- A BitcoinTalk thread was shared proposing the use of SSL session logs as tamper-evident receipts for peer-to-peer exchanges, aiming to give escrow services stronger cryptographic proof of payment.  
- Discussion of acoustic side-channel attacks on RSA and other asymmetric keys referenced the “RSA Key Extraction via Low-Bandwidth Acoustic Cryptanalysis” paper (Tromer et al.) and Debian’s DSA-2821 patch that adds blinding as a countermeasure.  
- Kanzure explained why he abandoned an automated microfluidic chip-generation project: the combinatorial complexity (≈20 000 failure modes) made a conventional DNA synthesizer a more pragmatic path to “working DNA synthesis.”  
- Delinquentme floated the idea of systematically cold-calling university technology-transfer offices to surface unpublished, high-impact research at the intersection of emerging technologies; kanzure noted that jojack tried this but ended up paying for a mediocre thermocycler patent (LavaAmp).  
- Transcriptic, the robotic cloud-lab startup, was highlighted in a Verge article; participants speculated the press push presages a new funding round after their previous $1.5 M seed.  
- Atlas Biotech was announced as a new seed-stage life-science accelerator class for 2013, adding to the ecosystem of bio-startup incubators tracked by the channel.  
- Paperbot successfully retrieved paywalled Cell papers (e.g., DOI 10.1016/j.cell.2013.11.037) via LibGen, illustrating the channel’s routine use of automated tools to bypass journal paywalls for open-access research.