The recession hits Harvard…with interesting changes – more money to undergrads, less to books

Harvard isn’t belt-tightening everywhere. Since 2007, its investment in financial aid to undergraduates has risen by more than 78%, which Harvard said is “significantly outpacing increases in tuition.” Undergraduate tuition for the 2012-13 year climbed 3.5% to $54,496. *** As it looks to economize, Harvard has turned some of its attention toward the more than …

International Space Station has a Large Hadron Collider – and it’s collected 18 billion cosmic rays

The largest-ever experiment in space has reported the collection of some 18 billion “cosmic ray” events that may help unravel the Universe’s mysteries. Run from a centre at Cern, the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) aims to spot dark matter and exotic antimatter. At the heart of the seven-tonne, $2bn machine is a giant, specially designed …

The end of ownership for DVDs – say goodbye to your DVD collection

I feel like this is one of those big moments that sputters into life – the end of ownership. At least, when it comes to DVDs. This happened to music a few years back…I mean, who still thinks of owning music with CDs? With Blu-ray sales slotted to decline in the next few years, the …

Isaac Newton Digital Library – 4,000 pages of his notebooks, drawings, and manuscripts

The largest collection of Isaac Newton’s papers has gone digital, committing to open-access posterity the works of one of history’s greatest scientist. Among the works shared online by the Cambridge Digital Library are Newton’s own annotated copy of Principia Mathematica and the ‘Waste Book,’ the notebook in which a young Newton worked out the principles of calculus. “Anyone, wherever …