Random Linkage

• The Pentagon’s Armed with Science podcast (via Danger Room)
  

  Armed with Science: Research and Applications for the Modern Military, is a bi-monthly webcast that discusses various applications of science and technology to military operations, and the cutting-edge scientific research and development sponsored by various defense offices. We will be interviewing scientists, administrators, and operators to educate and inform our listeners about the importance of science and advanced technology to the modern military.

• Epidurals in labor safer than once thought
  

  Estimates of the risk of lasting harm from these spinal injections, often offered to women in labour to numb the pain of childbirth, vary quite a bit, but a figure used widely was 1 in 25,000.

  Now a panel led by Tim Cook of the Royal United Hospital in Bath, UK, has collected information from all National Health Service hospitals in the UK that carry out the procedure. It concludes that the chance of lasting harm from a spinal anaesthetic is between 1 in 50,000 and 1 in 23,000 (British Journal of Anaesthesia, DOI: 10.1093/bja/aen360). If only women in childbirth are considered, it is between 1 in 320,000 and 1 in 80,000.

• The Downadup worm looks to trick you in to infecting your system through clever misdirection
• As a big fan and consumer of their peripherals, I’m sorry to here that last year Logitech saw a 70% revenue drop for the last quarter of calendar year 2008
  

  In posting its dismal financial results, Logitech pointed to sales slumps in PC speakers and keyboards as well. It announced intentions to cut 550 to 600 salaried positions — apparently the company’s most extensive job cuts since the mid-1990s, when it moved production facilities from Asia to Ireland.

• President Obama’s bullet resistant fashion sense
  

  ,p>The vests familiar from cop shows and news footage of SWAT teams are manufactured to be maximally effective with no consideration for how they might look under a dress shirt. It’s unclear what brand of body armor Obama sported at the inauguration, but several companies produce discreet, thinner vests that can be worn underneath clothing, inserted into an outer layer (like a coat) or woven into a shirt.

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