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Milky Way to face a one-two punch of galaxy collisions

The Large Magellanic Cloud will hit us before Andromeda can get here.

If our knowledge of galaxy structures was limited to the Milky Way, we'd get a lot of things wrong. The Milky Way, it turns out, is unusual. It's got a smaller central black hole than other galaxies its size; its halo is also smaller and contains less of the heavier elements. Fortunately, we've now looked at enough other galaxies to know that ours is a bit of an oddball. What's been less clear is why.

The next Alien project will be a mixed-media experience in 2019

A single tweet suggests something interactive about this year's return to Nostromo.

20th Century Fox announced the next project, or possible projects, in the Alien universe on Saturday by way of a vague and tantalizing social-media post. This next Alien universe release, slated for a "2019" launch, includes a "read, watch, play" promise, suggesting a mixed-media launch whose various parts could commingle.

Its interactive aspects will be paid off, at the very least, by the protagonist already named in the above teaser: Amanda Ripley. This character, the daughter of Sigourney Weaver's character Ellen Ripley, featured prominently in the 2014 video game Alien Isolation. In that game, the younger Ripley was tasked with uncovering mysteries on a Weyland-Yutani craft called the Sevastopol.

New hospital price lists are massive spreadsheets full of gibberish

From unintelligible abbreviations and jargon to $32,456.66 "headaches."

At Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, an “HC BYP FEM-ANT TIBL PST TIBL PRONEAL ART/OTH DSTL” will run you $35,014.00. If you go to Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, an “HC ECMO/ECLS INIT VENO-VENOUS” costs $51,384.00. And at Bellevue Hospital Center in New York City, a “TRLUML PERIP ATHRC ILIAC ART” goes for $22,689.83.

These mysterious prices—and tens of thousands of others—are all on the hospitals’ respective new price lists, available in beastly spreadsheets downloadable from the hospitals’ websites. As of January 1, hospitals around the country are now federally required to list all standard charges for common treatments and care. The goal is to make hospital billing more transparent, allowing patients to comparison shop and anticipate medical expenses.

Pay for Trump’s border wall with $20 online porn fee, Ariz. lawmaker says

Arizona bill would make online porn viewers pay for border wall with Mexico.

An Arizona state lawmaker has proposed a $20 fee on people who want to view online pornography in order to raise money for building a border wall between Arizona and Mexico.

Arizona House Bill 2444, proposed last week by State Rep. Gail Griffin (R-Hereford), would require makers and distributors of Internet-connected devices to ship such devices with blocking software "that renders a website that displays obscene material inaccessible by default." Under the bill, any Internet user who wants to deactivate the blocking software would have to pay "a onetime deactivation fee of at least $20 to the Arizona Commerce Authority."

Electric scooter users aren’t wearing helmets—the head injury rate proves it

Health experts raise concern about electric scooter use and head injury rate.

Forty-percent of the injuries linked to electric scooter use involve knocks to the noggin while nearly 95 percent of riders don’t wear helmets, according to a first-of-its kind study published Friday, January 25.

As electric scooters and bike shares zoom into cities across the country, health experts are chasing after the potential public health and safety issues circling the micromobility market. The new study, published in JAMA Network Open, is the first to try to track the pattern of injuries linked to electric scooters.

2018 ranks as fourth-warmest year for globe

With US government shutdown over, the data finally gets released.

It’s that time of year again… or at least it was. NASA and NOAA normally release the final global temperature data for the previous year around January 18, but the government shutdown delayed that release. It finally happened on Wednesday, with both agencies finding that 2018 ranks at number four on the ever-changing list of the warmest years on record.

The first private mission to the Moon may launch Thursday night

"What it means to me is that the responsibility is very high."

The 180kg Beresheet spacecraft, privately developed by SpaceIL in Israel and funded largely through philanthropy, will spend more than six weeks raising its orbit and becoming captured into lunar orbit before finally making the first private attempt to land on the Moon. Until now, only the US, Russian, and Chinese space agencies have ever successfully landed on the Moon.

This strange “paint disease” is putting Georgia O’Keeffe paintings at risk

Soon conservators will be able to use equivalent of Star Trek tricorder for diagnosis.

The Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico, houses some 140 oil paintings by the iconic American artist, along with thousands of additional works from O'Keeffe's prolific career. But the oil paintings have been developing tiny pin-sized blisters, almost like acne, for decades. Conservationists and scholars initially assumed they were grains of sand trapped in the paint. But then the protrusions grew, spread, and started flaking off, leading to mounting concern.

Ridley Scott’s Alien will finally be released in 4K HDR for its 40th anniversary

The new Blu-ray will include both the theatrical cut and the director's cut.

20th Century Fox and partners embarked on an effort to remaster the film in 4K last year, under supervision by Pam Dery and director Ridley Scott. Alien was originally shot on 35mm film, and the remaster was made using the original negative.

Momo challenge: The anatomy of a hoax

Following a flurry of scare stories, some schools have warned parents about the "momo challenge" - but fact-checkers say it is a hoax.

Earlier this week, versions of the momo story went viral on social media. They attracted hundreds of thousands of shares and resulted in newspaper articles reporting the tale.

According to the false story, children are contacted on WhatsApp by an account claiming to be momo. They are supposedly encouraged to save the character as a contact and then asked to carry out challenges as well as being told not to tell other members of their family.

Amazon to open all-new grocery stores separate from Whole Foods

Dozens of new stores are in the works, and the first may open before 2019's end.

Amazon reportedly feels confident enough in its grocery-store quests to branch out into new ventures. According to a report by The Wall Street Journal, Amazon plans to open dozens of new grocery stores that will be distinctly different from the company's Whole Foods Market stores. The retail giant has reportedly already signed leases for some locations and plans to open the new grocery stores in cities across the country, including San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Washington DC.

Mercedes-Benz debuts EQV electric van at the Geneva auto show

It seats between six and eight, and will have up to 249 miles of range.

The Geneva International Motor Show just got underway in Europe. If, like me, you're sitting at home, that means waking up to a flood of new car reveals. Audi showed off a smaller e-tron sedan and some plug-in hybrids; I'm still waiting to find out which—if any—are coming to the US. There were a bunch of hand-built hypercars, some from companies you've heard of, and some you haven't. Volkswagen had the new I.D. Buggy we showed you yesterday. And then there was the Mercedes-Benz Concept EQV.

Here be dragons: HBO drops full trailer for Game of Thrones final season

There's no guarantee of a happy ending as the epic series heads into the end game.

Based on George R.R. Martin's best-selling epic fantasy series, A Song of Ice and Fire, Game of Thrones long ago outstripped the novels in terms of plot, although the author had some input in shaping the TV series' narrative arc. We've seen plenty of sex, blood, and horrifying death over the course of seven seasons, and now it's time for the end game. This being George R.R. Martin, there's no guarantee of a happy ending.

Treating lymphoma with HIV-resistant stem cells stops an HIV infection

This is the second time we've cleared HIV, and it may help us learn what works.

The identification of HIV ultimately led to the development of therapies that specifically target the virus' ability to make new copies of itself. These therapies have radically altered the lives of infected people, turning a often-lethal virus into something that can be managed for decades. But while the treatments control the virus, they don't eliminate it. Infected people still have reservoirs of virus in their bodies, raising the prospect that a drug-resistant strain could ultimately evolve.

Sorry Amazon: Philadelphia bans cashless stores

The city follows only Massachusetts, which has banned cashless stores since 1978.

The law takes effect July 1, and it will not apply to stores like Costco that require a membership, nor will it apply to parking garages or lots, or to hotels or rental car companies that require a credit or debit card as security for future charges, according to the Wall Street Journal. Retailers caught refusing cash can be fined up to $2,000.

A “serious” Windows 0-day is being actively exploited in the wild

Unpatched flaw used in combination with Chrome exploit doesn't work against Win 10.

Unidentified attackers have been combining an exploit for the unpatched local privilege escalation in Windows with one for a separate security flaw in the Chrome browser that Google fixed last Friday. While that specific exploit combination won’t be effective against Chrome users who are running the latest browser version, the Windows exploit could still be used against people running older versions of Windows. Google researchers privately reported the vulnerability to Microsoft, in keeping with its vulnerability disclosure policy.

As anti-vax movement gets weirder—and dumber—Facebook announces crackdown

Anti-vaxxers falsely claim measles prevents cancer and can be treated with antibiotics.

Facing scrutiny for allowing anti-vaccine lies and conspiracy theories to fester and spread on its pages, Facebook announced Thursday a set of steps it will take to rid its platform of misinformation—which has seemingly become even weirder and more idiotic recently.