A robot developed by scientists at Yale University in Connecticut could soon pass a landmark test by recognizing itself in a mirror, the researchers say.Such a feat would be considered evidence of self-awareness and represent an advance toward robots that can think for themselves, they said.The robot, dubbed Nico, will take the test in coming months, Justin Hart, the doctoral student leading the research, told BBC News.“It is a spatial reasoning task for the robot to understand that its arm is o

The government unveiled on Wednesday an unusual plan to fight the threat of jellyfish to the country’s bathers: turning the sea creatures into cosmetics. The Ministry of Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said that it aims to eradicate the jellyfish by exploring ways to extract collagen from the creatures to produce commercial cosmetics.To that end, the ministry has asked the National Fisheries Research and Development Institute to conduct research to find a way to carry out the plan. If

NASA picks another Mars flight to explore its core

(Casey Reed/NASA)An international team of astronomers says they've seen the first evidence of a planet's destruction as its aging star became a red giant at the end of its life."A similar fate may await the inner planets in our solar system, when the sun becomes a red giant and expands all the way out to Earth's orbit some 5 billion years from now," team member Alex Wolszczan, a professor of astro

NASA’s Curiosity rover has zapped its first Martian rock, aiming its laser for the sake of science.During the target practice on Sunday, Curiosity fired 30 pulses at a nearby rock over a 10-second window, burning a small hole.Since landing in Gale Crater two weeks ago, the six-wheel rover has been checking out its instruments including the laser. During its two-year mission, Curiosity was expected to point the laser at various rocks as it drives toward Mount Sharp, a 3-mile (5-kilometer)-high mo

Since opening the Korea-U.S. Cooperation Center for Accelerator Science and beginning work on the design of the rare isotope accelerator, the Institute for Basic Science has sped up preparations for the country’s first particle accelerator of its kind. The purpose of a rare isotope accelerator is to produce isotopes of elements that do not or rarely occur naturally. An isotope is a variant of an element that has a different number of neutrons in the nucleus.Under the plans the IBS’ accelerator,

WASHINGTON (AP) ― Scientists have found a cosmic supermom. It is a galaxy that gives births to more stars in a day than ours does in a year.Astronomers used NASA’s Chandra X-Ray telescope to spot this distant gigantic galaxy creating about 740 new stars a year. By comparison, our Milky Way galaxy spawns just about one new star each year.The galaxy is about 5.7 billion light years away in the center of a recently discovered cluster of galaxies that give off the brightest X-ray glow astronomers ha

New research institute hopes to bring big changes for nation’s science communityThe Institute for Basic Science will change the way Korea carries out research and development to allow creative and original research, according the organization’s first chief Oh Se-jung. The institute launched in November seeks to hire top-class scientists from across the world.“Our target is not just for Korea, but a research institution that can compete on the international stage,” Oh said. Oh said that while Kor

A team of amateur cave explorers and arachnologists has found a new family of spiders in caves and old-growth redwood forests in Oregon and California, US researchers said Friday.Entomologists at the California Academy of Sciences said the spider, named Trogloaptor -- or "cave robber" -- for its lethal front claws, had such unique evolutionary features that it represented not just a new genus or s

(123rf)The lure of social status promotes overconfidence and helps explain why there is such an abundance of delusional confidence, U.S. and Spanish researchers say.The study, scheduled to be published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, sheds light on why incompetent people are so often promoted over their more competent peers.Study co-authors Cameron Anderson, Don Moore and Jess

The largest Burmese python ever found in Florida has been caught in the Everglades, scientists said Tuesday, and it contained 87 eggs -- also thought to be a record.“This thing is monstrous, it‘s about a foot wide,” Kenneth Krysko, the herpetology collection manager at the Florida Museum of Natural History, said of the 17-foot-7-inch (5.35-meter) creature.Scientists at the University of Florida-based museum examined the 164.5-pound (74.5-kilogram) snake on Friday as part of a government research