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nice demonstration what rapid manufacturing can already achieve!

nice demonstration what rapid manufacturing can already achieve!

Progress in atomic, optical and quantum science1, 2 has led to rapid improvements in atomic clocks. At the same time, atomic clock research has helped to advance the frontiers of science, affecting both fundamental and applied research. The ability to control quantum states of individual atoms and photons is central to quantum information science and precision measurement, and optical clocks based on single ions have achieved the lowest systematic uncertainty of any frequency standard3, 4, 5. Although many-atom lattice clocks have shown advantages in measurement precision over trapped-ion clocks6, 7, their accuracy has remained 16 times worse8, 9, 10. Here we demonstrate a many-atom system that achieves an accuracy of 6.4 × 10−18, which is not only better than a single-ion-based clock, but also reduces the required measurement time by two orders of magnitude. By systematically evaluating all known sources of uncertainty, including in situ monitoring of the blackbody radiation environment, we improve the accuracy of optical lattice clocks by a factor of 22. This single clock has simultaneously achieved the best known performance in the key characteristics necessary for consideration as a primary standard-stability and accuracy. More stable and accurate atomic clocks will benefit a wide range of fields, such as the realization and distribution of SI units11, the search for time variation of fundamental constants12, clock-based geodesy13 and other precision tests of the fundamental laws of nature. This work also connects to the development of quantum sensors and many-body quantum state engineering14 (such as spin squeezing) to advance measurement precision beyond the standard quantum limit.

Related to yesterday's post on RNA computers

Acasa was born out of Singularity University, a unique, world-changing institution founded in 2008 by Ray Kurzweil and Peter Diamandis. After nine weeks at NASA Ames, the home of Singularity University, four teams emerged with projects focused on one common goal-to positively affect the lives of one billion people over ten years. Our team has designed a business plan to leverage advances in rapid 3D additive manufacturing technologies in order to construct affordable, customizable housing for the developing world. This environmentally sustainable solution has the potential to create a powerful new paradigm for improving housing construction using local resources.

cool video, i'd like to see that in reality... Though i'm not sure it would be less expansive than the very cheap workers you can get on site ! You need to build the robot, to bring it on-site, highly specialised enginneers to supervize the project, etc...

yeah I am not sure about that either but the idea seems nice though

In a sign that the web is becoming more sociable than searchable Although Facebook is enjoying rapid growth, it is only beginning to cash in on its success. Revenues at the social media company are estimated to be in the range of $1bn to $1.5bn this year, while Google took in $23.7bn last year.

12 new NIAC 1 studies - many topics familiar to us ... please have a look at those closest to your expertise to see if there is anything new/worth investigating (and in general to be knowledgeable on them since we will get questions sooner or later on them)
Principal Investigator Proposal Title Organization City, State, Zip Code
Atchison, Justin Swarm Flyby Gravimetry Johns Hopkins University Baltimore, MD 21218-2680
Boland, Eugene Mars Ecopoiesis Test Bed Techshot, Inc. Greenville, IN 47124-9515
Cash, Webster The Aragoscope: Ultra-High Resolution Optics at Low Cost University of Colorado Boulder, CO 80309-0389
Chen, Bin 3D Photocatalytic Air Processor for Dramatic Reduction of Life Support Mass & Complexity NASA ARC Moffett Field, CA 94035-0000
Hoyt, Robert WRANGLER: Capture and De-Spin of Asteroids and Space Debris Tethers Unlimited Bothel, WA 98011-8808
Matthies, Larry Titan Aerial Daughtercraft NASA JPL Pasadena, CA 91109-8001
Miller, Timothy Using the Hottest Particles in the Universe to Probe Icy Solar System Worlds John Hopkins University Laurel, MD 20723-6005
Nosanov, Jeffrey PERISCOPE: PERIapsis Subsurface Cave OPtical Explorer NASA JPL Pasadena, CA 91109-8001
Oleson, Steven Titan Submarine: Exploring the Depths of Kraken NASA GRC Cleveland, OH 44135-3127
Ono, Masahiro Comet Hitchhiker: Harvesting Kinetic Energy from Small Bodies to Enable Fast and Low-Cost Deep Space Exploration NASA JPL Pasadena, CA 91109-8001
Streetman, Brett Exploration Architecture with Quantum Inertial Gravimetry and In Situ ChipSat Sensors Draper Laboratory Cambridge, MA 02139-3539
Wiegmann, Bruce Heliopause Electrostatic Rapid Transit System (HERTS) NASA MSFC Huntsville, AL 35812-0000

Eh, the swarm flyby gravimetry is very similar to the "measuring gravitational fields" project I proposed in the brewery

EXACTLY what I wanted to investigate as a rapid constuction tool for shape memory alloy structures!

Abstract: In the last 3000 yr, one significant and rapid increase in the concentration of 14C in tree rings was observed; it corresponds to a gamma-ray energy input of 7x10^24 erg at Earth within up to one year in AD 774/5 (Miyake et al. 2012).

Cool - reminds me of the cockroach ARIADNA study see the videos in supplementary material

"When a control laser is fired at the crystal, a complex quantum-level reaction turns it the opaque crystal transparent. A second light source is beamed into the crystal before the control laser is shut off, returning the crystal to its opaque state. This leaves the light trapped inside the crystal, and the opacity of the crystal keeps the light trapped inside from bouncing around, effectively bringing light to a full stop." is the simple explanation, but I am not sure how this is actually possible with the current laws of physics

There are two ways to make slow light: material slow light and structural slow light, where you either change the material or the structural properties of your system. Here they used EIT to make material slow light, by inducing transparency inside an otherwise opaque material. As you change the absorption properties of a material you also change its dispersion properties, the so-called Kramers-Kronig relations. A rapid positive change in the dispersion properties of a material will give rise to slow light. To effectively stop light they switched off the control beam, bringing back the opaque state. Another control beam is then used to retrieve the probe pulse that was 'frozen' inside the medium. Light will be halted according to the population lifetime on the energy level (~ 100s). They used an evolutionary algorithm to find an optimal pulse preparation sequence to reach close to the maximum possible storage duration of 100s. Interesting paper!

So it is not real storage then in a sense, as you are stimulating an excitation population which retains the phase information of your original pulse? Still it is amazing that they could store this up to 100s and retrieve it with a probe pulse, but light has never been halted.

so it took us 70% of the time Earth is in the habitable zone to develop, would this be normal or could it be much faster? In other words, would all forms of life that started on a planet that originated at a 'similar' point in time like us, be equally far developed?

That is actually quite tricky to estimate rly. If for no other reason than the fact that all of the mass extinctions we had over the Earth's history basically reset the evolutionary clock. Assuming 2 Earths identical in every way but one did not have the dinosaur wipe-out impact, that would've given non-impact Earth 60million years to evolve a potential dinosaur intelligent super race.

The opposite might be true - or might not be ;-). Since usually the rate of evolution increases after major extinction events the chance is higher to produce 'intelligent' organisms if these events happen quite frequently. Usually the time of rapid evolution is only a few million years - so Earth is going quite slow. Certainly extinction events don't reset the evolutionary clock - if they would never have happened Earth gene pool would probably be quite primitive. By the way: dinosaurs were a quite diverse group and large dinosaurs might well have had cognitive abilities that come close to whales or primates - the difference to us might be that we have hands to manipulate our environment and vocal cords to communicate in very diverse ways. Modern dinosaur (descendents), i.e. birds, contain some very intelligent species - especially with respect to their body size and weight.

any idea how their brain manages this ?

Called the reflex arc: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reflex_arc

On this note, there is the stunningly optimised flight path of the Tiger beetle http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/04/140415133815.htm

The SpaceX Falcon 9 explosion was caused by a failed strut that allowed a helium bottle to burst free inside the rocket's liquid oxygen tank, CEO Elon Musk said Monday. "One of those struts broke free during flight," Musk told reporters on a conference call to discuss the June 28 blast on what was supposed to be a routine cargo mission to the International Space Station.

I guess this is how it starts as they mentioned they will inspect struts individually before each flight. Also for the space shuttle they believed a rapid inspection between launches would be feasible, but in the end there was a need for individual assessment almost. And we haven't even considered human spaceflight yet.

as predicted, first failure, first inquiry board, first new safety procedures ... and certainly many more will follow and all will make sense but with the risk of loosing the competitive edge

who in the group will build the first fabber? bets are open ...

yes! very much so!!! is he in Holland? since would also probably be nice to get some first hand experience from him/her ....

but what would we do with it...? any idea ?

an additional investment of €50 billion in energy technology research will be needed over the next 10 years. This means almost tripling the annual investment in the European Union, from €3 to €8 billion

maybe we should get one of these ... love it!!!

I want one of these !!!