Taking heat detection to a new level of sensitivity and speed, GE Global Research scientists have developed new bio-inspired nanostructured systems that could outperform thermal imaging devices available today.
GE scientists are exploring many potential thermal imaging and sensing applications with their new detection concept such as medical diagnostics, surveillance, non-destructive inspection and…
NASA is pressing forward on assessing the value of a “human-tended waypoint” Earth-moon libration point 2 (EML-2) — a places in space where the combined gravitational pull of the Earth and Moon roughly balance each other out, allowing spacecraft to essentially “park” there.
EML-2 could serve as a gateway for capability-driven exploration of multiple destinations,… [ Space.com ]
Twitter has struck a deal with two large satellite operators to give subscribers the ability to publish in the most remote locations in Australia and around the world.
Iridium and Thuraya satellite subscribers will be able to use Twitter in situations where they lack access to 3G networks or phone lines. Twitter … [ IT News ]
MIT has launched an online learning initiative called “MITx.” Starting this week, interested learners can now enroll for free in the initiative’s prototype course — 6.002x: Circuits and Electronics.
Students can sign up for the course at mitx.mit.edu. The course will officially begin on March 5 and run through June 8. At the end…
“By mid-21st century, a team of fully autonomous humanoid robot soccer players shall win the soccer game, complying with the official rule[s] of the FIFA [Fédération Internationale de Football Association], against the winner of the most recent World Cup.”
This is the official goal of the RoboCup soccer competition, IEEE Spectrum Automaton…
The Kepler space telescope, which has its eye on 150,000 stars, is beginning to home in on Earth-size planets.
Earth 2.0 would be a rocky planet the size of our own, orbiting a star like the sun at a distance where the surface temperatures would allow liquid water oceans, assuming the planet was sheathed… [ New Scientist ]
A technique for printing radio frequency identification (RFID) chips on paper has been developed by University of Montpellier scientists.
The technique uses a thermal evaporation process to deposit thin aluminium coil antennas on sheets of paper, which can later be used for packaging or printed material. The researchers claim this is a cheaper way to… [ TechWeek Europe ]
A scientific team led by researchers at the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and the Charité Berlin Medical University has discove showing how much our immune system is provoked into action when confronted by viral intruders.
The possibility of exploiting this mechanism in vaccines holds promise for the development of new ways…
Welcome to the Age of Big Data — advancing trends in technology that open the door to a new approach to understanding the world and making decisions.
Data is doubling every two years, estimates IDC.
The computer tools for gleaning knowledge and insights from the Internet era’s vast trove of unstructured data are… [ New York Times ]
A joint research project between the University of Southampton and lithium battery technology company REAPsystems has found that a lithium battery has the potential to improve the efficiency and reduce the cost of solar power.
The research showed that the lithium battery has an energy efficiency of 95% compared to…
Retinal gene therapy for congenital blindness has taken another step forward, as research further improved vision in three adult patients previously treated in one eye.
After receiving the same treatment in their other eye, the patients became better able to see in dim light, and two were able…
A suite of artificial intelligence algorithms developed at Argonne National Laboratory can now predict a property of molecules from their theoretical structure in a millisecond that would take earlier methods an hour.
Similar advances should allow chemists to design new molecules on computers instead of by lengthy trial-and-error.
They bypassed the complex… [ New Scientist ]
The news last week that a concerted scientific search for extraterrestrial intelligence by the SETI Institute in California has resumed raises fundamental questions: If we made contact, what would we say? And what answers would we anticipate?
The SETI Institute has begun an online outreach program called Earth Speaks to solicit messages.… [ New York Times ]
Neuroscientists at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine have found that bexarotene, a drug currently prescribed to treat cancer, appears to reverse Alzheimer’s symptoms in mice.
The results suggest that bexarotene has a significant potential to help the 5.4 million Americans with the progressive brain disease.
Salk Institute researchers have discovered a startling feature of early brain development that helps to explain how complex neuron wiring patterns are programmed using just a handful of critical genes.
The findings may help scientists develop new therapies for neurological disorders, such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), and provide insight into certain cancers.…