Science & TechnologyS


Laptop

Study shows Americans' devotion to the Internet


CNN.com
Sat, 20 Jun 2009 05:39 UTC
Americans would rather keep their Internet connections than keep their cell phone or television service, a new study found.

Despite the souring economy, more and more Americans are buying high-speed Internet service, the study found -- and the most dramatic increase in broadband adoption has been in groups that traditionally use it less than average.
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Cell Phone

Prototype Nokia phone recharges without wires

Christopher Null
The Working Guy
Sat, 20 Jun 2009 04:31 UTC
wireless charging cellphone
© unknownCell phone of the future?
Pardon the cliche, but it's one of the holiest of Holy Grails of technology: Wireless power. And while early lab experiments have been able to "beam" electricity a few feet to power a light bulb, the day when our laptops and cell phones can charge without having to plug them in to a wall socket still seems decades in the future.

Nokia, however, has taken another baby step in that direction with the invention of a cell phone that recharges itself using a unique system: It harvests ambient radio waves from the air, and turns that energy into usable power. Enough, at least, to keep a cell phone from running out of juice.
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Rocket

New Mexico Breaks Ground on Commercial Spaceport


Reuters
Tue, 23 Jun 2009 04:20 UTC
Phoenix - New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson broke ground on Friday on construction of Spaceport America, the world's first facility built specifically for space-bound commercial customers and fee-paying passengers.

The $198 million project, which is being funded by the New Mexico state government, is located on a remote high-desert range near the town of Truth or Consequences.

British tycoon Richard Branson's space tours firm, Virgin Galactic, will use the facility to propel tourists into suborbital space at a cost of $200,000 a ride.
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Telescope

Herschel's daring test: a glimpse of things to come


European Space Agency
Sat, 20 Jun 2009 02:17 UTC
Herschel opened its 'eyes' on 14 June and the Photoconductor Array Camera and Spectrometer obtained images of M51, 'the whirlpool galaxy' for a first test observation. Scientists obtained images in three colours which clearly demonstrate the superiority of Herschel, the largest infrared space telescope ever flown.

Image
Herschel's test view of M51
This image shows the famous 'whirlpool galaxy', first observed by Charles Messier in 1773, who provided the designation Messier 51 (M51). This spiral galaxy lies relatively nearby, about 35 million light-years away, in the constellation Canes Venatici. M51 was the first galaxy discovered to harbour a spiral structure.
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Info

Research explores interactions between nanomaterials, biological systems


University of California - Los Angeles
Sat, 20 Jun 2009 00:25 UTC
Review article calls for measures to enable safe design of nanomaterials.

The recent explosion in the development of nanomaterials with enhanced performance characteristics for use in commercial and medical applications has increased the likelihood of people coming into direct contact with these materials.

There are currently more than 800 products on the market - including clothes, skin lotions and cleaning products - claiming to have at least one nanocomponent, and therapeutic nanocarriers have been designed for targeted drug delivery inside the human body. Human exposure to nanomaterials, which are smaller than one one-thousandth the diameter of a human hair, raises some important questions, including whether these "nano-bio" interactions could have adverse health effects.
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Laptop

Canada's monster computer roars to life

Omar El Akkad
Globe and Mail
Fri, 19 Jun 2009 13:43 UTC
Toronto's supercomputer
© unknownUniversity of Toronto's $50-million supercomputer – the fastest such machine in Canada – goes online to improve research potential
It has taken a year and $50-million to put together, and its brain takes up as much room as a warehouse full of refrigerators.

Today, the monster finally opens its eyes, as the University of Toronto's newest supercomputer - the fastest such machine in Canada - goes online.

There's no shortage of beastly metrics by which this computer's power can be measured: It can perform more than 300 trillion calculations a second, simulate the Earth's climate 100 years into the future in four days and help researchers study cosmic background radiation, a calculation-intensive task that offers a glimpse into what the universe looked like 13 billion years ago.
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Camera

Light sensor breakthrough could enhance digital cameras

Joyann Callender
University of Toronto
Fri, 19 Jun 2009 01:13 UTC
Toronto, ON - New research by a team of University of Toronto scientists could lead to substantial advancements in the performance of a variety of electronic devices including digital cameras.

Researchers created a light sensor - like a pixel in a digital camera - that benefits from a phenomenon known as multi-exciton generation (MEG). Until now, no group had collected an electrical current from a device that takes advantage of MEG.
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Telescope

World's fastest and most sensitive astronomical camera


European Organisation for Astronomical
Fri, 19 Jun 2009 01:07 UTC
The next generation of instruments for ground-based telescopes took a leap forward with the development of a new ultra-fast camera that can take 1500 finely exposed images per second even when observing extremely faint objects. The first 240x240 pixel images with the world's fastest high precision faint light camera were obtained through a collaborative effort between ESO and three French laboratories from the French Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique/Institut National des Sciences de l'Univers (CNRS/INSU). Cameras such as this are key components of the next generation of adaptive optics instruments of Europe's ground-based astronomy flagship facility, the ESO Very Large Telescope (VLT).
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Info

UC scientists reach milestone in study of emergent magnetism

Brock Cooper
DOE/Argonne National Laboratory
Fri, 19 Jun 2009 01:02 UTC
Argonne, Ill. - Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory and the University of Chicago have reached a milestone in the study of emergent magnetism.

Studying simple metallic chromium, the joint UC-Argonne team has discovered a pressure-driven quantum critical regime and has achieved the first direct measurement of a "naked" quantum singularity in an elemental magnet. The team was led by University of Chicago scientist Rafael Jaramillo, working in the group of Thomas Rosenbaum, and Argonne scientist Yejun Feng of the Advanced Photon Source.
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Sun

Scientists create first comprehensive computer model of sunspots


National Science Foundation
Fri, 19 Jun 2009 00:15 UTC
Image
© Matthias Rempel, NCARThe interface between a sunspot's central and outer regions shows a complex structure.
First model of entire sunspots shows striking, beautiful detail.

In a breakthrough that will help scientists unlock mysteries of the sun and its impacts on Earth, scientists have created the first-ever comprehensive computer model of sunspots. The resulting visuals capture both scientific detail and remarkable beauty. The results are published this week in a paper in Science Express. The research was supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

The high-resolution simulations of sunspots open the way for scientists to learn more about the vast mysterious dark patches on the sun's surface, first studied by Galileo. Sunspots are associated with massive ejections of charged plasma that can cause geomagnetic storms and disrupt communications and navigational systems. They are also linked to variations in solar output that can affect weather on Earth and exert a subtle influence on climate patterns.
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