Superconductor Improvements: Critical Current and Critical Temperature

1. Superconductor Meissner Transition found at 242 K Superconductors.org reports efforts to increase the Tc of the 233K superconductive material, announced in March 2009, have been successful. Producing a new world record near 242K (-24F, -31C), the host compound has the formula (Tl4Ba)Ba4Ca2Cu10Oy and is believed to have a 9212/2212C intergrowth structure. The chemical formula …

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Carnival of Space 104: 2nd Anniversary

Carnival of Space 104 is up at Mangs Bat page Cosmic log looks at the past and future of new space like Spacex Flysinger looks at Herschel space telescope and the Planck observatory The Herschel spacecraft that was launched by ESA earlier this week is super-cool. Literally. This advanced telescope for far-infrared and millimeter-wave observations …

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Superconducting Computer Chip Breakthrough

Artist view of the implantation of gallium ions (animated in blue) into germanium wafers followed by a reconstruction of the lattice using short-term flash-lamp annealing and, finally, of the observation of superconductivity at low temperatures. Other than in normal conductors, superconductivity is caused by the formation of electron pairs with anti-parallel momentum and spin (animated …

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Next Big Future at the Singularity University July 16, 2009

The Singularity University plans to offer a 9 week course this summer from 27 June – 29 Aug 2009, at NASA Research Park at Moffet Field. In March, the Singularity University had received preliminary applications from 1300 potential students for 40 slots. On Thursday, July 16th (11:30-12:30), Brian Wang of Next Big Future will speak …

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Senator Lamar Alexander Calls for 100 Nuclear Reactors Built in USA by 2030

Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) today told participants at the Tennessee Valley Corridor National Summit that “the United States should build 100 new nuclear power plants during the next 20 years” to put America on the path to clean energy independence. He said, “One year ago, I came to Oak Ridge to propose a new ‘Manhattan …

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Japanese scientists create transgenic monkeys

UPDATE: MIT Technology Review has coverage and the above pictures of the glow in the dark monkeys. The Nature journal abstract is here Eight pages of supplemental information is here Japanese scientists have created the world’s first transgenic primates, breeding monkeys with a gene that made the animals’ skin glow a fluorescent green. This can …

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Energy Information Administration Projections to 2030 Assume that China Will Not Meet Nuclear Targets

The 2009 Energy Information Administration Projections to 2030 have been released. The highest energy growth case has China at 274 billion kilowatt hours for 2020 and 426 billion kilowatt hours for 2030. China is increasing its nuclear build targets to 75 gigawatts for 2020 and 104 nuclear reactors for 2030. The 2030 reactors would mostly …

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Technology Roundup

1. Unity Semiconductor, a Silicon Valley start‐up that will serve the semiconductor data storage memory market as a designer, developer and manufacturer of non‐volatile memory (NVM) ICs, has announced a breakthrough technology called CMOx, which is based on the use of conductive metal oxides in the semiconductor process that allows for ionic motion. Unity said …

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Bayer Starts Building 200ton/year carbon nanotube plant and Nanocomp gets More Stimulus Funding

Bayer has begun construction of a carbon nanotube factory with a capacity of 200 tons/year. They are investing 22 million euro in the plant. They have had a plant with 60 ton/year capacity since 2007. A mid-2008 nextbigfuture look at carbon nanotube production. Nanocomp Technologies, Inc., [they make large sheets of carbon nanotubes] a developer …

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