Why are some sugars sweeter than others? Chew on this

The American Chemical Society looks at why some foods taste sweet, and why some sweeteners are, well, sweeter than others.

While most of us know we like ice cream, cookies and all sorts of other dessert-y goodness, we probably don't give much thought to why other than a vague "because, sugar." And while you might not realize it when you're chomping on that cake, our taste buds perceive some sugars as sweeter than others, and it all comes down to chemistry.

The American Chemical Society (ACS), by way of its "Reactions" YouTube series, looks to broaden our understanding of what makes things taste sweet in its latest video explainer. In the clip, ACS tells us about the Sweetness Triangle, a theory that for us to perceive something as sweet, it must have a triangular shape at the molecular level. This helps it bind to the sweetness receptors in our tongues, and the better the molecule fits the Sweetness Triangle, the sweeter the taste.

Artificial sweeteners like aspartame, commonly found in diet sodas, chemically resemble meat more than sugar. But aspartame, since it's been engineered to loosely fit the triangular shape, is still about as sweet as table sugar. New sweeteners like Stevia almost perfectly fit into the Sweetness Triangle, making them much sweeter (about 100 times more so) than sugar and other sugar substitutes.

To learn more about sugar and how our brains perceive sweetness, check out the video at the top of this post. And just try not to grab a cookie or some other sweet treat after watching.

Science has an explanation for why you want one of these. Ella Taggart/CNET

Anthony Domanico Crave freelancer Anthony Domanico is passionate about all kinds of gadgets and apps. When not making words for the Internet, he can be found watching "Star Wars" or "Doctor Who" for like the zillionth time. His other car is a Tardis. See full bio

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Augmented-reality startup nabs $542M from Google, others

As the battle for virtual reality heats up, Google -- along with other well-known firms -- makes a big bet on a little-known wearable headset maker called Magic Leap.

The head of Google's Android and Chrome operating systems, Sundar Pichai, will sit on Magic Leap's board. James Martin/CNET

Google's caught Facebook's virtual-reality fever.

The search giant led a $542 million investment round in a startup called Magic Leap, which hopes to eventually replace computer and smartphone screens with virtual-reality interfaces. The company, founded in 2011 and based in Florida, makes a head-mounted device that acts like glasses. Turn the technology on, and it displays computer-generated images on top of what a wearer normally sees.

The move indicates growing interest among tech's largest companies in firms that offer wearable technology that change what we see with computer-generated imagery. Facebook, the world's largest social network, closed a $2 billion deal in July for Oculus VR, a company that makes head-mounted virtual reality goggles. Sony, maker of the PlayStation video game console, is also developing a virtual-reality device, as is smartphone kingpin Samsung.

What Magic Leap offers that others don't is a technology that can keep users from experiencing nausea, a common problem for virtual-reality headset makers.

For Google, Magic Leap represents another investment into 3D technology. In June, Google unveiled do-it-yourself cardboard kits for creating virtual-reality goggles out of smartphones. At the same time, it also demonstrated an initiative called Tango, which attempts to bring 3D mapping and sensing capabilities to smartphones and tablets.

Google also develops a head-mounted device called Glass, which displays information from a smartphone and various apps on a tiny computer screen affixed to a metal frame or glasses. In May, Google released the product to the general public.

Now Google is investing in Magic Leap as well. And its interest goes beyond giving the company money: Sundar Pichai, the Google executive in charge of the company's Android mobile operating system and Chrome Web browser, will join Magic Leap's board of directors.

"We are looking forward to Magic Leap's next stage of growth, and to seeing how it will shape the future of visual computing," Pichai said in a statement.

Google's ultimate plans for Magic Leap are still unclear. Don Harrison, Google's mergers and acquisitions chief, will join Magic Leap's board as an observer. A source familiar with Google's acquisition strategy, however, said the company has no plans to acquire Magic Leap.

Google declined to further comment on the deal. Magic Leap did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Other investors in the company's funding round included chipmaker Qualcomm, film production company Legendary Entertainment, and well-known Silicon Valley venture firms like Andreessen Horowitz and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.

Richard Nieva Richard Nieva is a staff writer for CNET. He previously worked for PandoDaily and Fortune Magazine, and his writing has appeared in the New York Times and on CJR.org. See full bio

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How Apple's iWatch can succeed where others have failed

Sarah Tew

I've reviewed tons of smartwatches. Or so it seems. And yet, I don't see many people wearing them. That's because the whole wearable landscape is embryonic. And, a lot of it's not very good.

By very good, I mean good of the type I'd recommend to my mom or my friend who's not into tech. Good as in, you need one of these. Or you'd want one. I can count on one hand the number of wearables that have gotten to that stage, and I wouldn't use all five fingers.

Smartwatches have come in many shapes and sizes: some have black and white screens. Some are big, bright and curved. Some run their own apps. Some have no apps at all. Some work with just Android. Others, iOS and Android. Some track fitness. Some do it better than others.

I had a list of what I was looking for in a killer wearable, Apple or otherwise, well over a year ago. A lot of my opinions there still stand. But now, as Apple might finally be ready to show off something big next week, how can it -- watch, band, or otherwise -- improve on what's out there?

Here's a good start.

Sarah Tew

Smartwatches and wearables aren't necessary. They're additional gadgets in a world already flooded with gadgets. We don't need them. People need phones. People need computers. Tablets found a way to succeed to by doing some things so well that there was a desire to get one. It's the iPad equation: at first people called Apple's iPad a large iPhone. But it started up fast, had long battery life, and was a lot more portable than a laptop, and had a big screen.

What would a wearable do better than a phone or tablet or laptop? Track health? Pay for things? Stay connected with friends? It has to have its own purpose. Amazingly, beyond "act as a pager" or "count steps," most smartwatches right now don't.

Sarah Tew/CNET

Good-looking watches are one thing; a design that helps the wearable be good at what it does is far more important. Most watches go for flair: a curved screen, or a round face and super-thin bezel, or some premium material design. Do any of these make the wearable better at what it does? Sure, wristwatches are about design more than function. But when it comes to a killer smartwatch, I don't think it should work that way. MacBooks and iPads and iPhones are really well designed, but they're mostly practically designed: they function. I don't want a fancy look if it doesn't make sense.

Smartwatches are slaves to smartphones. They're glorified Bluetooth accessories. They can offer an on-wrist way to interact with stuff without checking your phone all the time, like on Google's Android Wear watches such as the Moto 360, but what about when you walk into a store, or an airport, or around your home?

Phones manage the relationship between smartwatches and other smart things and locations right now, but these wearables need to get smarter about where they are and what they're doing all on their own. Maybe, someday soon, we'll be in a world of connected things. Smartwatches should be ready to work with them and save us the extra drain on our phone.

Josh Miller/CNET

Android Wear watches last about a day on a charge. The Pebble Steel and Meta M1, four to seven days. Most fitness bands, about a week. A few go for months, but have standard watch batteries.

It's a lot to ask for a small device to have killer battery life, but having yet another little thing to charge up is a gift that no one I know cherishes. At the least, Apple's smartwatch or wearable will hopefully have a better, smarter way to conserve battery life, or recharge on the fly, or fast and effortlessly enough that it will remain functional. But some reports say that might not be the case. Maybe battery life on these types of devices just isn't ready to take the next step.

Wearables are meant to be worn all the time. The more they need recharging, the less they're worn, and the sooner they end up in a pile of discarded electronics.

Why does a wearable have to be a watch? Why can't it be more? The 2011 iPod Nano unclipped from a watchband and could be snapped on a jacket. It could be an accessory or a watch. Having something that could be swapped into different accessories with different styles, perform different functions in different situations, and be more of a universal multi-use mini-gadget...I'd far prefer that to any true watch.

Hundreds of accessory makers, fashion companies, and others could turn a flexible little device into a gadget with dozens of designs and forms. And it would make a lot more sense than creating a smartwatch with different physical shapes. The Misfit Shine is an activity tracker that takes this approach and succeeds: as a watch, necklace, or clip-on.

Sarah Tew

Google's Android Wear will transform rapidly over time: new features and improvements, and compatible apps, are certain to make it better six months from now than it is now. But right now, it feels like a beta test. It doesn't do everything I want. Parts don't work reliably. It's fragmented.

If an Apple wearable debuts now, better to start small and do a few things really, really well. If those few things are great, and well-delivered, others can be introduced later. The iPhone didn't start with an App Store. But it had polished software for what it did right out of the gate.

Most fitness wearables right now are, honestly, more of a carrot on a stick than a true way to improve daily fitness. Step-counting bands have limits as motivational tools. Heart-rate monitors on many recent smartwatches like Samsung's are buggy. Connected health-tracking hubs, like Withings, offer some good tools but don't always play well with everything else out there.

If Apple can make a hub via Health and Healthkit that allows shared and exchanged health-tracking data between other accessories and apps, and senses your health and fitness more continuously, and with better software coaching, there could finally be something worth getting beyond basic fitness bands.

I have other hopes, too, like a way to make secure payments from my wrist, but just nailing these would help Apple, and the whole wearable tech industry, take a much-needed leap forward. Otherwise, for now, the outlook still currently feels stuck in beta.

Tune in to our live blog of Apple's September 9 event to find out more: we'll be there.

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