A new approach that uses light to move mirrors could usher in a new generation of laser technology for a wide range of applications, including remote sensing, self-driving car navigation and 3D biomedical imaging. A team of UC Berkeley engineers led by Connie Chang-Hasnain, a professor of electrical engineering and computer sciences, used a novel …
America’s elite is producing children who not only get ahead, but deserve to do so: they meet the standards of meritocracy better than their peers, and are thus worthy of the status they inherit. This is partly the result of various admirable aspects of American society: the willingness of people to give money and time …
Researchers combine constraints on galaxy formation histories with planet formation models, yielding the Earth-like and giant planet formation histories of the Milky Way and the Universe as a whole. In the Hubble Volume (10^13 Mpc3 ), we expect there to be ∼ 10^20 Earth-like and ∼ 10^20 giant planets; our own galaxy is expected to …
Science Mag is reporting about Tri-alpha Energy making its plasma last for 5 milliseconds. There are some more details about their work and their plans, however, most of this has been covered by Nextbigfuture in June 2015 The original announcement and work on 5 millisecond duration was back in 2013. They were at 2 milliseconds …
Forbes Michael Lynch reviews Blacklight Power as an example of potentially revolutionary energy technology that has failed to deliver on commercialization. Forbes linked to Nextbigfuture where in 2014 we had updated the claims made by Blacklight Power. There is a July 29th, 2014 audio interview. Sterling Allan, the host of Greater Things on the Rense …
Scientists at Rice University have created a solid-state memory technology that allows for high-density storage with a minimum incidence of computer errors. The memories are based on tantalum oxide, a common insulator in electronics. Applying voltage to a 250-nanometer-thick sandwich of graphene, tantalum, nanoporous tantalum oxide and platinum creates addressable bits where the layers meet. …
Canadian space company, Thoth Technology Inc., has been granted the United States patent for a inflated tower. The freestanding space tower is pneumatically pressurized and actively-guided over its base. Reaching 20 km above the planet, it would stand more than 20 times the height of current tall structures and be used for wind-energy generation, communications …
Treehugger has a headline “ Nuclear fusion reactor in just five years?” The MIT design depends on getting 23 tesla superconducting magnets (currently at lab scale) scaled up for projects of this scale and beyond. The MIT researchers believe the engineering and development work on the new 23 tesla superconducting magnets could be achieved over …
Reversibly, repeatedly foldable electronics and displays have been enabled by employing engineered glass or plastics substrates, where folding deformation has been localized in thinned parts only. This design concept can further be extended to dual folding, leading to size reduction down to one quarter. Notably, the foldable electronics and displays can be implemented with no …
A study showed that scientists can wirelessly determine the path a mouse walks with a press of a button. Researchers at the Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, and University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, created a remote controlled, next-generation tissue implant that allows neuroscientists to inject drugs and shine lights on neurons deep inside the …
There is a proposed High-Definition Space Telescope (HDST) which would have a mirror up to 12 meters across. That’s 5 times the width of the 2.4-metre Hubble, which revolutionized astronomy with its sharp views of the cosmos, and nearly twice as wide as the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), which is being readied for its …