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Self-healing, stretchable wires using liquid metal

January 25, 2013

Researchers from North Carolina State University have developed elastic, self-healing electrical wires.

“Because we’re using liquid metal, these wires have excellent conductive properties,” says Dr. Michael Dickey, an assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at NC State and co-author of a paper on the work.

“And because the wires are also elastic and self-healing, they have a lot of potential for use …… read more

Topics: Electronics | Nanotech/Materials Science

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Storing data in individual molecules near room temperature

January 24, 2013

mit_molecular_memory

An experimental technology called molecular memory could store data in individual molecules has been developed by an international team of researchers led by Jagadeesh Moodera, a senior research scientist in the MIT Department of Physics and at MIT’s Francis Bitter Magnet Laboratory,

The technology promises a 1,000-fold increase in storage density over hard disks, which are approaching a million megabytes of… read more

Topics: Computers/Infotech/UI | Nanotech/Materials Science | Physics/Cosmology

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How to store the world’s data on DNA

January 24, 2013

Storage cost for DNA v. tape

Researchers at the EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) have created a way to store data in the form of DNA — a material that lasts for tens of thousands of years.

The new method, published in the journal Nature, makes it possible to store at least 100 million hours of high-definition video in about a cup of DNA.

There is a lot of digital information… read more

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

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A free database of the entire Web may spawn the next Google

January 24, 2013

common_crawl_Logo

A nonprofit called Common Crawl is now using its own Web crawler and making a giant copy of the Web that it makes accessible to anyone.

The organization offers up over five billion Web pages, available for free so that researchers and entrepreneurs can try things otherwise possible only for those with access to resources on the scale of Google’s, MIT Technology Review reports.… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Computers/Infotech/UI | Internet/Telecom

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Information wants to be free, but the world isn’t ready

January 24, 2013

“Every few years, one of my friends from the early days of digital enthusiasm turns up on the media’s radar as a ‘defector,’” R.U. Sirius, former editor-in-chief of Mondo 2000, writes on The Verge. …

The latest chapter of this saga, “What Turned Jaron Lanier Against the Web,” … portrays Jaron Lanier (You Are Not A Gadget) as being like a… read more

Topics: Internet/Telecom | Social/Ethical/Legal

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The Tech Awards is now accepting applications for 2013

January 24, 2013

the_tech_awards_logo_4c

Know people who are changing the world? Encourage them to apply for The Tech Awards 2013, a program of the Tech Museum, San Jose, CA.

Categories: Environment, Education, Young Innovator (under 27), Health, Economic Development.

Benefit: cash prizes of $75,000 and $25,000 awarded in each category; access to mentors, funders, media, former laureates.

Deadline: May 1, 2013

Apply Now… read more

Topics: Innovation/Entrepreneurship

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Chinese-made unmanned vehicle passes freeway test

January 24, 2013

fierce_lion_3

An unmanned vehicle designed by Military Transportation University of the PLA (MTU) recently won top prize in the fourth Future Challenge, a contest for intelligent vehicles, China.org.cn reports.

The vehicle, a third-generation prototype named “Fierce Lion 3,” completed a 114-kilometer journey within 85 minutes, with a top speed of 105 kilometers per hour, making itself China’s first unmanned vehicle to pass a freeway test.

Third party… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics

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Billion-euro brain simulation and graphene projects win European funds

January 24, 2013

Neocortical column in Henry Markram's Blue Brain project (Credit: Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

The European Commission has selected the two research proposals it will fund to the tune of half-a-billion euros ($650 million U.S.) each, after a two-year, high-profile contest, Nature News reports.

The Human Brain Project, led by neuroscientist Henry Markram at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) in Lausanne, plans to simulate the human brain in a supercomputer. (See “Brain in… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Cognitive Science/Neuroscience | Nanotech/Materials Science | Physics/Cosmology

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Self-assembling silica microwires may herald new generation of integrated optical devices

January 24, 2013

This image shows self-assembled silica wires illuminated by HeNe (helium-neon) laser light from one end (credit: John Canning)

By carefully controlling the shape of water droplets with an ultraviolet laser, a team of researchers from Australia and France has found a way to coax silica (silicon dioxide) nanoparticles to self-assemble into highly uniform silica wires, hair-like slivers of silica.

Such silica microwires could enable applications and technology not currently possible with comparatively bulky optical fiber.

The international team describes the research in a paper… read more

Topics: Electronics | Internet/Telecom | Nanotech/Materials Science

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O’Reilly Open Government book now a free download, in honor of Aaron Swartz

January 23, 2013

open_government_book

To honor Aaron Swartz, a contributor to the Open Government book, O’Reilly Media has posted the Open Government book files for free for anyone to download, read and share, says co-author Laurel Ruma on O’Reilly Radar.

The files are posted on the O’Reilly Media GitHub account as PDF, Mobi, and EPUB files for now here: github.com/oreillymedia/open_government.

 

Topics: Internet/Telecom | Social Networking/Web/Education | Social/Ethical/Legal

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Phoenix rising: DARPA’s plan to repair communication satellites in orbit

January 23, 2013

Satellite servicing

DARPA’s planned Phoenix program is intended to develop and demonstrate technologies to cooperatively harvest and re-use valuable components from retired, nonworking satellites in geosynchronous orbit (GEO) at greatly reduced cost.

Today, when a communication satellite fails, it usually means the expensive prospect of having to launch a brand new replacement communication satellite. Many of the satellites that are obsolete or have failed still have usable antennas, solar… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Electronics | Space

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Intel’s new interface idea is a mash-up of all the others

January 23, 2013

intel_perceptual_computing_2

At CES, Intel demoed its latest big idea — “perceptual computing,” MIT Technology Review reports.

With perceptual computing, Intel envisions a new kind of interface for devices that will let users switch fluently between keyboards, trackpads, touch screens, voice commands, and gestures — or use several modes of interaction at once.

Perceptual computing is Intel’s attempt to keep laptops relevant in a consumer-tech landscape… read more

Topics: Computers/Infotech/UI

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‘The future might be a hoot’: how Iain M. Banks imagines Utopia

January 23, 2013

The-Hydrogen-Sonata

For 25 years, Scottish science fiction writer Iain M. Banks, author of the Culture Series, has been writing about a utopian post-scarcity civilization managed by artificially intelligent drones known as Minds, and preoccupied by artificial intelligence, games, and interactions with other civilizations.

In the latest novel published in October, The Hydrogen Sonata, a civilization known as the Gzilt are making preparations to Sublime — in… read more

Topics: Singularity/Futures

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How to kill lymphoma cancer cells without chemotherapy

Nanoparticle annihilates lymphoma cancer cells by starving them to death
January 23, 2013

Transmission electron micrographs of nanoparticles in lymphoma cells 24 hours after treatment (credit: Shuo Yanga et al./PNAS)

Northwestern Medicine researchers have developed a nanoparticle that attacks a cancerous lymphoma cell by mimicking HDL.(high-density lipoprotein) cholesterol, an essential nutrient for the cell.

The nanoparticle tricks the cell by blocking cholesterol from entering the cell. Deprived of an essential nutrient, the cell eventually dies.

The new study by C. Shad Thaxton, M.D., and Leo I. Gordon, M.D. shows that these… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Biotech | Nanotech/Materials Science

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Researchers turn one form of neuron into another in the brain

January 22, 2013

Diagram of a typical motor neuron (credit: Wikimedia Commons)

A new finding by Harvard stem cell biologists turns one of the basics of neurobiology on its head — demonstrating that it is possible to turn one type of already differentiated (formed from a stem cell) neuron into another within the brain.

The discovery by Paola Arlotta and Caroline Rouaux indicates that “maybe the brain is not as immutable as we… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Biotech | Cognitive Science/Neuroscience

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