Time to geek out a bit here. In the current research race into nanotechnology, the idea of using DNA structures for nanoscale robots or machines isn't new though precise control over these structures has never been their strongest point. But now researchers from the UK and Germany have discovered a way to create a custom DNA structure that can be controlled remotely, using DNA signals to trigger reconfiguring events. More at the full story.

Look up. Do you see a thought bubble? Of course you don't. But zoom out a bit and imagine someone was watching you from his computer screen, seeing a thought bubble above your head indicating that you are reading this right now. It's the ultimate philosophical nightmare: we're not real, we're just a series of electric impulses darting about who think we're real. The old we're-just-brains-in-a-jar argument.

What are the chances of such a philosophical blackhole? Dr. Nick Bostrom, a philosopher at Oxford University, is quite specific on the number: "My gut feeling, and it’s nothing more than that, is that there’s a 20 percent chance we’re living in a computer simulation."

Such a thought is not foreign to us who have played the Sims and watched "The Matrix". Paranoia aside, isn't it possible for us to be part of a program and not be aware of it? The tastes and smells, the joy and pains, all sensation is just electrical impulses in our heads. It's entirely possible that all these electrical impulses are done inside the processes of a super computer.

That's exactly what Bostrom suggests. An advanced race of "posthumans" have built a supercomputer that simulates their ancestors, ie, us:

I think it’s highly likely that civilization could endure to produce those supercomputers. And if owners of the computers were anything like the millions of people immersed in virtual worlds like Second Life, SimCity and World of Warcraft, they’d be running simulations just to get a chance to control history — or maybe give themselves virtual roles as Cleopatra or Napoleon.

This explains why there's suffering and misery in the world. It's being run by humans. Who hasn't let their Sims go hungry just to see what happens? (I killed Kenny! I'm a computer simulated bast****!)

If you're the objective, logical thinking type who believes destiny is superstition and that the future is determined by today's events, you may very well be wrong. That's according to some new theories and findings by Oxford University.

According to scientists developing quantum theories, the past, present and future of the known universe is interconnected by what Einstein calls the "spooky action at a distance," where atomic-level particles interact with each other even when they're light years apart. If this is the case, then time may not be a linear progression of events at all.

If you think destiny is weird, you'll find other weirder stuff that quantum physicists believe in. For instance, most quantum physicists believe that every course of action by a body isn't limited to a choice of one ultimate option. "Parallel worlds" is a concept that postulates how all options are ultimately taken by several realities woven into one fabric which interact but never interfere with each other.

In such a scenario, only particles in the sub-atomic size range penetrate the fabric of time and space. Objects can be at different places at the same time because time, being the fourth dimension, is transgressed by these particles. The movement of these particles, according to the new study, actually allows the present to be affected by the past as well as the future in the smallest scales.

"Something that happens now is affected by something that happens in the future. It suggests that the universe has a destiny—a destiny that is out there and coming back to us from the future," says Jeff Tollaksen of George Mason University.

The proponents of the theory remain modest, pointing out that their claims are still speculative. Evidence is hard to get by at this point and the only proof currently available are minute measurements of subatomic particles interacting delicately with one another.

Don't you just hate it when a size zero person walks in the restaurant, orders the same amount of food as two-fully grown man can have, and nonchalantly eats it up without any fear of gaining any of those unwanted pounds?

More than just having a hyperfast metabolism, this could actually be because of the fact that the size-zero person, who happens to be the source of insecurity of a lot of other people, is blessed with good genes. Literally. Researchers from the Peninsula Medical School and Oxford University have found the "fat gene", or that clear link between the genes and obesity.

Those who had two copies of the "fat" version of a gene actually have 70% more risk of being obese, and would weigh 3kg (6.5 lb) more than the size-zero person, who does not have any "fat gene" at all. 3kg. That doesn't seem too bad. However, Professor Andrew Hattersly of the Peninsula Medical School said that "it is still enough to make a big change in the risks of obesity."

Professor Hattersly further explains that the presence of the "fat gene" could actually explain how come two people may engage in the same lifestyle or diet, doing the same amount of exercise, and still, one of them would be struggling more to lose weight than the other.

"The typical message has been that if you are overweight it is due to sloth and gluttony and it is your fault. This work is suggesting that there is also a genetic component."

What makes this finding significant is that it has presented a clear evidence "for the first obesity susceptibility gene," as lauded by Dr. Sadaf Farooqi of the University of Cambridge's Department of Clinical Biochemistry in UK. With this, the researchers just might have opened the gate for a better understanding at the causes and probable preventive measures, as well as treatment, for obesity.

Still, let us not sit back, nod our heads, and just resign to the fact that if the "fat gene" is in your genes, there's nothing you can do about your weight anymore.