Friday Futures: alien footprints on Mars, DNA and your next date

life on mars possibly
Image credit: alle / Shutterstock.com

Welcome to Friday Futures, our weekly guide to the latest visions of The Future from around the web. This week: life on Mars; before the Big Bang; smart glass gets competitive; DNA and dating; gene editing; salvation for bees; and a flying Porsche.

Did we just find fossilized alien footprints on Mars?

An astrobiologist may have discovered evidence of alien life on Mars after studying images taken by NASA’s Curiosity Rover. Barry DiGregorio, an honorary research fellow at the University of Buckingham, studies gases, rocks, and other materials that serve as indicators of life. The scientist has professional and personal interest in the search for life on planet Mars. Read more…

Stephen Hawking thinks he knows what happened before the Big Bang

One of the universe’s most intriguing questions is that what happened before the Big Bang. Celebrated physicist Stephen Hawking revealed he has an answer. There is no time before the start of time as time was always present, it was just different, Hawking said. Read more…

Smart glass just got a lot cheaper

New ‘smart glass’ technology could make curtains and blinds obsolete and provide an instant toggle between light and dark for windshields and roof panes. While this isn’t the first ‘smart glass’ ever developed, it is about one-tenth the price of other versions and more transparent in its transparent state and more reflective in its reflective state than competitors. Read more…

If you want to find the perfect date via DNA – don’t

If you’ve nearly given up hope on finding that special someone, you might be intrigued by the dating site du jour. Pheramor, a startup based in Houston, Texas, says it can use your DNA to find you a perfect match. Read more…

Gene editing is now down to the letter

One new gene editing technique is so precise, it’s almost shocking. MhAX, as it’s called, uses CRISPR and a DNA repair system to alter a single DNA base in the human genome. Read more…

GitHub just beat off the biggest DDoS attack of all time

On Wednesday, at about 12:15 pm EST, 1.35 Tbps of traffic hit the developer platform GitHub all at once. It was the most powerful distributed denial of service attack recorded to date—and it used an increasingly popular DDoS method, no botnet required. Read more…

Bees all over Europe may be a little safer

This comes after new evidence reinforces the case against harmful neonicotinoids, the world’s most used pesticides. A new report from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) explored in unprecedented detail the risk posed to honeybees and wild bees alike by the exposure to the compound. Read more…

Is Porsche developing a flying car?

A recent report claims that German carmaker Porsche has a flying passenger drone concept in the works. The passenger drone, which Porsche hasn’t confirmed yet, won’t require the driver to have a pilot’s license to operate. Read more…

)Compiled by Alex Leslie; Edited by John C. Tanner)

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