synthetic brain cell Created

The USC Viterbi School of Engineering team was led by Professors Alice Parker and Chongwu Zhou. Parker has been looking into the feasibility of creating a synthetic brain for the past five years, as part of the BioRC Biomimetic Real-Time Cortex project.

They Say

"It's probably still going to be a while before autonomous, self-aware androids are wandering amongst us. That scenario has come a little closer to reality, however, with researchers from the University of Southern California having created a functioning synapse circuit using carbon nanotubes. An artificial version of the connections that allow electrical impulses to pass between neurons in our brains, the circuit could someday be one component of a synthetic brain.

Kingston Wi-Drive:A Wireless SSD that expands your ipad memory

Another cool and innovative product  from Kingston .Need a little more wiggle room for media on your iPad? Want to share a movie to your girlfriend on her iPhone while you simultaneously watch the same movie on your iPad in the other room? Kingston’s Wi-Drive has you covered, but some serious drawbacks make this a hard recommendation to make.

Like the Seagate GoFlex Satellite, the Wi-Drive is an external drive that allows you to upgrade your iPhone or iPad’s internal storage with an external, WiFi equipped drive.
When we originally wrote about the GoFlex Satellite, we complained about its price: $200 for 500GB of space. We’re rethinking our frugality, though, because the Wi-Drive costs $130 for just 16GB of SSD storage, or $175 for 32GB.
What the Wi-Drive has as an advantage over the GoFlex Satellite is it can stream multiple files to multiple connected iOS devices at the same time. That’s a nice perk, made possible by Kingston’s decision to use an SSD instead of a spinning physical drive, but how often are you really going to use that functionality?
Otherwise, the feature set looks good: the Wi-Drive can stream 720p video, music and other media to your devices through a dedicated iOS app. It’s hard to look at that price, though, and want to add this to your next Apple store shopping list.

Google Wallet

Internet Search Gaint unveiled its new product Google wallet.Google wallet is going to be a brand new online payment system much like paypal. If I know Google, this is going to be a great option for the average web surfer to easily buy products online.

Not only will the web surfer benefit, so will the online merchants who accept Google wallet payments. Even the online auction houses will benefit by providing their members an alternative to the monopolizing paypal payment system. Will this help open the door to online micro payments? Probably.

With the volcanic increase in the online business the need for a simple transaction system was long felt. Though there was a powerful system to provide that- Paypal - it was felt that more competitors should join this fray and improve the facilities. 
The products launched by Google are very popular, robust in design, and have cutting-edge technology base. Online businessmen and women are looking forward for this product as a major breakthrough, which can solve many business transaction problems for them.

Google Wallet will be launched by Google to provide online transactions like E-Bay owned Paypal. But Google's CEO Eric Schmidt has stated that it is not just another Paypal system-it will be different. A good statement indeed!

Paypal till now has been the best, cheapest, and the most secure digital method to transact the funds electronically. Paypal services allow consumers-which range from more that 40 countries and there are more than 70 million accounts registered with Paypal-to pay for purchases directly on Web sites by funding electronic-payment accounts from their credit cards or bank checking accounts.

Google Wallet is expected to provide its users with a major new chunk of extra revenue money, which comes from the saved fees Google is now paying to banks and delivery services to distribute its payments to advertisers and publishers. Also the commission fees that Google will leverage from individual transactions will add to the total revenue. 
It seems that the major benefits of this service will be outstanding. Google accepts credit card payment for some of its services including advertisement and ad publishing. With this new facility for the users, Google will create a whole New World that would involve Google, its users, and no third party! It is clear that Google's publishing and advertising business benefit with this new service. Also giving the rival Paypal a run for it's money and setting a more fair battleground in the online transaction arena.

Apart from revenue building, the Google Wallet may also provide the strategic marketing and business information related to how its present advertising customers would be spending their money. However, it is a very significant point to notice that Google has disclosed no official details as how and when Google Wallet will start functioning.

E-Bay's Paypal service generated $233.1 million, or 23%, of E-Bay's total revenue in the first quarter. The security provided by PayPal is awesome and merchants all over the globe have almost blind faith in dealing with Paypal. But with Google coming into fray, it is obvious and clear that the users of Paypal will decrease, for, Google is not a new name in the online marketing world, and everyone knows the potentialities of the Google products! So it is clear indication of the possible threat for Paypal in its users and its revenue.

Google ready to launch Music Beta, online music service, for testing

Internet search gaint  Google Inc. expectedly rolled out a new online music service called Music Beta at the annual I/O developers conference Tuesday in San Francisco.

Music Beta is available through invitation only for a testing phase (to request an invitation, click here). Users will be able to upload their jams, create playlists and listen to their music via the Web or on a smartphone or tablet with the music app available free from the Android Market (click here). Recently played songs and selected albums will also be available offline, according to the Music Beta site.

Google, like Amazon's online music service, has yet to acquire licenses from major record labels. So far no music can be purchased directly through Music Beta, which currently functions like a "passive" locker system that allows users to listen only to music they have uploaded. With licenses, Google and other online music service operators could give users access to tunes stored in central servers and other expanded offerings for smartphones, tablets and on computer browsers.

The system ratchets up the competition among Google, Amazon and Apple to offer music storage and portability for the next generation. Apple is already negotiating with top record labels to acquire licenses to beef up its own online music service.

Amazon's service, launched March 28, allows users to store their music library into an Amazon Cloud Drive (which can store other types of files and data too) and play back their music using Amazon's Cloud Player, which is available on the Web and in the form of an app for Google Android phones and tablets.

Tata Docomo introduces Micro SIM

Tata Docomo, the GSM arm of Tata Teleservices, today announced the launch of its micro SIM cards, for its 3Gservices, for those devices which otherwise do not have enough space for regular SIM cards or even mini-SIMs.

The company offers quite a few plans on micro SIM. After purchasing the micro SIM, a user has to first get it recharged for Rs 109 which allows the user to enjoy all the available 3G services for 30 days with 500 MB free data download.

They also offer highly affordable plans for unlimited usage, on prepay as well as postpay. For data intensive users, such as downloading games, movies and music, you can subscribe to an unlimited plan on 3G for Rs 1,000 per month.

Recently the company has launched 3G WiFi hub that enables multiple users and devices to share wireless Internet access and stay connected on the go.

Tata Docomo launched it 3G services in India in November 2010. 3G enables you to enjoy services like live streaming, video calling and high speed data transfer via your 3G compatible devices.

As of now, Bharti Airtel has the highest number of 3G subscribers in the country with 3 million subscribers followed by Tata DoCoMo with 1.5 million users.

Teen sells kidney to buy Apple iPad 2

A teenager in China reportedly sold one of his kidneys so he could buy an Apple iPad 2, according to reports from Chinese media.

Identified as simply Zheng, the 17-year-old took to the Internet to find a way to raise money so he could buy himself an iPad 2, according to Shanghai Daily.

"I wanted to buy an iPad 2 but could not afford it," Zheng told the Daily. "A broker contacted me on the Internet and said he could help me sell one kidney for 20,000 yuan."

So, on April 28, the high-schooler left his home in the Anhui province to have his kidney removed in the Hunan province of China, according to reports from both Shanghai Daily and the Global Timesnewspaper.

Zheng got his 20,000 yuan, which is equal to about $3,100, and returned home with a laptop and an iPad 2, according to a report from the BBC.

When Zheng's mother noticed the computers and a "deep red scar on his body, which was caused by the surgery," the teen confessed to selling his kidney.

NBC got video footage of what it says is the boy's kidney-removal scar and aired it on the Today show.

After learning what Zheng did, his mother went straight to the police, who so far have been unable to track down the organ broker, the reports said.

However, police have learned that the hospital where Zheng had his kidney taken out "was not qualified to perform organ transplants," the Shanghai Daily report said. "The hospital claimed they had no idea about Zheng's surgery because the department that did the surgery had been contracted to a Fujian businessman."

Samsung Galaxy S2 vs HTC Sensation

We've been treated to a cornucopia of high quality mobile phones recently, but it's a certain two that have got the tongues wagging: the dual-core majesty of the HTC Sensation and the Samsung Galaxy S2.

We've reviewed them both already, but so often we're asked the question of 'which should I buy?'

So here's TechRadar's detailed and in-depth look at the differences between the two handsets - and if you still can't decide after reading through our guide, then we can only suggest you toss a coin in your local phone retailer.

Build quality

There's a marked difference between the HTC Sensation and Samsung Galaxy S2 when it comes to the design of the devices – which basically comes down to thickness and weight.

The Sensation has a plastic and aluminium chassis combined with a relatively heavy glass front – this line-up means the 148g weight of the phone is lighter than the likes of the Desire HD, but markedly heavier than the Galaxy S2, which weighs in at a sublime 116g.

The Galaxy S2 is also by far the slimmer of the two phones, offering a stupidly thin chassis that's just 8.5mm thin, meaning it fits beautifully in any pocket and will make you panic on occasion simply because you might not be able to feel it and you'll think a pickpocket has come along.

What's odd about the HTC Sensation is that despite the aluminium chassis, the phone still feels a little plastic-like in the hand. This is exacerbated by HTC's decision to make the whole rear of the phone an antenna, meaning the whole rear peels away to leave just a phone and screen

Buffalo Launches 512GB SATA III 6Gbps SSD

Buffalo has added a new 512GB SATA III solid state drive to their range this week with the immanent launch of their new SSD-N512S/MC400 on to the Japanese market. The new SSD-N512S/MC400 is capable of a 405MB/s of data transfer rate (reading speed).

The new Buffalo SSD-N256S/MC400 256GB SSD was released last week in Japan for 72,200 Yen or around $883.

However no information on pricing or worldwide availability has been released as yet, but as soon as it becomes available we will let you know. But I would expect the new double capacity drive would be in the region of 140,00 Yen $1,600.