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Patent trawler aims to predict next hot technologies

July 9, 2012

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A new tool automatically helps forecast emerging technologies, thanks to an innovative data-mining technique.

Developed by Péter Érdi at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in Budapest and colleagues, it works by analyzing the frequency with which prior-art (previous patents) are cited by other patents.

Plotting how the frequency of these citations changes over time shows that patents can be grouped into related clusters. These clusters evolve,… read more

Topics: Singularity/Futures | Social/Ethical/Legal

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Apple granted patent for head-mounted display

July 9, 2012

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Apple was granted a patent for a head-mounted display apparatus on Tuesday.

Titled “Peripheral treatment for head-mounted displays,” it describes how images could be projected to generate a peripheral display that would create “an enhanced viewing experience” for the user.

Apple calls its implementation a head-mounted display (HMD) rather than a head-up display (HUD), and it’s designed to display video information in front of one’s eyes.… read more

Topics: VR/Augmented Reality/Computer Graphics

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World’s fastest camera detects rogue cancer cells in real time

New blood-screening technology boasts a throughput of 100,000 cells per second
July 7, 2012

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A new optical microscope developed by UCLA engineers could make it easier to distinguish and isolate rare cells from among a large population of assorted cells for early detection of disease and for monitoring disease treatments.

“To catch these elusive cells, the camera must be able to capture and digitally process millions of images continuously at a very high frame rate [36.7 MHz],” said Bahram Jalali, who holds… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Electronics | Physics/Cosmology

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DARPA seeks 2000 percent increase in robot power transmission efficiency

July 6, 2012

DARPA_M3 Actuation

DARPA seeks revolutionary advances in the efficiency of robotic actuation; fundamental research into biology, physics and electrical engineering could benefit all engineered, actuated systems.

DARPA has created the M3 Actuation program, with the goal of achieving a 2,000 percent increase in the efficiency of power transmission and application in robots, to improve performance potential.

A robot that drives into an industrial disaster area and shuts off… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Survival/Defense

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A magnetic memory with one bit per molecule

July 6, 2012

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Researchers from Karlsruhe, Strasbourg, and Japan have developed a memristor magnetic memory with one bit per molecule.

One bit of digital information stored on a hard disk currently consists of about 3 million magnetic atoms.

Using an electric pulse, the metal-organic molecule can be switched reliably between a conductive, magnetic state and a low-conductive, non-magnetic state.

“The superparamagnetic effect prevents smaller bit… read more

Topics: Computers/Infotech/UI | Electronics | Nanotech/Materials Science

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Muscle-like action allows robot’s camera to mimic human eye movement

July 6, 2012

The camera positioning system (credit: Joshua Schultz/Georgia Tech’s School of Mechanical Engineering)

Using piezoelectric materials, researchers have replicated the muscle motion of the human eye to control camera systems to improve the operation of robots.

This new muscle-like action could help make robotic tools safer and more effective for MRI-guided surgery and robotic rehabilitation.

Key to the new control system is a piezoelectric cellular actuator that uses a novel biologically inspired technology that will allow a robot eye… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Electronics | Nanotech/Materials Science

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First robotic legs to fully model biologically accurate walking

July 6, 2012

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University of Arizona researchers have produced a robotic set of legs that they believe is the first to fully model walking in a biologically accurate manner.

The neural architecture, musculoskeletal architecture, and sensory feedback pathways in humans have been simplified and built into the robot, giving it a remarkably human-like walking gait that can be viewed in the video.

The biological accuracy of this robot, presented today (Friday… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Cognitive Science/Neuroscience

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Tiny magnetic coils may be safer than implanted electrodes for deep-brain stimulation

July 6, 2012

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Magnetic fields generated by microscopic devices implanted into the brain may be able to modulate brain-cell activity and reduce symptoms of several neurological disorders.

Micromagnetic stimulation appears to generate the kind of neural activity currently elicited with electrical impulses for deep brain stimulation (DBS) — a therapy that can reduce symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, other movement disorders, multiple sclerosis and chronic pain — and should avoid several… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Cognitive Science/Neuroscience

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Adapting telescope mirror technology to capture solar energy

July 6, 2012

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University of Arizona (UA) researchers are continuing to improve groundbreaking technology to produce solar electricity at a price competitive with non-renewable energy sources.

A prototype of the “tracker” at the university has a house-sized frame of crisscrossing steel tubes, mounted onto a swiveling post in the concrete bottom of an empty swimming pool.

The tracker  supports two curved, highly reflective glass mirrors, each measuring 10 feet… read more

Topics: Energy | Nanotech/Materials Science

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Sharing Internet access in networks of cars via WiFi

A new algorithm lets networks of Wi-Fi-connected cars share a few expensive links to the Internet
July 6, 2012

Car WiFi network (credit: Christine Daniloff/MIT)

A new algorithm that would allow Wi-Fi-connected cars to share their Internet connections has been developed by engineers at MIT, Georgetown University, and the National University of Singapore (NUS)

Wi-Fi is coming to our cars. Ford Motor Co. has been equipping cars with Wi-Fi transmitters since 2010. According to an Agence France-Presse story last year, the company expects that by 2015, 80 percent of the cars it sells in… read more

Topics: Electronics | Internet/Telecom

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Genetic 911: cells’ emergency systems revealed

How cells exploit gene sequences to cope with toxic stress
July 5, 2012

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Researchers at MIT and the University at Albany have developed a molecular emergency-response system that shifts the cell into damage-control mode and helps it survive attacks from toxic chemicals by rapidly producing proteins that counteract the harm.

Peter Dedon, a professor of biological engineering at MIT, and colleagues had previously shown that when cells are treated with poisons such as arsenic, the functions of… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Biotech

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Dark matter’s tendrils revealed

Direct measurement of a dark-matter "filament" confirms its existence in a galaxy supercluster
July 5, 2012

Dark-matter filaments, such as the one bridging the galaxy clusters Abell 222 and Abell 223, are predicted to contain more than half of all matter in the Universe (credit: Jörg Dietrich, University of Michigan/University Observatory Munich)

A “finger” of the Universe’s dark-matter skeleton, which ultimately dictates where galaxies form, has been observed for the first time.

Researchers have directly detected a slim bridge of dark matter joining two clusters of galaxies, using a technique that could eventually help astrophysicists to understand the structure of the Universe and identify what makes up the mysterious invisible substance known as dark matter.

The presence of dark matter… read more

Topics: Physics/Cosmology | Space

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Demystifying the immortality of cancer cells

July 5, 2012

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In cancer cells, normal mechanisms governing the cellular life cycle have gone haywire, continuing to divide indefinitely, and creating rapidly growing tumors. Now EPFL scientists have discovered a protein complex involved in this deregulated process, and hope to be able to exploit it to stop tumor formation.

All our cells come equipped with an automatic self-destruct mechanism; they are programmed to die after a certain number… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Biotech

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Science in three dimensions: the print revolution

July 5, 2012

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Three-dimensional printers are opening up new worlds to research.

Christoph Zollikofer witnessed the first birth of a Neanderthal in the modern age. In his anthropology lab at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, in 2007, the skull of a baby Homo neanderthalensis emerged from a photocopier-sized machine after a 20-hour noisy but painless delivery of whirring motors and spitting plastic.

These days, personal kits go for as little as… read more

Topics: Nanotech/Materials Science

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Robot avatar body controlled by thought alone

July 5, 2012

These areas of the motor cortex are activated when thinking about moving things (credit: New Scientist)

For the first time, a person lying in an fMRI machine has controlled a robot hundreds of kilometers away using thought alone.

.”The ultimate goal is to create a surrogate, like in Avatar, although that’s a long way off yet,” says Abderrahmane Kheddar, director of the joint robotics laboratory at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology in Tsukuba, Japan.

Teleoperated robots,… read more

Topics: Cognitive Science/Neuroscience | Human Enhancement

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