Scientists have identified lead poisoning - transmitted through cookware made of recycled metal - as an important factor in the health of Africans. And lead poisoning has important impacts on health, learning, and cognition.

Despite the ban on lead in gasoline, blood lead levels in African nations have remained stubbornly high. Now, researchers from Ashland University think they might know why. According to their tests, cookware made in Africa from recycled metals is leaching lead into food in quantities nearly 200 times the levels permissible in the United States.

"This previously unrecognized lead exposure source has the potential to be of much greater public health significance than lead paint or other well-known sources that are common around the world," added co-author Perry Gottesfeld. Lead exposure in children has been linked to brain damage, impaired cognition, lower educational performance, and a range of other health effects. It has also been suggested that the worldwide drop in violent crime was linked to the banning of leaded gasoline.

The seemingly on-again, off-again negotiations between IBM and GlobalFoundries over IBM's microchip manufacturing operations may have reached a successful conclusion this week. Dan Nenni, a semiconductor industry writer and consultant, published a story on Tuesday on the SemiWiki website asserting that IBM and GlobalFoundries have reached a "handshake" agreement on a deal valued at more than $2 billion, "on pretty good authority."

The potential deal is part of the transformation of the computer chip industry toward a "fabless" model under which chip companies outsource their manufacturing to so-called "foundry" companies such as GlobalFoundries and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. The trend has even led companies like Intel Corp. and Samsung Electronics, which still make their own chips, to offer foundry services.

IBM sent shock waves through the industry when it was reported they were investigating a sale of their chip fabrication business earlier this year. IBM has been a stalwart of the world semiconductor industry, inventing DRAM, mastering SiGe, SOI and much more besides and supplies manufacturing process technology to half the world's major companies, including Samsung, Globalfoundries, UMC, STMicroelectronics, Renesas, NEC, Freescale, Toshiba and Infineon.

Electronics Weekly has a good look at the deal, the history, and the implications for the industry.

Ahoy there. Let's say you'll be wantin' a Linux distro that's been blessed by his ownself the Grand Admiral of the GNU revolution, Richard Stallman. Arrr. And supposin' you can't abide by the wretched bilge that's binary blobs infectin' yer own GNU/Linux system, foisted upon ya by the likes of those lowly bastards Adobe and NVidia, whose scurvy, un-transparent and despicable rot goes against your very bein'. Well then, you'll be wantin' to make sure yer own good ship Linux hoists the latest version of Trisquel GNU/Linux, and smartly at that.

Off with ya then, to the grimy bastards at Distrowatch, with some right fine background for ya. Trisquel hails from Spain, a piratin' and thievin' port of call if ever there was one. Arrr. But they've chosen what's proper over what's easy. Turn away if you've got an Nvidia graphics card, or if ya can't stand the likes of a distro based on the latest Ubuntu. Trisquel is a fine lookin' ship if ever I've laid my eyes on one, hoistin' aloft clean versions of LXDE, XFCE, and KDE desktops, but believe you me when I tell ya they've been stripped bare of any software that isn't cut from the purest, GPL cloth. I sailed that ship in a virtual machine while hittin' no reefs, aaar, but I do reckon if your hardware isn't the plainest of vanilla, you may find it chafes your britches when you install 'er.

That said though, avast, she's a smart little distro, she sails a beaut, and she's right easy on the eyes, if I do say so myself. As for the package selection, aaar, when I'm at the tiller and the mainsail's drawin' wind, most of the packages I use I found sittin' sweet as a lily in the repos. Your own position at sea might be affected, though, if you find yerself needin' something exotic.

I myself am as pure as the next Linux captain, who be supportin' the cause of throwin' all those lily-livered binary blobs in the brig. But not if it means I can't sail my ship. That's why you won't be findin' this pirate sailin' Trisquel myself. But if ideological purity be yer cup-o-rum, well then, aaaarrr: raise the plank on Trisquel, and may fine winds be at yer back. Drop in at the Trisquel tavern where you can break yer jaw askin' yer questions, and tell 'em Captain Zafiro17 sent ya, like the devil himmself. Aaaar haar haar har har har.

Imagine being able to chat with another user using what's in effect a modem program that transmits sounds at near ultrasonic frequencies. Now imagine your cat or dog being royally pissed off by your conversation.

The future is now. An anonymous Pipedotter wrote it to direct out attention to quietnet, a program that does just that. It is a simple chat program that works without Wifi or Bluetooth connections and won't show up in a pcap. You need a good pair of speakers to make it work: If you can clearly hear the send script working then your speakers may not be high quality enough to produce sounds in the near ultrasonic range.

Quietnet is dependant on pyaudio[1] and Numpy[2].

[1] http://people.csail.mit.edu/hubert/pyaudio/
[2] http://www.numpy.org/

The same Anonymous Coward notes: "Quietnet is just a toy! Take a look at minimodem[3] or gnuradio[4] if you need something robust."

[3] http://www.whence.com/minimodem/
[4] http://gnuradio.org/

[Ed. note: looks pretty interesting. Time to test out my cat's audio frequency sensitivity, that fuzzy bastard.]

The modern era of solar electricity got under way in 1954 as Bell Laboratory scientists unveiled a "solar battery" made from silicon that was used to power a toy Ferris wheel and a radio. In recent years, solar has boomed as costs have declined and government policies have favored a renewable energy source that can help combat climate change.

California's solar energy generation hit a record earlier this year, accounting for 6 percent of energy from the California Independent System Operator, which manages the bulk of the state's flow of electricity. Last year's growth in solar capacity was greater than all earlier years combined. The state backs solar through financial incentives and a law that requires utilities derive 33 percent of their energy from renewable energy sources by 2020.

Good news for responsible energy generation.