Inside | Common News Update

Aug302020 by adminNo Comments

‘Assad has ruined everything’: Inside the buffer zone keeping a tenuous hold on stability in northern Syria

World

If there are symbols of just how indebted the Syrian opposition forces are to Turkey, then the new army base in Aleppo Province for its elite Al Hamza division is evidence of this.The Turkish red crescent flag is given as much prominence as the Syrian opposition one. In the grand greeting rooms where commanders and visiting dignitaries will meet to discuss tactics, it is the Turkish flag which is placed side-by-side with that of the opposition's.Sky News was given an exclusive tour of the base which is due to open in less than three weeks.We're shown conference rooms where "training on prisoners of war" will be given as well as lectures on military manoeuvres. ...

Jul192020 by adminNo Comments

Inside the failure to develop a contact-tracing app

Technology

Matt Hancock was clear: it was all Apple's fault.Standing at the same Downing Street podium where he had promised the government's contact-tracing app would "save lives", Mr Hancock now admitted it would not be ready for the lifting of lockdown. For months, the health secretary had insisted a homemade app was better than one based on the technology developed by Google and Apple.Yet even as he announced that the government would now use the American firms' system, Mr Hancock rounded on Apple."As it stands, our app won't work because Apple won't change their system," he said, citing a statistic some believe was inaccurate: that the app's Bluetooth system, which was supposed to detect nearby phones as a way of tracking potentially risky contacts, only detected 4% of iPhones, rendering it effe...

Mar232020 by adminNo Comments

Inside Bergamo – Father in epicentre of pandemic orders his girls in UK back home as ‘it’s safer’

World

The bridge takes you across the Po river and into Lombardy, another hour or so through the now deserted streets of the fashion and industry power house of Milan, and on to the medieval city of Bergamo.It is an easy drive on deserted roads. Just one thing niggles on your brain and makes you twitch as you touch your face or sanitise your hands - you are driving in to the epicentre of the worst coronavirus outbreak in the world at the moment where more people have died than anywhere else, even in China.The initial outbreak here wasn't understood and wasn't controlled. ...

Mar22020 by adminNo Comments

Computer inside the heart aims to aid treatment

Technology

A new tiny computer injected into the body could help millions of people suffering from heart failure. The V-LAP travels through a patient's veins to the heart where it opens up and then sends data to doctors helping them give better treatments and allowing them to adjust medicines at an earlier stage.BBC Click finds out more.See more at Click's website and @BBCClickLet's block ads! (Why?) BBC News - Technology

Jan312020 by adminNo Comments

Ancient shark found inside Kentucky’s Mammoth Cave

Science

Jan. 30 (UPI) -- Scientists have identified the 330-million-year-old remains of an ancient shark inside Kentucky's Mammoth Cave National Park. While exploring and mapping Mammoth Cave's many remote chambers, expert spelunkers Rick Olson and Rick Toomey happened upon a fossilized jaw and several teeth embedded in a cave wall. Olson and Toomey took pictures of the fossils and sent them to Vincent Santucci, senior paleontologist with the National Park Service. Santucci reached out to John-Paul Hodnett, a paleontologist and expert in the study of Paleozoic sharks. Hodnett, program coordinator at the Dinosaur Park in Maryland, came to visit the Mammoth Cave fossil. He was excited by what he found. There was enough fossil evidence to identify the ancient shark species as Saivodus striatus. "T...