New Scientist - USA (2019-10-05)

8 | New Scientist | 5 October 2019

PRONE to the occasional lapse

of memory? Smart cameras can

now remind you if you turned off

the stove or locked the door, and

where you put your wallet.

In one advance, Khai Truong

at the University of Toronto

in Canada and his colleagues

have created a smartphone app

that records interactions with

household objects. The system

involves barcode-like markers

that the user sticks to items that

they would like to track their

use of, such as a cooker hob.

With the smartphone worn

around your neck, the app

automatically records a short

video clip when a marked

object comes into view. “The

user is able to browse through

the application and see the last

time they interacted with it,”

says Truong.

The app can help people track

the state of objects – such as

whether they locked a door or

switched a light off – as well

as routine actions, like the last

time they watered a plant or

took their medication.

At present, it successfully

captures about 75 per cent

of interactions, but only

works for fixed objects.

A similar but separate

system can tell you where

you have left moveable items.

E. Akin Sisbot and Jonathan

Connell at IBM Research in

New York have devised a

ceiling-mounted camera that

monitors objects and people.

It continuously watches an

area, such as a tabletop in your

home, tracking the placement of

items in relation to one another.

It also remembers who first

brought an object into the

field of view as well as if

anyone moved it afterwards.

When asked, “Where is

my wallet?”, the system might

respond, “It is next to the vase,

under the magazines.” It could

also be used in factories or

operating theatres to track

vital tools, says Sisbot.

For now, the camera uses

a depth sensor to spot things.

It is limited to detecting items

thicker than 3 centimetres,

meaning that it has trouble with

thin objects such as a closed

laptop placed flat on a table.

Multiple cameras would need

to be set up to cover several flat

surfaces in a room where items

could be left, or to cover multiple

rooms in a house. The team has

plans to fit the system to a robot

that can move between rooms.

Both the smartphone app and

the ceiling camera could be

used to help people with

memory problems.

In future, both systems will

trial proactive interventions,

such as prompting someone if

they have left the stove on or if

they have accidentally picked

up someone else’s cup of coffee.

The accuracy of such smart

camera systems may need to

improve before they are widely

adopted. “You’ve got to trust

the technology for it to be of any

comfort or reassurance,” says

Geoffrey Ward at the University

of Essex in the UK. ❚

WHAT’S the evolutionary origin

of the female orgasm? A study that

involved giving antidepressants

to rabbits has lent support to the

idea that the female orgasm may

have originated from a reflex that

makes some female mammals

ovulate during intercourse.

There are multiple theories

regarding the function of female

orgasms. Some studies have found

that contractions of the uterus

experienced during orgasm help

transport sperm towards the egg.

However, many women don’t

orgasm during intercourse, and

it is also common for women to

conceive without climaxing.

There are also simpler

explanations, including that

sexual pleasure encourages

women to have more sex, making

them more likely to conceive,

or motivates them to form

committed relationships, which

may be beneficial for raising

children. But how did the female

orgasm evolve? Mihaela Pavlicev,

currently at the University of

Vienna in Austria, and her

colleagues think that animals

that ovulate during intercourse

may hint at the answer.

While women release an egg

roughly every month, ovulation in

some mammals, such as rabbits, is

triggered by copulation. Pavlicev

and her team think the hormones

and brain circuitry involved in

such reflex ovulation could also

be involved in generating a

pleasurable climax.

In 2016, they analysed 41 species

of mammal. Of these, 15 species,

including cats, koalas and camels,

have reflex ovulation. The way

these species are related across

the mammal family tree suggests

that this system is likely to have

been present in the earliest

mammal ancestors.

In their latest study, the

researchers exploited the finding

A hint on the origins

of the female orgasm

Evolution Technology

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News

that the antidepressant fluoxetine,

which is sold as Prozac, reduces

people’s ability to orgasm. They

found that, after giving rabbits

fluoxetine for two weeks, the rate

of ovulation during copulation fell

by a third (PNAS, doi.org/db53 ).

This supports the idea that

the same hormones and brain

circuitry could be involved in

both sex-triggered ovulation

and orgasm, says Pavlicev.

It could be that both events

happened in our mammalian

ancestors – or perhaps the brain

circuitry was once used for

triggering egg release and has

since evolved into a mechanism

for triggering orgasm.

“Selection can take something

and shape it for a new function,”

says David Puts of Pennsylvania

State University, who wasn’t

involved in the work. “Our ear

holes were gill slits originally.

Functions evolve over time.”

One clue would be whether

female rabbits and other animals

with reflex ovulation also

experience orgasms. “That’s a

hard question – we can’t talk to

them,” says Pavlicev. ❚

A maturing ovarian

follicle, seen through

a microscope

Can you

remember

if you

secured the

door to the

garden shed?

“The app can help

people recall whether

they locked a door or

switched a light off”

Camera tells

you where you

put your wallet