Aasemoon'z Cluster

Experimental microbial fuel cells could turn bacteria into batteries that generate electricity from biomass. The key to this technology is the ability of bacteria to transfer electrons to their surroundings—for example, to the anode of a microbial fuel cell. But if the organisms have to be in direct contact with the anode, such devices would have to have extremely large surface areas. Researchers from Aarhus University, in Denmark, report today in the journal Nature that bacteria appear to conduct electricity while separated by several millimeters, at least a thousand times as far apart than previously demonstrated. The naturally occurring electric currents, if confirmed, would allow bacteria spaced at least 12 millimeters apart to communicate electrically. The discovery might lead to new paths to treating infection and a better understanding of microbial ecosystems.

In 2008 a team of physicists from Argonne National Laboratory, in Illinois, and other institutions stumbled upon an odd phenomenon. They called it superinsulation, because in many ways it was the opposite of superconductivity. Now they’ve worked out the theory behind it, potentially opening the doors to better batteries, supersensitive sensors, and strange new circuits. Superconductors lose all resistance once they fall below a certain temperature. In superinsulators, on the other hand, the resistance to the flow of electricity becomes infinite at very low temperatures, preventing any flow of electric current.

(Nanowerk News) Scientists at the University of Glasgow have devised a molecular 'LEGO toolkit' which can be used to assemble a vast number of new and functional chemical compounds. Using molecules as building blocks they have been able to construct a molecular scaffold based on tiny (nano-scale) storage cubes. This new ‘designer route’ opens the door to many new compounds that, potentially, are able to act as the ion sensors, storage devices, and catalysts of the future. Researchers within the Department of Chemistry created hollow cube-based frameworks from polyoxometalates (POMs) – complex compounds made from metal and oxygen atoms – which stick together like LEGO bricks meaning a whole range of well-defined architectures can be developed with great ease ("Face-directed self-assembly of an electronically active Archimedean polyoxometalate architecture").

) Die gezielte Manipulation von Strukturen im Nanometerbereich ist eine Grundlage der modernen Biotechnologie. Zu den vielseitigsten Bausteinen im Bereich von Millionstel Millimetern gehört die DNA, der Träger der Erbinformation. Im Organismus kommt das Molekül in linearen und zirkulären Formen vor, aus denen dann technologisch höhere Strukturen erzeugt werden können. Deren spezifische Form ist die Folge eines Wechselspiels mehrerer physikalischer Kräfte. LMU-Forscher um den Biophysiker Professor Erwin Frey konnten in Zusammenarbeit mit Schweizer Wissenschaftlern nun klären, welches Gewicht diese Kräfte jeweils haben und welche effektive Form der Bausteine daraus resultiert ("Excluded Volume Effects on Semiflexible Ring Polymers").

Die gezielte Manipulation von Strukturen im Nanometerbereich ist eine Grundlage der modernen Biotechnologie. Zu den vielseitigsten Bausteinen im Bereich von Millionstel Millimetern gehört die DNA, der Träger der Erbinformation. Im Organismus kommt das Molekül in linearen und zirkulären Formen vor, aus denen dann technologisch höhere Strukturen erzeugt werden können. Deren spezifische Form ist die Folge eines Wechselspiels mehrerer physikalischer Kräfte. LMU-Forscher um den Biophysiker Professor Erwin Frey konnten in Zusammenarbeit mit Schweizer Wissenschaftlern nun klären, welches Gewicht diese Kräfte jeweils haben und welche effektive Form der Bausteine daraus resultiert ("Excluded Volume Effects on Semiflexible Ring Polymers").

Every few years, we're wowed by news of some jaw-dropping sum paid for a previously unknown painting or drawing by a famous artist. But how can a buyer truly be sure that a piece is a legitimate creation of, say, Leonardo or Gauguin? Mathematicians at Dartmouth College, in Hanover, N.H., may have the answer. They recently presented a computer-based statistical analysis technique which they say will help art historians and conservators discover even the most skilled forgery. Their method, called sparse coding, learns what characterizes the artist's style at a level of detail that is practically imperceptible to the eye of even the most experienced appraiser. It works by examining small patches of a picture and breaking them down to a set of essential elements.

For the past 20 years, a debate over the longevity and legitimacy of the 8-bit microcontroller (MCU) periodically erupts. The debate is usually sparked by the introduction of a higher-end processor or architecture and is almost always accompanied by overstated claims of a market moving away from 8-bit MCUs or transitioning to higher-end devices. It wasn't too long ago that the 16-bit market was doomed to disappear, due to pressures from 8-bit on the low end and 32-bit at the high end.

In a recent video, Willow Garage researcher Eitan Marder-Eppstein describes the open-source navigation stack they've released as version 1.0. The code, available at http://ros.org/wiki/navigation, was designed to be flexible and cross-platform, he says, and could be used in anything from a small iRobot Create-based bot to a large multi-sensor robot like Willow's own PR2 (which Spectrum has covered in detail here and here).

The Khronos™ Group today announced the release of the OpenGL® 4.0 specification; a significant update to the most widely adopted 2D and 3D graphics API (application programming interface) that is deployed on all major desktop operating systems.  OpenGL 4.0 brings the very latest in cross-platform graphics acceleration and functionality to personal computers and workstations and the OpenGL standard serves as the basis for OpenGL® ES, the graphics standard on virtually every shipping smart phone.   The OpenGL 4.0 specification has been defined by the OpenGL ARB (Architecture Review Board) working group at Khronos, and includes the GLSL 4.00 update to the OpenGL Shading language in order to enable developers to access the latest generation of GPU acceleration with significantly enhanced graphics quality, acceleration performance and programming flexibility.  This new release continues the rapid evolution of the royalty-free OpenGL standard to enable graphics developers to portably access cutting-edge GPU functionality across diverse operating systems and platforms. The full specification is available for immediate download at http://www.opengl.org/registry .

A product can be of low quality for several reasons, such as it was shoddily manufactured, its components were improperly designed, its architecture was poorly conceived, and the product's requirements were poorly understood. Quality must be designed in. You can't test out enough bugs to deliver a high-quality product. The quality assurance (QA) process is vital for the delivery of a satisfactory system. In this last part in this series, we will concentrate on portions of the methodology particularly aimed at improving the quality of the resulting system. The software testing techniques described earlier in this series constitute one component of quality assurance, but the pursuit of quality extends throughout the design flow. For example, settling on the proper requirements and specification cannot be overlooked as an important determinant of quality. If the system is too difficult to design, it will probably be difficult to keep it working properly.

Dynamite Entertainment is set to launch its new series of Stargate comic books in 2010, starting with Vala Mal Doran #1.  The limited series is set in the SG-1 universe and features the sexy thief played on television by Claudia Black. Series writer Brandon Jerwa talks about the story in a new interview with Comic Book Resources. Jerwa, known for his work on G.I. Joe, Highlander and Battlestar Galactica, revealed that the story will feature a “heist” for which Vala assembles an Ocean’s 11-style group of cohorts. “Vala’s working with a crew of science fiction ne’er-do-wells that are all new to the franchise,” Jerwa told the site. “I’m going to keep the hard details under wraps for now, but let me give you some glimpses into my madness: Vala’s crew has a weirdo alien pilot, an officious robot, a tiger warrior, a midget assassin and a hot chick with a space monkey.” Look for the SG-1 team to be involved too, of course — including Jack O’Neill.

The race to create tiny wireless sensors that could monitor anything from pressure in the eyes and brain to the stability of bridges appears to be heating up. Earlier this month, IEEE Spectrum reported on two approaches to creating an almost-indefinitely-running sensor using piezoelectric systems to convert tiny vibrations into power. Now, another team from the University of Michigan has created an alternative approach that uses solar power to keep the sensor running autonomously for many years.

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Something about the mood of this track really works for me. There's a certain feeling of "lost and random" about it... love it! =)

When considering the resolution required for an A/D converter (ADC) integrated in a microcontroller (MCU), embedded systems designers must balance cost and performance. Higher ADC resolution implies higher-cost MCUs, but in some cases you can use other features in the MCU to enhance the ADC performance via software. That approach lets you achieve higher resolution using an inexpensive integrated ADC. Here's how to use of oversampling to achieve extra bits of resolution for an ADC integrated in an MCU.

Commenter Cynox was browsing through the 137 years of Popular Science magazine which are now available online, and he noticed this robot in the September 1984 issue. Called Odex I, it was developed by a (now apparently defunct) company called Odetics. Odex was six and a half feet tall, had six legs, and was fully capable of walking. Although it only weighed 370 pounds, each of its legs could lift 400 pounds. It could dead lift some 2100 pounds, and carry 900 pounds while walking at normal speed (which was about 18 inches per second). Odex used a tripod gait, and the fishbowl thing on top contained sensors that helped it avoid obstacles. It was one of the first robots with an onboard computer that helped coordinate all of its limbs. Since the limbs could articulate themselves in several directions independently, Odex was able to rapidly change its limb configuration to squeeze through tight spaces, move quickly, or lift stuff. It was able to climb into the back of a truck through a combination of automated step behaviors and teleoperation, which was pretty damn good for 1984.

This API provides users with a standard FPGA communication interface from C++ code. It is intended to encourage more widespread adoption of FPGAs and reconfigurable computing platforms—particularly among Windows application developers

A little more than a week after long-simmering programmable logic startup Tabula Inc. emerged from stealth mode, Tier Logic Inc. stepped into the light Wednesday (March 10), offering the first details about its technology, which employs a novel processing change to build FPGA and ASIC products on a single die. Like Tabula, Tier Logic's technology depends on a three-dimensional structure. But while Tabula uses rapid reconfiguration to, in the words of that firm's executives, treat time as the third dimension, Tier Logic's approach separates user circuits and configuration circuits into 3-D stacked layers, creating what the company calls the world's first monolithic 3-D FPGA.

The past week or so there have been two stories about very secure system protocols being able to be successfully hacked by researchers. The first concerned the report by the AP that Christopher Tarnovsky, a former U.S. Army computer-security specialist and who now runs the Flylogic security company, was able to crack open (literally) a Trusted Platform Module or TPM and obtain its cryptographic keys. This hadn't been done before, or at least admitted to publicly.

Space robotics may appear to be a purely scientific endeavor -- brave little rovers exploring planets in search of life -- but it turns out there's a multi-million dollar market in space just waiting for the right kind of robot. This market is satellite servicing. Geostationary communication satellites fire small thrusters to stay in orbit. When they run out of fuel (typically helium or hydrazine), or when a battery or gyroscope fails, these expensive satellites often have to be abandoned, becoming just another piece of space junk, even though their mechanical systems and electronics work fine.

Three-dimensional microchip designs are making their way to market to help pack more transistors on a chip as traditional scaling slows down. By stacking logic chips on top of one another other or combining logic chips with memory or RF with logic, chipmakers hope to sidestep Moore's Law, increasing the functionality of smartphones and other gadgets not by shrinking a chip's transistors but the distance between them. "There's a big demand for smaller packages in the consumer market, especially for the footprint of a mobile phone, or for improving the memory bandwidth of your GPU," says Pol Marchal, a principal scientist of 3-D integration at European microelectronics R&D center Imec. On 9 February, at the IEEE International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC), in San Francisco, Imec engineers presented some key design challenges facing 3-D chips made by stacking layers of silicon circuits using vertical copper interconnects called through-silicon vias (TSVs). These design constraints will have to be dealt with before TSVs can be widely used in advanced microchip architectures, Marchal says.