Following up on a 2007 world record for the fastest transistor speed, Northrop Grumman announced today that it has shattered the world record for integrated circuit performance, nearing one terahertz. More »
Technology – Terahertz – Physics – Electromagnetism – Terahertz radiation
Scientists have already created mini-cyborgs out of living cells and semiconductor materials, but now biological cells can also contain tiny silicon chips, which could become sensors that monitor microscopic activities, deliver drugs to target cells or even repair cell structures. More »
Human skin is apparently a very energy-efficient conduit for transmitting data. A recent experiment achieved a rate of 10Mbps, which may put my Internet connection to shame. The experiment used small, flexible electrodes and took place at Korea University. More »
Johnny Cash can’t have known about carbon nanotubes when he sang about rings of fire, but MIT scientists have shown how they can create electrical current—about 100 times as much energy per unit of weight as lithium-ion batteries.
The new experiments involved nanotubes, or submicroscopic structures just a few billionths of a meter in diameter, that can conduct both electricity and heat. Engineers coated the nanotubes with reactive fuel that produces heat by decomposing, and then ignited it with laser beams or high-voltage sparks.
That set off a fast-moving heat wave that traveled through the nanotube’s hollow cylinder 10,000 times faster than in the reactive fuel itself, and reached a temperature of 4,940 degrees F (3,000 Kelvin). The fast-moving heat also pushed electrons along the tube and created a noticeable electrical current.
Such combustion waves were studied mathematically for a century, according to Michael Strano, a chemical engineer at MIT. Strano first predicted that a nanotube or nanowire could channel the heat pulse and create electrical current, but now his group has realized that prediction.
Some semiconductor materials can also produce an electric current when heated, but the carbon nanotube experiments defy predictions by thermoelectric calculations. Strano noted that the heat wave seemed to carry along electrons or other electrical charge carriers, not unlike how an ocean wave can pick up debris.
The possibility of creating substantial energy on such a tiny scale could lead to new ultra-small electronic devices the size of rice grains, whether for implantable medical chips or other tiny sensor applications.
Strano’s MIT group plans to continue improving the efficiency and cut back on wasted energy given off as heat and light. Strano also suggested that a different reactive fuel coating for the nanotubes might produce alternating current — an intriguing contrast to current energy-storage systems that all produce direct current.
[MIT]
It’s the bane of Web designers everywhere, and it makes most modern Websites look broken and horrible. So why are 20% of web surfers still using it?
Today was supposed to be a great day for the Web. As of March 1, 2010, Google will no longer support Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 6 browser-a decade-old dinosaur engineered to navigate the Web as it existed in the year 2000. Why would this be cause for celebration? Because IE6 is barely capable of navigating the modern Web and a total nightmare to build sites, services and applications for.
But ten years after its release, it’s still being used by an estimated 20% of surfers. And while Google’s move is one in the right direction, I’m not breaking out the whiskey and noisemakers for IE6’s funereal wake quite yet. Sadly, IE6 isn’t going away for good anytime soon.
Those unfamiliar with the Internet Explorer 6 saga might be wondering what the big deal is. How could the life or death of one browser be so critical to the future of our increasingly Internet-based lives? When compared to browsers of today, IE6 is a standards-incompliant antique. It debuted during a dark, dark period in Web history; In the summer of 2001, Microsoft had soundly beaten Netscape into submission for a 90% lock on the browser market and was in the uniquely powerful position to decide which Web standards it would ignore, which it would integrate, which it would halfway adopt and which it would simply make up. And IE6 is the bastard child of this hubris. It doesn’t behave like any other browser on the market because it doesn’t interpret Cascading Style Sheets or JavaScript according to the universal standards set by organizations like the W3C. I’ve heard of developers spending anywhere between 20% and 50% of their time on a project making a site work in Internet Explorer 6. I know of many others who simply chop out advanced features, enhanced interactivity and slick design elements altogether, just so their work doesn’t “break” in IE6.
Why do they bother? Because nearly a decade after it shipped with Windows XP, IE6 still commands a mind-blowing 20% market share for browsers, according to the most recent statistics compiled by NetMarketShare. That’s more than double the shares of Chrome and Safari combined, and just shy of Firefox’s 24% piece of the pie. And that’s only Internet Explorer 6. Combined with its better-behaving but by no means perfect descendants, IE7 and IE8, Internet Explorer as a whole owns 62% of the browser market. Now, browser market share is not an inexact science and the numbers vary widely from site to site and country to country, but you get the picture.
The longevity of IE6 is the result of a perfect storm of unfortunate factors. First among them: Microsoft’s IE division simply fell asleep. Having emerged the undisputed victor of the late ’90s browser wars, Microsoft had virtually no competitors and so no incentive to fix any of IE6’s bugs. It took Microsoft more than five years to release IE7, which was an improvement over IE6, but still a disappointment for Web designers and developers. Five years! In the five years between 2004 and 2009, Mozilla released three versions of Firefox (actually, 3.5 versions to be exact). Meanwhile, Chrome has gone through four iterations in just over a year. In those five years between IE6 and IE7, technological progress on the Web was severely hobbled to say the least. After all, who cares if Firefox can do something really cool if only a handful of users will ever see it?
But Internet Explorer 7 did eventually come out, and so did Internet Explorer 8, Firefox, Safari, Chrome and new versions of Opera. And yet, IE6 remains the second most popular browser in the world (behind IE8). What gives? The chief reason Internet Explorer 6 keeps hanging on is because people are using it at work or on work computers.
As anyone who’s ever used a computer furnished by their employer can attest, IT departments are slow to make any changes that might disrupt the delicate balance of their electronic ecosystems. And they sure as hell aren’t going to let you upgrade or install anything yourself.
Making matters worse, Internet Explorer 6 is deeply embedded in the infrastructures of countless corporations worldwide. Back when IE6 was the only game in town, businesses invested in Intranets and browser-based apps that functioned only in IE. Why bother with anything else? Five years later, of course, a lot of businesses learned the hard way that “IE-only” actually meant “IE6-only.” Oops. Now, ask yourself how much interest corporations have in re-investing more capital to fix something that, in their eyes, isn’t broken. The answer is: not much.
A recent article on Dell’s IT Expert Voice blog cited another reason your company doesn’t upgrade to IE8 or another browser: user control. Your bosses don’t want you on Facebook and YouTube, and they know that the experience of visiting these sites with IE6 will be painful enough to limit your time on them. They effectively block you without coming off as overtly Orwellian. Win win.
Finally, there are the countless folks who simply don’t know any better-a contingent I was reminded of by David Walsh, a developer for the Mootools Javascript framework (for which IE6 support remains a priority). “When it comes to Internet Explorer 6, developers ask, ‘God, why do people choose to stay with it?’” he says. “But, I like to remind them that users don’t care and shouldn’t have to care. The one example I give is my grandmother. She doesn’t know what a browser is. She just knows that when she clicks the little blue ‘e’ on her desktop she gets to see the Internet.”
It’s not just grannies, either. I was using the computer of a 30-something year-old friend recently and mentioned my surprise to see him still using IE6. He asked me why it even mattered.
If people aren’t allowed to upgrade or have no idea that they need to, then does the Google announcement inch us any closer to an IE6-free Web today than we were yesterday? “It’s an important first step that I’m quite happy about,” Walsh says. “But, I don’t think it would be wise for developers to say, ‘Well, Google is doing it so I’m going to do it too.’ I foresee at least another year or two of having to support Internet Explorer 6.”
I’m less optimistic than Walsh, and that’s thanks mostly to Microsoft’s pledge to support IE6 until April 8, 2014-the day it officially ends support for Windows XP, the OS it was bundled with. As much as it pains me, I have to give Microsoft a tiny bit of respect for doing this. Though the company wouldn’t provide comment for this story, it pointed me to a blog post explaining the method behind this madness. “Dropping support for IE6 is not an option because we committed to supporting the IE included with Windows for the lifespan of the product. We keep our commitments. Many people expect what they originally got with their operating system to keep working whatever release cadence particular subsystems have.” Microsoft is basically taking the exact opposite approach to upgrades that Apple takes, which is to upgrade quickly at the expense of its users (Snow Leopard on G5, anyone?).
For its own part, Microsoft would be happy to see you stop using IE6, too. In another blog post, the company says, “Think about what technology and the Internet were like in the year 2000 – and consider how they’ve evolved since then. In 2000, ‘phishing’ was something that happened at the lake, not online. There was no social networking, no RSS feeds, and no real blogs. It was a different time – and people’s browsing needs were different.”
The post goes on to explicitly recommend moving off of IE6. The problem is, corporate IT departments won’t do so until they absolutely must, which may be well after the April 2014 death knell sounds. If Microsoft was smart, it would actively help businesses upgrade their IE6-based systems to IE8 (and future versions). And they would do it for free.
Why? Because IE’s very survival could be at stake. If Microsoft doesn’t, then Google could certainly afford to offer similar support for companies to move their systems over to Chrome. Overnight, we could see Chrome’s market share balloon to 30% and all versions of Internet Explorer shrink to below 40%.
Walsh points out that Explorer’s market share is being further threatened by empowered Web developers and a more educated Web-going public. “There’s this assumption that people are going to go straight from Internet Explorer 6 to Internet Explorer 7 or 8,” he says. “But, the thing we have to realize is that browsers as a whole have become more popular. Five years ago, most people probably didn’t know what a browser was, but more and more they’re able to indentify them. And as Web sites drop IE6 support, developers are going to steer people toward the browsers they like. Firefox, Chrome and Safari are going to be pitched a lot more than IE and I think those browsers have a good chance at being the next step for people.”
But IE6 is something many Web developers will have to tangle with for years to come. For any Web site considering following Google unto the breach, I ask you to remember a few things. First, Google.com isn’t going to suddenly stop working for folks using IE6. By dropping support, Google is saying that future upgrades to sites and services like YouTube, Gmail and Google Docs will no longer prioritize IE6 compatibility. Second, let your user base determine your course of action. David Walsh’s blog, for example, is targeted at professional Web designers and developers. “My Website is 1% IE6,” he says. “So I don’t really care about it.” (Only 5% of PopSci users are on IE6). But, you can believe a site like the New York Times will care about IE6 until the bitter end. No matter what you do, consider this comment to one the above-mentioned Microsoft blog posts:
“I work for a large financial services company with 40,000+ employees. And yes, every desktop PC and laptop runs WinXP and IE6. More than 85% of all browsing is intranet. Basic news sites etc deliver the information without the frills. For our vendors who offer Web portals (eg home loan valuations, stationery suppliers etc) – we’ll simply dump them if we can’t access their sites after a ‘no-IE6 revamp.’”
So, there it is. Continue at your own risk. And in the meantime, IE6’s celebratory funerals might be in haste.
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As we’ve been hearing for months, 2010 is going to be a year of belt-tightening for NASA. But it still has some cool technologies on the way: inflatable space stations, research into mid-orbit refueling, and new autonomous space vehicles.
Inflatable space station modules rank high on NASA’s wish list for an important reason: they’re cheap. However, don’t let the price fool you. Despite costing less, the modules can be larger than current models for the same weight, provide just as much protection, and even be tested with the currently deployed ISS. Plus, private sector companies have already started developing the technology.
NASA also wants to automate many of the tasks currently performed by humans, essentially replacing the Space Shuttle with unmanned autonomous spacecraft. This new budget dedicates money for a remote rendezvous and docking system, as well as an autonomous precision landing and hazard avoidance system.
And, like every American who’s getting hit at the gas pump, NASA wants to spend less on fuel. In the new budget, they approach that problem in two ways. The first is by paying for the development of an in-orbit refueling system. This could significantly increase the lifespan of currently existing satellites, and save NASA the time and money required to launch a new mission every time something runs out of gas. Additionally, NASA is allocating more funds to programs that would make fuel out of materials already found on the Moon and Mars. By only having to bring half the fuel for the trip, and gassing up with material found at the destination, NASA hopes to significantly cut the cost of interplanetary exploration.
The new budget contains a number of other interesting programs, some of which seem like reactions to the new age of lower cash flow, and others that appear to signal a true coming of age in automation technology. Either way, it’s as interesting as any 517-page government report can be.
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If bacteria settle in between your teeth and form a cavity, your dentist must drill through your tooth just to get at it. But now dentists can trade their drills for a simple treatment that stops early-stage cavities.
The Icon system lets dentists halt decay between teeth. Usually when a dentist spots an early cavity-when bacteria have eaten away enough tooth such that it’s a weak lattice but hasn’t yet degraded into a true cavity’s sinkhole-he prescribes an enamel-strengthening fluoride rinse and hopes the tooth heals itself. If that doesn’t work, the only option is drilling through healthy tooth to get to the problem spot.
Icon, developed by dental-materials manufacturer DMG, does away with both the drill and the waiting time. A dentist simply slides a thin plastic applicator between the patient’s teeth and squirts the cavity with hydrochloric acid, which etches away the enamel to access the tooth’s deeper layers. Using a fresh applicator, he then injects a low-viscosity resin into the gaps in the tooth’s lattice and hardens the resin with a quick flash of high-energy blue light to fortify the tooth.
DMG is working on a version that could hold up to the wear and tear of a tooth’s chewing surfaces, which company president George Wolfe hopes to have ready in a year. The sooner the better, he says: “One of my greatest fears is having to hold down my scared kid for a filling. Hopefully, I’ll never have to.”
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What’s cooler than a hover-capable, electric-powered, super-quiet personal VTOL (vertical takeoff and landing) aircraft? If you answered “absolutely nothing,” do read on, because NASA is preparing to oblige you.
The space agency’s Puffin aircraft design will be officially unveiled tomorrow, showing just how far personal, electrically propelled flight could change the ways we live and get around.
The Puffin is something of a personal V-22 Osprey, complete with vertical-takeoff and landing capability (but minus the squad of Marines). But rather than tilting the rotors forward for horizontal flight, the whole craft — cockpit and all — pitches forward, meaning the pilot flies from a prone position. During takeoff and landing the tail splits into four legs that serve as landing gear, and flaps on the wings deploy to keep the aircraft stable as it lifts and descends.
Don’t let the cuddly name fool you; as far as specs are concerned the Puffin is no slouch. Its 12-feet height and 13.5-feet wingspan mean it’s big, but of manageable stature. In theory it can cruise at 150 miles per hour and sprint at more like 300 miles per hour. Since the craft is electrically propelled it doesn’t need air intake, so thinning air is not a limitation, meaning it can reach — again, in theory — 30,000 feet before limitations on battery power force it to descend (clearly the pilot would need a pressurized cabin or oxygen tanks at that altitude, but we’re just talking raw physical capability here).
The Puffin’s range would be the most limiting characteristic, at just 50 miles, but that’s simply a matter of battery density. Batteries are growing more dense by the day, so in coming years that range could be drastically improved.
Of course, the Puffin is so far just a cool digital rendering in a NASA-branded video, but let’s not forget exactly who put men on the moon before we call the concept unfeasible. The coolest thing about the Puffin design is that it shows just how electric flight could revolutionize personal transportation. Aside from the military applications (super-stealthy troop insertions with very low thermal signatures?) the quiet, uncomplicated, low-powered electric lift — just 60 horsepower gets pilot and craft airborne — shows how a world in which everyday folks get around modern cities via personal aircraft may not be as sci-fi as was once thought.
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The People’s Republic has unveiled more details on its quest to phase U.S.-made processors from its microchip diet. China’s next supercomputer will run purely on Chinese processors, possibly before the end of this year.
China has been developing its own CPUs at the state-run Institute of Computing Technology (ICT) for several years, but iterations of its chip – known as Loongson or “Dragon Core” – have been incapable of breaking into the elite ranks of supercomputing. China’s last supercomputer, the Dawning 5000a, was intended to run on Loongson processors, but was eventually constructed around AMD processors when the ICT couldn’t deliver a powerful enough chip quickly enough.
The Loongson 3, under development since 2001, should change all this if the ICT can deliver on its promise. Based on the MIPS architecture, the chips theoretically can be strung in 16-core clusters to perform at extremely high speeds, possibly hitting the petaflop performance mark with just 782 16-core chips. That’s one quadrillion operations per second, for those of you keeping score.
Right now, of course, this is all on paper (well, a quad-core chip is in prototype, but the proposed 16-core bad boy is still under development). But authorities in the supercomputing field seem to agree that the chips, running in clusters, can hit the performance marks necessary to create a top-tier supercomputer. This isn’t the first time the Chinese have promised a home-grown high-performance supercomputer, but for the first time it looks like they are going to deliver.
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LCDs, make way for LPDs. Xconomy reports on a California startup’s new laser phosphor displays (LPDs) that use just 25 percent of the electricity required by today’s liquid-crystal displays (LCD) or LEDs.
LPD screens can supposedly come in any size or shape, including square tiles and long, thin ribbon bands. That would allow the lights of Times Square or Tokyo to spread across many more cities and towns. Casinos and stadiums would remain shiny beacons, but train stations, shopping malls, airports, financial exchanges and even churches could also join in the lighting blitz.
The company Prysm has remained fairly tight-lipped about LPD technology, but the basic idea comes from eliminating the expensive layer of transistors that help drive each pixel of an LCD screen in HDTVs, computer monitors or smart phones. Instead, LPDs use a laser that blinks on and off precisely as it sweeps across a pattern of phosphor stripes — not unlike older cathode ray tubes (CRTs) that use an electron beam to activate a field of electro-sensitive phosphors. And rather than the magnets used in CRTs, rotating “scanning mirrors” direct the highly efficient laser beam within an LPD screen.
A first generation of LPD screens may cost more than LCD or LED screens, but Prysm envisions savings from lower power usage, as well as the lack of lamps that could go bust and require replacement. The company also says that LPDs have higher resolution, don’t suffer from motion blur, and can be seen from wider angles than the usual displays. Once LPD production has scaled up, costs may drop low enough for common usage within computers and smart phones.
Prysm first plans to target larger displays that can factor in savings from long-term operations. So keep your eyes peeled next time you go walking around the bright lights of a big city. [Xconomy]
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With perennial foe Pakistan always teetering on the brink of political collapse and neighboring superpower China taking strides into space technology, India has announced that it is developing an exo-atmospheric “kill vehicle” that will knock enemy satellites out of orbit.
The program was proudly announced as part of India’s ballistic missile defense program, a division of India’s Ministry of Defense. However, in a briefing last week defense officials admitted lots of work on the project is yet to be done. Like, almost all of it. The kill vehicle (read: missile of some kind) will be guided by a laser, which will lock onto the offending satellite and keep the kill vehicle on a solid interception course. Neither the laser nor the kill vehicle actually exists yet, but be forewarned: India will put a dent in your space capabilities at a time and place as yet undetermined.
Of course, India isn’t the first state to dabble in space-based defenses or satellite-slaying technologies. Ronald Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative — the now infamous “Star Wars” — proposed to arm a series of ground- and space-based stations with interceptor missiles (for defensive purposes only, of course). In 2007 China brazenly launched a ground-based missile into the atmosphere to demonstrate its ability to destroy satellites, creating a mess of orbital debris when it blew apart an aging weather satellite. The U.S. also used a ship-based missile to incinerate one of its own spy satellites in 2008, as its decaying orbit was threatening to send it crashing down to Earth with toxic materials on board.
So exactly whose satellites might India be protecting herself from? Pakistan, India’s most reliable nemesis, isn’t exactly running a robust space program. More likely the world’s largest democracy is a bit wary of the world’s largest military-minded single-party ruled “republic” right across the Himalayan range. Whatever the reasoning, putting weapons in space has never been a popular topic in the international community; we likely haven’t heard the last word on this. [Space]
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Bacteria naturally turn carbon dioxide into methane gas over billions of years. Now Japanese researchers want to give that process a speed boost, to help counter global warming and create some much-needed natural gas.
Agence France-Presse reports that Japan hopes to reduce the transformation period from billions to about 100 years.
The researchers at the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology plan to develop a method within five years for speeding up the bacterial transformation. Their target: produce methane gas from carbon dioxide buried about 6,600 feet (2,000 m) beneath the sea bed, just off the northern tip of Japan’s main island.
Many nations have already built massive carbon sequestration plants that can store carbon dioxide underground, as part of a worldwide effort to curb greenhouse gas emissions. And some researchers have experimented with synthetic trees that can soak up carbon even better than the real things.
Few would probably complain if the Japanese can pull off this neat trick and produce some natural gas in the bargain. But we’ll keep our fingers crossed that the new super-strain of bacteria doesn’t cause any unforeseen consequences.
[via Agence France-Presse]
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Microwaves can transform a frozen pizza into hot, melted goodness in four minutes flat, but they can’t rescue your melted ice-cream sundae. Or can they?
To cook food, a microwave oven converts voltage into high-frequency electromagnetic microwaves. The molecules in food-especially water and fat-absorb this energy and wiggle at high speeds, causing them to heat rapidly and warm the surrounding food. Although quickly turning leftovers cold would be handy, this is a one-way operation, explains David Pozar, a professor and microwave expert at the University of Massachusetts. Microwaves can only speed up atoms, not slow them down.
Scientists do have a high-tech method for slowing atoms, however: lasers. Shoot a moving atom with a laser, and it will absorb the laser’s photons and re-emit them every which way, causing the atom to hold nearly still. Placing an atom at the junction of multiple beams can slow its momentum in all directions, decreasing its energy and cooling it.
This drops an atom’s temperature a couple hundred degrees Fahrenheit-much colder than anything you’d want to put in your mouth-in less than a second. But because it works most efficiently on low-density gases of atoms of a single element, physicist Mark Raizen of the University of Texas doesn’t think it will be useful for cooling food anytime soon: “Not unless you can subsist on a thousand sodium atoms.”
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