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not latest news but still, he is probably the most high profile SPS advocate out there

An excellent science coffee topic! This is a true breakthrough in pure mathematics with plentiful applications in the lesser sciences (such as theoretical physics). People tell me quantum gravity is already practically solved by this. Conway's powerful theory of Alternative Facts can render many difficult problems tractable. Here we demonstrate the power of AF to prove the Riemann Hypothesis, one of the most important unsolved problems in mathematics. We further suggest applications of AF to other challenging unsolved problems such as the zero-equals-one conjecture (which is also true) and the side-counting problem of the circle.

" The ultimate goal of the Shanghai Institute: to build a molten-salt reactor that could replace the 1970s-era technology in today's nuclear power plants and help wean China off the coal that fouls the air of Shanghai and Beijing, ushering in an era of cheap, abundant, zero-carbon energy."

A North Carolina State University researcher has developed a more efficient, less expensive way of cooling electronic devices - particularly devices that generate a lot of heat, such as lasers and power devices.

f existing lithium-ion batteries were scaled up to match the range capacity of gas-powered vehicles, they would be unfeasibly large and heavy. Lithium-air batteries, which have the potential to provide energy densities that rivals traditional gasoline-powered engines, are seen as a possible solution.

coming soon to a garden near you: Snail Sensor Networks

Using a sophisticated weather model, environmental engineers at Stanford have defined optimal placement of a grid of four wind farms off the U.S. East Coast. The model successfully balances production at times of peak demand and significantly reduces costly spikes and zero-power events.

Liquid solar cells are pretty neat, to be sure, but current-generating paint can be a hard color to match. Good thing, then, that researchers at Rice university have developed the perfect complement: a spray-on battery.

nice read ... let's hope since Apple got anyway already too powerful

3-dimensional silicon solar cell produces at least 250% of the power of a basic silicon solar cell.

Any idea of the technology behind ... Sounds too much advertisement what is in the article " Now, our near term objective is to continue to improve the fabrication process and the power output, as we optimize the cost of manufacturing. We believe that the result will be a 50% reduction in the cost of solar electricity. Perhaps the installed system cost savings will be even greater"

Frightening! In reality, the deal has almost nothing to do with trade: actual trade barriers between these countries are already very low. The TPP is an effort to use the holy grail of free trade to impose conditions and override domestic laws in a way that would be almost impossible if the proposed measures had to go through the normal legislative process. The expectation is that by lining up powerful corporate interests, the governments will be able to ram this new "free trade" pact through legislatures on a take-it-or-leave-it basis.

always said so...

Spacecraft equipped with lasers powered by light from the Sun are our best defence against incoming asteroids, say aerospace engineers

Sante, Andreas, Luzi, Pacome ... we need you: "But recently White calculated what would happen if the shape of the ring encircling the spacecraft was adjusted into more of a rounded donut, as opposed to a flat ring. He found in that case, the warp drive could be powered by a mass about the size of a spacecraft like the Voyager 1 probe NASA launched in 1977.

Furthermore, if the intensity of the space warps can be oscillated over time, the energy required is reduced even more, White found.

"The findings I presented today change it from impractical to plausible and worth further investigation," White told SPACE.com. "The additional energy reduction realized by oscillating the bubble intensity is an interesting conjecture that we will enjoy looking at in the lab.""

To me, this looks a little bit like the claim "infinity minus one is a little bit less than infinity"...

Luzi I miss you ...

Physicists in the US have made the first ultrathin flat lens. Thanks to its flatness, the device eliminates optical aberrations that occur in conventional lenses with spherical surfaces. As a result, the focusing power of the lens also approaches the ultimate physical limit set by the laws of diffraction.

Really nice indeed! The new flat ultrathin lens is different in that it is a nanostructured "metasurface" made of optically thin beam-shaping elements called optical antennas, which are separated by distances shorter than the wavelength of the light they are designed to focus. These antennas are wavelength-scale metallic elements that introduce a slight phase delay in a light ray that scatters off them. The metasurface can be tuned for specific wavelengths of light by simply changing the size, angle and spacing between the nanoantennas. "The antenna is nothing more than a resonator that stores light and then releases it after a short time delay," Capasso says. "This delay changes the direction of the light in the same way that a thick glass lens would." The lens surface is patterned with antennas of different shapes and sizes that are oriented in different directions. This causes the phase delays to be radially distributed around the lens so that light rays are increasingly refracted further away from the centre, something that has the effect of focusing the incident light to a precise point.

In work that has major implications for improving the performance of building insulation, scientists at the University of Namur in Belgium and the University of Hassan I in Morocco have calculated that hairs that reflect infrared light may contribute significant insulating power to the exceptionally warm winter coats of polar bears and other animals.

That's quite interesting. Maybe the future of buildings and spacecraft is furry?

some biomimicry used in energy systems... maybe it sparks some ideas

not much new that has not been shared here before ... BUT: we have done relativley little on any of them. for good reasons?? don't know - maybe time to look into some of these again more closely Energy Efficiency( Termite mounds inspired regulated airflow for temperature control of large structures, preventing wasteful air conditioning and saving 10% energy.[1] Whale fins shapes informed the design of new-age wind turbine blades, with bumps/tubercles reducing drag by 30% and boosting power by 20%.[2][3][4] Stingray motion has motivated studies on this type of low-effort flapping glide, which takes advantage of the leading edge vortex, for new-age underwater robots and submarines.[5][6] Studies of microstructures found on shark skin that decrease drag and prevent accumulation of algae, barnacles, and mussels attached to their body have led to "anti-biofouling" technologies meant to address the 15% of marine vessel fuel use due to drag.[7][8][9][10] Energy Generation( Passive heliotropism exhibited by sunflowers has inspired research on a liquid crystalline elastomer and carbon nanotube system that improves the efficiency of solar panels by 10%, without using GPS and active repositioning panels to track the sun.[11][12][13] Mimicking the fluid dynamics principles utilized by schools of fish could help to optimize the arrangement of individual wind turbines in wind farms.[14] The nanoscale anti-reflection structures found on certain butterfly wings has led to a model to effectively harness solar energy.[15][16][17] Energy Storage( Inspired by the sunlight-to-energy conversion in plants, researchers are utilizing a protein in spinach to create a sort of photovoltaic cell that generates hydrogen from water (i.e. hydrogen fuel cell).[18][19] Utilizing a property of genetically-engineered viruses, specifically their ability to recognize and bind to certain materials (carbon nanotubes in this case), researchers have developed virus-based "scaffolds" that

Put together two ACT topics and see what happens.

I remember discussing this briefly and then discarding the idea - but don't remember why any more; duncan?

Well, I think that although the antenna is small, you counteract this with a much large metameterial lens. Probably if you design an antenna of a similar size to the 'lens' you can couple power equally well over the same distance. Then again, further optimization might help improve the size. Maybe in the end you want to combine both together, optimization of the antenna, including a metamaterials lens.

Using realtime environmental information (irradiance in this case) from GOES to update grid forecasts.