Day 1 – Interstellar Now (Next 20 Years) | Thursday August 15th, 2013 The Icarus Interstellar Starship Congress aims to bring together the interstellar community to foster discussion and generate tangible action. Our ambition is to move humanity toward becoming an interstellar civilization, with a broad campaign of exploration and migration to begin by the …
Researchers used a novel computational method to demonstrate that the properties of what had previously been thought to be only a hypothetical structure of a superhard form of carbon called “M-carbon” – constructed by Oganov in 2006 – matched perfectly the experimental data on “superhard graphite.” M-carbon is almost as hard as diamond. Another result …
Economist – In a world economy as troubled as today’s, news that India’s growth rate has fallen to 5.3% may not seem important. But the rate is the lowest in seven years, and the sputtering of India’s economic miracle carries social costs that could surpass the pain in the euro zone. The near double-digit pace …
An international research team led by the University of Colorado Boulder has generated the first laser-like beams of X-rays from a tabletop device, paving the way for major advances in many fields including medicine, biology and nanotechnology development. For half a century, scientists have been trying to figure out how to build a cost-effective and …
Patients showing heart attack symptoms who received a mixture of glucose, insulin and potassium from paramedics were half as likely to go into cardiac arrest or die than those who did not receive the dose, a study found. Although the treatment did not stop the heart attack from occurring, patients who received it were 50 …
World Nuclear News – Unit 1 of China’s Sanmen nuclear power plant has been connected to a nearby substation to provide offsite power for testing electrical systems. The reactor is set to begin operating next year. The Westinghouse AP1000 reactor in Sanmen, China is still on schedule. China’s other AP1000 reactors also appear to be …
Wired – futurist Vernor Vinge is surprisingly optimistic when it comes to the prospect of civilization collapsing. Rebooting Civilization from the rich carcass Could humanity really claw its way back after a complete collapse? Haven’t we plundered the planet’s resources in ways that would be impossible to repeat? “I disagree with that,” says Vinge. “With …
Tom Murphy a UCSD professor has put out an article that argues against space based solar power. This is similar to an argument made in 2004 by Steve Fetter Tom makes the arguments that launch costs are too high and it will be too expensive to make the space based solar power to justify about …
Washington D.C. went live with the first link of a 100-gigabit network Wednesday. The new network, called the D.C. Community Access Network (DC-CAN), will provide links out to communities east of the Anacostia River, but the ultra-high-speed network will soon serve the entire District. However, the pricing for the service still looks expensive with 1 …
Scientists at Carnegie’s Geophysical Laboratory are part of a team that has discovered a new form of carbon, which is capable of withstanding extreme pressure stresses that were previously observed only in diamond. The experiment started with a form of carbon called glassy carbon, which was first synthesized in the 1950s, and was found to …
DARPA wants to create a quasi-passive adaptive suit. The vision of the Warrior Web program, grounded in human physiology and performance, is to develop and demonstrate the technologies required to create a compliant, warfighter-wearable, quasi-passive and adaptive suit system to both reduce injuries and retain optimal warrior performance. The Warrior Web program currently seeks the …