4,000-mile-long subsea cable

Work on Marea, a high-capacity subsea cable spanning the 6,437 kilometres (between Bilbao, Spain, and Virginia Beach, Virginia, has been completed. Microsoft and Facebook collaborated on the development, design and implementation of the cable, while a third partner, global communication infrastructure specialist Telxius, was responsible for its construction and will take care of its maintenance.

The cable is the first link of its kind between Virginia and Spain. In total, it weighs more than 5,125 tonnes and has a capacity of 160 TB of data per second — the highest of any subsea cable to cross the Atlantic Ocean.

While coastal sections of Marea were buried under sand for protective purposes, the majority of the cable rests on the ocean floor at an average depth of nearly 3,352 metres. Planners had to route the cable so that it avoided such obstacles as earthquake zones, coral reefs and even active volcanoes. Much of our online connectivity relies on infrastructure like Marea, and when Hurricane Sandy hit, it caused widespread interruptions to internet and phone service due to the number of cables located in the storm’s path.

The companies are hopeful that Marea will help prevent such a lack of connection in the future.

The largest delivery pizza

A Michigan pizzeria aimed to break the Guinness World Record for largest delivery pizza by cooking up a 72-inch pie.

Steve Mallie, the owner of Mallie’s Sports Grill & Bar in Southgate, led a team in constructing the massive pizza and cooking it in the same oven he used to cook a Guinness World Record-breaking 1,796 pound hamburger last summer.

Mallie said his pizza, which was donated to the Southgate Police and Fire departments, successfully bested the current Guinness record holder, a 54-inch pizza.

The owner said he decided on a 72-inch pizza because that size of pie would still be able to fit through buildings with double doors.

“The hardest part is moving it,” he told.

Mallie said documentation of the massive pizza has been sent to Guinness for official certification.

Robot to teach infants to communicate

Experts believe that the optimal time to teach kids language skills is when they are infants.

Now, an adorable blue-eyed robot, a human avatar, and some high-tech neuroscience may be able to assist parents and guardians with this crucial developmental task.

The Robot AVatar Thermal-Enhanced system, or RAVE, is the brainchild of a team of researchers led by Laura Ann Petitto, an educational neuroscientist, at Washington, D.C.’s Gallaudet University. The learning process begins when the robot’s thermal camera, which is focused on the baby’s face, detects tiny changes in his/her body temperature, which is associated with alertness. This, combined with the baby’s engaged facial expression, causes the robot to turn its head and guide the infant’s attention to a computer screen. Here, a human avatar starts to communicate with the baby, much like a parent would.

The researchers found that infants as young as six to eight months old began to move their hands in a rhythm similar to ASL after interacting with RAVE for just a few minutes.

What sets this technique apart from other methods, such as showing educational videos or television shows, is its interactive nature and real-time response to the baby’s actions.

Published in Dawn, Young World, April 7th, 2018