'SimCity Social' goes live on Facebook

Electronic Arts has today launched SimCity Social on social network Facebook, where it will compete with Zynga's popular social building games.

SimCity, the original city building simulation game, is now live on Facebook and available to play for the site's 900m global users.

Developed as a collaboration between Maxis and Playfish, SimCity Social brings back the same gameplay that launched two decades ago, but also integrates it with the social features on Facebook.

Entire cites are evolved based on the player's choices, as they become mayor of their growing metropolis, tasked with dealing with issues such as crime and pollution.

On Facebook, SimCity will see players visiting friends' cities and using them as resources to complete tasks.

But also, city-to-city relations involve players choosing whether to have friendly relationships with other players, or foster an intense rivalry via the "friend and foe system".

"SimCity Social will entice a new generation of urban planners with its easy-to-use tools that allow anyone to expand and grow their own unique sprawling metropolises and watch as it comes to life in fun and unexpected ways," said Jami Laes, the vice president of global studios for EA's Playfish digital division.

"SimCity Social is about playing with your friends. Whether you do that with kindness by helping put out a fire or through mischievous acts like helping a criminal escape, the decisions you make with your friends will determine how the story of your cities plays out."

SimCity Social will face stiff competition on the social network from CityVille and FarmVille, Zynga's blockbuster social building simulation games.

EA is offering the incentive of anyone who visits the SimCity Facebook page and "Likes" the game will get access to free in-game exclusive content.

The game launches ahead of a new SimCity title for PC, which is scheduled for a February 2013 release.

Source: http://rss.feedsportal.com/c/32545/f/492401/p/1/s/2d38b05b/l/0L0Sdigitalspy0O0Cgaming0Cnews0Ca3917930Csimcity0Esocial0Egoes0Elive0Eon0Efacebook0Bhtml0Drss/story01.htm

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Ice Cream Sandwich is the third favorite flavor of Android

Only one in 10 users are running the latest version of the operating system

Although Google continues to make improvements to its Android mobile operating system, users of devices designed to run it are still a few steps behind. According to the latest stats released by the search engine giant, only 10% of Android device owners are running version 4.0 of the software, also known as Ice Cream Sandwich.

The most-used variant, Gingerbread (Android 2.3), was released in December 2010 and has an install base of 64%. After that is Froyo (Android 2.2) at 17.3% and Eclair (Android 2.1) at 4.7%. Ice Cream Sandwich debuted in October 2011 on the Samsung Galaxy Nexus and, according to Google, is compatible with any device that's able to run Gingerbread.

That said, there's a good reason why all those devices that should be able to run it aren't: fragmentation. Hardware manufacturers actually need to tweak Android releases in order to make them work with each individual device, which means that older handsets and tablets are pretty low on their priority lists. What's more, cellular carriers have to agree to roll out each version of Android to each device individually.?Time will tell if Android 4.1, aka Jelly Bean ??which made its debut on the new Nexus 7 tablet from Google ? fares better in this regard than its frozen-snack-themed predecessor.

[Image credit: Google]
[via?Engadget]

This article was written by Randy Nelson and originally appeared on Tecca

More from Tecca:

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/technology-blog/ice-cream-sandwich-third-favorite-flavor-android-205204646.html

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Engadget HD Podcast 306 - 07.03.2012

After Google I/O, the latest news from Mountain View is tops on our list as we try to wrap our heads around the Nexus Q. Also on the list this week are the odd couple pairings of Boxee and Comcast, as well as HBO and Hulu (in Japan.) Meanwhile Dish Network and AMC have severed ties, we'll see if the relationship can be repaired before Breaking Bad season five begins. We've also got updates on Windows 8 Media Center, Verizon's new CableCARD policy, and changes for the NFL -- press play for the full run down.

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Hosts: Ben Drawbaugh (@bjdraw), Richard Lawler (@rjcc)

Producer: Trent Wolbe

00:10:17 - Cracking the Nexus Q, Google's 25-watt amplified obsession
00:22:07 - Google Play starts selling movies, TV shows (single episode or full season) and magazines today
00:29:20 - Don't worry, you're not the only one: Netflix is currently down, admins hard at work
00:36:32 - HBO Go update supports Android tablets up to ICS
00:36:48 - Hulu Japan lands HBO content, but don't expect any changes in the US
00:37:56 - Boxee, Comcast agree to a workaround for encrypted basic cable channels on third party boxes
00:43:45 - Verizon FiOS TV finally set to enforce CableCARD restrictions
00:47:50 - Marquee Media Center hands-on
00:50:00 - Vizio XVT CinemaWide TV goes on sale, 21:9 movie purists celebrate the end of black bars
00:52:05 - Control4 delivers home automation Starter Kit for under $1,000 including installation, we go hands-on
00:58:42 - Marvel's The Avengers Blu-ray hits September 25th, iOS second screen app this month
01:01:15 - Indiana Jones: The Complete Adventures Blu-ray set hits shelves September 18th
01:01:35 - AMC dropped from Dish Network, cuts a new deal to stay on with AT&T U-verse
01:09:00 - Next season NFL will release All-22 game tape, relax blackout rules and start later
01:11:25 - Must See HDTV (July 2nd - 8th)

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Engadget HD Podcast 306 - 07.03.2012 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 03 Jul 2012 17:50:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Israel rejects settlement university in West Bank

JERUSALEM (AP) -- Israel's council of higher education voted Wednesday not to grant a West Bank college coveted university status, vetoing a move that could have triggered international condemnations and enraged the Palestinians.

Sharon Achdut, the council's spokesman, said five out of seven members of the committee voted against upgrading the status of the college in Ariel, one of the largest Jewish settlements in the West Bank.

The council cited academic, not political, reasons for its decision. It said there was no justification for another university in Israel when others were already suffering from a shortage in faculty and research infrastructure.

The ruling marked a setback for nationalist settlers, who had hoped university recognition would have given them further legitimacy and a stronger sense of permanence in the West Bank.

Palestinians consider the West Bank to be part of their future state. Most of the international community agrees and considers Israel's West Bank settlements illegal and an obstacle to peace.

Proponents of the upgrade said it would have marked a crowning jewel of the government's commitment to holding the West Bank, the heartland of biblical Judaism, captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war.

Opponents feared it would politicize Israel's vaunted higher education system and perhaps jeopardize international funding, staff and research exchanges. The specter of an international boycott also loomed.

Some 19,000 Jewish settlers reside in Ariel. Positioned deep in the West Bank, its removal is seen by pro-Palestinian activists as essential to the viability of a future Palestinian state, since annexing it to Israel would also take a significant wedge of land with it to connect with Israel proper.

The Ariel institution has operated for 30 years in some form, ultimately growing into a college of some 12,500 students. It is open to all Israeli citizens, including Arabs. But like other Israeli universities, it is closed to the 2.5 million Palestinians in the West Bank.

Source: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_ISRAEL_SETTLEMENT_UNIVERSITY?SITE=MOPAR&SECTION=INTERNATIONAL&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

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Government affirms UnitedHealth's TriCare contract

[ [ [['Connery is an experienced stuntman', 2]], 'http://yhoo.it/KeQd0p', '[Slideshow: See photos taken on the way down]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['Connery is an experienced stuntman', 7]], ' http://yhoo.it/KpUoHO', '[Slideshow: Death-defying daredevils]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['know that we have confidence in', 3]], 'http://yhoo.it/LqYjAX ', '[Related: The Secret Service guide to Cartagena]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['We picked up this other dog and', 5]], 'http://yhoo.it/JUSxvi', '[Related: 8 common dog fears, how to calm them]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['accused of running a fake hepatitis B', 5]], 'http://bit.ly/JnoJYN', '[Related: Did WH share raid details with filmmakers?]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['accused of running a fake hepatitis B', 3]], 'http://bit.ly/KoKiqJ', '[Factbox: AQAP, al-Qaeda in Yemen]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['have my contacts on or glasses', 3]], 'http://abcn.ws/KTE5AZ', '[Related: Should the murder charge be dropped?]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['have made this nation great as Sarah Palin', 5]], 'http://yhoo.it/JD7nlD', '[Related: Bristol Palin reality show debuts June 19]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['have made this nation great as Sarah Palin', 1]], 'http://bit.ly/JRPFRO', '[Related: McCain adviser who vetted Palin weighs in on VP race]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['A JetBlue flight from New York to Las Vegas', 3]], 'http://yhoo.it/GV9zpj', '[Related: View photos of the JetBlue plane in Amarillo]', ' ', '630', ' ', ' ', ], [ [['the 28-year-old neighborhood watchman who shot and killed', 15]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/white-house-stays-out-of-teen-s-killing-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/cv/ip/ap/default/120411/martinzimmermen.jpg', '630', ' ', 'AP', ], [ [['He was in shock and still strapped to his seat', 6]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/navy-jet-crashes-in-virginia-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/cv/ip/ap/default/120406/jet_ap.jpg', '630', ' ', 'AP', ], [ [['xxxxxxxxxxxx', 11]], 'http://news.yahoo.com/photos/russian-grannies-win-bid-to-sing-at-eurovision-1331223625-slideshow/', 'Click image to see more photos', 'http://l.yimg.com/a/p/us/news/editorial/1/56/156d92f2760dcd3e75bcd649a8b85fcf.jpeg', '500', ' ', 'AP', ] ]

[ [ [['did not go as far his colleague', 8]], '29438204', '0' ], [ [[' the 28-year-old neighborhood watchman who shot and killed', 4]], '28924649', '0' ], [ [['because I know God protects me', 14], ['Brian Snow was at a nearby credit union', 5]], '28811216', '0' ], [ [['The state news agency RIA-Novosti quoted Rosaviatsiya', 6]], '28805461', '0' ], [ [['measure all but certain to fail in the face of bipartisan', 4]], '28771014', '0' ], [ [['matter what you do in this case', 5]], '28759848', '0' ], [ [['presume laws are constitutional', 7]], '28747556', '0' ], [ [['has destroyed 15 to 25 houses', 7]], '28744868', '0' ], [ [['short answer is yes', 7]], '28746030', '0' ], [ [['opportunity to tell the real story', 7]], '28731764', '0' ], [ [['entirely respectable way to put off the searing constitutional controversy', 7]], '28723797', '0' ], [ [['point of my campaign is that big ideas matter', 9]], '28712293', '0' ], [ [['As the standoff dragged into a second day', 7]], '28687424', '0' ], [ [['French police stepped up the search', 17]], '28667224', '0' ], [ [['Seeking to elevate his candidacy back to a general', 8]], '28660934', '0' ], [ [['The tragic story of Trayvon Martin', 4]], '28647343', '0' ], [ [['Karzai will get a chance soon to express', 8]], '28630306', '0' ], [ [['powerful storms stretching', 8]], '28493546', '0' ], [ [['basic norm that death is private', 6]], '28413590', '0' ], [ [['songwriter also saw a surge in sales for her debut album', 6]], '28413590', '1', 'Watch music videos from Whitney Houston ', 'on Yahoo! Music', 'http://music.yahoo.com' ], [ [['keyword', 99999999999999999999999]], 'videoID', '1', 'overwrite-pre-description', 'overwrite-link-string', 'overwrite-link-url' ] ]

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/government-affirms-unitedhealths-tricare-contract-122427729--finance.html

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How do you find a Higgs boson? A crash course.

Scientists are using the $10 billion Large Hadron Collider in their search for the Higgs boson. Understanding how it works explains why it has proven so hard to find the Higgs boson.

By Pete Spotts,?Staff writer / July 3, 2012

Two engineers assemble one of the detectors at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)'s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in Geneva, Switzerland, in this file photo. Scientists will provide an update Wednesday on their quest to find the Higgs boson.

Martial Trezzini/AP/File

Enlarge

Butterfly scientists have their $24 nets. Well-heeled birders have their $2,000 Swarovski binoculars. Particle physicists have their $10 billion Large Hadron Collider.

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If that price tag sounds a little steep ? even in the quest to find the elusive Higgs boson, which could answer the?longstanding question of why the fundamental building blocks of matter have mass?? consider what it is trying to do.?

If theories are correct, the Higgs boson existed only?during the first millionth of a millionth of a second after the Big Bang some 13.6 billion years ago. As the universe cooled, all the Higgs bosons decayed into other particles. That means to find it, scientists have to make it themselves, recreating the high energies that existed when the universe was only a millionth of a millionth of a second old.?

To do this researchers use the LHC to accelerate protons to within a whisker of the speed of light, then steer them into head-on collision. In the usual shorthand, that makes the LHC a proton collider.?

"Proton collider" is a misnomer, however, because the collisions actually occur among particles that make up protons, such as quarks and the gluons that bind the quarks together, says Lawrence Sulak, a physicist at Boston University who is working with one of the two Higgs-hunting teams. It's the particular combination of quarks that gives a proton its positive charge ? the trait that allows scientists to use powerful magnets to guide and focus the LHC's proton beams.

As if to make matters more difficult, even though physicists speak of colliding beams of protons, in reality, the beams are mostly empty space. If an atom was the size of Earth, a proton in its nucleus would only measure about 2,000 feet across. The three quarks that typically make up the proton would be no more than four inches across, and probably a lot smaller, says?Meenakshi Narain, a physicist at Brown University in Providence, R.I., and a member of the other team hunting for the Higgs boson.

Other processes go on inside the proton as well, but it's the collision among quarks and gluons, which binds the quarks -- that physicists are actually smashing.

At the LHC, the main show takes place in the collider's circular main ring, a racetrack with a circumference of nearly 17 miles and up to 300 feet below ground. But the facility also takes advantage of every type of particle accelerator developed in the past 115 years to first harvest the protons from hydrogen gas, then accelerate them incrementally through three increasingly powerful accelerators.

Only in the final stage do the protons reach energy levels high enough to allow the LHC's main ring to give them their final precollision energy.

Beams are made from bunches of protons ? 100 billion protons to the bunch, and just over 2,800 bunches per beam. The large number of protons offsets the mostly-empty-space problem, significantly raising the probability of collisions.

Using powerful magnets to steer the protons around two lines running in opposite directions, the beams are at last brought into focus at each of two mammoth detectors the size of a cathedral's nave. This is where the collisions take place.?By the time the beams are focused for collision, each is about half the width of a human hair. The detectors that track the collision debris must be able to locate the telltale debris trails to within half the width of a human hair. ?

The?engineers who keep the machine going with such precision "are?real magicians," says Dr. Sulak.?

The collisions take place about once every 50-billionths of a second.

"That means you have to look at these collisions every 50 nanoseconds and decide whether you want one or not," says James Proudfoot, who leads the high-energy physics division at the Argonne National Laboratory in Argonne, Ill. "That's a huge challenge, because there's a prodigious amount of background" ? detector signals from collision debris that researchers must sift through to pick out the truly interesting signals.

The signals of interest get stored for detailed analysis. And how do you know you have spotted a Higgs boson? Among other things, theory predicts that a decaying Higgs boson should produce an array of secondary particles gathered into five distinct groups, or channels. It's not enough to spot one or two, although that will suggest the hunt may soon be over. All five channels must be present, and in the predicted proportions.

If the proportions are off, or the number of channels is different, researchers certainly can claim a discovery, but it will be up to the theorists to figure out what it is.

On Wednesday morning, the world will get the latest official word from scientists at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva as to what the data tells them and how confident they are in their results.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/0rA1bdh-omU/How-do-you-find-a-Higgs-boson-A-crash-course

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Charting autism's neural circuitry: Deleting single gene results in autism-like behavior and immunosuppressant drug prevents symptoms

ScienceDaily (July 2, 2012) ? Deleting a single gene in the cerebellum of mice can cause key autistic-like symptoms, researchers have found. They also discovered that rapamycin, a commonly used immunosuppressant drug, prevented these symptoms.

The deleted gene is associated with Tuberous Sclerosis Complex (TSC), a rare genetic condition. Since nearly 50 percent of all people with TSC develop autism, the researchers believe their findings will help us better understand the condition's development.

"We are trying to find out if there are specific circuits in the brain that lead to autism-spectrum disorders in people with TSC," said Mustafa Sahin, Harvard Medical School associate professor of neurology at Boston Children's Hospital and senior author on the paper. "And knowing that deleting the genes associated with TSC in the cerebellum leads to autistic symptoms is a vital step in figuring out that circuitry."

This is the first time researchers have identified a molecular component for the cerebellum's role in autism. "What is so remarkable is that loss of this gene in a particular cell type in the cerebellum was sufficient to cause the autistic-like behaviors," said Peter Tsai, HMS instructor of neurology and the first author of this particular study.

These findings were published online July 1 in Nature.

TSC is a genetic disease caused by mutations in either one of two genes, TSC1 and TSC2. Patients develop benign tumors in various organs in the body, including the brain, kidneys and heart, and often suffer from seizures, delayed development and behavioral problems.

Researchers have known that there was a link between TSC genes and autism, and have even identified the cerebellum as the key area where autism and related conditions develop.

In both cases, deleting this gene caused the three main signs of autistic-like behaviors:

• Abnormal social interactions. The mice spent less time with each other and more with inanimate objects, compared to controls.
• Repetitive behaviors. The mice spent extended amounts of time pursuing one activity or with one particular object far more than normal.
• Abnormal communication. Ultrasonic vocalizations, the communication technique among rodents, were highly distressed.

The researchers also tested learning. "These mice were able to learn new things normally," said Tsai, "but they had trouble with 'reversal learning,' or re-learning what they had learned when their environment changed."

Tsai and colleagues tested this by training the mice to swim a particular path in which a platform where they could rest was set up on one side of the pool. When the researchers moved the platform to the other side of the pool, the mice had greater difficulty than the control mice re-learning to swim to the other side.

"These changes in behavior indicate that the TSC1 gene in Purkinje cells, and by extension, the cerebellum, are a part of the circuitry for autism disorders," emphasized Sahin.

The researchers also found that the drug rapamycin averted the effects of the deleted gene. Administering the drug to the mice during development prevented the formation of autistic-like behaviors.

Currently, Sahin is the sponsor-principal investigator for an ongoing Phase II clinical trial to test the efficacy of everolimus, a compound in the same family as rapamycin, in improving neurocognition in children with TSC. The trial will be open for enrollment until December 2013.

"Our next step will be to see how the abnormalities in Purkinje cells affect autism-like development. We don't know how generalizable our current findings are, but understanding mechanisms beyond TSC genes might be useful to autism," said Tsai.

This study was supported by the National Institutes of Health (R01 NS58956), the John Merck Scholars Fund, Autism Speaks, Nancy Lurie Marks Family Foundation, Children's Hospital Boston Translational Research Program, the Children's Hospital Boston Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities Research Center (P30 HD18655).

Sahin serves as a consultant and site primary investigator for Novartis.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Harvard Medical School. The original article was written by Shraddha Chakradhar.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

---

Journal Reference:

1. Peter T. Tsai, Court Hull, YunXiang Chu, Emily Greene-Colozzi, Abbey R. Sadowski, Jarrett M. Leech, Jason Steinberg, Jacqueline N. Crawley, Wade G. Regehr, Mustafa Sahin. Autistic-like behaviour and cerebellar dysfunction in Purkinje cell Tsc1 mutant mice. Nature, 2012; DOI: 10.1038/nature11310

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/6HU6BSk12XY/120702210303.htm

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