zoo

It's like Google Maps, but for finding cats: Cat Map, a Web site set up by the London Zoo.

Have you ever wanted to stare at a global map of cats? Just hang out on a world map, seeing where all the cats are? Well, now you can.

The Zoological Society of London set up the Web site to promote tiger conservation and its tiger sanctuary, opening March 22, but the map lets you see beloved felines, not just from London, but everywhere. … Read more

Apple's iPad is proving to be popular among a different, and hairier, type of consumer.

The Smithsonian's National Zoo recently kicked off Apps for Apes, a program that lets orangutans use the iPad as a way to stimulate their lives.

Offered through Orangutan Outreach, Apps for Apes has already been used at 12 other zoos around the world. As described by the group, the program has three goals:

… Read more

Who needs Helvetica when you can write in a font made from real galaxies?

The font comes courtesy of Galaxy Zoo, a citizen science project that enlists volunteers to classify the observable universe's billions of galaxies on the Web for scientific use. In their wanderings, the galaxy watchers spotted a select few galaxies that resemble the ABCs.

"The Zooites started collecting these peculiar galaxies on the Redirect Galaxy Zoo Forum, the most beautifully simple, the most spectacular, the most messy, even those that happen to look like animals and, here we get to the point, letters of the alphabet," said Steven Bamford, a senior research fellow at the University of Nottingham's Centre for Astronomy and Particle Theory in the U.K. who created the unusual font as part of his work with Galaxy Zoo. … Read more

SAN DIEGO -- For hundreds of thousands of passionate panda watchers, the birth at the San Diego Zoo today of a new panda cub is an event well worth celebrating, especially given that the mother is probably the second-oldest known panda ever to successfully deliver. And thanks to some high-tech imaging, the zoo was able to monitor the pregnancy every step of the way.

For weeks, the panda team at the zoo here has been on tenterhooks, hoping against hope that the 20-year-old mother, Bai Yun, would carry to term what they were nearly certain was a healthy cub. But … Read more

People who work at Miami's Jungle Island zoo have figured out a hi-tech way to communicate with orangutans. Rather than using old-fashioned sign language, they're using iPads.

According to the Associated Press, trainers are working specifically with 8-year-old twin orangutans helping them draw, play games, and work on new vocabulary as part of a mental stimulus program.

"Our young ones pick up on it. They understand it. It's like, `Oh I get this,'" Linda Jacobs, who oversees the program, told the Associated Press. "Our two older ones, they just are not interested. I think … Read more

In today's show, Google takes us for a spin, ultrabooks are no longer ultra-pricey, and the iPad isn't just for humans anymore:

Hewlett-Packard announced several new thin and light laptops under the Envy brand. Some are officially called ultrabooks, equiped with Intel's latest Ivy Bridge processors, while less-expensive ones are called sleekbooks. But regardless of the different labels, it means high-quality thin and light laptops are moving into the $600 to $700 price range. (There's even a rumor that the MacBook Air -- the computer that kickstarted the ultrabook craze -- will drop its price to $… Read more

The Denver Zoo is rolling out a motorized rickshaw that has been converted to run on animal droppings. It might help save a bundle.

Imported from Thailand, the tuk-tuk is about 20 years old, but it has been given a new lease on life from engineers at the zoo.

The electric three-wheeler runs on gasified pellets made from animal poop, as well as trash produced by zoo visitors and staff.

A heater on the back of the prototype vehicle turns the pellets into syngas, which is used to generate electricity to power the tuk-tuk. … Read more

If someone sends you a link to a video of an iPad 2 being dropped in hot lava, the only sensible thing to do--once confirming the link is malware-free--is to click it.

This logic seems to be the entire basis for a new marketing campaign from California-based ZooGue, which sells accessories for iPads and other devices. The aforementioned video features ZooGue CEO Tim Angel trekking to a lava flow in Hawaii to lower an iPad 2 into the magma, watch it plead for its existence with a cute "excessive heat" warning, then burst into flames and melt.… Read more

To celebrate the most miserable day of the year, aka Christmas 2.0, we're being Debbie Downers and checking out stories to ruin your cheesy holiday. If you're not hitched up with a honey bunny today, you may be able to increase your chances of bagging someone special based on the next gadget you buy.

According to this Gadgetology study, your computer, cell phone, and other tech accessories are big factors in determining your attractiveness to the people around you. Of the men surveyed under the age of 35, 50 percent find women with fancy smartphones more attractive, whereas 38% of women think a modern laptop oozes the most sex appeal.

And this is no surprise, but the two worst tech deal breakers for women are the awful Bluetooth wireless headset and cell phone holster, so steer clear of those two if you're looking to hook up. Finally, outside of the tech world, more women younger than 35 say they're attracted to a man walking a cute dog than a geek with a cool smartphone, so we're kind of screwed either way.

On the other hand, if you want to avoid sex altogether this year, the best way to accomplish that goal is to trick your partner by cooking them a dinner made of anaphrodisiac ingredients.

You can kill the mood with a number of ingredients including hops, marjoram, common rue, soy, and coriander, or you can really play it safe with a combination of it all in a deliciously platonic chicken and tofu in a marjoram cream sauce.

A anti-touch relationship is a good way to practice safe sex altogether, but what if a painful health affliction is preventing you from getting yours? A dating Web site based out of Winnipeg is playing Cupid for clients that suffer from herpes.

Actually, you don't have to have herpes to join. According to the creators, hopeful clients are asked during registration if they have it and if they'd be open to someone with it for full transparency. According to the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, about one in six people between the ages of 14 and 49 suffer from the STD and are embarrassed to admit it to lovers, so Camelot Introductions offers this service to dispel the prejudice.

But all that aside, if you're a super procrastinator and still haven't purchased your boo a gift, consider a New York solution and just name a cockroach after your Valentine.