Wed Night Tech News

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A gene that helps fruit flies develop alcohol tolerance has been found – and named “hangover”. The gene also controls the flies’ response to stress, and the researchers say that a similar pathway linking alcohol tolerance and stress probably functions in humans. The findings may explain why people who have been in a stressful situation often have a blunted response to alcohol and may drink more to feel inebriated, experts say, putting them at greater risk of becoming addicted.

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New York Governor George Pataki on Wednesday signed a bill that requires businesses and state government agencies to notify consumers if sensitive data is nabbed in a security breach. This places New York on the list of states such as California that have adopted similar rules--while many other states and the federal government are considering them.

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Called 87 Sylvia, the 280-kilometre-wide, potato-shaped asteroid lies about 3.5 times further from the Sun than the Earth does. Astronomers discovered an 18-km-wide moon orbiting it at a distance of about 1360 km in 2001. The newly found moon lies about twice as close to Sylvia, at a distance of 710 km, and measures just 7 km across.

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Designs call for large masonry arches and vaulted ceilings and domed skylights built with bricks baked from Martian soil and stones cut from Martian quarries. Bruce Mackenzie, a co-founder of the group and a former member of the National Space Society’s board of directors, has been preaching the benefits of brick as an ideal building material for a Martian settlement for years.

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Shuttle Discovery appears to have suffered very little damage on its latest mission, though a detailed analysis is yet to be completed, a NASA spokeswoman said on Wednesday. "It's one of the cleanest vehicles they've ever seen," said Leslie Williams, a spokeswoman at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base in California.