The Wall Street Journal 2008 Technology Innovation Awards Some of the winners have been covered on this site. Nanocomp Technologies, maker of large sheets of carbon nanotubes won in the materials category. India’s Tata which makes the Tata Nano car won in the transportation category Brian WangBrian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a …
UCLA researchers developed a method of placing graphite oxide paper in a solution of pure hydrazine (a chemical compound of nitrogen and hydrogen), which reduces the graphite oxide paper into single-layer graphene. This is the first reported instance of using hydrazine as the solvent. The graphene produced from the hydrazine solution is also a more …
The Sonic RAREFACTION WAVE GUN (RAVEN) is a Projectile Launch Method that achieves:– Unprecedented Reductions in Recoil Impulse. It can shoot faster, cooler and can be lighter than a current gun while packing the same punch or more. The latest raven gun will be shown at the 26th Army Science conference Dec 1-4, 2008 in …
The uranium mining forecast was from the Uranium 2008 report (joint report of the IAEA and OECD). The forecast and expected mine openings are on page 48, 49 of the report. Anticipated New Mines 2007 China Qinlong 100tU/year Kazakhstan Appack LLP-West Mynkuduk 1,000 tU/year in 2010 Kazakhstan Karatau LLP-Budennovskoye 1,000 tU/year in 2009 South Africa …
Rodney Brooks, co-founder and CTO of iRobot, is leaving his iRobot post to found his own robotics company, Heartland Robotics. Heartland Robotics, based in Cambridge, Mass., will focus on the manufacture of industrial worker robots. “I want to effect a powerful evolution in the world’s labor markets, and my current focus is to develop low-cost …
The Bussard fusion design, also known as inertial electrostatic confinement or Polywell fusion, has completed the WB7 test which was a replication of the promising WB6 test which was showing a breakthrough in low-cost fusion power. The results of the first-phase test are now being reviewed by the funders and experts in the fusion energy …
China has recently completed a factory to build modules for AP1000 nuclear reactors. The 71000 square meter factory was completed in 11 months and can build the parts for two AP1000 reactors each year. China is wanting 100 Westinghouse AP1000 reactors to be built or being built by 2020. Now a similar factory will be …
The US Department of Energy (DoE) is planning to build a very high temperature gas-cooled reactor (VHTR) at Idaho National Laboratory, with the prime objective of supplying heat at about 900°C. This heat could be used to generate electricity, or for other industrial processes such as hydrogen production or water desalination at a neighbouring facility. …
An circuit that uses excitons for computing flashes light as the particles decay to release photons. Credit: Leonid Butov/UCSD Particles called excitons that emit a flash of light as they decay could be used for a new form of computing better suited to fast communication, physicists at UC San Diego have demonstrated. Switching times on …
China is looking at increasing the number of nuclear plants built by 2020. Cao Shudong, director of system engineering with the China Atomic Energy Agency, said that although the country’s 40,000-MW nuclear capacity target only covers projects located on the eastern and southern coast, ‘from the point of view of economic development, interior provinces and …