New Scientist – Elon Musk talked about getting to Alpha Centauri (4 light years away). With a nuclear thermal rocket you could definitely reach a tenth of the speed of light. It would take 40 years, though [to reach Alpha Centauri], which is a long time. You’d have to start off not too old if …
Slashgear – SamMobile reports that their sources have said a new device known internally as “Project J” will be announced in April of next year, and they say it’s the Galaxy S IV, which is currently rumored to come with a 5-inch 1080p display, and quad-core processor, a couple gigabytes of RAM, and a 13MP …
IBTimes – Mining giant BHP will pilot test the use of robot trucks at ts Jimblebar iron ore mine in Pilbara. The company will use by late 2013 between 12 and 15 automated Caterpillar trucks, BHP head of Iron Ore and Coal Marcus Randolph disclosed. By trying the robot trucks, BHP would follow rival Rio …
Wired – The 3-D printing industry is on track to be a $3.1 billion business by 2016 and the innovations on display this week show its foundation is growing — both in revenue and in physical print size. The big news out of Euromold is really big — a 3-D printer so large that it …
1. Atomic Insights – Fear of radiation has ruined far more lives than exposure to radiation This fact should be stated loud and clear, right up front: In every “nuclear disaster”. radiation injured few if any people, whereas overplayed FEAR of radiation had disastrous impact, ruining the lives of thousands. A recent study showed that …
Bloomberg – Continental Resources Inc. (CLR), the largest owner of oil-drilling rights in the U.S. Bakken Shale, said the formation holds about 57 percent more crude than previously thought. The shares rose the most in more than three months. The formation beneath North Dakota and Montana holds the equivalent of 903 billion barrels of so-called …
Borrowing from microfabrication techniques used in the semiconductor industry, MIT and Harvard Medical School (HMS) engineers have developed a simple and inexpensive way to create three-dimensional brain tissues in a lab dish.The new technique yields tissue constructs that closely mimic the cellular composition of those in the living brain, allowing scientists to study how neurons …
The Carnival of Space 278 is up at Vintage Space. Meridiani Journal – The MESSENGER spacecraft has confirmed water ice deposits, covered by a layer of organics, on Mercury of all places… Nextbigfuture – Scientists discover 20 billion to 1 trillion tons of ice water on Mercury Nextbigfuture – if Harold White’s warp research were …
EETimes has FBR actual and estimated sales statistics for tablets for 2012 and 2013. Apple will still maintain 55%-60% market share in tablets in 2012 and 2013. 1. Apple iPad 2. Apple iPad Mini The next most popular tablets are 3. Kindle Fire (HD) 4. Google Nexus 5. Samsung Galaxy 6. Barnes and Noble Nook …
Wall Street Journal – China’s Lenovo Group sold twice as many smartphones as Apple in the third quarter in China and moved closer to overtaking Samsung as the country’s market leader. China is widely expected to pass the U.S. as the world’s biggest smartphone market this year. “Lenovo’s strength is that its China PC business …
IEEE Spectrum – Flash memory wears out after being programmed and erased about 10 000 times. That’s fine for a USB dongle that you’ll probably lose in a year, but not ideal for the solid-state drives of server farms. And the same problem keeps manufacturers from using flash to replace other types of computer memories. …