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The End of the Battery – Getting All Charged Up over Supercapacitors

“‘Is this for real?’ Doug was referring to an article in the recent issue of Nature Communications on a novel way to mass-produce so-called superconductors on the super-cheap – using no more equipment than the average home CD/DVD burner. Hacked together by a group of research scientists at UCLA, the ingenious technique is a way of producing layers of microscopically nuanced lattices called graphene, an essential component of many superconductor designs. It holds the promise of rapidly dropping prices for what was until now a very expensive process.” Continue reading →

Hacking an Airplane With Only an Android Phone

“So it looks like someone could hack a jetliner. With an Android smartphone. Awesome. At the Hack In The Box conference in Amsterdam, security consultant Hugo Teso demonstrated PlaneSploit, an app he developed that can take control of certain systems aboard an airplane and cause it to change direction or just crash itself into the ground. Hugo’s no terrorist, mind you. He developed the app to point out the glaring, frightening, insane security holes in most planes’ onboard flight systems. His demonstration was done in a simulated environment, but the methods and effects, he says, are exactly the same as what could happen with a real plane.” Continue reading →

Biofuel breakthrough turns virtually any plant into hydrogen

“Researchers at Virginia Tech announced Thursday that their latest breakthrough in hydrogen extraction technology could lead to widespread adoption of the substance as a fuel due to its ease of availability in virtually all plant matter, a reservoir previously impossible to tap. The new process uses a cocktail of 13 enzymes to strip plant matter of xylose, a sugar that exists in plant cells. The resulting hydrogen is of an such a ‘high purity’ that researchers said they were able to approach 100 percent extraction, opening up a potential market for a much cheaper source of hydrogen than anything available today.” Continue reading →

Scientists use 3D printer to make tissue-like material

“British scientists have used a custom-made 3D printer to make living tissue-like material that could one day serve medical purposes, according to findings released Thursday.
The material is made up of thousands of connected water droplets, encapsulated within lipid films, that can carry out some of the functions of human cells. These ‘droplet networks’ could be the building blocks of a new technology used to pass on drugs and, down the road, could even replace damaged tissue, said a statement from Oxford University, where the scientists are based. Their findings were published in Friday’s issue of the US journal Science.” Continue reading →

Scientists used modified T-cells to wipe out childhood leukemia in a little girl

“US researchers on Monday reported encouraging success with a new type of immune cell therapy that wiped out leukemia in a young girl by using her own modified T cells to fight the cancer. The case study of Emily ‘Emma’ Whitehead, age 7, offers hope for a new path against a stubborn form of leukemia, known as acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), maybe even replacing the need for chemotherapy and bone marrow transplants someday. An attempt at T cell reprogramming in another child who did not survive pointed to the need for more research to improve on the therapies being tested.” Continue reading →

NASA slams spending cuts that put Earth at risk of undetected killer asteroids

“A trio of experts testified before the House Science Committee of the U.S. Congress on Tuesday and warned that the detection and early warning of approaching Near Earth Objects (NEOs) and other threats from space is imperiled by current political wrangling over the national budget. Holdren, Shelton and Bolden emphasized that while odds of a devastating strike from an object from space are small, the consequences could be enormous. While dozens of objects a meter or more in size strike the Earth’s atmosphere every year, most burn up harmlessly in the upper limits of the stratosphere.” Continue reading →

White House confirms NASA plan to ‘lasso’ and bring asteroid near Earth

“President Barack Obama’s administration will seek $100 million in funding for a mission to tow an asteroid closer to Earth for the purpose of helping future expeditions to Mars. NASA’s mission proposal, adapted from a scenario (PDF) designed by the Keck Institute for Space Studies, calls for a robotic probe to grab an asteroid measuring approximately 500 tons and 25 to 35 feet in width in 2019 and bringing it into orbit near the moon, which would shorten future asteroid expeditions by months, on top of providing access to the asteroid’s natural resources.” Continue reading →

PC Shipments Post the Steepest Decline Ever in a Single Quarter

“Worldwide PC shipments totaled 76.3 million units in the first quarter of 2013 (1Q13), down -13.9% compared to the same quarter in 2012 and worse than the forecast decline of -7.7%, according to the International Data Corporation. The extent of the year-on-year contraction marked the worst quarter since IDC began tracking the PC market quarterly in 1994. The results also marked the fourth consecutive quarter of year-on-year shipment declines. Despite some mild improvement in the economic environment and some new PC models offering Windows 8, PC shipments were down significantly across all regions compared to a year ago.” Continue reading →