Ingenious smart glove translates sign language into speech
A savvy student has designed a 'smart glove' which translates sign language - into speech. PhD student Hadeel Ayoub designed the BrightSign to help people with speech disabilities communicate without needing an interpreter. Hadeel, who specialises in digital and software design at Goldsmiths University, has been working on the BrightSign for the past two years as part of her PhD project. She said: "What it does is it translates sign language to text into speech in real time to allow...
Harry Potter’s Diagon Alley may be lost under plans to build £400m skyscraper
Harry Potter's Diagon Alley may soon become a "lost relic" if plans to build a £400 million skyscraper are approved, conservation experts have warned. Leadenhall Market is used in the Potter films as the entrance to Diagon Alley while the wizard's pub The Leaky Cauldron is actually an opticians in the Victorian market. The proposed "glass lump" - a 36 storey development - would obscure the Grade II listed market's glass roof if it replaces the existing seven storey office...
Shellfish food wrap will “kill bugs, extend shelf life and eventually biodegrade without a trace”
A food wrap made using shellfish could end up in every kitchen in the world, save millions for the food sector and slash pollution, it has been claimed. The wrap is made using discarded langoustine shells taken from Scotland's huge seafood sector. Developers CuanTec say that the material will kill bugs, extend shelf life and eventually biodegrade without a trace. Scientists hope the new food wrapping will replace cling film commonly used in the food industry and at home. The...
Unbeaten girls’ football team too good for the boys….without a goalie!
Sport News 24/7 A football coach whose girls' team hasn't lost a match for three seasons on the trot is calling for more girls to take up the sport - because the boys' teams are too afraid to play them. Stuart Henley's nine and ten-year-old players have scored 110 goals in seven matches and have conceded just four - setting a new season record. But Stuart and his under-10s team are "gutted" that boys' teams sometimes refuse to play against...
Bird flu is back: We need solutions, not scapegoats
By Philip Lymbery, CEO of Compassion in World Farming Bird flu is back. All farmers and keepers of poultry have been ordered by Defra to keep their birds indoors, separate and ‘safe’ from contact with wild birds. Just this week, a flock of 8,000 turkeys in Lincolnshire was diagnosed with the virus. Some have died and the rest are due to be culled. If bringing the birds indoors to ‘protect’ them from wild birds is the solution to preventing the...
We need to talk about Nazi Germany
In the week Theresa May defiantly delivered her "hard right" stance on the Brexit negotiations and America gets set to inaugurate one of the most "hard right" figures in modern political history the message of 2017 has become quite clear; If 2016 delivered the body blows, the next few years are going to be a series of repeated knock out punches. With them has come a series of worrying undertones about the state of the current social and political climate...
Secret Chef – Cooking for the young (but not the brightest) super-rich
Here's a story about cooking for an independently wealthy Young Gentleman and his gang of friends. To protect the innocent, the guilty and myself, nothing I tell you will be quite true. As your secret chef I have spent two decades being a private chef for High Net Worth (HNW) and Ultra High Net Worth (UHNW) clients all over Europe and on super yachts. What I have become experienced at is keeping secrets and cheffing. Here is what I remember...
Theatre Review: The Lower Depths, Arcola Theatre
This production directed by Helena Kaut-Howson and translated by Jeremy Brooks and Kitty Hunter-Blair really is in the anguished lows as it opens the Arcola’s commemorative Russian Revolution season. It’s Maxim Gorky’s best known play, heralds the birth of theatrical social realism, made his name in 1902 but was lambasted by the critics then for its rather despairing and unredemptive avant-garde portrait of those who occupy the “lower depths” of society. Akira Kurosawa made a Japanese version of the play...
Newspapers tackling their falling readership by throwing scare-mongering immigrant stories on front page
By Selena Drake “A hospital is chasing a £350,000 bill racked up by a Nigerian mother who flew to Britain to give birth to twins.” This was the headline on the front page of the Daily Mail three days ago. A pattern is emerging that seems to be accompanying the rapid rise in immigration. The prioritisation of news stories of this nature is a typical example of scare-mongering. It is not uncommon for right-wing newspapers to try to increase readership...