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Microchip for diagnosing influenza

Scientists at the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention and the University of Colorado have come out with a microchip-based test that can differentiate between flu strains and help trace strains back to their origin. According to reports, the chip can diagnose 72 influenza strains, including the H5N1 avian influenza strain, in less than 12 hours.

Since the Flu Chip technology can be used in lower-level bio-safety facilities, more labs can be used to determine the geographic origins of a new virus. The chip also helps determine whether the source is human or from animals, and how closely it is related to existing viruses.

The Flu Chip is called a micro-array or a gene chip. It is made by dropping hundreds or thousands of spots of genetic material onto a microscope slide. By analysing the pattern of captured targets, doctors can diagnose the cause of infection. Beginning with a pool of nearly 5,000 flu gene sequences, the investigators selected 55 flu RNA sequences for use as probes on the Flu Chip. Among these were probes chosen to enable the detection of two of the most common flu strains currently circulating in humans, the H1N1 and H3N2 strains, as well as the avian flu strain H5N1. The technology is considered to be path-breaking as this can help in flu surveillance efforts. The good news is that this chip will be in use by 2007.

Samsung takes on iTunes

It seems like everybody’s after Apple Computers’ quasi-monopoly on online music. iTunes is in for competition from Samsung and Nokia. Handset manufacturers are acquiring companies to take on Apple. Samsung plans to develop its own music service along with MusicNet, which also distributes music to Yahoo, Virgin Digital and iMesh, among others. The soon-to-be-launched service will initially be available only in the UK, France and Germany, but Samsung plans to expand it to other countries in Europe and Asia. Samsung said the service will work with a number of its new media players, including the K5 which sports a built-in speaker system.

Nokia recently announced its decision to buy digital-music distributor Loudeye. The acquisition, worth $60 million, will allow the company to give its customers a comprehensive experience when it comes to music. This should be good news to Nokia’s biggest handset market—India. According to reports, Nokia sold over 15 million digital music-capable devices worldwide in the second quarter alone. With this acquisition, Nokia will gain a set of online music capabilities equivalent to that of Apple: devices, a service, and licences to a large catalogue of music from all the major labels and many of the independents. Like Apple, Nokia needs the help of wireless carriers to get mobile music services off the ground; unlike Apple, Nokia has found no takers so far.

Windows Vista pricing announced

With the nearing of the launch of Vista, the next avatar of Microsoft’s ubiquitous desktop OS, the company has announced estimated US retail pricing. Beta 2 was released for testing in May, followed by Release Candidate 1 in early September. RC1 is being made available for broad customer and partner testing.

The pricing of the full retail versions of Vista will be $299 for Vista Business, $199 for an upgrade from Windows XP Professional, $239 for Vista Home Premium, and $159 for an upgrade from Windows Media Centre. There will also be the Vista Home Basic edition for $199, $99.95 for an upgrade from XP Home, $399 for Vista Ultimate, and $259 for an upgrade from Windows XP Pro.

While these are the suggested retail prices, it wouldn’t hurt the company to take a hard look at its pricing policy for emerging markets. Without a competitive upgrade offer, users might end up sticking to Windows XP.

Beyond pricing, Vista’s hardware requirements are quite steep. Unless you have a new PC or one purchased recently, running Vista will require you to upgrade your graphics card and memory to 1 GB. Chances are that Vista will end up entering the enterprise through the new PC (pre-loaded) route. The company plans to provide the RC1 to five million customers worldwide through its Customer Preview Programme (CPP). Based on user feedback, Microsoft will decide whether another beta version of the software is required.

NAC and NAP working hand-in-hand

Back in 2004, Cisco and Microsoft had promised to work together on an inter-operable platform for both Network Admission Control (NAC) and Network Access Protection (NAP), their respective security initiatives.

This promise was fulfilled in the first week of September 2006 when both companies published a detailed roadmap for the same.

With this a user can now have an option of either using NAP or NAC or simply going in for an inter-operable solution from both companies. The joint architecture allows communication and policy enforcement across NAC and NAP, enabling an end-to-end solution to be built around it.

Technology partners of the NAP and NAC ecosystems can also refer to the joint architecture for building or marketing solutions that work within this joint framework.

According to a white-paper jointly released by both companies, inter-operability will be supported with the release of NAP in the upcoming version of Windows Server, codenamed Longhorn, which is scheduled to be available in the second half of 2007.

The primary features and benefits of the solution include a single agent included in Windows Vista, independent software vendor integration ecosystem, and cross-platform support.

Microsoft takes on the iPod

Apple’s pretty much cornered the market for MP3 players. This has been a sticking point with Microsoft, and it’s earlier efforts to team up with other manufacturers under the PlaysForSure umbrella have failed to make a dent in Apple’s armour. But Zune will be available this Christmas, and will come in black, brown and white. It will be a 30GB digital media player featuring wireless technology, a built-in FM tuner, and a 3-inch screen. Zune is being marketed as a multimedia player that can be personalised.

The feature that stands out is Wi-Fi connectivity. That said, within a few days Apple riposted with a revamped 30GB video iPod that has a brighter screen and longer battery life. A price comparison is not possible as of now because Microsoft hasn’t decided on Zune pricing.

Every Zune device will purportedly come preloaded with content from record labels such as DTS, EMI Music’s Astralwerks Records and Virgin Records, Ninja Tune, Playlouderecordings and Quango Music Group.

The killer feature in Zune is supposed to be wireless Zune-to-Zune sharing that lets a user share full-length sample tracks of songs, homemade recordings, playlists or pictures with friends who also own Zune devices. Recipients can listen to these tracks in their entirety for up to three times over a three-day period, and if they happen to like what they hear they can flag these songs right on their Zune device and purchase it from the Zune Marketplace.

Roll over 3G

At Samsung’s 4G forum, it showcased 4G mobile technology delivering 100 Mbps. The demonstration aboard a moving bus delivered multi-cell data handovers of video on demand and Internet access. The company said that the handover is possible with a speed of up to 60 kmph.

According to the International Telecommunication Union, 4G involves attaining speeds of 1 Gbps when stationary and 100 Mbps on the move. Along with this there was also a demonstration of 1-Gbps data transmission while the user was walking, delivering a 32-channel HD broadcast (20 Mbps) download, Internet access and video telephony services all working simultaneously.

1 Gbps data speed is 50 times faster than the current Mobile WiMax technology. It takes about 2.4 seconds to transfer 100 MP3 files (300 MB), and 5.6 seconds to transfer a DIVX movie (800 MB) at 1 Gbps. A 3.5 Gbps data transfer demonstration using 8X8 MIMO (Multi-Input Multi-Output) technology is on the cards.

The company says it has invested more than $100 million in its 4G technology, which aims to replace mobile WiMax technology. Both Samsung’s 4G technology and mobile WiMax are based on orthogonal frequency-division multiple access. Samsung said other core technologies used in its version of 4G include MIMO and Smart Antenna. The 4G technology is a step up from mobile WiMax being offered by telecom providers.