Month: February 2010

Diode Pumped Alkali Lasers Could Eventually Enable Practical Airplane Based Laser Anti-Missile Systems

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Lawrence Livermore National Lab on the Diode-Pumped Alkali Laser (DPAL) Solid-state and gas lasers have followed largely divergent development paths. Gas lasers are based primarily on direct electrical discharge for pumping (energizing), while solid-state lasers are pumped by flashlamps and semiconductor diode laser arrays. The alkali-vapor laser’s intrinsically high efficiency (80+%) and its compatibility with …

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Energy News Roundup – details on difficulty in making a nuclear bomb and some energy politics

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1. Depleted Cranium has an excellent article on the problems of making a nuclear bomb from material taken from a commercial nuclaer reactor and even taking material during reprocessing. The issue is the percentage of Plutonium 240 and Plutonium 241 mixed in with Plutonium 239. Having too much Plutonium 240 and 241 means you will …

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Sound Proof Panels Made of Latex and Buttons – Practical Application of Metamaterial Physics

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Metamaterial sound proofing from materials less than an inch thick would be as good as 4 foot thick walls for soundproofing. People outside a metamaterial sound proofed room – no one will hear you screaming inside Applied Physics Letters – Acoustic metamaterial panels for sound attenuation in the 50–1000 Hz regime The Hong Kong University …

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Intel Will Use Immersion Lithography to 11 nanometers, EUV litho is late, Junctionless Transistor Will Simplify 10 nanometer Work

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1. EETimes reports that Intel will be able to extend 193 nm immersion lithography to 11 nanometers, as Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV) lithography is late again Intel hoped to use EUV at 22-nm, which is due out in 2011. The problem is that EUV will not be ready in time for 22- or 15-nm in production–at …

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Pennsylvania State University Root Biology Center aims to boost crop yields around the globe

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A professor of horticulture at Penn State, Lynch believes that understanding plant root architecture may be the key to producing enough food to feed the world’s expanding population. The goal is the generation of new crop varieties and cropping systems adapted to the stressful soils of eastern and southern Africa. Correlated with genetic information, root …

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Nanotechnology sparks energy storage on paper and cloth

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By dipping ordinary paper or fabric in a special ink infused with nanoparticles, Stanford engineer Yi Cui has found a way to cheaply and efficiently manufacture lightweight paper batteries and supercapacitors (which, like batteries, store energy, but by electrostatic rather than chemical means), as well as stretchable, conductive textiles known as “eTextiles” – capable of …

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Midday nap markedly boosts the brain’s learning capacity

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New research from the University of California, Berkeley, shows that an hour’s nap can dramatically boost and restore your brain power. Indeed, the findings suggest that a biphasic sleep schedule not only refreshes the mind, but can make you smarter. The results support previous data from the same research team that pulling an all-nighter – …

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