Net Pioneer Wants New Internet

by Mark Baard Wired News, 29 Jun 2005 One of the fathers of the internet wants to be a daddy again. David Clark, who led the development of the internet in the 1970s, is working with the National Science Foundation on a plan for a whole new infrastructure to replace today's global network. The NSF aims to put out a request for proposals in the fall for plans and designs that could lead to what Clark called a "clean slate" internet architecture. Those designs, Clark said, could be tested on the National LambdaRail, the nationwide optical network that researchers are using to experiment with new networking technologies and applications. Read more

Fluctuating Magnetic Moments in Liquid Metals

by Mark Patty, Keary Schoen, & Wouter Montfrooij arXiv.org e-Print archive, 23 Jun 2005 We re-analyze literature data on neutron scattering by liquid metals to show that non-magnetic liquid metals possess a magnetic moment that fluctuates on a picosecond time scale. This time scale follows the motion of the cage-diffusion process in which an ion rattles around in the cage formed by its neighbors. We find that these fluctuating magnetic moments are present in liquid Hg, Al, Ga and Pb, and possibly also in the alkali metals. Read more

New Robots Help Patients Walk, Touch, Feel

PhysOrg, 29 Jun 2005 A 500-pound robot that follows a stroke patient down a hallway and catches him when he falls. A machine that suspends a gunshot wound victim over a treadmill and teaches her legs how to walk again. A virtual reality game that helps people with Parkinson's disease grasp coffee cups. These were just some of the new medical tools on display at a conference on rehabilitation robotics in Chicago this week. Read more

Smart Traffic Forecast Offers Seven-Day Predictions

by Duncan Graham-Rowe NewScientist.com, 29 Jun 2005 A traffic forecasting system capable of predicting traffic conditions seven days in advance will go live to the public in California on Wednesday. The system, called Beat-the-Traffic, is the first public traffic forecasting system that combines real-time traffic density and speed with historical trends on major routes. Read more

Vesicle-Based Rechargeable Batteries

by I. Stanish et al. Advanced Materials, 25 Apr 2005 Researchers from the Naval Research Laboratory, Nova Research and the University of Maryland, US, say they have made the first vesicle-based rechargeable battery. Based on a biological design, the battery could find applications in nanoscale devices such as sensors, biomolecular motors and molecular electronics. Read more

Researchers Create First Nanofluidic Transistor

University of California - Berkeley Press Release, 29 Jun 2005 University of California, Berkeley, researchers have invented a variation on the standard electronic transistor, creating the first "nanofluidic" transistor that allows them to control the movement of ions through sub-microscopic, water-filled channels. The researchers -- a chemist and a mechanical engineer -- predict that, just as the electronic transistor became the main component of microprocessors and integrated circuits, so will nanofluidic transistors anchor molecular processors, allowing microscopic chemical plants on a chip that operate without moving parts. Read more

Sunshine Mapping from Space Means Brighter Solar Energy Future

European Space Agency Press Release, 29 Jun 2005 How sunny is it outside right now -- not just locally but all across Europe and Africa? Answering this question is at the heart of many weather-related business activities: solar power and the wider energy sector, architecture and construction, tourism, even health care. Read more

Vehicle with the Highest Fuel Efficiency Sets New World Record

PhysOrg, 28 Jun 2005 ETH Zurich set itself a goal to construct a vehicle that used as little fuel as possible and provided the highest possible fuel efficiency. So they gave the so-called PAC-Car a fuel cell that produces electrical energy from hydrogen and drives two electric motors. The only "emission" from PAC-Car is pure water. The car is lightweight, weighing in at only about 30 kilograms. Read more

Controllable High-Speed Rotation of Nanowires

by D. L. Fan et al. Physical Review Letters, 24 Jun 2005 We report a versatile method for executing controllable high-speed rotation of nanowires by ac voltages applied to multiple electrodes. The rotation of the nanowires can be instantly switched on or off with precisely controlled rotation speed (to at least 1800 rpm), definite chirality, and total angle of rotation. We have determined the torque due to the fluidic drag force on nanowire of different lengths. We also demonstrate a micromotor using a rotating nanowire driving a dust particle into circular motion. This method has been used to rotate magnetic and nonmagnetic nanowires as well as carbon nanotubes. Read more

New Hybrid May Curb Trucks' Thirst

by Bradley Berman New York Times, 27 Jun 2005 For all the hoopla over hybrids, sales of the high-efficiency gas-electric vehicles in the United States are still just a small slice -- about 1 percent -- of the new-car market. Until recently, hybrid vehicles, too, were small. But a growing stream of sport utilities and midsize sedans with hybrid powertrains is changing that profile. Read more

Tiny Brush Cleans Up the Nano World

by Duncan Graham-Rowe New Scientist, 18 Jun 2005 How do you clean up nanoparticles? Obviously, you sweep them up with a nanobrush. Fabricated from millions of carbon nanotubes and resembling a tiny toothbrush, a nanobrush has been made that can clean very small surfaces and paint the inside of capillary tubes that are thinner than a human hair. Read more

New Calculator Makes Solving Tricky Sums Easy

by Duncan Graham-Rowe NewScientist.com, 27 Jun 2005 A novel calculator interface makes solving tricky sums easy, as users can simply write them onto a screen and then watch the answer appear. The device could easily be incorporated into stylus-controlled handheld computer and its inventors say it reduces the number of errors that users make. Read more

Space Station Gets HAL-Like Computer

by Maggie McKee NewScientist.com, 27 Jun 2005 A voice-operated computer assistant is set to be used in space for the first time on Monday -- its operators hope it proves more reliable than "HAL", the treacherous speaking computer in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. Called Clarissa, the program will initially talk astronauts on the International Space Station through tests of onboard water supplies. But its developers hope it will eventually be used for all computer-related work on the station. Read more

Quantum Computer Springs a Leak

by Mark Buchanan NewScientist.com, 26 Jun 2005 Attempts to build quantum computers could run up against a fundamental limit on how long useful information can persist inside them. Exceed the limit and information could just leak away, making computation impossible. Read more

Nanorods Produce More Heat Than Light

by Philip Ball Nature Materials Update, 23 Jun 2005 By absorbing visible light, rod-shaped gold nanoparticles can raise their local temperature by many tens of degrees. Chris Wang and colleagues at National Chung Cheng University in Chia-Yi, Taiwan, have found that the effect is much stronger for nanorods than for the nanospheres investigated previously. They say that the effect could be exploited for detection of biomolecules and for other sensors, and in contrast agents for optoacoustic biomedical imaging. Read more

US Technology Center to Combat Blackouts with SiC

Compound Semiconductor News, 21 Jun 2005 The National Center for Reliable Electrical Power will develop solid-state electronics based on SiC to avert serious blackouts of the US power grid. Engineers at the University of Arkansas have received $1 million from the US government to help set up a technology center that will develop SiC chips to upgrade the country’s electrical power grid. Read more

DOE Regulations to Accelerate Solid-State Lighting

Compound Semiconductor News, 28 Jun 2005 Intellectual property legislation signed by the Department of Energy should accelerate the market introduction of solid-state lighting technology in the US. LED development in the US has received a boost through legislation introduced by the Department of Energy. The changes will allow industry to benefit from breakthroughs made in solid-state lighting research at both academic institutions and small businesses. Read more

Smart Eyewear for Keen Swimmers

BBC News, 28 Jun 2005 Smart goggles that help swimmers log lengths have been designed by a UK engineering student. The Inview goggles display a lap count and time elapsed on their lenses so swimmers can track their progress. Invented by industrial design student Katie Williams, the goggles use an in-built compass to spot when swimmers complete lengths. Read more

Appliances Wipe Out Blackouts

by John Gartner Wired News, 22 Jun 2005 If someday your TV stays on during a heat wave, you may have your dryer and dishwasher to thank. The Department of Energy is developing technologies to avert electrical grid failures such as the blackout of August 2003, including household appliances that temporarily reduce their power consumption. The devices switch off when they detect a power disruption on the electricity grid. Energy officials say the devices could save consumers billions of dollars by reducing the need to build new power stations. Read more

Roomba Tweak for Neat Freaks

by Mark Baard Wired News, 24 Jun 2005 Clean freaks can now wake to dust-free floors, thanks to an enhancement to the Roomba robot vacuum that starts the little picker-upper while owners are sleeping or away from home. The Roomba Scheduler is a remote control for programming the vacuum to run at any time, any day of the week. Read more

Arranging Matter by Magnetic Nanoparticle Assemblers

by Benjamin B. Yellen, Ondrej Hovorka, & Gary Friedman Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 21 Jun 2005 We introduce a method for transporting colloidal particles, large molecules, cells, and other materials across surfaces and for assembling them into highly regular patterns. In this method, nonmagnetic materials are manipulated by a fluid dispersion of magnetic nanoparticles. Manipulation of materials is guided by a program of magnetic information stored in a substrate. Dynamic control over the motion of nonmagnetic particles can be achieved by reprogramming the substrate magnetization on the fly. The unexpectedly large degree of control over particle motion can be used to manipulate large ensembles of particles in parallel, potentially with local control over particle trajectory. Read more

The Turbulent Wall Jet: A Triple-Layered Structure and Incomplete Similarity

by G. I. Barenblatt, A. J. Chorin, & V. M. Prostokishin Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 21 Jun 2005 We demonstrate using the high-quality experimental data that turbulent wall jet flows consist of two self-similar layers: a top layer and a wall layer, separated by a mixing layer where the velocity is close to maximum. The top and wall layers are significantly different from each other, and both exhibit incomplete similarity, i.e., a strong influence of the width of the slot that had previously been neglected. Read more

Vibrational Inelastic Scattering Effects in Molecular Electronics

by H. Ness & A. J. Fisher Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 21 Jun 2005 We describe how to treat the interaction of traveling electrons with localized vibrational modes in nanojunctions. We present a multichannel scattering technique, which can be applied to calculate the transport properties for realistic systems, and we show how it is related to other methods that are useful in particular cases. We apply our technique to describe recent experiments on the conductance through molecular junctions. Read more

A Single-Molecule Diode

by Mark Elbing et al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 21 Jun 2005 We have designed and synthesized a molecular rod that consists of two weakly coupled electronic {pi}-systems with mutually shifted energy levels. The asymmetry thus implied manifests itself in a current -- voltage characteristic with pronounced dependence on the sign of the bias voltage, which makes the molecule a prototype for a molecular diode. The individual molecules were immobilized by sulfur -- gold bonds between both electrodes of a mechanically controlled break junction, and their electronic transport properties have been investigated. The results indeed show diode-like current -- voltage characteristics. In contrast to that, control experiments with symmetric molecular rods consisting of two identical {pi}-systems did not show significant asymmetries in the transport properties. To investigate the underlying transport mechanism, phenomenological arguments are combined with calculations based on density functional theory. The theoretical analysis suggests that the bias dependence of the polarizability of the molecule feeds back into the current leading to an asymmetric shape of the current-voltage characteristics, similar to the phenomena in a semiconductor diode. Read more

Molecular Electronics: Some Views on Transport Junctions and Beyond

by Christian Joachim & Mark A. Ratner Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 21 Jun 2005 The field of molecular electronics comprises a fundamental set of issues concerning the electronic response of molecules as parts of a mesoscopic structure and a technology-facing area of science. We will overview some important aspects of these subfields. The most advanced ideas in the field involve the use of molecules as individual logic or memory units and are broadly based on using the quantum state space of the molecule. Current work in molecular electronics usually addresses molecular junction transport, where the molecule acts as a barrier for incoming electrons: This is the fundamental Landauer idea of "conduction as scattering" generalized to molecular junction structures. Another point of view in terms of superexchange as a guiding mechanism for coherent electron transfer through the molecular bridge is discussed. Molecules generally exhibit relatively strong vibronic coupling. The last section of this overview focuses on vibronic effects, including inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy, hysteresis in junction charge transport, and negative differential resistance in molecular transport junctions. Read more

Inscription of Optical Waveguides in Crystalline Silicon by Mid-Infrared Femtosecond Laser Pulses

by Amir H. Nejadmalayeri & Peter R. Herman Optics Letters, 1 May 2005 For the first time to the authors’ knowledge, optical waveguides have been inscribed in bulk crystalline silicon by ultrafast laser radiation. Femtosecond laser pulses of 40-nm spectral bandwidth, 1-kHz repetition rate, and 1.7-µJ on-target energy were applied at a mid-infrared wavelength of 2.4 µm to induce nonlinear absorption in the focal volume of the beam. By scanning the laser beam with respect to the sample, buried optical waveguides have been created that were single mode at 1550 and 1320 nm and guided light only with its polarization perpendicular to the sample’s surface. Propagation losses with an upper limit of 1.2 dB/cm or less were observed throughout the optical telecommunications band. Read more

Robo-Pups Created with Curiosity in Mind

by Will Knight NewScientist.com, 22 Jun 2005 A litter of robotic puppies exhibiting a form of artificial curiosity is being put through kindergarten at Sony's research and development lab in Paris, France. The Aibo pups display an innate artificial curiosity similar to that seen in baby animals. They slowly learn to explore the surrounding world, before playing with toys and trying to communicate with other Aibo dogs. Read more

Nano-Levers Point to Futuristic Gadgets

by Will Knight NewScientist.com, 24 Jun 2005 Billions of tiny mechanical levers could be used to store songs on future MP3 players and pictures on digital cameras. As bizarre as the idea might sound, researchers at a Dutch company have already demonstrated that miniscule mechanical switches can be used to store data using less power than existing technologies and with greater reliability. Read more

Light Shines Bright from Tiny Antenna

by Jeff Hecht New Scientist, 18 Jun 2005 Visible light should be about as compatible with nanotechnology as a sledgehammer is with a fine Swiss watch. That's because it has a wavelength of 400 to 700 nanometres, while nanotech structures are measured in tens of nanometres. Read more

Granular Matter: A Tale of Tails

by Martin van Hecke Nature, 23 Jun 2005 Granular materials such as sand can either be jammed and rigid, or yield and flow. Puzzling changes in the forces between the grains deepen the mystery surrounding this basic, but poorly understood, transition. Read more

Not-So-Deep Impact

Nature, 23 Jun 2005 Every year at the end of June, scientific publishers' eyes turn to Philadelphia, where the Institute for Scientific Information releases a snippet of data that they crave: the impact factor of each journal. In due course, bureaucrats in research agencies will roll the impact figures into their performance indicators, and those scientists who worry about such things will quietly note which journal's number wins them the most brownie points. Attempts to quantify the quality of science are always fraught with difficulty, and the journal impact factors are among the few numbers to persist. The result is an overemphasis of what is really a limited metric. Read more

Intel Says Photonics Light the Way to Faster Chips

by John G. Spooner eWeek.com, 23 Jun 2005 Intel researchers are shedding some light on a potential new application for chip photonics: upping the performance of multicore processors. The processor giant's research labs are exploring ways to use silicon photonics to replace electrical interconnects using copper wiring and simultaneously speed up vital connections that move data into and out of processors. Read more

The Evolution and Devolution of Speed Limit Law and the Effect on Fatality Rates

by Robert O. Yowell Review of Policy Research, July 2005 The three most recent decades provide an outstanding opportunity to study the changing federalist landscape concerning the regulation of speed on the nation's highways. Speed limits were the province of the states until the 1970s when, in an effort to save energy, the central government nationalized the maximum speed at 55 miles per hour. The national standard remained until the 1980s, when a partial devolution transferred some power to set speed limits back to the individual states. At that time, states could increase the maximum speed to 65 miles per hour on (at fewest) four-lane, controlled access highways in low population density areas. Some states elected to loosen the limits within their borders, while others did not, citing concerns of highway safety as paramount. The 1990s saw the complete devolution of speed limit control to the states, when Congress returned to the states unlimited control. States reacted differently in both of the two latter phases, providing a fruitful landscape for comparative analysis of the effects of the devolution of speed limit control. Read more

Teacher's Little Helpers

University of California - San Diego Press Release, 22 Jun 2005 The children hug RUBI, but she doesn't hug them back -- because as a developing humanoid robot she still can't. RUBI, a Robot Using Bayesian Inference, is the evolving creation of the Machine Perception Laboratory at the University of California, San Diego. Together with QRIO, a research platform for advanced robotic technologies developed by Sony Corporation, RUBI is attending the Early Childhood Education Center at UCSD as part of a long-term research study to investigate the uses of interactive computers in educational environments and to advance the field of real-time, social robotics. Read more

Structural Signature of Jamming in Granular Media

by Eric I. Corwin, Heinrich M. Jaeger, & Sidney R. Nagel Nature, 23 Jun 2005 Glasses are rigid, but flow when the temperature is increased. Similarly, granular materials are rigid, but become unjammed and flow if sufficient shear stress is applied. The rigid and flowing phases are strikingly different, yet measurements reveal that the structures of glass and liquid are virtually indistinguishable. It is therefore natural to ask whether there is a structural signature of the jammed granular state that distinguishes it from its flowing counterpart. Here we find evidence for such a signature, by measuring the contact-force distribution between particles during shearing. Because the forces are sensitive to minute variations in particle position, the distribution of forces can serve as a microscope with which to observe correlations in the positions of nearest neighbours. We find a qualitative change in the force distribution at the onset of jamming. If, as has been proposed, the jamming and glass transitions are related, our observation of a structural signature associated with jamming hints at the existence of a similar structural difference at the glass transition -- presumably too subtle for conventional scattering techniques to uncover. Our measurements also provide a determination of a granular temperature that is the counterpart in granular systems to the glass-transition temperature in liquids. Read more

Parking Lot Sealcoat: An Unrecognized Source of Urban Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons

by Barbara J. Mahler et al. Environmental Science and Technology, 22 Jun 2005 (web release) Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are a ubiquitous contaminant in urban environments. Although numerous sources of PAHs to urban runoff have been identified, their relative importance remains uncertain. We show that a previously unidentified source of urban PAHs, parking lot sealcoat, may dominate loading of PAHs to urban water bodies in the United States. Particles in runoff from parking lots with coal-tar emulsion sealcoat had mean concentrations of PAHs of 3500 mg/kg, 65 times higher than the mean concentration from unsealed asphalt and cement lots. Diagnostic ratios of individual PAHs indicating sources are similar for particles from coal-tar emulsion sealed lots and suspended sediment from four urban streams. Contaminant yields projected to the watershed scale for the four associated watersheds indicate that runoff from sealed parking lots could account for the majority of stream PAH loads. Read more

Contact Force Measurements and Stress-Induced Anisotropy in Granular Materials

by T. S. Majmudar & R. P. Behringer Nature, 23 Jun 2005 Interparticle forces in granular media form an inhomogeneous distribution of filamentary force chains. Understanding such forces and their spatial correlations, specifically in response to forces at the system boundaries, represents a fundamental goal of granular mechanics. The problem is of relevance to civil engineering, geophysics and physics, being important for the understanding of jamming, shear-induced yielding and mechanical response. Here we report measurements of the normal and tangential grain-scale forces inside a two-dimensional system of photoelastic disks that are subject to pure shear and isotropic compression. Various statistical measures show the underlying differences between these two stress states. These differences appear in the distributions of normal forces (which are more rounded for compression than shear), although not in the distributions of tangential forces (which are exponential in both cases). Sheared systems show anisotropy in the distributions of both the contact network and the contact forces. Anisotropy also occurs in the spatial correlations of forces, which provide a quantitative replacement for the idea of force chains. Sheared systems have long-range correlations in the direction of force chains, whereas isotropically compressed systems have short-range correlations regardless of the direction. Read more

US Technology Center to Combat Blackouts with SiC

Compound Semiconductor News, 21 Jun 2005 The National Center for Reliable Electrical Power will develop solid-state electronics based on SiC to avert serious blackouts of the US power grid. Engineers at the University of Arkansas have received $1 million from the US government to help set up a technology center that will develop SiC chips to upgrade the country’s electrical power grid. Read more

Supercomputers Step Up the Pace

BBC News, 22 Jun 2005 A partially built supercomputer has kept its spot at the top of the list of most powerful machines on the planet. The BlueGene/L machine currently under construction at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the US was crowned top number-cruncher. Read more

Solar Sail Probe 'Probably Lost'

BBC News, 23 Jun 2005 Sponsors of an experimental spacecraft designed to use light from the Sun to power space travel have conceded that the mission is probably lost. But they said the apparent detection of signals from the craft by tracking stations remained to be explained. Read more

Cleaning the Air and Improving Health with Hydrogen Fuel-Cell Vehicles

by M. Z. Jacobson, W. G. Colella, & D. M. Golden Science, 24 Jun 2005 Converting all U.S. onroad vehicles to hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles (HFCVs) may improve air quality, health, and climate significantly, whether the hydrogen is produced by steam reforming of natural gas, wind electrolysis, or coal gasification. Most benefits would result from eliminating current vehicle exhaust. Wind and natural gas HFCVs offer the greatest potential health benefits and could save 3700 to 6400 U.S. lives annually. Wind HFCVs should benefit climate most. An all-HFCV fleet would hardly affect tropospheric water vapor concentrations. Conversion to coal HFCVs may improve health but would damage climate more than fossil/electric hybrids. The real cost of hydrogen from wind electrolysis may be below that of U.S. gasoline. Read more

Teaching Real-World Lessons

by Erica Vonderheid The Institute, 6 Jun 2005 Kevin Kornegay, an electrical and computer engineering professor, knows that for his students, there is life after school. New engineering graduates have to know how to handle the equipment used in the real world of industry, solve complex problems and, perhaps most important, as they say in elementary school, play well with others. With that in mind, Kornegay has forged a unique alliance between industry and academia for the benefit of his students. Read more

Electronic Warrior

by Harrison Donnelly Military Information Technology (online), 13 Jun 2005 Edward T. Bair is developing an integrated, netted ISR domain stretching from national agencies down to the individual soldier. Read more

Solid-State Light Sources Getting Smart

by E. Fred Schubert & Jong Kyu Kim Science, 27 May 2005 More than a century after the introduction of incandescent lighting and half a century after the introduction of fluorescent lighting, solid-state light sources are revolutionizing an increasing number of applications. Whereas the efficiency of conventional incandescent and fluorescent lights is limited by fundamental factors that cannot be overcome, the efficiency of solid-state sources is limited only by human creativity and imagination. The high efficiency of solid-state sources already provides energy savings and environmental benefits in a number of applications. However, solid-state sources also offer controllability of their spectral power distribution, spatial distribution, color temperature, temporal modulation, and polarization properties. Such "smart" light sources can adjust to specific environments and requirements, a property that could result in tremendous benefits in lighting, automobiles, transportation, communication, imaging, agriculture, and medicine. Read more

Data from Space: Adaptive Array Network Could Improve Access to NASA's Earth Observing Satellites

Georgia Tech Research News, 23 May 2005 Sophisticated signal processing techniques and simple proof-of-principle antenna arrays built from PVC pipe, aluminum foil and copper wire could revolutionize the way NASA obtains data from its Earth observing satellites. If the adaptive array system being studied by NASA and Georgia Institute of Technology researchers ultimately proves feasible, it could dramatically decrease the cost of building and maintaining ground stations, thus enabling the cost-effective construction of many more ground stations. Ultimately, that could make information from the space agency’s Earth-observing satellites more widely and rapidly available. Read more

Emergency Radio through the Rubble

by David Pescovitz TheFeature, 30 May 2005 In the midst of a massive disaster, careful coordination is essential to the rescue effort. There's simply no room for communication problems. Unfortunately, on September 11, that's exactly what emergency response crews were dealing with. It wasn't a communication problem in the psychological sense, but rather a technological one. The building blocked radio signals, preventing commanders on the outside from reaching their teams inside. Later, emergency responders wielding wireless sniffers and mobile phones did their best to locate any survivors trapped in pockets within the collapsed buildings, but the radio signals were no match for the rubble. Read more

Asymptotically Stable Running for a Five-Link, Four-Actuator, Planar Bipedal Robot

by C. Chevallereau, E.R. Westervelt, & J.W. Grizzle 4 Mar 2005 Provably asymptotically stable running gaits are developed for the five-link, four-actuator bipedal robot, RABBIT. A controller is designed so that the Poincare return map associated with periodic running gaits can be computed on the basis of a model with impulse-effects that, previously, had been used only for the design of walking gaits. This feedback design leads to the notion of a hybrid zero dynamics for running, which in turn allows the existence and stability of running gaits to be determined on the basis of a scalar map. The main results are illustrated via simulations performed on models with known parameters and on models with parameter uncertainty and structural changes. Animations of the resulting running motions are available on the web. Read the paper

Pixel Entanglement: Experimental Realization of Optically Entangled d=3 and d=6 Qudits

by Malcolm N. O'Sullivan-Hale et al. Physical Review Letters, 10 Jun 2005 We demonstrate a simple experimental method for creating entangled qudits. Using transverse-momentum and position entanglement of photons emitted in spontaneous parametric down-conversion, we show entanglement between discrete regions of space, i.e., pixels. We map each photon onto as many as six pixels, where each pixel represents one level of our qudit state. The method is easily generalizable to create even higher dimensional, entangled states. Thus, the realization of quantum information processing in arbitrarily high dimensions is possible, allowing for greatly increased information capacity. Read the article

Robo-Legs

by Michel Marriott New York Times, 20 Jun 2005 For people who see Cameron Clapp for the first time, he is an object of wonderment: a young man walking and talking tall on shiny robotic legs. Mr. Clapp lost both his legs above the knee and his right arm just short of his shoulder after falling onto train tracks almost five years ago near his home in Grover Beach, Calif. After years of rehabilitation and trying a series of prosthetics, each more technologically sophisticated than the last, he finally found his legs. Read the article

New System Integrates Landlines and Cellphones

by Duncan Graham-Rowe NewScientist.com, 15 Jun 2005 The world’s first combined phone service, which allows a single handset to switch between cellphone networks and domestic fixed-lines, was launched by BT in the UK on Wednesday. Called BT Fusion, the service means a handset works like a typical cellphone when outdoors, but automatically and seamlessly switches onto a user’s domestic account when they are home -- even in mid-call. Read the article

Solar Sail Set to Launch

by Mark Peplow news@nature, 20 Jun 2005 The revolutionary spacecraft Cosmos 1 is due to launch from a Russian submarine on Tuesday 21 June. Its designers hope that it will become the first ship propelled by nothing more than the gentle pressure of sunlight bouncing off its mirror-like sails. Read the article

Foggy Screen Points the Way

by Michael Hopkin news@nature, 10 Jun 2005 Forget plasma screens, here's one made out of nothing but water. Inventors have fashioned an interactive computer display from a curtain of fog. The FogScreen uses ceiling-mounted air jets to create a vertical, turbulence-free slice of air a few centimetres thick, into which a fine mist of water is pumped. An ordinary projector can be used to display images on the resulting wall of fog. Read the article

Engineering: Skimming the Surface

by Jacob N. Israelachvili Nature, 16 Jun 2005 What happens at the atomic and molecular level when surfaces come into contact with each other? And how do these events relate to macroscopic properties and observations? These questions, which centre on the phenomena of adhesion and friction, pose challenges not only in engineering but in many other areas of the physical and biological sciences. Read the article

Low-Temperature Physics: Tunnelling into the Chill

by Jukka Pekola Nature, 16 Jun 2005 The trend towards ever smaller electronic instruments had left refrigerators out in the cold. Now a practical, compact device uses quantum mechanical tunnelling to cool close to absolute zero. Read the article

Water-Soluble Polythiophene/Nanocrystalline TiO2 Solar Cells

by Qiquan Qiao & James T. McLeskey, Jr. Applied Physics Letters, 11 Apr 2005 We report the characteristics of polymer/nanocrystalline solar cells fabricated using an environmentally friendly water-soluble polythiophene and TiO2 in a bilayer configuration. The cells were made by dropping the polymer onto a TiO2 nanocrystalline film and then repeatedly sweeping a clean glass rod across the polymer as it dried. The devices showed an open circuit voltage of 0.81 V, a short circuit current density of 0.35 mA/cm2, a fill factor of 0.4, and an energy conversion efficiency of 0.13%. The water-soluble polythiophene showed significant photovoltaic behavior and the potential for use in solar cells. Read the article

The Breakdown of Continuum Models for Mechanical Contacts

by Binquan Luan & Mark O. Robbins Nature, 16 Jun 2005 Forces acting within the area of atomic contact between surfaces play a central role in friction and adhesion. Such forces are traditionally calculated using continuum contact mechanics, which is known to break down as the contact radius approaches atomic dimensions. Yet contact mechanics is being applied at ever smaller lengths, driven by interest in shrinking devices to nanometre scales, creating nanostructured materials with optimized mechanical properties, and understanding the molecular origins of macroscopic friction and adhesion. Here we use molecular simulations to test the limits of contact mechanics under ideal conditions. Our findings indicate that atomic discreteness within the bulk of the solids does not have a significant effect, but that the atomic-scale surface roughness that is always produced by discrete atoms leads to dramatic deviations from continuum theory. Contact areas and stresses may be changed by a factor of two, whereas friction and lateral contact stiffness change by an order of magnitude. These variations are likely to affect continuum predictions for many macroscopic rough surfaces, where studies show that the total contact area is broken up into many separate regions with very small mean radius. Read the article

Passing the Test: The Secret of Success in 10 GbE

by Erik Wendt fibers.org News, 30 May 2005 For more and more network architects, 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10 GbE) is rapidly becoming the "technology of choice" for high-bandwidth applications. In fact, any large-capacity user today is either exploiting it already, or will be doing so very soon. Clearly, the more informed those users are about 10 GbE technology, the easier it will be for them to plan, deploy and efficiently take advantage of it in the network. Read the article

Component Developers Rethink the Fundamentals

by Michael Lawton fibers.org News, 20 Jun 2005 Throughout the 1990s, the market for fibre-optic communications was driven by dramatic growth in demand for long-haul capacity -- growth that resulted in a need for components/subsystems with higher and higher serial bit rates. At the same time, the full-out commercialization of DWDM technology allowed serial capacity to be multiplied up to one hundredfold through the use of multiwavelength transmission. In turn, the roll-out of DWDM was enabled by the invention of the erbium-doped fibre amplifier, a technology that supports the amplification of multiple signals without conversion to the electrical domain, thereby allowing operators to upgrade their networks by simply installing equipment at remote terminals and not at repeater sites. The development of DWDM has led to advances in capacity such that it is now possible to support bandwidths up to 1 Tbit/s over a single fibre. The result? Raw long-haul capacity is no longer the main driver in today's optical comms market. Read the article

Imaging Spin Flows in Semiconductors Subject to Electric, Magnetic, and Strain Fields

by S. A. Crooker & D. L. Smith Physical Review Letters, 15 Jun 2005 Using scanning Kerr microscopy, we directly acquire two-dimensional images of spin-polarized electrons flowing laterally in bulk epilayers of n:GaAs. Optical injection provides a local dc source of polarized electrons, whose subsequent drift and/or diffusion is controlled with electric, magnetic, and -- in particular -- strain fields. Spin precession induced by controlled uniaxial stress along the <110> axes demonstrates the direct k-linear spin-orbit coupling of electron spin to the shear (off diagonal) components of the strain tensor. Read the article

Studies of Silicon Dihydride and Its Potential Role in Light-Induced Metastability in Hydrogenated Amorphous Silicon

by T. A. Abtew, D. A. Drabold, & P. C. Taylor Applied Physics Letters, 13 Jun 2005 Recent nuclear magnetic resonance experiments on protons in hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) have shown that light exposure leads to structures involving two protons separated by 2.3±0.2 Å. In this report, using supercell models of a-Si:H, we show that SiH2 configurations in the solid state are consistent with these observations. We find an average proton distance of 2.39 Å for SiH2 structures considered for four different configurations. We also find that the details of basis set and density functional are important for accurately representing these structures. Read the article

Physicists Clarify Exotic Force, But No 'Theory of Everything' Yet

Purdue University Press Release, 20 Jun 2005 The quest for a single theory that unites all of the universe's fundamental forces has thus far eluded physicists, but that has not stopped a team of them from clearing the way for nanotechnologists while they look for it. Press release

The Search for Semiconductor IP Intensifies

by Ron Wilson EE Times, 20 Jun 2005 Simple arithmetic can show the necessity for intellectual-property reuse in system-level chip design. A modest system-on-chip requires millions of gates. Each designer is capable of averaging perhaps a few tens of fully verified gates per day. Unless substantial portions of the chip are reused from previous designs or licensed from third parties, either the design team will grow to the Intel-esque scale or the schedule will span a geological time frame. Read the article

Process Engineers Passing the Buck to Designers over Low-k

by Ron Wilson EE Times, 20 Jun 2005 Papers and panels at the recent International Interconnect Technology Conference here showed growing fissures in the once-solid compact between the back-end-of-line process engineers who create the interconnect stacks in ICs and the chip designers who use them. Read the article

Converters Move On-Chip to Regulate SoC's Voltage

by Ron Wilson EE Times, 20 Jun 2005 While most of the attention in system-on-chip design remains focused on digital issues -- IP selection, interconnect architecture, memory generation and the like -- yet another kind of integration problem is quietly creeping up on designers, especially in compact, highly mobile applications. This one involves power -- not power reduction, but power supply. Read the article

'Teleporting' Over the Internet

BBC News, 17 Jun 2005 Computer scientists in the US are developing a system which would allow people to "teleport" a solid 3D recreation of themselves over the internet. Professors Todd Mowry and Seth Goldstein of Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania think that, within a human generation, we might be able to replicate three-dimensional objects out of a mass of material made up of small synthetic "atoms". Read the article

Vibration Engineers Feel the Rock

BBC News, 20 Jun 2005 The University of Sheffield, UK, system monitors, in real-time, the behaviour of crowds in stadiums and the vibration levels that they can produce. The system has been in place for a year in one stadium and was tested at a gig. It will help engineers collect real data for a better idea of how stadiums act under the stress of swaying people. Read the article

Quantum Interference Device Made by DNA Templating of Superconducting Nanowires

by David S. Hopkins et al. Science, 17 June 2005 The application of single molecules as templates for nanodevices is a promising direction for nanotechnology. We used a pair of suspended DNA molecules as templates for superconducting two-nanowire devices. Because the resulting wires are very thin, comparable to the DNA molecules themselves, they are susceptible to thermal fluctuations typical for one-dimensional superconductors and exhibit a nonzero resistance over a broad temperature range. We observed resistance oscillations in these two-nanowire structures that are different from the usual Little-Parks oscillations. Here, we provide a quantitative explanation for the observed quantum interference phenomenon, which takes into account strong phase gradients created in the leads by the applied magnetic field. Read the article

International Computer Science Institute

The International Computer Science Institute is an independent, nonprofit basic research institute that is affiliated with the University of California, Berkeley. The goal of the Institute is to create "synergy between world-leading researchers in computer science and engineering" by bringing together academic and industrial researchers. Its research currently focuses on Internet research, such as Internet architecture, open-source routing, and network security, as well as Human Language Technology, such as speech and text processing. A significant portion of the Institute's work is in theoretical computer science and projects are chosen for their importance and their compatibility with the strengths its researchers. This website provides links to websites detailing several programs including Algorithm Projects, AI Projects, Networking Projects, and Speech Projects. Other areas of research include a project "to support historically underrepresented ethnic minorities and women in their desire to become leaders in the fields of computer science, engineering and information technology;" the development of a Community of Practice Environment utilizing the Internet for information sharing and collaboration; and a project exploring Robust Video Compression based on Distributed Source Coding techniques. A number of publications, such as conference proceedings, academic journals, technical reports, and some books, are available to search and download free of charge. The ISCI Gazette, available in the News section, periodically features a research area. Visit the website

Engineering Conferences International

Engineering Conferences International is an electronic journal available through the Berkeley Electronic Press "to provide conference organizers with a new publication option -- a highly visible, rapidly disseminated outlet for conference materials." The ECI program sponsors interdisciplinary scientific/engineering conferences through the Engineering Conferences Foundation and Polytechnic University. They publish this series, which includes presented papers, peer-reviewed articles, and other materials (presentations, data sets, video files, etc.) that are associated with ECI conferences. Visitors can browse by year or subject and download the materials free of charge. Visit the website

NanoLink: Key Nanotechnology Sites on the Web

The NanoLink website provides links to nanotechnology resources online. The service is maintained collaboratively by Memex Research Pte Ltd and Internet Research & Development Unit (IRDU), and is hosted by SunSITE Singapore at the Computer Centre of the National University of Singapore. The listing includes websites of research groups and informational materials related to Nanotechnology and related areas, including Fullerenes and Bio-Fullerenes, Molecular Engineering, Molecular Manufacturing, Molecular Medicine, Molecular Self-Assembly, Nanobiology, Nanochemistry, Nanocomputers and Nanocomputing, Nanoelectronics, Nanofabrication, Nanomedicine, Nanophotonics, Nanophysics, Quantum Computing, Quantum Engineering, Scanning Tunnelling, and Atomic Force Microscopy. The resources range from the general overview to more detailed topics and are organized alphabetically. If the list is a bit overwhelming, the authors have identified a subset of eight resources as especially "worth reading." Visit the website

Applied and Computational Mathematics

This website from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) features "the interwoven fields of applied and computational mathematics." Highlighting the interdisciplinary nature of the field, the group's work draws on modeling, analysis, algorithm development, and simulation to address problems arising in the pure sciences and engineering. Students and faculty explore the mathematical properties of systems in physics, chemistry, biology, geology, astronomy, materials science, fluid mechanics, and other disciplines. At the time of this report, the section offering Technical Reports was still under development. However, some of the individual researchers have links to websites (within the People section) with a list of publications, some of which are available to download free of charge. Abstracts of Colloquia at Caltech also provide the visitor an overview of topics that interest this group of researchers. Visit the website

GNUplot

GNUplot is described as "a portable command-line driven interactive data and function plotting utility for UNIX, IBM OS/2, MS Windows, DOS, Macintosh, VMS, Atari and many other platforms." The software, which is copyrighted but also freely distributed, was designed to allow scientists and students to visualize mathematical functions and data. Since its development, GNUplot has also proved useful in supporting many non-interactive uses, such as Web scripting and integration as a plotting engine for third-party applications. The plots can be either 2-D or 3-D, using lines, points, boxes, contours, vector fields, surfaces, and various associated text. The current officially released version of GNUplot is available to download from this website. Also available are minimal instructions for building from CVS source, instructions for patching and building, and a demo gallery along with other documentation. Visit the website

Computer Vision Homepage

The Computer Vision Homepage, established at Carnegie Mellon University in 1994, serves as a central location for links to websites relating to computer vision research. The resources are divided into specific subpages, including Vision Groups, Hardware, Software, Demos, Test Images, Conferences, Publications, and General Info. A separate subpage also lists links to websites on related topics, such as Geographic Information Systems and Pattern Recognition. Recent additions to the website are listed in chronological order in the New Additions section. The Computer Vision Homepage is currently maintained by Daniel Huber on a volunteer basis and he invites others to contribute suggestions for websites to add to the list or to assist in updating the Homepage. Visit the website

MIT Building Technology Program

The Building Technology Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is an interdisciplinary program, bringing together researchers from the Department of Architecture, the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and the Department of Mechanical Engineering. Their projects focus on the building industry, which represents "one of the largest enterprises in the country" and innovations in building technology. This website provides links to information on several research projects, such as a project "to explore design, technology and implementation of environmentally responsive urban housing in China" and others that explore options for naturally ventilated buildings. Another project website describes recent research in Masonry Structures, while The MIT Design Advisor offers and online design tool for architects and building engineers. Visit the website

BT to Launch Fixed-Mobile Service

BBC News, 15 Jun 2005 BT Group is to launch a pioneering internet phone service that allows users to switch between mobile networks and fixed-lines using a single handset. The service, called BT Fusion, uses a specially-equipped mobile phone to access BT's fixed-line network when making calls at home or in the office. Read the article

RF and Microwave Technology Enable Networking on the Move

Military & Aerospace Electronics eNewsletter, 14 June 2005 Designers of RF and microwave technology say low power and small size remain the trend in product designs. Meanwhile, integrators adapt and combine RF and microwave technologies to enable networking on the move. Military and aerospace systems integrators that buy radio-frequency (RF) and microwave components are demanding low power, ever-smaller sizes, and increasing integration of components into products with several functions. Read the article

Chip Makers Turn to Multicore Processors

by David Geer Computer, May 2005 Computer performance has been driven largely by decreasing the size of chips while increasing the number of transistors they contain. In accordance with Moore's law, this has caused chip speeds to rise and prices to drop. This ongoing trend has driven much of the computing industry for years. However, transistors can't shrink forever. Even now, as transistor components grow thinner, chip manufacturers have struggled to cap power usage and heat generation, two critical problems. Even performance-enhancing approaches like running multiple instructions per thread have bottomed out. For these reasons, processor performance increases have begun slowing. In response, manufacturers are building chips with multiple cooler-running, more energy-efficient processing cores instead of one increasingly powerful core. Read the article

Single-Molecule Conductivity

by Mitch Jacoby Chemical & Engineering News, 6 Jun 2005 Researchers in Canada have discovered a new way to control the flow of electrical current through individual molecules. The study broadens understanding of fundamental molecular processes and may hasten development of single-molecule-based detectors and other types of molecular electronic devices. Read the article

T-Engine: Japan's Ubiquitous Computing Architecture Is Ready for Prime Time

by Jan Krikke IEEE Pervasive Computing, April-June 2005 Japan is quietly positioning itself for the next phase in digital technology: ubiquitous computing. A sign of things to come is T-Engine, arguably the most advanced ubiquitous computing platform in the world. T-Engine enables the distribution of software resources, including middleware developed on T-Kernel, its compact, real-time operating system. The platform also features standardized hardware and tamper-resistant network security. Ubiquitous computing is the third era in computing. It follows the mainframe era and the PC era. T-Engine's developers consider it the first platform to offer a complete end-to-end solution for ubiquitous computing. Read the article

Hybrid Vigor

By Cheryl Gerber Military Information Technology, 13 Jun 2005 As battlefield electronic equipment increases power demands, researchers are exploring fuel cell hybrids and other alternatives to conventional batteries. A recent Army-sponsored study released by the National Research Council, for example, recommended the use of new and hybrid energy systems to support the increasingly diverse needs of mobile warriors of the Future Force. While Land Warrior will equip future soldiers with high-tech electronics to increase awareness of the combat environment through the use of helmets with visual displays, chemical and biological sensors, radios and portable computers, the devices are not energy-efficient and will need new power sources to operate efficiently. Read the article

NASA Report Sees Potential for IP-Based Space Communications

NASA has released a report finding positive results from a demonstration of using a commercial, off-the-shelf router onboard a satellite in an effort to bring IP to space, and to further enhance military network-centric warfare capabilities. A Cisco Internet router was placed on a low earth orbit satellite in 2003, and subsequent tests showed how IP technology can be used to communicate with satellite payloads in space. The successful demonstrations prove that network centric operations using space-based assets and could easily be extended to air, ground and sea assets. In addition, NASA expects to save at least 25 percent of the cost of future spacecraft development by implementing architecture similar to the one tested with the VMOC. Read the report

New Polymer Has Applications for Dentistry, Electronics, Automobiles

PhysOrg.com, 10 Jun 2005 University of Colorado at Boulder researchers have developed a new polymer that resists cracking and shrinking, paving the way for creative breakthroughs in fields ranging from dentistry and microelectronics to the auto industry. Read the article

Quantum Cryptography Network Gets Wireless Link

by Will Knight NewScientist.com, 7 Jun 2005 The world's first quantum encryption computer network has been expanded to include a wireless link that uses quantum communications codes. Read the article

Computer Graphics Card Simulates Supernova Collapse

by Will Knight NewScientist.com, 10 Jun 2005 New software enabling scientists to perform mind-boggling mathematical calculations and see the results rendered almost instantly on their screens has been released by US researchers. The Scout programming language, developed at Los Alamos National Laboratory in California, US, lets scientists run complex calculations on a computer's graphics processing unit instead of its central processing unit (CPU). In tests, the graphics processor was able to perform certain types of calculation 12 times faster than a single CPU. Read the article

Polymorphism in AB13 Nanoparticle Superlattices: An Example of Semiconductor-Metal Metamaterials

by Elena V. Shevchenko et al. Journal of the American Chemical Society, 27 May 2005 (web release) Colloidal crystallization of nanoparticles with different functionalities into multicomponent assemblies provides a route to new classes of ordered nanocomposites with novel properties tunable by the choice of the constituent building blocks. While theories based on hard sphere approximation predict crystallization of only a few stable binary phases (NaCl-, AlB2- and NaZn13-type), we find that additional polymorphs of lower packing density are possible. We demonstrate that PbSe and Pd nanoparticles can be reproducibly crystallized into two polymorphs with AB13 stoichiometry. One polymorph is isostructural with the intermetallic compound NaZn13 and is consistent with dense packing of hard spheres driven by entropy. The second unanticipated polymorph is of lower packing density. This observation underscores the shortcomings of applying simple space-filling principles to the crystallization of organically passivated nanocrystals and further motivates the development of models that incorporate combinations of hard-sphere, van der Waals, dipolar, and hydrophobic forces. This work demonstrates that ordered periodic structures with lower packing density are achievable and provides the first example of a binary semiconductor-metal superlattice using a combination of PbSe-Pd nanocrystals. Read the article

A Thermally Self-Sustained Micro Solid-Oxide Fuel-Cell Stack with High Power Density

by Zongping Shao et al. Nature, 9 Jun 2005 High energy efficiency and energy density, together with rapid refuelling capability, render fuel cells highly attractive for portable power generation. Accordingly, polymer-electrolyte direct-methanol fuel cells are of increasing interest as possible alternatives to Li ion batteries. However, such fuel cells face several design challenges and cannot operate with hydrocarbon fuels of higher energy density. Solid-oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) enable direct use of higher hydrocarbons, but have not been seriously considered for portable applications because of thermal management difficulties at small scales, slow start-up and poor thermal cyclability. Here we demonstrate a thermally self-sustaining micro-SOFC stack with high power output and rapid start-up by using single chamber operation on propane fuel. The catalytic oxidation reactions supply sufficient thermal energy to maintain the fuel cells at 500−600 °C. A power output of approx350 mW (at 1.0 V) was obtained from a device with a total cathode area of only 1.42 cm2. Read the article

Blue Brain Boots Up to Mixed Response

by Jim Giles Nature, 9 Jun 2005 One of the boldest brain-modelling projects ever attempted is about to get under way in Switzerland. A team of neuroscientists plans to use a supercomputer to create a biologically realistic simulation of the neural circuits responsible for higher mental processes in humans and other mammals. But experts elsewhere are divided about its chances of success. Read the article

Obtaining Carbon Nanotubes from Grass

by Zhenhui Kang et al. Nanotechnology, 20 May 2005 Multi-walled carbon nanotubes can be obtained by heating grass in the presence of a suitable amount of oxygen. Grass contains a large amount of vascular bundles in the stem and nervation. The major compositions of them are cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin. In the present approach, a rapid heat treatment (at about 600 °C) and the participation of oxygen make the vascular bundles become dehydrated and turn into carbon nanotubes. The diameters of the carbon nanotubes obtained are between 30 and 50 nm. Read the article

Supramolecular Nanostamping: Using DNA as Movable Type

by A. Amy Yu et al. Nano Letters, 13 May 2005 Here we present a novel printing technique (that we call supramolecular nanostamping), based on the replication of single-stranded DNA features through a hybridization-contact-dehybridization cycle. On a surface containing features each made of single-stranded DNA molecules of known sequence, the complementary DNA molecules are hybridized, spontaneously assembling onto the original pattern due to sequence-specific interactions. These complementary DNA strands, on the end that is assembled far from the original surface, are 5' modified with chemical groups ("sticky ends") that can form bonds with a target surface that is brought into contact. Heating induces dehybridization between DNA strands, leaving the original pattern on the original surface and the copied pattern on the secondary substrate, and thus stamping. Molecular recognition provides the unique and disruptive ability of transferring large amounts of information in a single printing cycle, that is the simultaneous stamping of spatial information (i.e., the patterns) and of chemical information (i.e., the features' DNA sequence -- their chemical composition). This method combines high resolution (<40 nm) with the advantage of an exponential increase in the number of masters; in fact, any printed substrate can be reused as a master. Patterns fabricated via very different lithographic techniques can be replicated. Read the article

Engineers Design Tsunami-Resistant Houses

by Mike Kunzelman The Associated Press, 27 May 2005 Not long after the devastating December tsunami, a team of structural engineers from London visited Sri Lanka and noticed a trend as they surveyed destroyed homes: Walls facing the sea were leveled, while those perpendicular to it were standing. That inspired a group of researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University to design what they're calling a "tsunami-safe(r) house" that is less likely to collapse under wind and pounding surf. Read the article

Project Prototype

by Katrina C. Arabe Industrial Market Trends, 7 Jun 2005 Engineering students from around the country are unveiling some nifty senior projects, including devices that could ease discomfort (from a shock-absorbent walking cane to a lightweight wheelchair) or at least fix us a drink (a robotic bartender). Read the article

Newsflash: There is NO Engineering Shortage

by Katrina C. Arabe Industrial Market Trends, 7 Jun 2005 Many commentators lament that there won't be enough engineering students to fill future openings because of the profession's image problem and a declining interest in math and science. But hold up--there's something terribly wrong with that statement. Read the article

Microwave Transport in Metallic Single-Walled Carbon Nanotubes

by Z. Yu & P. J. Burke Nano Letters, 7 Jun 2005 (web release) The dynamical conductance of electrically contacted single-walled carbon nanotubes is measured from dc to 10 GHz as a function of source-drain voltage in both the low-field and high-field limits. The ac conductance of the nanotube itself is found to be equal to the dc conductance over the frequency range studied for tubes in both the ballistic and diffusive limit. This clearly demonstrates that nanotubes can carry high-frequency currents at least as well as dc currents over a wide range of operating conditions. Although a detailed theoretical explanation is still lacking, we present a phenomenological model of the ac impedance of a carbon nanotube in the presence of scattering that is consistent with these results. Read the article

Power Stations 'No Cancer Risk'

BBC News, 10 Jun 2005 There is categorically no evidence that living near nuclear power stations increases the rate of childhood cancers, says a report. The Committee on Medical Aspects of Radiation in the Environment based its conclusions on data on 32,000 childhood cancer cases from 1969-93 in the UK. Read the article

These Walls (and Teddy Bears) Have Eyes

by Michael Kanellos ZDNet News, 9 Jun 2005 Intel Research has developed the ultimate baby monitor for neurotic parents. The experimental system -- which consists of a series of sensors under the baby's mattress and a camera mounted on a wall -- will monitor a child's heart rate, temperature and movement; stream video of the infant; and even take pictures. Captured data is sent to a parent's PC. Read the article

Boards Get Brains, Chalk Vanishes

by David Cohn Wired News, 9 Jun 2005 Third graders at Columbia University's elementary school may never know the painful sound of fingernails scratching on a chalkboard. That's because the dust-covered board that normally would be the focus of their classroom has been replaced by a giant, touch-sensitive computer screen. All across the country, chalkboards are being ditched in favor of interactive, computer-driven whiteboards that allow students and teachers to share assignments, surf the web and edit video using their fingers as pens. Read the article

High-Tech Gizmos Propel Aviation into the Future

by Alan Levin USATODAY.com, posted 9 Jun 2005 The future of aviation went on display here this week, and it's not afraid to talk back to pilots. The robot copilot, which listens to voice commands and calls out warnings when pilots make mistakes, is one of dozens of high-tech innovations that seem to leap from the pages of a science-fiction novel. Read the article

Production of Liquid Alkanes by Aqueous-Phase Processing of Biomass-Derived Carbohydrates

by George W. Huber et al. Science, 3 Jun 2005 Liquid alkanes with the number of carbon atoms ranging from C7 to C15 were selectively produced from biomass-derived carbohydrates by acid-catalyzed dehydration, which was followed by aldol condensation over solid base catalysts to form large organic compounds. These molecules were then converted into alkanes by dehydration/hydrogenation over bifunctional catalysts that contained acid and metal sites in a four-phase reactor, in which the aqueous organic reactant becomes more hydrophobic and a hexadecane alkane stream removes hydrophobic species from the catalyst before they go on further to form coke. These liquid alkanes are of the appropriate molecular weight to be used as transportation fuel components, and they contain 90% of the energy of the carbohydrate and H2 feeds. Read the article

Camera Sees Behind Objects

by Kimberly Patch Technology Research News, 1-8 Jun 2005 Researchers from Stanford University and Cornell University have put together a projector-camera system that can pull off a classic magic trick: it can read a playing card that is facing away from the camera. Read the article

Enhanced: Snapshots of Crystal Growth

by Michael D. Ward Science, 10 Jun 2005 In recent years, atomic force microscopy has provided important insights into how materials crystallize. The method allows measurements to be performed under actual crystallization conditions and is particularly well suited to small-molecule or protein crystals. Ward reviews this work, which has provided support for the terrace-ledge-kink model of crystallization and promises insights into the influence of experimental condition on crystallization at the near-molecular level. A recent extension of the method enables spatial control of crystal nucleation and regulation of the crystal growth rate and may allow crystallization conditions to be optimized. Read the article

Photoinduced Plasticity in Cross-Linked Polymers

by Timothy F. Scott et al. Science, 10 Jun 2005 Chemically cross-linked polymers are inherently limited by stresses that are introduced by post-gelation volume changes during polymerization. It is also difficult to change a cross-linked polymer's shape without a corresponding loss of material properties or substantial stress development. We demonstrate a cross-linked polymer that, upon exposure to light, exhibits stress and/or strain relaxation without any concomitant change in material properties. This result is achieved by introducing radicals via photocleavage of residual photoinitiator in the polymer matrix, which then diffuse via addition-fragmentation chain transfer of midchain functional groups. These processes lead to photoinduced plasticity, actuation, and equilibrium shape changes without residual stress. Such polymeric materials are critical to the development of microdevices, biomaterials, and polymeric coatings. Read the article

Resonant Optical Antennas

by P. Mühlschlegel et al. Science, 10 Jun 2005 We have fabricated nanometer-scale gold dipole antennas designed to be resonant at optical frequencies. On resonance, strong field enhancement in the antenna feed gap leads to white-light supercontinuum generation. The antenna length at resonance is considerably shorter than one-half the wavelength of the incident light. This is in contradiction to classical antenna theory but in qualitative accordance with computer simulations that take into account the finite metallic conductivity at optical frequencies. Because optical antennas link propagating radiation and confined/enhanced optical fields, they should find applications in optical characterization, manipulation of nanostructures, and optical information processing. Read the article

Zone of Silence

by Erico Guizzo IEEE Spectrum Online, accessed 9 Jun 2005 Limor Fried got the idea when a friend with whom she was eating dinner broke off their conversation to answer her cellphone. Fried got mad. Then she got even, in the way a graduate student at the MIT Media Laboratory, very well might. She built a gadget. She calls it the Wave Bubble because it creates a cellphone-free bubble of silence 4 meters in diameter. It does so by jamming the phones' radio-frequency bands with a junk signal of a few milliwatts. Read the article

Reengineering for More Reliable Power Distribution

by Mark B. Lively IEEE-USA Today’s Engineer, May 2005 Restructuring is sweeping the electricity industry around the world, changing the role engineers must play in achieving a reliable electricity supply. Previously, engineers designed and operated “vertically” integrated systems, where the only interface was the smallish connection associated with the sale of electricity to customers. Sometimes the customer was the end user, and occasionally, a distribution utility. But, except for minor events on the other side of the meter, a single engineering group was responsible for the reliability of the vast majority of the system. Read the article

NSF Funding Opportunity - Polymers

Supports basic research and education on the materials aspects of polymer science that are largely experimental and multidisciplinary, with strong components of chemistry, physics, and materials science. The program addresses synthesis, structure, morphology, processing, characterization, and structure-property relationships of polymers at the molecular level, with particular focus on new materials or materials with superior properties. The polymers studied are principally synthetic, but there is also an interest in biopolymers. More information

DoE Funding Opportunity - Electric Transmission and Distribution

The Department of Energy Chicago Office is seeking applications to the topic areas defined herein. The topic areas of this announcement address key technical challenges and high-priority activities identified in two Multi-Year Plans for three of the operating programs within the OEDER, namely, Electric Distribution Transformation (EDT) Program, GridWise Program, and GridWorks Program. The EDT Program and GridWise Program have jointly developed the Electric Distribution Multi-Year Research, Development, Demonstration, and Deployment Technology Roadmap Plan: 2005-2009 (December 2004), and the GridWorks Program has developed its GridWorks Multi-Year Plan, March 2005. More information

Eggheads Invent Tele-Petting

by Lakshmi Sandhana Wired News, 17 May 2005 Researchers have developed a cybernetic system to allow physical interaction over the internet. The system allows touching and feeling of animals or other humans in real time, but it's first being tried out on -- chickens. Read the article

Differential Adhesion of Amino Acids to Inorganic Surfaces

by R. L. Willett et al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 31 May 2005 A fundamental, yet underexplored, materials system is the interface between biological molecules and inorganic surfaces. In an elemental approach to this problem, we have systematically examined the adhesion of amino acids to a series of inorganic surfaces including metals, insulators, and semiconductors. Significant differential adhesion is observed over the full complement of amino acids, determined largely by amino acid side-chain charge. Extensive mapping of the amino acid adhesion versus materials in multiple solutions is presented, with preliminary mechanisms derived from concentration and pH dependence. These results provide an empirical basis for building peptide to inorganic surface structures, and, using this adhesion data, we design inorganic nanostructures that are shown to selectively bind to prescribed primary peptide sequences. Read the article

Mission to Build a Simulated Brain Begins

by Duncan Graham-Rowe NewScientist.com, 6 Jun 2005 An effort to create the first computer simulation of the entire human brain, right down to the molecular level, was launched on Monday. The “Blue Brain” project, a collaboration between IBM and a Swiss university team, will involve building a custom-made supercomputer based on IBM’s Blue Gene design. The hope is that the virtual brain will help shed light on some aspects of human cognition, such as perception, memory and perhaps even consciousness. Read the article

Bridge Design Tips

The Association for Bridge Construction and Design was formed in response to "the bridge crisis" which leaves "only an extremely small percentage of bridges throughout the nation" receiving the attention they need. The goal of the Association is to educate bridge designers, constructors, federal, state, and local officials, as well as the general public in the vital role of safe bridges in our society; to improve the science of bridge design, construction and reconstruction through a professional forum; to provide technical information and assistance; and to educate and encourage public and private authorities to use new and improved techniques for testing and reconstruction. This section of the website provides a basic overview of bridge construction along with related drawings and pictures. By reading through the text and following the links, visitors are taken to a section that discusses ways to calculate the forces in your trusses and then use Java program to design trusses. Links to related articles and websites are available for further reading on the subject of bridge design. Although the website has not been updated recently, the resources are still relevant. Visit the site

Georgia Tech Strategic Energy Initiative

The Georgia Tech Strategic Energy Initiative’s mission is "to actively engage in and facilitate energy technology development, assessments, demonstration projects, and policy guidance based on scientific facts, engineering principles and economic realities." They analyze the national impact of implementing new energy system technology options in relation to the current status of world oil and gas production, which is characterized by higher and higher prices. They study new and innovative energy technologies in the transportation, building, manufacturing, and electric power sectors and work with Georgia Tech’s researchers, as well as industry and government partners, to carry out research, development, and demonstration projects. Presentations from their formal kickoff dinner and workshop provide an overview of the Initiative, while more discussion of ongoing projects are described in the Current Projects section of the website. The Energy Facts section provides information on Clean Coal, Ethanol, Fossil Fuel Resources, and Nuclear energy. They also make two Energy Briefs available to download, one on World Oil Production: Future Implications and another on Hybrid Vehicles. Visit the website

Computation Structures Group

The Computation Structures Group is part of the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Their mission is "to enable the creation and development of high-performance, reliable and secure computing systems that are easy to interact with." Their current research focuses on hardware synthesis, computer security, computer architecture and VLSI design. This well organized website provides short descriptions of the projects within each of these areas. Publications by researchers affiliated with the Computation Structures Group are also available. Visit the website

Engineering Case Studies

This website on Engineering Case Studies has been developed by Geza Kardos from the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and Neal Holtz from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada, in collaboration with the RHIT Logo Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Terre Haute, Indiana, and the American Society for Engineering Education, and the Canadian Design Engineering Network. They have gathered together a collection of information on engineering cases which provide accounts of real engineering projects. The collection of over 250 cases is intended for use in engineering education but may also be of interest to armchair engineers. Abstracts provide an overview of the case and a search function and classification system help visitors navigate the collection. They also provide an overview on how to write engineering cases, how to use engineering cases in the classroom, and "a short treatise on the use of engineering cases." Workshop notes and background on using engineering cases to introduce more design content into the engineering curriculum may also be of interest to educators. Visit the website

The Institute for the Interdisciplinary Study of Human & Machine Cognition

The Institute for the Interdisciplinary Study of Human & Machine Cognition (IHMC) is an interdisciplinary research unit of the University of West Florida. Researchers and staff at the IHMC investigate "a broad range of topics related to understanding cognition in both humans and machines with a particular emphasis on building computational tools to leverage and amplify human cognitive and perceptual capacities." Their work advances the study of human-centered computing, which takes a “systems view” to link human thought and action and technological systems. They are primarily interested in the analysis, design, and evaluation of computational aids or "cognitive prostheses." The website provides an overview of each of their current research areas, which include: knowledge modeling and sharing, adjustable autonomy, advanced interfaces and displays, communication and collaboration, computer-mediated learning systems, intelligent data understanding, software agents, expertise studies, work practice simulation, knowledge representation, and other related areas. They also provide Cmap Tools, a knowledge modeling software kit, which is free to download and "empowers users to construct, navigate, share, and criticize knowledge models represented as Concept Models." Visit the website

The Machine That Can Copy Anything

by Simon Hooper CNN.com, 2 Jun 2005 A revolutionary machine that can copy itself and manufacture everyday objects quickly and cheaply could transform industry in the developing world, according to its creator. The "self-replicating rapid prototyper," or "RepRap" is the brainchild of Dr. Adrian Bowyer, a senior lecturer in mechanical engineering at the University of Bath in the UK. Read the article

Broadband Speed to Jump 10-Fold

by Sean Michael Kerner internetnews.com, 2 Jun 2005 There was a time not so long ago when a T1 at 1.54 Mbps was enough bandwidth for almost anyone. Not anymore. The International Telecommunication Union has just ratified the VDSL2 (Very-high-bit-rate Digital Subscriber Line 2) standard, which is intended to reach downstream and upstream rates of up to 100Mbps. Read the article

DoE Funding Opportunity - Computer-Aided Design of High-Temperature Materials

The quest for high-temperature materials is one of the dominant themes in materials development for efficient energy systems. High-temperature materials are a fast-moving research area with numerous practical applications. Materials that can withstand extremely high temperatures and extreme environments are generating considerable attention worldwide; however, designing materials that have low densities, elevated melting temperatures, oxidation resistance, creep resistance, and intrinsic toughness encompass some of the most challenging problems in materials science. Traditional approaches to alloy design have involved the trial-and-error method of adding various alloying elements to the base alloy and experimentally measuring the effect. This is best demonstrated in the previous development of superalloy turbine materials, where particular alloying elements are added for their historically known effect on a particular property of the alloy. This process is not suited for true process parameter optimization, but instead only achieves a “local minimum” based on the limited phase-space explored. To overcome this limitation, and thereby lead to a better composition in a more efficient research effort, it is desirable to have a computational approach to alloy design and performance prediction. The search for high-temperature materials is largely based on traditional, trial-and-error experimental methods which are costly and time-consuming. An effective way to accelerate research in this field is to use advances in materials simulations and high performance computing and communications to guide experiments. This synergy between experiment and advanced materials modeling will significantly enhance the synthesis of novel high-temperature materials. The studies should only address materials of interest to fossil energy conversion systems. More information

DoE Funding Opportunity - Hydrogen Storage Materials

A critical need is the development of materials for hydrogen storage as a necessary precursor to the eventual implementation of the hydrogen economy. For practical transportation applications, the hydrogen storage material must function in the temperature range of 0-100°C and pressure range of 1-10 bar. The materials currently being investigated for hydrogen storage include metal organic frameworks; alloys and intermetallics; sodium and lithium alanates; nanocubes; carbon nanotubes; and other emerging materials. Grant applications are sought to develop materials that provide high hydrogen storage density and stability at commercially relevant conditions of temperature and pressure. More information

DoE Funding Opportunity - Surface Modification of Alloys for Ultrasupercritical Coal-Fired Boilers

The implementation of ultrasupercritical boilers requires materials with high-temperature creep properties and high-temperature oxidation and corrosion resistance. New ferritic, austenitic and nickel-base alloys have been designed to meet the creep resistance demands but the high operating temperature poses the risk of accelerated material degradation in various harsh environments. Both fireside corrosion and accelerated oxidation in the presence of superheated steam are of concern. More information

DoE Funding Opportunity - SOFC Sealing Materials and Systems

Solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) technology has advanced considerably under the Office of Fossil Energy Solid State Energy Conversion Alliance (SECA) Program. SOFC power generation systems are being developed to operate on syngas derived from coal in FutureGen power plants. Financial assistance applications are sought to research and develop novel glass, glass-ceramic, ceramic-filled glass composite, metal-filled glass composite and/or ceramic-filled metal composite-based seal materials and systems to address planar SOFC sealing needs. Of particular interest are novel seal concepts focusing on seal material composition and structure with an emphasis on attaining long-term durability under typical SOFC operating conditions. More information

DoD Program Announcement - Defense University Research Instrumentation Program

The Department of Defense (DoD) announces the Fiscal Year 2006 Defense University Research Instrumentation Program (DURIP), a part of the University Research Initiative. DURIP is designed to improve the capabilities of U.S. institutions of higher education to conduct research and to educate scientists and engineers in areas important to national defense, by providing funds for the acquisition of research equipment. A central purpose of the DURIP is to provide equipment to enhance research-related education. Therefore proposals must address the impact of the equipment on the institution’s ability to educate students, through research, in disciplines important to DoD missions. This announcement seeks proposals to purchase instrumentation in support of research areas of interest to the DoD, including areas of research supported by the administering agencies. More information

Spin Control

by Harold Miller, Steven Massey, & Alan Paxton oeMagazine, June/July 2005 Leaders in the defense community continue to be interested in understanding the potential of high-power lasers for military applications. The promise of light-speed, precision engagement of soft targets, along with the multitude of other possible applications enabled by alternate wavelengths, powers, and beam formats compels technologists to consider laser-based systems in their planning. Although chemical lasers have been shown to be capable of very high output powers, compact, electrically driven solid-state lasers appear to be the enabling technology for many of the envisioned scenarios. Read the article

Measurement in Micro

by Arnaud Liotard & Frederic Zamkotsian oeMagazine, June/July 2005 Micro-electromechanical systems technology is poised to play an important role in next-generation astronomy instrumentation as, for example, micro-deformable mirrors for adaptive optics and programmable slit masks for multi-object spectroscopy. The characterization of such devices is a key issue in assessing the performance of the actual components and in providing reliable inputs for our models, leading to a better design and optimization of the architectures. Optical techniques provide a means for inspecting such devices. Read the article

Research Center Unveils New Supercomputer for Physics Research

oeMagazine Newscast, 31 May 2005 A new computer -- the RIKEN BNL Research Center supercomputer -- was unveiled 26 May at a dedication ceremony at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory attended by physicists from around the world. It is called QCDOC for quantum chromodynamics on a chip, and it was designed and built by Brookhaven Lab, Columbia University, IBM, RIKEN -- The Institute of Physical and Chemical Research in Japan, and the University of Edinburgh. The computer has 10 teraflops of peak computing power, which makes it capable of performing 10 trillion arithmetic calculations per second, with sustained speeds of five teraflops. Read the article

Silicon-Based Shielding May Protect Military Electronics from EMP

by John McHale Military & Aerospace Electronics, May 2005 Electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attacks are one of the biggest threats the nation and its military face. Engineers at Transtector in Hayden, Idaho, are producing EMP shielding devices based on silicon for U.S. Department of Defense classified applications. The goal is to have every military base and C4 application shielded from EMP attacks. Read the article

Transformational Communications

by John Keller Military & Aerospace Electronics, May 2005 U.S. military leaders are moving forward with new space-based, land-based, and forward-deployed wireless tactical networks to bring Internet-like information-retrieval systems to military leaders, logistics experts, and warfighters who all seek the same goal: shared battlefield knowledge. Read the article

The Smart Phone: A First Platform for Pervasive Computing

by Gregory D. Abowd, Liviu Iftode, & Helena Mitchell Pervasive Computing, April-June 2005 One way in which the vision of ubiquitous computing has become a reality is in the ubiquity of mobile phones. Over a billion mobile phones exist today, a third of which are in China. In many Asian countries, more mobile phones are used than domestic landlines; in Singapore, mobile phones outnumber citizens. Mobile phones are thus a near-constant companion of a significant percentage of the world’s population, always on and always connected. More importantly, improvements in battery life, service coverage, processor performance, and overall platform capabilities are providing new opportunities for service deployment on these devices. Read the article

Paving the Way for Gigabit Networking

by Jean-Pierre Ebert et al. Global Communications Newsletter, April 2005 Wired LANs soared to the gigabit level some years ago, and terabit networks are in place for wide area networking. However, in terms of data rate, wireless short-range networks tend to lag one generation behind wired LANs. The recent second generation of wireless short-range networks offers transmission rates of up to 54 Mb/s. The third wireless LAN generation is under development and will materialize in the IEEE 802.11n standard in about two years. IEEE 802.11n WLANs will offer a few hundred megabits per second, but the performance gap from wired networks remains. he recently started project Wireless Gigabit with Advanced Multimedia aims to close this gap with a heterogeneous 1 Gb/s fourth-generation system based on high-data-rate orthogonal OFDM transmission, MIMO, and efficient MAC protocol techniques. Read the article

First-Principles Study of Electron-Conduction Properties of Helical Gold Nanowires

by Tomoya Ono Physical Review Letters, 27 May 2005 Multishell helical gold nanowires (HGNs) suspended between semi-infinite electrodes are found to exhibit peculiar electron-conduction properties by first-principles calculations based on the density functional theory. Our results that the numbers of conduction channels in the HGNs and their conductances are smaller than those expected from a single-atom row nanowire verify the recent experiment. In addition, we obtained a more striking result that, in the cases of thin HGNs, distinct magnetic fields are induced by the electronic current helically flowing around the shells. This finding indicates that the HGNs can be good candidates for nanometer-scale solenoids. Read the article

Fuel for the New Millennium

by Karen Epper Hoffman TechnologyReview.com, 23 May 2005 As a future fuel source, hydrogen inspires a lot of hope -- and more than a little wariness. But one New Jersey startup has developed a hydrogen-powered fuel cell technology for portable devices that it's promising can be as safe and even longer-lasting than today's batteries. Read the article

Move Over Plasma TVs: Nano-Screens Are Coming

by John Brandon TechnologyReview.com, 23 May 2005 Motorola revealed its first working nano-emissive display prototype on Monday at the Society for Information Display conference in Boston. The company hopes its five-inch diagonal proto-television will attract licensees not yet convinced that Liquid Crystal Display and plasma screens are the future of high-definition entertainment. Read the article

Learning to Crawl

by Karen Epper Hoffman TechnologyReview.com, 30 May 2005 A team of researchers at Case Western Reserve University has created a robotic device that moves much like a slug or earthworm -- and it could ultimately become the ideal tool to help doctors perform colonoscopies. Read the article

Nanohole-Templated Organic Light-Emitting Diodes Fabricated Using Laser-Interfering Lithography: Moth-Eye Lighting

by Yoon-Chang Kim & Young Rag Do Optics Express, 7 Mar 2005 We describe the architecture, fabrication, and electro-optical characteristics of a two-dimensional (2D), periodic, highly ordered array of subwavelength scale organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). A 2D nanohole array template was introduced onto a patterned ITO glass substrate by two-step irradiated hologram lithography and reactive ion etching, and then a 2D nanohole OLED array was prepared by following typical OLED fabrication procedures. Our analysis of the electro-optical characteristics of this device showed that shrinking the OLEDs to sub-wavelength scale has only a minimal effect on their optical properties. We also used the Bragg scattering effect to confirm the compounding of the millions of ~220 nm OLED light sources to form 2D periodic nanohole emission by comparing the angular dependence of the emission spectrum of the OLED array with that of a conventional OLED. Read the article

Optical Routing and Sensing with Nanowire Assemblies

by Donald J. Sirbuly et al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 31 May 2005 The manipulation of photons in structures smaller than the wavelength of light is central to the development of nanoscale integrated photonic systems for computing, communications, and sensing. We assemble small groups of freestanding, chemically synthesized nanoribbons and nanowires into model structures that illustrate how light is exchanged between subwavelength cavities made of three different semiconductors. The coupling strength of the optical linkages formed when nanowires are brought into contact depends both on their volume of interaction and angle of intersection. With simple coupling schemes, lasing nanowires can launch coherent pulses of light through ribbon waveguides that are up to a millimeter in length. Also, interwire coupling losses are low enough to allow light to propagate across several right-angle bends in a grid of crossed ribbons. The fraction of the guided wave traveling outside the wire/ribbon cavities is used to link nanowires through space and to separate colors within multiribbon networks. In addition, we find that nanoribbons function efficiently as waveguides in liquid media and provide a unique means for probing molecules in solution or in proximity to the waveguide surface. Our results lay the spadework for photonic devices based on assemblies of active and passive nanowire elements and presage the use of nanowire waveguides in microfluidics and biology. Read the article

OLED Displays Offer Double the View

optics.org News, 2 Jun 2005 Mobile phones could soon be getting a new look if a double-sided organic display proves popular. The new active-matrix organic display generates 1.5 inch-sized full-color images on both its front and rear surfaces and is controlled by a single IC driver chip. Read the article

Patent Highlights, 2 Jun 2005

optics.org News, 2 Jun 2005 The pick of this week's patents including a UV actived pharmaceutical ink from Hewlett-Packard. • Method for the production of an anti-reflecting surface on optical integrated circuits • Optical pick-up apparatus for multi recording/reproducing • A system and a method for an edible, optically invisible ink Read the article

What Stops Noise, but Starts Conversations?

by Lisa W. Foderaro New York Times, 29 May 2005 Their backyards may share a wall, but their feelings about that are not shared in the slightest. The wall is the 16-foot-tall concrete noise barrier -- roughly the height of the old Berlin Wall -- that the state Department of Transportation erected several years ago after it finished a reconstruction project on a nearby section of the Hutchinson River Parkway. The idea was to quiet the constant whirring of traffic for the residents of Winding Wood Road. Read the article

Light Gun Fires Photons One by One

by Justin Mullins NewScientist.com, 24 May 2005 The first photon gun capable of firing single particles of light over optical fibres was unveiled on Tuesday. The breakthrough may remove one of the final obstacles keeping perfectly secure messages from being sent over standard telephone fibres. Read the article

Heart Patient Has First Turbocharger Fitted

by Rachel Nowak New Scientist, 19 May 2005 The first patient to be fitted with a device designed to "turbocharge" an ailing heart, without greatly increasing the risk of blood clots and other life-threatening complications, is recovering in a New Zealand hospital following surgery earlier this month. Read the article