Spark plugs can only ignite the fuel at one end of the chamber. A laser ignites the fuel in the middle of the chamber instead, burning more of the fuel and improving combustion efficiency by 27 per cent. Laser ignition could boost the fuel efficiency of a car from 40 miles per gallan up to …
India is tripling its fleet of nuclear submarines in the country’s priciest naval expansion in five years, a move that comes as China increases naval activity in the Indian Ocean. A cabinet committee on Tuesday approved plans to build six nuclear-powered submarines and seven stealth warships at a cost of about 1 trillion rupees ($16 …
The Carnival of Nuclear Energy 245 is up at Fukushima Commentary Forbes- The moon is a planet. A minor planet. In our Solar System, there are 28 planets of all sizes within the orbit of Pluto. Major planets. Minor planets. Dwarf planets. And the Moon is one of the minor planets. Here are many small, …
China will soon start building its second locally designed aircraft carrier in Shanghai. It would be China’s third aircraft carrier. The 60,000 ton Liaoning is an operational training aircraft carrier. The first Dalian aircraft carrier is scheduled to be launched before 2017 according to China’s plan to produce two China-made 48,000 to 64,000-ton conventional carriers. …
Researchers at the École Polytechnique Fédérale, in Lausanne, Switzerland, to design a soft, flexible electronic implant, which they say has the same ability to bend and stretch as dura mater, the membrane that surrounds the brain and spinal cord. The e-Dura implant developed by EPFL scientists can be applied directly to the spinal cord without …
Theory of a Mach Effect Thruster The Mach Effect Thruster (MET) is a device which uses Machs principle in Einsteins general relativity to produce a constant acceleration in a device which is undergoing internal energy changes and mass fluctuations. Machs principle is a statement that the inertia of a body is the result of the …
DARPA’s Warrior Web program’s goal is to create a soft, lightweight undersuit to help reduce injuries and fatigue, while improving mission performance. DARPA is responsible for the development of new technologies for the U.S. military. Researchers from Harvard University’s Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering spent the past two years developing a biologically inspired smart …
Previously Neil de Grasse Tyson called for doubling NASA’s $17 billion space budget. Tyson promoted building a core fleet of launch vehicles that can be customized for a variety of missions and for a range of purposes. China is using its lead with low cost high speed rail to gain economic and geopolitical advantage. The …
Frailty is a common geriatric syndrome that embodies an elevated risk of catastrophic declines in health and function among older adults. Curing and preventing osteoporosis (severe bone loss and weakness) and sarcopenia (muscle loss and weakness) would dramatically improve the health and life of most people over the age of 60. How common is osteoporosis …
Global health officials are looking closely at the Ebola Virus “reproduction number,” which estimates how many people, on average, will catch the virus from each person stricken with Ebola. The epidemic will begin to decline when that number falls below one. A recent analysis estimated the number at 1.5 to 2. To bring the epidemic …
Real-world engines have to trade off between efficiency–how well they convert heat into work–and power, how quickly they accomplish this conversion. Generally, the more powerful an engine is (the faster it moves), the less efficient it is because it creates more friction. For this reason cars need oil! But using some quantum mechanical trickery, ICTP …