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SpaceX Dragon capsule arrives at Space Station with precious cargo

October 10, 2012

Dragon ISS

A privately built robotic space capsule arrived at the International Space Station early Wednesday (Oct. 10) to make the first-ever commercial cargo delivery to the orbiting lab under a billion-dollar deal with NASA, Space.com reports.

The unmanned Dragon spacecraft was captured by station astronauts using a robotic arm after an apparently flawless approach by the cargo-laden space capsule, which was built by the private spaceflight company SpaceX. It… read more

Topics: Space

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The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2012 — Robert J. Lefkowitz, Brian K. Kobilka

October 10, 2012

nobel_chemistry_2012

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2012 to Robert J. Lefkowitz, Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, USA, and Brian K. Kobilka, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA, for studies of G-protein–coupled receptors.

Smart receptors on cell surfaces

Your body is a fine-tuned… read more

Topics: Biotech | Nanotech/Materials Science

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A tactile glove provides subtle guidance to locate objects

October 11, 2012

tactile_glove

Researchers from the University of Helsinki Institute for Information Technology (HIIT) and the Max Planck Institute for Informatics have developed a prototype of a glove that uses vibration feedback on the hand to guide the user’s hand towards a predetermined target in 3D space.

The glove could help users in daily visual search tasks in supermarkets, parking lots, warehouses, libraries etc.

Their study shows an almost three-fold advantage… read more

Topics: Computers/Infotech/UI | Human Enhancement | Innovation/Entrepreneurship | VR/Augmented Reality/Computer Graphics

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How to print headphones

October 11, 2012

TEAGUE_3D_Headphones_2_LABS

What if printed prototypes could become actual products? John Mabry of Teague Labs.decided to try it by creating printable headphones.

The idea was to print an object that could be assembled without any tools and be made functional by adding readily attainable components. He decided to stress-test the premise with the challenge of making electronically simple yet functionally complex headphones.

“My first go resulted in a… read more

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

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Mysterious algorithm was 4% of trading activity last week

October 11, 2012

hft_chart

A single mysterious computer program that placed orders — and then subsequently canceled them — made up 4 percent of all quote traffic in the U.S. stock market last week, according to the top tracker of high-frequency trading activity.

The motive of the algorithm is still unclear, CNBC reports.

The program placed orders in 25-millisecond bursts involving about 500 stocks, according to Nanex, a… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics

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Researchers unravel the secret to making cheap, high-density data storage

October 11, 2012

surface smoothness

Researchers from A*STAR’s Institute of Materials Research and Engineering (IMRE) and the National University of Singapore (NUS) have discovered that an ultra-smooth surface is the key factor for “self-assembly” — a cheap, high-volume, high-density patterning technique for data storage.

This technique allows manufacturers to use the method for data storage on a variety of different surfaces. This discovery paves the way for the development of… read more

Topics: Nanotech/Materials Science

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3D printing may put global supply chains out of business: report

October 11, 2012

make_replicator_2

Will 3D printing make global supply chains unnecessary? That’s a real possibility, according to a recent report from Transport Intelligence, Smart Planet reports.

3D printing (or “additive manufacturing,” as it’s called in industrial circles) takes offshore manufacturing and brings it back close to the consumer. It has enormous potential to shift the trade balance. Goods will be cheaper to reproduce within the domestic market, versus manufacturing and then shipping them… read more

Topics: Nanotech/Materials Science | Social/Ethical/Legal

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Glowing DNA allows for high speed disease detection

October 11, 2012

glowing_dna_nanoclusters

University of Copenhagen scientists have invented a method that promises to shave days off the lab work done to reveal diseases, using cheap methods and easy to use analytical apparatuses.

Many diseases, including cancers, leave genetic clues in the body just as criminals leave DNA at the scene of a crime. But tools to detect the DNA-like sickness clues known as miRNAs, tend to be slow… read more

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

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Extending Einstein’s theory beyond light speed

October 11, 2012

Spacetime_curvature

University of Adelaide applied mathematicians have extended Einstein’s theory of special relativity to work beyond the speed of light.

Einstein’s theory holds that nothing could move faster than the speed of light, but Professor Jim Hill and Dr Barry Cox in the University’s School of Mathematical Sciences have developed new formulas that allow for travel beyond this limit.… read more

Topics: Physics/Cosmology

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A ‘compound eye’ on light sent from galaxies 10 billion years ago

October 12, 2012

15711_VLT_alt_Iztok_Boncina_ESO

At ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile they are about to fit a new instrument called KMOS that can record the light from 24 galaxies simultaneously.

KMOS has 24 robotic arms tipped with gold-plated mirrors that can be trained on a different galaxy — each arm has almost 200 facets making them rather like an insect’s compound eye. Light from these mirrors is channelled… read more

Topics: Physics/Cosmology

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Panetta warns of dire threat of cyberattack on US

October 12, 2012

(Credit: iStockphoto)

Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta warned Thursday that the United States was facing the possibility of a “cyber-Pearl Harbor” and was increasingly vulnerable to foreign computer hackers who could dismantle the nation’s power grid, transportation system, financial networks and government, The New York Times reports.

He said he was reacting to increasing aggressiveness… read more

Topics: Internet/Telecom | Survival/Defense

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The world’s first 3D-printed guitar

October 12, 2012

1011_3d_guitar_630x420

Scott Summit created a 3D model of his ideal guitar and sent the computer design to 3D Systems, which used its massive 3D printers to transform the graphic model into an actual acoustic instrument that Summit can play, Bloomberg Businessweek reports.

As far as anyone seems to know, this is the first 3D-printed guitar on the planet, and it raises all kinds musical possibilities. “It’s rich and full and… read more

Topics: Innovation/Entrepreneurship | Nanotech/Materials Science

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3D model for lung cancer mimics the real thing

October 12, 2012

lung_cancer_methodist_hospital

Using a new technique that allows scientists to grow lung cancer cells in three dimensions, researchers at The Methodist Hospital and the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center have created a model that uses biological matter to form miniature lungs that mimic the structure and function of real lung cancer, after which human lung cancer cells are added.

The model could accelerate discoveries for a type of cancer that has benefited… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Biotech

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Prospective Alzheimer’s drug builds new brain-cell connections

October 12, 2012

572px-PET_Alzheimer

Washington State University researchers have developed a new drug candidate that dramatically improves the cognitive function of rats with Alzheimer’s-like mental impairment.

Their compound, which is intended to repair brain damage that has already occurred, is a significant departure from current Alzheimer’s treatments, which either slow the process of cell death or inhibit cholinesterase, an enzyme believed to break down a key neurotransmitter involved in… read more

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

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Dyson sphere hunt using Kepler data

October 12, 2012

med_fractaldyson_bowers

Geoff Marcy has received a grant from the UK’s Templeton Foundation to look for Dyson spheres, Paul Gilster writes on Centauri Dreams, the news forum of the Tau Zero Foundation.

Freeman Dyson hypothesized the vast structures over fifty years ago that could ring or completely enclose their parent star. Such structures, the work of a Kardashev Type II civilization — one capable of drawing on the… read more

Topics: Physics/Cosmology | Singularity/Futures | Space

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