A contest to build a robot that can operate autonomously in urban warfare conditions, moving in and out of buildings to search and destroy targets like a human soldier, was launched in Singapore on Tuesday. Defence Science and Technology Agency (DSTA) is offering one million Singapore dollars ($652,000) to whoever develops a robot that completes …
Fuel cells have been made efficient for small machines like lawnmowers. Many standard fuel cell designs use electronics to control power output, but such designs require complex systems to manage humidity and fuel recovery and recycling systems to achieve acceptable efficiency. The new process controls the hydrogen feed to match the required power output, just …
Better uses for the conservative estimate of the Iraq War 1.2 trillion Currently the war is not buying much. A shift should be made to a lower cost approach. Just engage enough to prevent safe havens for terrorists. Redeploy to borders. Occasional sweeps through different cities. Reduce the objectives. Shore up allies Kuwait, Israel, Turkey, …
An 8 megajoule railgun is working This could lead to higher velocity and longer range weapons. Key to practicality is power generation and storage like superconducting engines or nuclear power. A powerful pulse generator is used for this railgun. The prototype fired at Dahlgren is only an 8-megajoule electromagnetic device, but the one to be …
The World Health Organization (WHO) says 3 million people are killed worldwide by outdoor air pollution annually from vehicles and industrial emissions, and 1.6 million indoors through using solid fuel. Most are in poor countries. One study says 7-20% of cancers are attributable to poor air and pollution in homes and workplaces. Wikipedia discusses air …
EU’s energy and climate plan has a 20% carbon reduction target by 2020. The plan has three main areas a truly free internal energy market, where users have their choice of suppliers among all European suppliers; an accelerated shift to low-carbon energy, by increasing the share of renewable sources in the energy mix to 20% …
DNA computers are likely more than a decade away so they will not be used and minimally useful. The performance will probably not be more than traditional computers of that time and for massively parallel comparison searches it will be faster to use quantum computers. Analog Quantum computers should start to see introduction in 2007 …
‘Top-10’ forecast list released today by Elie K. Track, Ph.D., senior partner, HYPRES Inc., a leading developer of superconducting microelectronics technology. 1. Lab demonstrations that can lead to an advanced, low-cost MRI machine that leverages superconducting technology. Ultimately, this will make it easier and cheaper to screen for many serious medical conditions, such as breast …
An article from the New York Times about the UN report on global wealth distribution A lot of focus has been on how much is owned by the top tier. (40% by the top 1% and 50% by the top 2%, 85% from the top 10%) I think it is more important to note how …