Wasim Akram urges struggling Pakistani captain Misbah-ul-Haq to say goodbye to ODIs

Former Pakistan cricket team captain Wasim Akram has urged struggling skipper Misbah-ul Haq to say good-bye to ODIs, while blaming a lack of international cricket and the absence of a system for developing young players for the team's disappointing defeats in recent months.

Pakistan lost the final ODI against Australia in Abu Dhabi on Sunday to complete a 3-0 rout, and the upcoming Test series in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) looks likely to be a tough proposition.

The fast bowling legend Wasim urged struggling one-day and Test captain Misbah to take a positive approach with the team, or step aside. He said that the skipper should take brave and aggressive decisions but added that he is not doing that, The Dawn reported.

Akram said that if any vice captain is ready to lead then Pakistan must say goodbye to Misbah, who withdrew himself from the third and final ODI in Abu Dhabi on Sunday, as far as ODI is concerned.

The common complaint in international cricket is that teams play too many matches, but Akram said that Pakistan was suffering for precisely the opposite reason. He said that Australia was always favourites to win the one-day series, so he added that do not blame the Pakistan team, because they are playing so much less international cricket than other countries.

Pakistan lost one-day and Test series against Sri Lanka in August, their first international encounters in six months.

Akram said that India is playing too much cricket and so is Sri Lanka, and they are performing well. While hitting out at a lack of infrastructure and shortage of junior-level tours, Akram added that he thinks the PCB should arrange more Under-19 tours and Pakistan 'A' tours which would help groom youngsters but that is not there. 

Formula 1: McLaren boss Eric Boullier says Jenson Button not racing for place in 2015 team

McLaren racing director Eric Boullier has said that their racer Jenson Button is not racing for a place in the 2015 team despite uncertainty over the team's next season's line-up.

Boullier said that he would name the 2015 pairing before the end of the season with the futures of drivers Button and Kevin Magnussen under threat. Button produced his best performances of the season in the last two races.

Boullier said that they do not need Button to deliver an extra job on track to save his job, adding that they know the value of Button and know that he is a world champion-class driver and has been a world champion already, The BBC reported.

Double world champion Fernando Alonso has been linked with McLaren with the Spaniard set to leave Ferrari at the end of the season. Button has scored nearly double Magnussen's points this year, finishing fifth in Japan and fourth in Russia in his last two races. But the Dane's qualifying pace has impressed and he has started ahead of his teammate nine times to Button's seven in his rookie season. Boullier said that he understands that Button might obviously not feel comfortable and obviously he would be concerned about his future.

Boullier added that he is in charge of McLaren Racing and they have to build the best for the team. He said that drivers are obviously very important in the discussion and Button is more than considered to stay with them for the long term. But, Boullier added that they are still investigating what they want to do with their driver line-up, once they have all the data in their hands. 

Former Indian spinner Harbhajan Singh asks umpire Darrell Hair to 'shut up' post controversial chucking comments

Harbhajan Singh has lashed out at Australian umpire Darrell Hair and asked him to 'shut up' post the latter's chucking comments.

After Darrell Hair recently made disparging comments against Harbhajan Singh and a host of other spin bowlers, the Indian has lashed out at the Australian by asking him to 'shut up' and defended his fellow counterparts.

Hair earlier had labeled Harbhajan, Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan and Pakistan's Saqlain Mushtaq as 'role models', who have encouraged modern day chucking in international cricket. 

Harbhajan said that Hair has crossed the limit with his comments and also feels that he has gone 'mad'.

Hair, who infamously had called Muralitharan for chucking in the Melbourne Test in 1995, had stated that the ICC was too late in taking action against bowlers with suspect actions.

Harbhajan reiterated that he and Muralitharan were given the clean chit by the ICC and also said that Hair was afraid of 'losing his job' as an Elite Panel umpire.

The spinner concluded by saying that Hair should stop challenging the present day rules and standards of the ICC and must 'keep his mouth shut'.

For the record, the latest spinner to be reported for suspect action was West Indies' Sunil Narine, who has since then been withdrawn from the ongoing series against India. 

Why Himalayan glaciers are expanding instead of shrinking

Scientists' observations in the Karakoram region have revealed that the glaciers there were stable, and snowfall is increasing instead of decreasing.

The researchers found that while precipitation is increasing across the Himalayas, most of this moisture drops in the summer — except in Karakoram, where snow dominates the scene, Discovery News reported.

Study researcher Sarah Kapnick, a postdoctoral researcher in atmospheric and ocean sciences at Princeton University, gave reasoning for why you can have increased snowfall in a region and have increased glaciers or stable glaciers in a warming world.

She and her colleagues collected data on recent precipitation and temperatures from the Pakistan Meteorological Department and other sources, including satellite data. They combined this information with climate models to track changes in three regions of the Himalayas between 1861 and 2100: the Karakoram; the central Himalayas; and the southeast Himalayas which included part of the Tibetan Plateau.

The researchers found that a new model that simulates climate down to an area of 965 square miles (2,500 square kilometers) was able to match the observed temperature and precipitation cycles seen in the Karakoram. A model used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to simulate what will happen if the world continues to emit greenhouse gases at current rates was unable to capture these seasonal cycles, Kapnick said.

The reason, she said, was that the IPCC and other climate models are lower-resolution, capturing climate change over areas no finer than about 17,027 square miles (44,100 square km). The coarser resolution "smoothes out" variations in elevation that works fine for the central Himalayas and southeast Himalayas. However, the Karakoram region has more elevation variability than the other two regions.

Ultimately, the result is that the IPCC and other models overestimate the amount of warmth in this region, Kapnick said.

Google uncovers vulnerability in SSL web encryption technology

Three Google researchers have reportedly discovered a security bug in widely used web encryption technology that can be used by hackers to take over email accounts, banking accounts and other services. The bug has been named Poodle and stands for Padding Oracle On Downloaded Legacy Encryption.

The revelation has prompted browsers to issue advises asking users to disable use of the source of the security bug: an 18-year old encryption standard known as SSL 3.0, reported The Huffington Post. This is the third time in a year that researchers have uncovered a bug in the web technology following April's "Heartbleed" bug in OpenSSL and last month's "Shellshock" bug in a piece of Unix software known as Bash. However, the report said that the vulnerability is not as complicated and dangerous as the last two. 

Microsoft rolls out Windows, IE, Office update to fix two dozen vulnerabilities

Microsoft has rolled out eight security bulletins to fix two dozen vulnerabilities as part of its October edition of Patch Tuesday. The software giant has also issued update addressing the "SandWorm" bug reportedly being exploited by Russian hackers to spy on NATO and the Ukrainian government.

CNET reports that the updates address vulnerabilities found in all currently supported versions of Windows, Internet Explorer, Office and the .Net framework. Three of the bulletins are rated critical, meaning Microsoft recommends systems administrators apply the patches immediately. A report said that Russian hackers targeted the Ukrainian government around the time of the recent NATO summit in Wales, where discussions on Russia's alliance with separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine were of prime focus.

iSight Senior Director Stephen Ward said that the vulnerability appeared in every version of Windows from Vista to 8.1, barring Windows XP. Security researcher FireEye said that Microsoft identified two of three so-called zero-day bugs -- flaws that are being actively exploited in the wild by hackers -- being used as "part of limited, targeted attacks against some major corporations," the report added.

New 'smart' lithium-ion battery warns before it overheats and explodes

Scientists in Stanford University have developed a "smart" lithium-ion battery that gives ample warning before it overheats and bursts into flames. The battery is designed for conventional lithium-ion batteries now used in billions of cellphones, laptops and other electronic devices, as well as a growing number of cars and airplanes.

Yi Cui, an associate professor of materials science and engineering at Stanford, said that they wanted to create an early-warning system that saves lives and property. After incidents such as, fire in two aircrafts of the Boeing aircraft company in 2013 and short-circuit in millions of lithium-ion batteries after consumer-laptop the Sony Corporation in 2006, Cui said, they wanted to lower the odds of a battery fire to one in a billion or even to zero.

Manufacturing defects, such as particles of metal and dust, can pierce the separator and trigger shorting, as Sony discovered in 2006. Shorting can also occur if the battery is charged too fast or when the temperature is too low – a phenomenon known as overcharge.

To address the problem, Cui and his colleagues applied a nanolayer of copper onto one side of a polymer separator, creating a novel third electrode halfway between the anode and the cathode.

The copper layer acted like a sensor that allows you to measure the voltage difference between the anode and the separator. When the dendrites grow long enough to reach the copper coating, the voltage drops to zero. That lets you know that the dendrites have grown halfway across the battery. It's a warning that the battery should be removed before the dendrites reach the cathode and cause a short circuit.

You might get a message on your phone telling you that the voltage has dropped to zero, and the battery needs to be replaced and the early-warning technology can also be used in zinc, aluminum and other metal batteries. "It will work in any battery that would require you to detect a short before it explodes.

Study was published in the journal Nature Communications.