WLAN, PC-Hardware)

LG’s Amazon Echo-like device controls smart home devices and plays music

The SmartThinq Hub is a portal to your smart appliances and sensors.

(credit: LG)

Ahead of CES 2016, LG is hopping on the smart speaker bandwagon with a new device that looks somewhat familiar. The company announced its SmartThinq Hub today, a smart home hub with an LCD display that can control intelligent appliances and sensors and stream music. It looks quite similar in design to Amazon's Echo, but LG is positioning the hub as a "gateway" to your connected home rather than a voice-activated personal assistant that lives on your countertop.

The cylindrical device has a built-in speaker and a 3.5-inch color LCD display that's positioned on the slanted top of the hub. According to LG, the display will not only show you information like the time and weather, but it will also flash with calendar alerts from your smartphone. It's not immediately clear if the SmartThinq Hub will be able to show you other smartphone notifications, such as text, call, or social media alerts.

(credit: LG)

The SmartThinq Hub is meant to be used as a monitor and controller for all your other smart appliances and products. LG makes a wide range of connected appliances including refrigerators, washing machines, and ovens, all of which can be controlled via the SmartThinq Hub and its companion smartphone app. LG announced its SmartThinq Sensors earlier this year, which can be applied to "normal" objects to make them smart, and those that are connected via Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and Zigbee can be controlled via the hub, too. LG's products are not the only items compatible with the hub: any smart home device that supports the AllJoyn Alliance open source framework can work with the hub as well.

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Bumbling would-be UK bomber asked Twitter followers for target suggestions

Once again, encryption was not used to cover tracks in any way.

(credit: Francis Tyers)

A would-be UK bomber and his wife have been found guilty by the Old Bailey court of plotting to carry out an explosion in London to mark the tenth anniversary of the 2005 suicide attacks that took place in the same city. Both been sentenced to life imprisonment: a minimum of 27 years for Mohammed Rehman, and a minimum of 25 years for his ex-wife Sana Ahmed Khan.

A report by The Guardian explains the case: "Mohammed Rehman, 25, who secretly wed Sana Ahmed Khan, 24, intended to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the 7/7 atrocities with blasts that would have inflicted mass casualties in either Westfield shopping centre, west London, or the London Underground."

Remarkably, Rehman took to Twitter to ask for advice on which of those two targets he should choose: "Westfield shopping centre or London underground?" Rehman asked. "Any advice would be appreciated greatly." The post carried a link to an al-Qaida press release about the 2005 London bombings. Sky News reports that Rehman's Twitter name was "Silent Bomber," with the handle @InService2Godd. As if that weren't enough, his Twitter bio read: "Learn how to make powerful explosives from the comfort of ones' bedroom." The Twitter account has since been suspended.

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Identity Leak Checker: “123456” beliebtestes Passwort in geleakten Daten

Das Hasso-Plattner-Institut hat im Jahr 2015 fast 35 Millionen neu geleakte Identitätsdaten untersucht. Wie die Sicherheitsforscher feststellten, verwenden immer noch sehr viele Nutzer unsichere Passwörter. (Passwort, Instant Messenger)

Das Hasso-Plattner-Institut hat im Jahr 2015 fast 35 Millionen neu geleakte Identitätsdaten untersucht. Wie die Sicherheitsforscher feststellten, verwenden immer noch sehr viele Nutzer unsichere Passwörter. (Passwort, Instant Messenger)

SmartThinQ Hub: LG zeigt Smart-Home-Hub mit Display und Lautsprecher

LGs SmartThinQ Hub soll nicht nur die zentrale Steuereinheit für das Smart Home sein – dank eines eingebauten Lautsprechers können Nutzer auch per Bluetooth übertragene Musik hören. Über ein 3,5-Zoll-Display werden weitere Informationen angezeigt. (LG, Smarthome)

LGs SmartThinQ Hub soll nicht nur die zentrale Steuereinheit für das Smart Home sein - dank eines eingebauten Lautsprechers können Nutzer auch per Bluetooth übertragene Musik hören. Über ein 3,5-Zoll-Display werden weitere Informationen angezeigt. (LG, Smarthome)

ArcaBoard is a real hoverboard—but it’ll cost you $20,000

It will only run for a few minutes and sounds like a jet. Coming April 2016.

After all the teased products that didn't live up to their promises and the trouble caused by self-balancing scooters, ArcaBoard appears to be the closest we'll get to an actual hoverboard in 2015. Designed by the US-based Arca Space Corporation, the mattress-shaped vehicle packs 272 horsepower and is propelled by 36 ducted fans spinning at 45,000rpm. Buying one will set you back about £13,500 ($19,900).

Arca has begun taking pre-orders for ArcaBoard and promises to start shipping it to the customers in April 2016. The device's speed is limited to 20km/h (12mph) and its flying height to 30cm (1ft). It's powered by a set of Li-Po batteries that account for a significant part of its price: getting a new battery pack after the 1-year warranty has expired will cost you £4,600 ($6,840).

There are two versions of the device: one for riders that weigh up to 80kg (176lbs), and another for riders up to 110kg (242lbs). The lighter option can hover for six minutes, the heavier just three minutes. The lighter rider can theoretically travel up to 2km (1.2mi) on one charge.

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Chrome: Google-Entwickler zerpflückt Antiviren-Addon

Eine Chrome-Erweiterung des Antiviren-Herstellers AVG habe so viele Sicherheitslücken gehabt, dass es auch Malware hätte sein können, schreibt ein Google-Entwickler. Die Fehler sind zwar behoben, das Addon könnte aber trotzdem aus dem Chrome-Store verbannt werden. (Chrome, Virus)

Eine Chrome-Erweiterung des Antiviren-Herstellers AVG habe so viele Sicherheitslücken gehabt, dass es auch Malware hätte sein können, schreibt ein Google-Entwickler. Die Fehler sind zwar behoben, das Addon könnte aber trotzdem aus dem Chrome-Store verbannt werden. (Chrome, Virus)

Ireland’s population underwent a dramatic change 4,000 years ago

Ancient DNA offers a glimpse of Ireland’s farmers before and after the shift.

Recreation of an Irish Neolithic village, similar to the one where the Ballynahatty woman lived 5,000 years ago. (credit: Irish National Heritage Park)

Farming began in the West roughly 10,000 years ago, with Neolithic villagers slowly domesticating grains in the regions that today we call Turkey, Syria, and Iraq. Just a few thousand years later, it had spread throughout Europe. But how did it get there, and who brought it? A new study of ancient DNA from Irish settlers between 5,000 and 3,000 years ago helps to tell this story.

Trinity College geneticist Lara Cassidy and her colleagues describe their work in an article out today from Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. They sequenced the genomes of four ancient Irish people: a Neolithic woman who was buried in a megalithic tunnel grave about 5,000 years ago in Ballynahatty (see video below for what a megalithic grave looks like) and three Bronze Age men discovered in an underground "cist" grave on Rathlin Island from about 4,000 years ago.

A flythrough of the Dowth megalithic tomb in Ireland, created from detailed laser scans, shows the kind of grave where the Neolithic Ballynahatty woman was buried.

The differences between the Ballynahatty woman and the Rathlin men are dramatic—during the millennium that separated their lives, it's likely that Irish people and culture underwent a major upheaval. The Ballynahatty woman likely had dark hair and eyes, with distant kin from the Near East, where western agriculture was born. She also shared genetic similarities with people from the region now known as Spain, which suggests that her ancestors took a southerly route along the coast as they migrated from the Near East to Ireland. The Neolithic peoples of Spain also buried their dead in megalithic tunnel graves, which suggests a cultural continuity between the Ballynahatty woman's people and her ancestors.

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C-Lab: Samsung zeigt Fitness-Gürtel und Fingertelefon auf der CES

Samsungs kreative Entwicklungsabteilung C-Lab zeigt auf der CES 2016 erstmals drei Projekte: Einen Sensoren-Gürtel für die Überwachung verschiedener Körperwerte, Hand-Controller für VR-Brillen sowie ein Uhrenarmband, das akustische Signale per Körperschall ans Ohr überträgt. (CES 2016, Samsung)

Samsungs kreative Entwicklungsabteilung C-Lab zeigt auf der CES 2016 erstmals drei Projekte: Einen Sensoren-Gürtel für die Überwachung verschiedener Körperwerte, Hand-Controller für VR-Brillen sowie ein Uhrenarmband, das akustische Signale per Körperschall ans Ohr überträgt. (CES 2016, Samsung)