A ransomware attack is blamed for causing electricity supply problems in South Africa's biggest city.
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Friday, July 26, 2019
Thursday, July 25, 2019
Seeking new physics, scientists borrow from social networks
When two protons collide, they release pyrotechnic jets of particles, the details of which can tell scientists something about the nature of physics and the fundamental forces that govern the universe.
Enormous particle accelerators such as the Large Hadron Collider can generate billions of such collisions per minute by smashing together beams of protons at close to the speed of light. Scientists then search through measurements of these collisions in hopes of unearthing weird, unpredictable behavior beyond the established playbook of physics known as the Standard Model.
Now MIT physicists have found a way to automate the search for strange and potentially new physics, with a technique that determines the degree of similarity between pairs of collision events. In this way, they can estimate the relationships among hundreds of thousands of collisions in a proton beam smashup, and create a geometric map of events according to their degree of similarity.
The researchers say their new technique is the first to relate multitudes of particle collisions to each other, similar to a social network.
“Maps of social networks are based on the degree of connectivity between people, and for example, how many neighbors you need before you get from one friend to another,” says Jesse Thaler, associate professor of physics at MIT. “It’s the same idea here.”
Thaler says this social networking of particle collisions can give researchers a sense of the more connected, and therefore more typical, events that occur when protons collide. They can also quickly spot the dissimilar events, on the outskirts of a collision network, which they can further investigate for potentially new physics. He and his collaborators, graduate students Patrick Komiske and Eric Metodiev, carried out the research at the MIT Center for Theoretical Physics and the MIT Laboratory for Nuclear Science. They detail their new technique this week in the journal Physical Review Letters.
Seeing the data agnostically
Thaler’s group focuses, in part, on developing techniques to analyze open data from the LHC and other particle collider facilities in hopes of digging up interesting physics that others might have initially missed.
“Having access to this public data has been wonderful,” Thaler says. “But it’s daunting to sift through this mountain of data to figure out what’s going on.”
Physicists normally look through collider data for specific patterns or energies of collisions that they believe to be of interest based on theoretical predictions. Such was the case for the discovery of the Higgs boson, the elusive elementary particle that was predicted by the Standard Model. The particle’s properties were theoretically outlined in detail but had not been observed until 2012, when physicists, knowing approximately what to look for, found signatures of the Higgs boson hidden amid trillions of proton collisions.
But what if particles exhibit behavior beyond what the Standard Model predicts, that physicists have no theory to anticipate?
Thaler, Komiske, and Metodiev have landed on a novel way to sift through collider data without knowing ahead of time what to look for. Rather than consider a single collision event at a time, they looked for ways to compare multiple events with each other, with the idea that perhaps by determining which events are more typical and which are less so, they might pick out outliers with potentially interesting, unexpected behavior.
“What we’re trying to do is to be agnostic about what we think is new physics or not,” says Metodiev. “We want to let the data speak for itself.”
Moving dirt
Particle collider data are jam-packed with billions of proton collisions, each of which comprises individual sprays of particles. The team realized these sprays are essentially point clouds — collections of dots, similar to the point clouds that represent scenes and objects in computer vision. Researchers in that field have developed an arsenal of techniques to compare point clouds, for example to enable robots to accurately identify objects and obstacles in their environment.
Metodiev and Komiske utilized similar techniques to compare point clouds between pairs of collisions in particle collider data. In particular, they adapted an existing algorithm that is designed to calculate the optimal amount of energy, or “work” that is needed to transform one point cloud into another. The crux of the algorithm is based on an abstract idea known as the “earth’s mover’s distance.”
“You can imagine deposits of energy as being dirt, and you’re the earth mover who has to move that dirt from one place to another,” Thaler explains. “The amount of sweat that you expend getting from one configuration to another is the notion of distance that we’re calculating.”
In other words, the more energy it takes to rearrange one point cloud to resemble another, the farther apart they are in terms of their similarity. Applying this idea to particle collider data, the team was able to calculate the optimal energy it would take to transform a given point cloud into another, one pair at a time. For each pair, they assigned a number, based on the “distance,” or degree of similarity they calculated between the two. They then considered each point cloud as a single point and arranged these points in a social network of sorts.
Three particle collision events, in the form of jets, obtained from the CMS Open Data, form a triangle to represent an abstract "space of events." The animation depicts how one jet can be optimally rearranged into another.
The team has been able to construct a social network of 100,000 pairs of collision events, from open data provided by the LHC, using their technique. The researchers hope that by looking at collision datasets as networks, scientists may be able to quickly flag potentially interesting events at the edges of a given network.
“We’d like to have an Instagram page for all the craziest events, or point clouds, recorded by the LHC on a given day,” says Komiske. “This technique is an ideal way to determine that image. Because you just find the thing that’s farthest away from everything else.”
Typical collider datasets that are made publicly available normally include several million events, which have been preselected from an original chaos of billions of collisions that occurred at any given moment in a particle accelerator. Thaler says the team is working on ways to scale up their technique to construct larger networks, to potentially visualize the “shape,” or general relationships within an entire dataset of particle collisions.
In the near future, he envisions testing the technique on historical data that physicists now know contain milestone discoveries, such as the first detection in 1995 of the top quark, the most massive of all known elementary particles.
“The top quark is an object that gives rise to these funny, three-pronged sprays of radiation, which are very dissimilar from typical sprays of one or two prongs,” Thaler says. “If we could rediscover the top quark in this archival data, with this technique that doesn’t need to know what new physics it is looking for, it would be very exciting and could give us confidence in applying this to current datasets, to find more exotic objects.”
This research was funded, in part, by the U.S. Department of Energy, the Simons Foundation, and the MIT Quest for Intelligence.
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Rapper Tay-K sentenced to 55 years in prison for his role in shooting death of Texas man
On Tuesday viral sensation Tay-K was handed a 55-year prison sentence for a murder that took place during a robbery in 2016, according to the Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney’s Office.
Tay-K, whose real name is Taymor McIntyre must serve also 30 years, plus two 13 year sentences for the two counts of aggravated robbery, which all must be served concurrently, according to reports.
Taymor McIntyre has been found guilty by a Tarrant County jury of Murder and 3 counts of Aggravated Murder. He was sentenced to 55 years for Murder, and 30 yr, 13 yr and 13 yr sentences for the Aggravated Robbery convictions.
— Tarrant County DA (@TarrantCountyDA) July 23, 2019
—Wendy Williams breaks down about divorce and opens up about upcoming Lifetime biopic—
In 2017, the 19-year-old Texas rapper became a household name with the release of the song “The Race,” which he recorded while on the run from police. The video for the song now has over 100 million views on YouTube and according to CNN, the song debuted at No. 70 on the Billboard Hot 100 Charts. McIntyre also received widespread support from rappers like Lil Bibby and Travis Scott. He was taken into custody after being on the run for three months.
Prior to the release of the song, McIntyre was involved in a home invasion with six other people in 2016 that resulted in the death of 21-year-old Ethan Walker, who was fatally shot in the stomach according to People. CNN reported that Walker, a young father, did not even have the money or drugs the group was looking for. McIntyre and the others involved were initially arrested on capital murder charges in July 2016. He was then placed on house arrest, where he somehow removed his ankle monitor and went on the run.
—Nicole Murphy issues apology for kiss with Lela Rochon’s husband—
Prosecutors argued that though McIntyre was not the one that made the fatal shot, he was just as responsible because he was aware that someone was going to be shot in the process of the robbery.
People reported that a 15-year-old girl devised the plan and reached out to the rapper to see if he could get guns for the robbery. When McIntyre told her he did not have guns, he also said he knew someone who was “trigger-happy.”
McIntyre is also facing a capital murder charge for an April 2017 robbery that took the life of 23-year-old Mark Saldivar at a Chick-fil-A in San Antonio.
The post Rapper Tay-K sentenced to 55 years in prison for his role in shooting death of Texas man appeared first on theGrio.
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LisaRaye McCoy blasts Nicole Murphy for kissing scandal and says she messed around with her ex-husband too
LisaRaye McCoy is not taking the high road nor is she letting bygones be bygones. She blasted Nicole Murphy for not only getting caught kissing married Antoine Fuqua but also for sleeping with her ex-husband and damaging her marriage to Turks and Caicos politician Michael Misick.
—Nicole Murphy issues apology for kiss with Lela Rochon’s husband—
On Wednesday, TMZ caught up with McCoy who had a few choice words for Murphy who is in the midst of a nasty scandal after pics surfaced of her kissing Fuqua who has been married for more than 20 years to Waiting to Exhale actress Lela Rochon.
Murphy’s been trying desperately to douse the flames of this dumpster fire, but it’s not going so well. First, she defended the photos saying it was “friendly” and then when several more scandalous pics hit the net, she backtracked and apologized for getting caught on candid camera.
McCoy, however, is not letting Murphy off the hook so easily for her indiscretion.
The Players Club actress contends that Murphy hooked up with her husband too. McCoy was married to Misick from 2006 to 2008.
When asked directly if Murphy did the same thing to her, McCoy flatly said, “That’s true. Absolutely true.”
She then spilled the beans about her ex and Murphy’s dirty deeds.
“She messed around with my husband,” she admits.
“Here’s the thing, we’ve all done something that we regret. We’ve all made mistakes and we have to learn from that, but when you start doing it and being messy enough to start doing it amongst family… how does a family kiss turn into a I’m sorry apology? Like, what do you mean? You didn’t know that she was married? We all know that she was married. That’s 20 years. That’s history,” she said.
“You don’t do that amongst friends. Because there’s no loyalty…you gotta look up and the person you invited to your house and celebrated your birthday and going to games with you gotta look up and they’re in Italy with your husband?”
If you missed it, Murphy and Fuqua got themselves embroiled in jaw-dropping controversy after it was revealed that the Training Day director was still allegedly “happily” married to Lela Rochon while getting hot and heavy in Italy with Murphy.
There were several questionable pictures that surfaced of the two canoodling poolside nearly naked with Murphy in a skimpy bathing suit and Fuqua with a towel around his midsection. The kisses looked like they were an epilogue to something else that might have occurred the night before. But we digress.
Initially, the stunning 51-year-old issued a statement claiming, “Antoine and I are just family friends. I ran into him in Italy and we exchanged a friendly hello and that was it.”
But nobody was buying it.
—Wendy Williams breaks down about divorce and opens up about upcoming Lifetime biopic—
She later changed her statement admitting:
“It was not my intention to be in this situation. I do not condone women kissing or interacting in anyway inappropriately with a married man. I too was once married and I would never intentionally undermine another woman, despite what has been written.”
In response to McCoy’s explosive revelation, Murphy denied the cheating claims saying: “It’s not true. She’s [LisaRaye’s] been saying that for years. There’s no truth to that.”
What even more sad about this whole ordeal is that McCoy reported that Rochon is pretty broke up about it.
“It’s hard because I know she’s sad and messed up about this and embarrassed about this.”
When the scandal first broke McCoy ended up in the comment section of the The Shade Room to comment saying, “Gurl @nikimurphy you went after @iamlelarochon husband too?…smh So wrong….again!!!”
That led many to believe that this was Murphy’s m.o., to chase and sleep around with married men. When asked if she thought Murphy was a homewrecker, McCoy responded:
“I don’t know if she’s a homewrecker or not. But I know what she’s doing to people’s homes is wrecking it.”
Well damn.
Sources have also reportedly told TMZ that Murphy feels blindsided by the backlash because she only kissed Fuqua – who’s been married to actress Lela Rochon since 1999 – because she was informed that the couple had divorced and he was free to see other people.
Sources also say that Murphy is devastated about being painted as the other woman, feels terrible about hurting anyone, and hopes people can forgive her for her mistake.
The Training Day director and his wife have two children and were last photographed in a public together in February of 2019. Despite the mounting speculations, they have yet to make any formal announcements or clarifications about the current status of their marriage.
The post LisaRaye McCoy blasts Nicole Murphy for kissing scandal and says she messed around with her ex-husband too appeared first on theGrio.
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Kanye West files trademark request for ‘Sunday Service’ merchandise
Kanye West is gearing up to extend his “Sunday Service” concert series into a business venture and filed a trademark to register the name to sell merchandise emblazoned with the brand.
The Golddigger rapper plans to legitimately sell “bottoms, dresses, footwear, headwear, jackets, loungewear, scarves, shirts, socks and tops” with the name, Page Six reports.
—Kanye West says after son Psalm’s birth, he wants to preach the Gospel—
See, he’s done it before at Coachella on Easter Sunday, but he didn’t have the legal trademark secured with the moniker. That ultimately could prove problematic and result in a monetary loss if another trademark exists.
At Coachella, West sold Sunday Service hoodies ranging from $165 and $225 and socks with the slogan “Church Socks” and “Jesus Walks” for $50.
Mascotte Holdings, Inc filed the trademark application for West, but that’s doesn’t mean it will get approved. Getting a trademark is sometimes an uphill battle especially is other organizations challenge it. And being as though Sunday Service has been a religious theme for ages, West might be in for quite a battle.
It seems that West is getting more deeply embedded in his concert series.
—Wendy Williams breaks down about divorce and opens up about upcoming Lifetime biopic—
Earlier this year, West tried to show the world he’s more in tune with his spiritual after naming his fourth child, Psalm. The “Jesus Walks” rapper also revealed that he wants to become an ordained minister.
West has recently been known for holding weekly gospel-flavored “Sunday Services”, but now it looks like he wants to take it up a notch.
“Kanye is convinced that his calling in life is now gospel and spreading the word of God,” a Keeping Up With The Kardashians source previously told Radar Online. “He has always been a man of faith, but he has taken it to a whole new level now.”
Bless his heart.
The post Kanye West files trademark request for ‘Sunday Service’ merchandise appeared first on theGrio.
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Wendy Williams breaks down about divorce and opens up about upcoming Lifetime biopic
The pain of divorce cut deep for talk-show host Wendy Williams who burst out in tears as she discussed the remnants of her on-going divorce to Kevin Hunter on Sirius XM’s Urban View radio show.
On Tuesday, the talk-show host was the one in the hot seat as interviewer Karen Hunter pressed her about closely-held details of the high-profile divorce and whether she’d ever take her alleged cheating ex back or change her legal name, Entertainment Tonight reports.
—After kicking Kevin Hunter to the left, Wendy Williams is reportedly ready to take over her empire—
When asked if there was ever a chance of reconciliation with her ex who allegedly fathered a child with his mistress, Williams vehemently said. “No! Don’t ask. No!” She then gave Karen the side-eye and followed up with “Girl.”
“But my family’s good, and we’ll always be family,” she continued.
Williams was clearly emotional as she discussed whether she has made life changes like getting new credit cards or legally changing her last name.
“No, my name is Wendy Hunter. That’s my son’s name, and you can’t take away twenty-…” Williams said, fighting back tears.
“So who is Wendy, right now?” Karen asked.
“Happy,” Williams said. “I’m happy, I’m healthy, and I am at peace with the world and everyone around me.”
However, things are looking up for Williams who is working on a Lifetime biopic that surely will be juicy and revealing.
According to a press release, “The authorized project provides a revealing look at Wendy’s journey, from her scrappy upstart days in urban radio to the success of her own syndicated talk show.” It will go into production this fall in Toronto and will air on Lifetime in 2020.
—Wendy Williams sheds tears over divorce drama, but then gets real about it—
The project reportedly is a Will Packer (Girls Trip) production and the screenplay reportedly will be penned by Boomerang writer Leigh Davenport. After the biopic, a two-hour documentary will follow.
“It’s like a Wendy night on Lifetime!” Williams stated.
Williams life has undoubtedly been a tumultuous one.
The cheating scandal rocked Williams world and she admitted to spending some time in a sober living facility to get her life back on track. She also opened up about her future plans sans Hunter.
With a career that spans over three decades, the 55-year-old has had success as both a popular radio host and television producer and host. The Wendy Williams Show is celebrating its eleventh season this year.
The post Wendy Williams breaks down about divorce and opens up about upcoming Lifetime biopic appeared first on theGrio.
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