Instead of heading to the gas pump, in the future automobile owners may just need to plug in the outhouse.

While astronauts are recycling urine and sipping the results in plastic cups (or wine glasses, whatever they use up there), automobile owners may be powering cars with urine in the future. According to Dr. Gerardine Botte, an Associate Professor from the Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering department at Ohio University, extracting hydrogen from urine--using electrolysis--will cost less than extracting hydrogen from water.

Ouch.

To discover if the theory was indeed possible, Botte and her group of scientists formulated fake pee--or rather synthetic urine--for the initial tests. The idea is that the urea molecule incorporates four hydrogen atoms that are not quite as adhesive as they are with water molecules. Electrolysis easily oxidizes the urea molecule with an inexpensive nickel-based electrode using a voltage of 0.37V; 1.23V is needed to split water. However, Botte eventually received clearance to play around with real human pee although it's unknown whether the scientists donated personal samples, or received a batch from external sources.

"It took us some time to get clearance to work with human urine - which held up publication of the research," Botte told the Royal Society of Chemistry.

For now, it doesn't look as if the technology will be readily available anytime soon, as the method is "expensive and inefficient." The process of ridding the urea molecule actually sounds like an unpleasant experience, as urea naturally "hydrolyses" into ammonia before generating gas phase ammonia emissions. From there, the stink just gets worse, and could lead to asthma attacks, chronic bronchitis, and premature death.

Currently Botte and her group are conducting long term stability studies on their electrolysis systems as well as conducting "computational" experiments. One source of waste Botte plans to harvest is sewage plants. Upscaling the electrolysis technology wouldn't be the problem--she's afraid that there may be a lot of salt content.

One expert applauds Botte's attempt to find a more efficient way to obtain hydrogen without splitting water. Bruce Logan, an expert in energy generation from wastewater and director of Pennsylvania State University's H2E Center and Engineering Environmental Institute, not only cautioned that urea converts to ammonia by bacteria rather quickly, but believes that the earth's population should start shelving jars of pee, in the basement, or out in the barn.

"You have to remember about the P [phosphorus] in pee--globally we need to start thinking about conserving phosphorus for fertilizer, because, just like oil, one day the deposits are all going to run out and we need to start building phosphorus recycling into our infrastructure," he told the RSC.

New PS3 packs in one very impressive bundle of games.

The current rumor is that Sony is secretly preparing for the launch of a redesigned PlayStation 3 sometime this fall. But before it can do that, it has to clear its channels of existing stock, particularly the 80 GB SKU.

To give customers and incentive to buy, but without cutting to below a certain price point, it's common practice to bundle in some free games – and the latest PS3 shipment comes with a very attractive bundle.

Kotaku received pictures from a Best Buy employee showing off a new bundle that includes the 80 GB PS3 packed in with Killzone 2 and Metal Gear Solid 4 – two of the most impressive looking and sounding games that are exclusive to the Sony console. Best of all, it's still at the same $399 price.

Of course, as attractive as this may be, there are rumblings that a newer, slimmer, smaller PS3 will be hitting in just a few months. Those of you in the market for a PS3 will have to decide between the attractive offer of today against the possibility of newer hardware in the near future.

Your electric car will be lovin' it.

Need to refuel? Perhaps you might consider stopping by McDonald's for a Happy Meal… for your electric car.

McDonald's and NovaCharge today announced that it will be deploying electric vehicle charging stations at the famous fast food restaurant. The first of these new "green" McDonald's will open on July 14 at noon and is located at 1299 Kildaire Farm Road in Cary, NC. 

“The networked grid-friendly charging stations are a perfect complement to the many innovative green features of the restaurant,” said Ric Richards, owner/operator of the new McDonald's. “Our customers will have a dedicated place to park and recharge their vehicles.  McDonalds is enabling a better environment for future generations by supporting zero-emissions transportation infrastructure, through the use of the ChargePoint Network.”

While this is undoubtedly a great idea for the few of those with electric vehicles (hey, you've got to start somewhere), the nature of the short-term stays for patrons of McDonald's makes the little bit of charging somewhat pointless at fast food restaurants. Hopefully full-service restaurants and shopping centers adopt the idea of electric plug-ins.

China has blocked Internet access in Urumqi for 48 hours.

China kicked into high censorship mode yesterday by shutting down Internet access in Urumqi, the capitol of the northwestern region of Xinjiang, in an effort to control the flow of information stemming from Sunday's bloody riots. Many Urumqi residents were told that access would be denied for 48 hours, while others have confirmed with Reuters that Internet has indeed been cut off. Outside the region, China residents have not been able to gain access to websites related to Urumqi and Xinjiang regional governments.

The censorship doesn't stop there. Other reports indicate that users in Beijing and Shanghai are complaining that Twitter has been blocked, and that searches in Fanfou.com produced no results when entering "Urumqi," "Xinjiang" and "Uighur."  However, despite the government's effort to control information related to the riots, China has been unable to keep everything contained. Many unverified images claiming to be taken during the riot have appeared online, only to quickly disappear.

Despite the restrictions, many users have found their way online, and have expressed anger towards the incident. However, those too have fallen under China's heavy hand, especially those comments relating to the violence in Xinjiang. China fears that comments will spark ethnic hatred or provoke questions in regards to government policies toward "regions populated by ethnic minorities." On some sites, comments regarding the "unrest" in Urumqi were removed by late Sunday afternoon, replaced with the words "this posting does not exist."

According to Reuters, the government is blaming Sunday's riots on exiled Muslim separatists. China has previously block communications in portions of Tibet during a period of "ethnic unrest," or when the government feared that ethnic unrest would erupt.

Here’s a rumor we haven’t heard in oh, at least a month.

Reports today are suggesting that the next generation iPod Touch will feature a camera. Not only that, but rumor has it the next-gen iPod Nano will have one too. TechCrunch today cites sources in Asia who claim Apple has placed an order for a massive number of camera modules; the same type used in the iPhone. Theses same sources went on to say that the quantity ordered suggests they will be used for iPods.

Sources say there’s enough cameras on order for Apple to include a camera in pretty much everything but the shuffle, which is a little puzzling. Sure, it makes sense to stick a camera on the iPod touch because the device is essentially an iPhone without the phone, but the iPod nano is an PMP. Period.

We’re genuinely interested in hearing your feedback on this one. Is there any need for a camera on a music player? Does actually anyone want an PMP with a camera?  Let us know in the comments below!

Marc Andreessen, founder of Netscape, has announced he and his business partner Ben Horowitz are launching a venture capital firm.

Andreessen said yesterday in a blog post that the new firm, aptly named Andreessen Horowitz, will launch with a starting capital of $300 million and is aimed at helping out start ups in the technology industry.

Marc Andreessen founded Netscape back in the early 90s and at 23 became a millionaire practically overnight. Now Andreessen and his partner want to offer others the same chance and are ready to invest between $50 thousand and $50 million in a company, depending on the stage and the opportunity. They plan on investing in brand new startups with seed-stage investments as well as in venture stage and late stage rounds of high-growth companies.

That said; just because they’re willing to invest in companies of all shapes and sizes, don’t think you’re a shoe in. Here is a brief summary the must haves you should tick off before you think of approaching Andreessen Horowitz:

• Above all else, we are looking for the brilliant and motivated entrepreneur or entrepreneurial team with a clear vision of what they want to build and how they will create or attack a big market.
• We are hugely in favor of the technical founder.
• We are hugely in favor of the founder who intends to be CEO.
• We believe that the product is the heart of any technology company. The company gets built around the product. Therefore, we believe it is critical that we as investors understand the product.
• Here are some of the areas we consider within our investment domain today: consumer Internet, business Internet (cloud computing, "software as a service"), mobile software and services, software-powered consumer electronics, infrastructure and applications software, networking, storage, databases, and other back-end systems.
• We are almost certainly not an appropriate investor for any of the following domains: "clean", "green", energy, transportation, life sciences (biotech, drug design, medical devices), nanotech, movie production companies, consumer retail, electric cars, rocket ships, space elevators.
• We are primarily but not entirely focused on investing in Silicon Valley firms. We do not think it is an accident that Google is in Mountain View, Facebook is in Palo Alto, and Twitter is in San Francisco.

Check out Andreessen's blog post announcing the move by clicking here.

An awful lot of phone makers have said that they’re working on Android devices and even if they haven’t announced anything, most probably wouldn’t rule it out. That is, except for Nokia.

Early this morning, reports said the company was going to be unveiling an Android-powered Nokia in September. Yawn, we thought. Plenty of companies are planning Android devices. However, just a few hours later, the Finnish company released a statement addressing those rumors. Much to our surprise Nokia said no, it’s not planning an Android device.

Nokia told Reuters that there is "absolutely no truth to this whatsoever” in the reports and went on to say that, "Everyone knows that Symbian is our preferred platform for advanced mobile devices."

While it makes sense for Nokia to stand by its own OS, we’re a tad disappointed that we won’t be seeing anything Android-related from the company at all. Especially when you consider the huge deal just signed by Nokia and Intel that promises some fancy-pants new MIDs.

The iPhone has always been a hot item.

A lot of noise has been made recently about the new Apple iPhone 3GS having heat issues. While there hasn't been any statement from Apple about the problem, the company did update its tech support webpage with information on keeping the iPhone 3G and 3GS within acceptable operating temperatures.

Apple recommends that users operate iPhone 3G and 3GS in temperatures between 0º and 35º C (32º to 95º F) and to store in between -20º and 45º C (-4º to 113º F). Operation outside of those ranges could result in the device to stop charging, the display to dim, weakening of cell signal, or for the phone to stop working altogether until the temperature returns to within normal ranges.

Apple advised against leaving the device in a car on a hot day or under direct sunlight for long periods of time.

The original aluminum-backed 2G iPhone does not appear to be affected by the same guidelines and ranges as the 3G and 3GS – likely because the chips in the newer phones run hotter.

Some have interpreted Apple's updating of technical support documents regarding temperature as an admission of a fault with the iPhone 3GS, but in reality the company's updated guidelines are commonplace (and common sense) for many electronic devices.

Have you ever had any problems with an iPhone 3G or 3GS even when adhering to Apple's conditions? Let us know!

Police have released footage from a shooting that took place at an Apple store in Virginia late last week.

At around 10 a.m. on Friday, July 3, a man entered an Apple store in Arlington, Virginia through an entrance at the rear of the premises. The suspect led one employee, a 26 year old female who’s identity has not been released, off camera and while it is not yet clear what the man wanted, police reports say the employee was shot at the scene. The suspect then fled the store, using the same back entrance.

The Washington Post reports that the police have spoken to the woman who is in hospital and in a serious but stable condition. The Post cites Police spokeswoman, Detective Crystal Nosal as saying the victim was sedated at the time of the interview and will probably be interviewed several more times.

The suspect was last seen fleeing the scene on foot, wearing a light-colored, short sleeve shirt, light-colored long pants, and a dark baseball cap. The suspect was also carrying a handgun. The surveillance footage released is embedded below.

MI6 has called for a probe after the wife of Sir John Sawers (diplomat, spy, the British ambassador to the United Nations and future chief of MI6, the Secret Intelligence Service) published family details on her Facebook page.

Several publications today report that Lady Sawers disclosed details such as the location of the London apartment used by the couple, as well as the whereabouts of Sir John’s parents and their three children. The lack of privacy protection on her profile meant that Facebook’s 200 million users in the open-access London network could see the information posted by Lady Sawers.

Conservative MP Patrick Mercer, chairman of the counter-terrorism sub-committee claims the incident is cause for security concern. "It raises all sorts of worrying issues about the... personal life, in particular the location of flats, transport details, movement details, of an individual who is our most senior counter-terrorism officer abroad,” Mercer told the BBC. "A great deal of taxpayers' money has been spent over the past several decades making sure he and his family are protected from security compromises,” the MP explained, adding, “Well, it doesn't seem to be very relevant any more, does it?"

The BBC also cites Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman Edward Davey who shares Mercer’s opinion that the information has the potential to be damaging. "We would be negligent if there wasn't an internal inquiry into the security implications, not just in relation to MI6 but to Sir John and his family," he said, according to the BBC.

That said, there are plenty of folks who think the whole thing is a storm in a teacup. Foreign Secretary David Miliband denied claims that security had been compromised, and told the BBC that the make of Sawers’ swimsuit does not constitute a state secret. "It is not a state secret that he wears Speedo swimming trunks, for goodness sake let's grow up.” Sir John Major, former prime minister, said that there are far more worrying issues to be focusing on and said the whole thing was “overblown.”

Read the full story here.

Do you think the holiday snaps or information posted by Lady Sawers is cause for concern? Or do you, like Sir John Major and David Miliband, think that the whole thing has been blown way out of proportion? Let us know in the comments below!