Category Archives: Outlets

Nature, News

European ministers back research-buddy plan

Europe’s leading scientific institutions could work with less-developed regions to create a new type of research centre, suggests a proposal backed by science ministers last week.

Under the ‘teaming’ proposal, the partners would put forward joint business plans to bid for European Union (EU) start-up funds as part of Horizon 2020, the EU research funding programme for 2014–20, which will replace the current Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) after it expires next year. Ministers gave their backing for the general structure of Horizon 2020 last June. Continue reading European ministers back research-buddy plan →

News, Technology Review

Sentry System Combines a Human Brain with Computer Vision

Sentry duty is a tough assignment. Most of the time there’s nothing to see, and when a threat does pop up, it can be hard to spot. In some military studies, humans are shown to detect only 47 percent of visible dangers.

A project run by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) suggests that combining the abilities of human sentries with those of machine-vision systems could be a better way to identify danger. It also uses electroencephalography to identify spikes in brain activity that can correspond to subconscious recognition of an object. Continue reading Sentry System Combines a Human Brain with Computer Vision →

Inter Press Service, Nairobi, News

Political Provocateurs Expose Kenya’s “MaVultures”

A new website linking corruption and other scandals to high-ranking Kenyan politicians, created by a team of political provocateurs, has become one of the most-visited web pages in the country.

MaVulture.com, which means “many vultures” in Swahili, aims to collect, condense, and air the past wrongdoings of Kenya’s political class. Going live on Nov. 13, the site is the latest project from activist Boniface Mwangi, known for his political graffiti murals around Nairobi and his photographic exhibitions that documented the violent aftermath of the 2007 presidential elections.

Read the rest of this story by Mike Elkin with additional reporting by me, in Inter Press Service news agency: [html] [pdf]

Audio, Deutsche Welle, Nairobi

Nairobi photographer inspires political action

Nairobi photographer Boniface Mwangi is fed up with his country’s politicians. To raise awareness, he’s taking an in-your-face approach with a graffiti campaign, political art show and online newspaper.

This audio package first appeared in Deutsche Welle’s Generation Change podcast and blog: [mp3] [html].

Photos and additional reporting by Mike Elkin.