Technology

In the age of the petabyte, we all need help digesting and understanding massive amounts of information. In this month’s Physics World, a series of features celebrates the ascendance of visual methods that are being used to make meaning of the mountains of scientific data.
Scientific visualizations can play a key role in fundamental physics, particularly [...]

Research into the development of invisibility devices has spurred two physicists’ thought on the behaviour of light to overcome the seemingly intractable problem of optical singularities which could soon lead to the manufacturing of a perfect cat’s eye.
A research paper published in a New Journal of Physics’ focus issue ‘Cloaking and Transformation Optics’ called ‘The [...]

Researchers from IBM and Purdue University have discovered that tiny structures called silicon nanowires might be ideal for manufacturing in future computers and consumer electronics because they form the same way every time.
The researchers used an instrument called a transmission electron microscope to watch how nanowires made of silicon “nucleate,” or begin to form, before [...]

Headphones for MP3 players placed within an inch of pacemakers and implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICDs) may interfere with these devices, according to research presented at the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions 2008.
View the video news release here.
Researchers investigated the effects of MP3 player headphones, most of which contain the magnetic substance neodymium, on the operation [...]

In this information age, increased storage capacity is a central challenge for science and technology. A team of German and Italian researchers has pursued this by exploring the concept of “nanostructured storage domains.” As the scientists, led by Massimiliano Cavallini at the National Research Council (CNR) in Bologna (Italy) and Mario Ruben at the Forschungszentrum [...]

The world record bid again teams Andy, the current record holder and first man to drive a supersonic vehicle on land with Head of the Design Team and former world record holder Richard Noble. It is aiming to develop the first land speed vehicle that breaks the 1,000 mph barrier and will have its design [...]

What stands a better chance of surviving 50 years from now: a framed photograph or a 10-megabyte digital photo file on your computer’s hard drive?
The framed photograph will inevitably fade and yellow over time, but the digital photo file may be unreadable to future computers — an unintended consequence of our rapidly digitizing world that [...]

A new research field called transformation optics may usher in a host of radical advances including a cloak of invisibility and ultra-powerful microscopes and computers by harnessing nanotechnology and “metamaterials.”
The field, which applies mathematical principles similar to those in Einstein’s theory of general relativity, will be described in an article to be published Friday (Oct. [...]

A terahertz version of the single-pixel camera developed by Rice University researchers could lead to breakthrough technologies in security, telecom, signal processing and medicine.
The research, recently published online in Applied Physics Letters, describes a way to replace the expensive, multipixel sensor arrays used in current terahertz imaging systems with a single sensor.
Two keys to the [...]

A pair of Penn State researchers has developed a statistical approach, called Automatic Linguistic Indexing of Pictures in Real-Time (ALIPR), that one day could make it easier to search the Internet for photographs. The public can participate in improving ALIPR’s accuracy by visiting a designated Web site, uploading photographs, and evaluating whether the keywords that [...]

Boston University’s College of Engineering is a partner launching a major program, under a National Science Foundation grant, to develop the next generation of wireless communications technology based on visible light instead of radio waves. Researchers expect to piggyback data communications capabilities on low-power light emitting diodes, or LEDs, to create “Smart Lighting” that would [...]

This week undergraduate and graduate students in an advanced computer security course at Rice University in Houston are learning hands-on just how easy it is to wreak havoc on computer software used in today’s voting machines.
As part of his advanced computer science class, Rice University Associate Professor and Director of Rice’s Computer Security Lab Dan [...]

A groundbreaking poll finds that almost half of U.S. adults have heard nothing about nanotechnology, and nearly nine in 10 Americans say they have heard just a little or nothing at all about the emerging field of synthetic biology, according to a new report released by the Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies (PEN) and Peter D. [...]

Smaller. Faster. More efficient. These are the qualities that drive science and industry to create new nanoscale structures that will help to speed up computers.
Scientists at the University of California, Santa Barbara have made a major contribution to this field by designing a new nanotechnology that will ultimately help make computers smaller, faster, and more [...]

Research at Purdue University suggests synthetic carbon molecules called fullerenes, or buckyballs, have a high potential of being accumulated in animal tissue, but the molecules also appear to break down in sunlight, perhaps reducing their possible environmental dangers.
Buckyballs may see widespread use in future products and applications, from drug-delivery vehicles for cancer therapy to ultrahard [...]

Schools are set for a Star Trek make-over thanks to the development of the world’s first interactive classroom by experts at Durham University.
Researchers at the Technology-Enhanced Learning Research Group (TEL) are designing new learning environments using interactive multi-touch desks that look and act like a large version of an Apple iPhone.
Click here to see how [...]

A team of researchers at Michigan Technological University is harnessing the computing muscle behind the leading video games to understand the most intricate of real-life systems.
Led by Roshan D’Souza, the group has supercharged agent-based modeling, a powerful but computationally massive forecasting technique, by using graphic processing units (GPUs), which drive the spectacular imagery beloved of [...]

It’s an archetypal exchange in musical performance. A vocalist stands poised to perform. The guitarist alongside is ready to add depth and harmony to the melody.
The guitarist doesn’t know the song but "hum a few bars and I’ll fake it," she tells the singer. "Could you do it in the style of Radiohead?" asks the [...]

The next major advance in computer processors will likely be the move from today’s two-dimensional chips to three-dimensional circuits, and the first three-dimensional synchronization circuitry is now running at 1.4 gigahertz at the University of Rochester.
Unlike past attempts at 3-D chips, the Rochester chip is not simply a number of regular processors stacked on top [...]

Technologies used today by companies, such as Direct TV, Iridium Satellite, Bluetooth, and Globalstar, are based on satellite communications efforts started at Virginia Tech four decades ago in its Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE).
Beginning with their first NASA-funded project in 1971 and continuing through the 1990s, ECE Professors Charles Bostian and Warren [...]