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so what about a space sensor for measuring thermal efficiency of buildings? Can you have a look ?

"Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the eyes and brains of 27 astronauts who have spent prolonged periods of time in space revealed optical abnormalities similar to those that can occur in intracranial hypertension of unknown cause, a potentially serious condition in which pressure builds within the skull."

scaring ...

The film Batman Begins shows the character of Batman gliding using a rigid form of his cape. This paper assesses the feasibility of such a glide and finds that while a reasonable distance could be travelled if gliding from a tall building, the speed at which Batman would be travelling would be too dangerous to stop without some method of slowing down.

CubeSats + 3D printing... for space. I'm surprised this isn't an ACT project :) more info: SpiderFab: Process for On-Orbit Construction of Kilometer-Scale Apertures

$100,000 from NASA's Innovative Advanced Concepts program to hammer out a design and figure out whether spacecraft self-construction makes business sense .... I can answer for 0$ ..... NO Infact the question is just stupid: a) spacecraft self-construction exist: then it is a no brainer to decide wether it makes business sense b) it does not: then there is no business

spaceship1 on steroids ...

Looks slightly fragile in the middle...

The "Effizienzhaus-Plus mit Elektromobilität" (Google translation: House-Plus efficiency with electric mobility) project is a German government-backed initiative to build an energy-efficient house that generates more electricity than it consumes. It will see a family of four living in the house located in Berlin for fifteen months, starting in March 2012. Audi, BMW, Daimler, Opel and VW will each get a chance to put their respective electric vehicles to the test with each providing EVs to the house for periods of three months each.

always said so...

A "four-wheel drive car" less than one billionth the length of an average SUV has been built and operated by researchers in the Netherlands and Switzerland.

"Molecular machines are common in nature. Motor proteins, for example, can move along a surface to transport molecular-sized cargo and are often used to build structures within living cells. " reminds me of the fantastic movie on what happens inside a cell ...

Google subsidiary Google Fiber, Inc. is seeking permission to place satellite antennas on land near its data center in Council Bluffs, Iowa. The antennas could be used to receive content feeds from broadcast networks that could be bundled with a high-speed fiber service.

an oddly similar story http://venturebeat.com/2012/02/20/apple-is-solar-friendly/ apple to build largest solar array in US

he drone of speakers who won't stop is an inevitable experience at conferences, meetings, cinemas and public libraries.  Today, Kazutaka Kurihara at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology in Tskuba and Koji Tsukada at Ochanomizu University, both in Japan, present a radical solution: a speech jamming device that forces recalcitrant speakers into submission. 

...must...not...make...the...obvious...ACT...meeting...joke...

Unfortunately it won't work when it is most needed .... Read this: "Their tests also identify some curious phenomena. They say the gun is more effective when the delay varies in time and more effective against speech that involves reading aloud than against spontaneous monologue. Sadly, they report that it has no effect on meaningless sound sequences such as "aaaaarghhh".

In remote / under-developed regions this might actually be a strong alternative for building internet connectivity - somewhat like the exploding market for cell phones in Africa due to the lack of land lines.

That is about € 14e9 - enough to pay more than a million YGTs for half a year. Could we use maybe just half a million YGTs for half a year to build a similar platform and keep the remaining € 7e9 for ourselves? Keep in mind that WhatsApp only has 45 employees (according to AllThingsD: http://goo.gl/NtJcSj ). So we would have an advantage > 10000:1. On the other hand does this mean that every employee at WhatsApp gets enough money now to survive comfortably for ~5000 years or will the inevitable social inequality strike and most people get next to nothing while a few get money to live comfortably for ~1000000 years? Also: Does Facebook think about these numbers before they pay them? Or is it just a case of "That looks tasty - lets have it"? Also (2): As far as I can see all these internet companies (Google, Facebook, Yahoo, WhatsApp, Twitter...) seem to make most of their income from advertising. For all these companies together that must be a lot of advertising money (turns out that in 2013 the world spent about $ 500 billion on advertising: http://goo.gl/vYog15 ). For that money you could of course have 20 million YGTs roaming the Earth and advertising stuff door-to-door... ... ...

The whole valuation of those internet companies is a bit scary. Things like the Facebook and Twitter ipo numbers seem just ridiculous.

Facebook is not really so much buying into a potential good business deal as much as it's buying out risky competition. Popular trends need to be killed fast before they take off the ground too much. Also the amount of personal data that WhatsApp is amassing is staggering. I have never seen an app requesting so many phone rights in my life.

Problem solved.

Those would also work very well to keep the Kaiju's out..

Good point!

On the way towards autonomous flying deliveries and building a Megazord formation!

anna, this is your shit ;) ...and they mentione albert einstein so it has to be an intelligent and good finding :)

and?

and?

wireless power transmission made useful ? this application did certainly not come to my mind when Guy Pignolet showed me 12 years ago how his handy would lid up a small diode after our first SPS meeting in Paris ...

Great idea to use either unused/wasted energy. Then again, the signal power (receiver floor) is steadily going down going from 3G to 5G, yet there might be more use of bandwidth to compensate this. It is funny though that you buy a device which could have the function build in it on the back from the start, yet you put a shell around it and then harness wireless power to give it that add-on functionality.

Recently I came across this article in a Japanese newspaper about wireless power transmission applications in the women beauty business. It's probably not as useful as an iPhone cover but apparently there is a market for such things! http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/04/18/business/led-nails-light-up-when-calling/#.U2OcWV7v2X8

Looking forward to see what this amazing piece of engineering can do!

Whenever I see the complexity of fusion reactor design it makes me appreciate the simplicity of fission reactors even more. ;-D

Hope no one left their sandwich inside this time...

The system is based on two liquids which are adsorbed. As the sensor generates heat, the liquids desorb and the pressure builds up, it can then move to an expansion vessel which is held at a cooler temperature and the liquid then adsorb together again. This technique requires no mechanical compression and there are less vibration, leading to less wear and tear of components. It is being developed in a joint collaboration between UTwente and Dutch Space.