Antilaser n.
A light absorber, capable of extinguishing a laser beam by converting it to heat or electricity. The first prototypes trap photons inside a silicon wafer, suggesting the potential for future use as optical switches in computers.

Lianghuin.
Chinese euphemism for protest. After the government began censoring certain words, including Egypt and Tunisia, on the Internet, activists adopted the Communist party’s lingo for two successive political meetings—lianghui—so that censoring calls for dissent would entail blocking news about state proceedings.

Steppenwolf planetsn. pl.
Planets ejected from their solar systems and potentially capable of ferrying life across interstellar space. Simulations show that the molten core of a lone-wolf planet, insulated by a thick layer of ice, could sustain liquid oceans teeming with microbes for billions of years.

Diabetes belt n.
A swath of the American South where diabetes is nearly one-third more prevalent than in most of the US. Not surprisingly, the newly mapped region largely overlaps the stroke belt and the obesity belt.

—Jonathon Keats ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it )