… on a Renault F1 V10 engine.

Crazy.

An interesting spin on the burgeoning invisibility cloak tech.

From the link:

In a twist on the concept of an invisibility cloak, researchers have designed a material that not only makes an object invisible, but also generates one or more virtual images in its place. Because it doesn’t simply display the background environment to a viewer, this kind of optical device could have applications that go beyond a normal invisibility cloak. Plus, unlike previously proposed illusion devices, the design proposed here could be realized with artificial metamaterials.

The team of engineers, Wei Xiang Jiang, Hui Feng Ma, Qiang Cheng, and Tie Jun Cui from Southeast University in Nanjing, China, describes the recently developed class of optical transformation media as “illusion media.” As they explain in a new study, any object enclosed by such an illusion medium layer appears to be one or more other objects. The researchers’ proposed device is designed to operate at microwave frequencies.

“The illusion media make an enclosed object appear like another object or multiple virtual objects,” Cui told PhysOrg.com. “Hence it can be applied to confuse the detectors or the viewers, and the detectors or the viewers can’t perceive the real object. As a result, the enclosed object will be protected.”

Illusion media can transform a real image into a virtual image. For example, a golden apple (the actual object) enclosed within the illusion medium layer appears as two green apples (the illusion) to any viewer outside the virtual boundary (dashed curves). Image credit: Jiang, et al.

The latest news in one of the two areas — cost in this case — solar needs to continue to see improvement for widespread use.

From the link:

A simple chemical treatment could replace expensive antireflective solar cell coatings, bringing down the cost of crystalline silicon panels. The treatment, a one-step dip in a chemical bath, creates a highly antireflective layer of black silicon on the surface of silicon wafers, and it would cost just pennies per watt, say researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). They’ve used it to create black silicon solar cells that match the efficiency of conventional silicon cells on the market.

Solar goes black: These two solar cells were fabricated on a silicon wafer treated to create an antireflective black silicon surface. The silvery areas around the cells are a different color because the highly absorbent black layer has been etched away.
Credit: Hao-Chih Yuan

This post is the third in an ongoing series highlighting the artists behind the SculptCAD Rapid Artists Project. (Hit this link for all posts related to the project.)

David W Van Ness is a Richardson, Texas-based artist and is a sculptor/educator whose work deals primarily with a surreal world developing after the fall of a civilization. David’s civilization, unlike ours, can manipulate nature to their whim. He’s the son of a very successful mathematician and was obsessed with myth, monsters, and science fiction as a child.

How did you get involved with the RAPID Artists project?

Since 2006 I have been working with SculptCAD on and off on several different projects.  Nancy came to me early and asked about people I thought she should include.  Though none of my suggestions were included, I was.

Is this your first experience with 3D/digital sculpting technology and tools?

No, SculptCAD first did work for me on my stacking cow project in 2006.

How have these technologies changed the way you approach your process?

The ability to test a design out and change it without much demand has been nice, but also a problem when the computer crashes amid working.   Just means I do the work again but this time more direct and succinct.

Are these digital tools having an effect on the work you are creating? Are the tools aiding/adding to/hindering the process?

Not really.  I have been able to realize a project that I was working out in my head.  I did have a little learning curve but now I think of them just like any tool.

What are your thoughts on the SculptCAD Rapid Artists Project?

It has been fun and interesting to see the other artists’ creations.  I have been thinking about computer aided design for a long time and see now that I was rather limited in my vision

Looking beyond the project, what do you have coming up in the near future art-wise? Do you have any shows or projects planned?

I am giving a lecture at the conference and at Boise State University on this subject.  I have yet to build much work this year beyond the RapidArtist piece.  I did have one show earlier this year at Mary Thomas Gallery.  I am working on new work for a show there as well.  My galleries in Santa Fe and Denver are more salon type ond don’t have “shows”

How can people interested in your work get in touch with you?

www.davidvanness.com

dave.vanness (at) gmail.com

Do you have any final thoughts on the Rapid Artists Project?

I hope we can reproduce this experience again, with more and different artists. I know this means that I might not be able to participate next time but I think it would be interesting to see what develops

The whole story is full of twists, turns and more than a little Kabuki theater (yeah, I know Kabuki isn’t Chinese).

Here’s the latest:

The Chinese government apparently slowed access to Google (GOOG) Web sites earlier this week, as the search giant last night backed off earlier statements that access to the site was blocked by changes Google made to the engine’s search parameters.

Google had disclosed early this week some users in China were unable to complete Google searches or had intermittent trouble accessing any of Google’s Chinese-language sites.

That disclosure prompted some immediate speculation that China was blocking access to the sites because of Google’s decision to stop censoring search results in the country.

The speculation abated yesterday afternoon when Google announced that it had accidentally caused the blockage itself.

A spokeswoman told Computerworld then that access to the Chinese site, now run out of Hong Kong, was blocked because its programmers had added a series of letters — gs_rfai — to the Web addresses of Google search pages. The spokeswoman explained that “rfa” is associated with Radio Free Asia, a site that China has long blocked. Therefore, adding them automatically caused Google’s site to be blocked there.

Now, Google says that something in China’s Internet filter, or “great firewall,” caused the site to be blocked.

Is anyone there? Hello …

No April Fool joke with the blogging blackout this week. Just more outside projects than usual coupled with an electrical problem (now fixed) at the home office. Should be rolling as usual soon.

Sands of time, twists of the wheel, etc. etc. …

From the link:

China’s Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co. bought Volvo cars from Ford Motor Co. on Sunday for $1.8 billion, a landmark agreement designed to elevate the Chinese company’s profile onto the global automotive stage.

Geely’s acquisition of Volvo offers the latest illustration of how China’s economic rise is reshaping large swaths of global business, as its huge market and increasingly powerful companies play a growing role in industries from cars to natural resources to telecommunications equipment. The Volvo deal, which comes after China surpassed the U.S. last year as the biggest auto market, puts a Chinese company for the first time in charge of a major global car brand.

A very interesting release:

Safer nuclear reactors could result from Los Alamos research

‘Loading-unloading’ effect of grain boundaries key to repair of irradiated metal

Self-repairing materials within nuclear reactors may one day become a reality as a result of research by Los Alamos National Laboratory scientists.

In a paper appearing today in the journal Science, Los Alamos researchers report a surprising mechanism that allows nanocrystalline materials to heal themselves after suffering radiation-induced damage. Nanocrystalline materials are those created from nanosized particles, in this case copper particles. A single nanosized particle—called a grain—is the size of a virus or even smaller. Nanocrystalline materials consist of a mixture of grains and the interface between those grains, called grain boundaries.

When designing nuclear reactors or the materials that go into them, one of the key challenges is finding materials that can withstand an outrageously extreme environment. In addition to constant bombardment by radiation, reactor materials may be subjected to extremes in temperature, physical stress, and corrosive conditions. Exposure to high radiation alone produces significant damage at the nanoscale.

Radiation can cause individual atoms or groups of atoms to be jarred out of place. Each vagrant atom becomes known as an interstitial. The empty space left behind by the displaced atom is known as a vacancy. Consequently, every interstitial created also creates one vacancy. As these defects—the interstitials and vacancies—build up over time in a material, effects such as swelling, hardening or embrittlement can manifest in the material and lead to catastrophic failure.

Therefore, designing materials that can withstand radiation-induced damage is very important for improving the reliability, safety and lifespan of nuclear energy systems.

Because nanocrystalline materials contain a large fraction of grain boundaries—which are thought to act as sinks that absorb and remove defects—scientists have expected that these materials should be more radiation tolerant than their larger-grain counterparts. Nevertheless, the ability to predict the performance of nanocrystalline materials in extreme environments has been severely lacking because specific details of what occurs within solids are very complex and difficult to visualize.

Recent computer simulations by the Los Alamos researchers help explain some of those details.

In the Science paper, the researchers describe the never-before-observed phenomenon of a “loading-unloading” effect at grain boundaries in nanocrystalline materials. This loading-unloading effect allows for effective self-healing of radiation-induced defects. Using three different computer simulation methods, the researchers looked at the interaction between defects and grain boundaries on time scales ranging from picoseconds to microseconds (one-trillionth of a second to one-millionth of a second).

On the shorter timescales, radiation-damaged materials underwent a “loading” process at the grain boundaries, in which interstitial atoms became trapped—or loaded—into the grain boundary. Under these conditions, the subsequent number of accumulated vacancies in the bulk material occurred in amounts much greater than would have occurred in bulk materials in which a boundary didn’t exist. After trapping interstitials, the grain boundary later “unloaded” interstitials back into vacancies near the grain boundary. In so doing, the process annihilates both types of defects—healing the material.

This unloading process was totally unexpected because grain boundaries traditionally have been regarded as places that accumulate interstitials, but not as places that release them. Although researchers found that some energy is required for this newly-discovered recombination method to operate, the amount of energy was much lower than the energies required to operate conventional mechanisms—providing an explanation and mechanism for enhanced self-healing of radiation-induced damage.

Modeling of the “loading-unloading” role of grain boundaries helps explain previously observed counterintuitive behavior of irradiated nanocrystalline materials compared to their larger-grained counterparts. The insight provided by this work provides new avenues for further examination of the role of grain boundaries and engineered material interfaces in self-healing of radiation-induced defects. Such efforts could eventually assist or accelerate the design of highly radiation-tolerant materials for the next generation of nuclear energy applications.

###

The Los Alamos National Laboratory research team includes: Xian-Ming Bai, Richard G. Hoagland and Blas P. Uberuaga of the Materials Science and Technology Division; Arthur F. Voter, of the Theoretical Division; and Michael Nastasi of the Materials Physics and Applications Division.

The work was primarily sponsored by the Los Alamos Laboratory-Directed Research and Development (LDRD) program, which, at the discretion of the Laboratory Director, invests a small percentage of the Laboratory’s budget in high-risk, potentially high-payoff projects to help position the Laboratory to anticipate and prepare for emerging national security challenges. The research also received specific funding through the Center for Materials under Irradiation and Mechanical Extremes, an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences.

About Los Alamos National Laboratory (www.lanl.gov)

Los Alamos National Laboratory, a multidisciplinary research institution engaged in strategic science on behalf of national security, is operated by Los Alamos National Security, LLC, a team composed of Bechtel National, the University of California, The Babcock & Wilcox Company, and URS for the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration.

Los Alamos enhances national security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile, developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons of mass destruction, and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health, and global security concerns.

… as a scientific discipline? Couldn’t say, but studies like this don’t help the argument.

The release:

Is it really bipolar disorder?

New study finds widely used screening scale misidentifies borderline personality disorder as bipolar disorder

PROVIDENCE, RI – A study from Rhode Island Hospital has shown that a widely-used screening tool for bipolar disorder may incorrectly indicate borderline personality disorder rather than bipolar disorder. In the article that appears online ahead of print in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, the researchers question the effectiveness of the Mood Disorder Questionnaire (MDQ).

The MDQ is the most widely-used and studied screening tool for bipolar disorder. It is a brief questionnaire that assesses whether a patient displays some of the characteristic behaviors of bipolar disorder. It can be administered by clinicians or taken by patients on their own to determine if they screen positively for bipolar disorder. For the purposes of this study, the MDQ was scored by researchers.

Bipolar and borderline personality disorders share some clinical features, including fluctuations in mood and impulsive actions. The treatments, however, will vary depending on the individual and the diagnosis. Principal investigator Mark Zimmerman, MD, director of outpatient psychiatry at Rhode Island Hospital, conducted a study to test the accuracy of the MDQ.

The research team interviewed nearly 500 patients using the Structured Clinical Interview for Diagnostic Statistical Manual IV (DSM-IV) and the Structured Interview for DSM-IV for personality disorders. The patients were also asked to complete the MDQ. The research team then scored the questionnaires and found that patients with a positive indication for bipolar disorder using the MDQ were as likely to be diagnosed with borderline personality disorder as bipolar disorder when using the structured clinical interview. Further, their findings indicate that borderline personality disorder was four times more frequently diagnosed in the group who screened positive on the MDQ.

Zimmerman says that these findings raise caution for using the MDQ in clinical practice because of how differently the disorders are treated. “An incorrect diagnosis of bipolar disorder will usually lead to a treatment involving medications. If a patient truly has bipolar disorder, that treatment may work. However, at this time there are no approved medications to treat borderline personality disorder.

“Without an accurate diagnosis of borderline personality disorder, we may have many people in treatment who are taking medications that will not work to alleviate the characteristics of the condition from which they really suffer.” Zimmerman, who is also an associate professor of psychiatry and human behavior at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, continues, “In addition, patients with unrecognized borderline personality disorder will not be treated with one of the effective psychotherapies for this condition. It is therefore vital that we develop or identify a more accurate method to distinguish between these two conditions, and adopt it into clinical practice.”

###

About Rhode Island Hospital:

Founded in 1863, Rhode Island Hospital in Providence, RI, is a private, not-for-profit hospital and is the largest teaching hospital of The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University. A major trauma center for southeastern New England, the hospital is dedicated to being on the cutting edge of medicine and research. Rhode Island Hospital receives nearly $50 million each year in external research funding. For more information on Rhode Island Hospital, visit www.rhodeislandhospital.org.

Jon Chait nails it.

From the link:

The psychology of victory and defeat is a remarkable thing. A week ago, the Democrats were perceived to have an enormous political problem. Their agenda was stalled in Congress. There was a mass groundswell of public anger they had to contend with.

Suddenly those problems have been flipped on their head. Now Democrats don’t have a problem because they can’t pass anything, Republicans have a problem because they’re obstructing everything. Whereas right-wing grassroots activism represented a public backlash against the Democrats, it’s now seen as an extremist element that discredits the GOP. Political reporters are starting to construct a seamless narrative connecting the over-the-top rhetoric from GOP and conservative leaders, the unusual acts of obstructionism and legislative retribution (like canceling unrelated hearings as revenge for health care reform), and sporadic vandalism and threats of violence. For example, see Dana Milbank’s column today.

With health care over and done Congress is already looking to boost an ailing Main Street.

From the link:

The House approved 246-178 a bill designed to boost investment in small businesses, which have been reluctant to take on new workers as the economy recovers from the worst recession in 70 years.

The bill would also expand subsidies for state and local construction bonds in an effort to bring down the 9.7 percent unemployment rate ahead of the November congressional elections.

Democrats noted that the popular Build America bond-subsidy program has funded $78 billion in state and local construction projects.

“It’s been an effective tool in job creation,” said the bill’s author, Ways and Means Committee Chairman Sander Levin.

Of course all this liquidity was wrung out of Main Street and the lifeblood of the economy — the workforce.

From the link:

The brutal recession has left many American families, small businesses and state and local governments in financial ruin or teetering on the brink.

But it’s a much different story for the nation’s biggest companies. Many have emerged from the economy’s harrowing downturn loaded with cash, thanks to deep cost-cutting that helped drive unemployment into double digits.

And although the banking crisis starved countless entrepreneurs for money last year, credit was never scarce for business titans.

News straight from the source:

More than 180 Local IRS Offices Open this Saturday to Help Taxpayers

IR-2010-36, March 24, 2010 WASHINGTON — The IRS announced today that Internal Revenue Service offices will be open, nationwide, on Saturday, March 27 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., local time to help taxpayers. The location of participating offices is listed on IRS.gov. “We are holding these special open houses to give taxpayers who are struggling in these difficult economic times more opportunity to work directly with IRS employees to resolve their tax issues,” said IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman.  “We will host more than 180 open houses this Saturday.” During the expanded open-house hours on Saturday, taxpayers will be able to address economic hardship issues, make payment arrangements or get help claiming any of the special tax breaks in last year’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, including the: Homebuyer tax credit – a refundable credit equal to 10 percent of the purchase price up to a maximum of $8,000 ($4,000 if married filing separately). A first-time homebuyer is an individual who, with his or her spouse if married, has not owned any other principal residence for three years prior to the date of purchase of the new principal residence for which the credit is being claimed. American Opportunity Credit — a federal education credit to offset part of the cost of college under the new American Opportunity Credit. This credit modifies the existing Hope credit for tax years 2009 and 2010, making it available to a broader range of taxpayers. Income guidelines are expanded and required course materials are added to the list of qualified expenses. Many of those eligible will qualify for the maximum annual credit of $2,500 per student. Making Work Pay credit — In 2009 and 2010, the Making Work Pay provision of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act will provide a refundable tax credit of up to $400 for working individuals and up to $800 for married taxpayers filing joint returns. Expanded Earned Income Tax Credit – there is now a new tax classification for EITC recipients who have three or more children and a higher credit amount – up to $5,657 In addition to IRS help, community organizations partner with the IRS. Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) programs assist people who earned $49,000 or less and Tax Counseling for the Elderly (TCE) programs assist individuals 60 and over with their 2009 income tax return preparation and electronic filing.   Many of these sites have Saturday hours while others offer assistance at various times during the week.  To locate the partner sites in this area call 1-800-906-9887. In addition to the open houses this Saturday, the IRS will open many of its offices on three additional Saturdays in the spring and early summer.

And seems to be for very good reason — the program just didn’t even come close to delivering on alleviating Main Street pain, and to make matters worse for homeowners in need of relief the Treasury Department still claims offering to help with a troubled mortgage counts as a success. Yes, the government is trying to say starting the process is just the same as actually following through and helping someone stay in their home. What a mess.

From the link:

The Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program said the Treasury Department set targets that weren’t “meaningful,” mismanaged the implementation of the program, and now risks a substantial number of “re-defaults,” with many participants ultimately losing their homes anyway.

The administration’s $75 billion loan modification program may help as little as 1.5 to 2 million people, about half the number Obama said it would when he first unveiled the program in February 2009, the inspector general, Neil Barofsky, wrote in a report.

Recently, Treasury Department officials have come under fire for saying the initial goal applied only to offering trial modifications, as opposed to permanent help.

“Continuing to frame HAMP’s success around the number of “offers” extended is simply not sufficient,” Barofsky wrote, referring to the Home Affordable Modification Program.

… a good move? Looks like at least some analysts think it’ll help Google’s image.

From the link:

People using Google.cn are now redirected to Google.com.hk, where they are given uncensored search results in simplified Chinese. Google is running Google.com.hk off of servers located in Hong Kong.

“Google made a smart move,” said Augie Ray, an analyst at Forrester. “Rather than unilaterally pulling out, they took an action that puts the ball back into China’s court.”

“While Google feels redirecting Chinese users to their Hong Kong site and search results is ‘entirely legal’, it seems unlikely the Chinese government will see this as anything other than an attempt to bypass their laws and direction. Given the impasse that Google and China came to on the issue of censorship, this move by Google seems a little less brave than inevitable,” Ray said.

Google had taken its lumps for agreeing earlier to follow Chinese law and censor search results in China . That wasn’t a popular move with critics in the West.

Monday’s move, however, may go a long way to cleaning some of that tarnish off its image. “Google is generating a great deal of press for taking on an issue that many in the U.S. care deeply about,” Ray said.

This can only mean advances in production and manufacturing coupled with a likely cost reduction. A win for the field since GE is going to bring to bear its corporate might on process improvements.

From the link:

GE has confirmed long-standing speculation that it plans to make thin-film solar panels that use a cadmium- and tellurium-based semiconductor to capture light and convert it into electricity. The GE move could put pressure on the only major cadmium-telluride solar-panel maker, Tempe, AZ-based First Solar, which could drive down prices for solar panels.

Last year, GE seemed to be getting out of the solar industry as it sold off crystalline-silicon solar-panel factories it had acquired in 2004. The company found that the market for such solar panels–which account for most of the solar panels sold worldwide–was too competitive for a relative newcomer, says Danielle Merfeld, GE’s solar technology platform leader.

I actually caught the original gallery show at Barry Whistler last fall and it was pretty cool. Of course I have a decent eight-track collection including Kiss, Elvis, Johnny Cash, Wild Cherry (of “Play that funky music white boy” fame) and more. Sadly, I do not own a working eight track player right now.

Congrats, Bucks, on the latest show/temporary museum, the WSJ feature and best of luck with the permanent eight track museum.

From the link:

Last fall, more than 200 people crammed into one of this city’s premier contemporary art galleries for a three-day show. The white walls, accustomed to paintings that sell for thousands of dollars, were home to less rarified fare.

The show? Eight Track Tapes: The Bucks Burnett Collection. “It was packed,” says gallery owner Barry Whistler.

Presiding over the affair was James “Bucks” Burnett, a portly fellow with long gray hair and a white beard. He wore a tailored brown suit covered with images from the album cover of Led Zeppelin’s 1973 Houses of the Holy. Strangers showed up offering boxes of eight tracks, which Mr. Burnett happily pawed through, plucking out dusty rarities and putting them on display.

The positive response “led me to think maybe I’m not insane,” says Mr. Burnett. But it also helped him realize that a brief gallery show simply can’t contain his vision for the hard plastic tapes, one of the clunkiest and most short-lived music formats of all time.

He wants to open an eight-track museum. “There are only two choices. A world with an eight-track museum and a world without an eight-track museum,” he says. “I choose with.”

I’m honestly shocked, particularly that the vote was so one-sided — 28-4.

From the link:

The NFL owners voted to change an element in the overtime rule, giving the team that loses the coin toss at the start of overtime to get a possession if the coin-toss winning team scores a field goal with the first possession.

The proposal passed 28-4. As it is written, the rules change applies just for the postseason, but the owners also decided to discuss adopting the changes for the regular season at their next meeting, in May in Dallas.

The Buffalo Bills, Minnesota Vikings, Baltimore Ravens and Cincinnati Bengals voted against the proposal.

The competition committee recommended the change in a vote of 6-2, and commissioner Roger Goodell supported the plan. He was able to secure enough votes to get the proposal passed on Tuesday, a day before the expected Wednesday vote.

The reason for the change was the increased accuracy of kickers since 1993. In 1994, the NFL moved kickoffs from the 35 to the 30, which created better field position for the teams that won the coin toss and received the kickoffs.

Statistics examined by the committee showed that since 1994, teams winning the coin toss win the game 59.8 percent of the time. The team that loses the toss wins the game 38.5 percent in that 15-year span.

Love it, hate it or maybe just sick of hearing about it, this bill will pass today. Obama essentially staked his entire presidency on health care reform this past week, so there’s no shock this thing is going to become a law. Next stop Obama’s desk, and then on to SCOTUS?

Should have taken that $100 bet at Thanksgiving …