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Luzi Bergamin

First circuit breaker for high voltage direct current - 2 views

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    Doesn't really sound sexy, but this is of utmost importance for next generation grids for renewable energy.
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    I agree on the significance indeed - a small boost also for my favourite Desertec project ... Though their language is a bit too "grandiose": "ABB has successfully designed and developed a hybrid DC breaker after years of research, functional testing and simulation in the R&D laboratories. This breaker is a breakthrough that solves a technical challenge that has been unresolved for over a hundred years and was perhaps one the main influencers in the 'war of currents' outcome. The 'hybrid' breaker combines mechanical and power electronics switching that enables it to interrupt power flows equivalent to the output of a nuclear power station within 5 milliseconds - that's as fast as a honey bee takes per flap of its wing - and more than 30 times faster than the reaction time of an Olympic 100-meter medalist to react to the starter's gun! But its not just about speed. The challenge was to do it 'ultra-fast' with minimal operational losses and this has been achieved by combining advanced ultrafast mechanical actuators with our inhouse semiconductor IGBT valve technologies or power electronics (watch video: Hybrid HVDC Breaker - How does it work). In terms of significance, this breaker is a 'game changer'. It removes a significant stumbling block in the development of HVDC transmission grids where planning can start now. These grids will enable interconnection and load balancing between HVDC power superhighways integrating renewables and transporting bulk power across long distances with minimal losses. DC grids will enable sharing of resources like lines and converter stations that provides reliability and redundancy in a power network in an economically viable manner with minimal losses. ABB's new Hybrid HVDC breaker, in simple terms will enable the transmission system to maintain power flow even if there is a fault on one of the lines. This is a major achievement for the global R&D team in ABB who have worked for years on the challeng
LeopoldS

Helix Nebula - Helix Nebula Vision - 0 views

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    The partnership brings together leading IT providers and three of Europe's leading research centres, CERN, EMBL and ESA in order to provide computing capacity and services that elastically meet big science's growing demand for computing power.

    Helix Nebula provides an unprecedented opportunity for the global cloud services industry to work closely on the Large Hadron Collider through the large-scale, international ATLAS experiment, as well as with the molecular biology and earth observation. The three flagship use cases will be used to validate the approach and to enable a cost-benefit analysis. Helix Nebula will lead these communities through a two year pilot-phase, during which procurement processes and governance issues for the public/private partnership will be addressed.

    This game-changing strategy will boost scientific innovation and bring new discoveries through novel services and products. At the same time, Helix Nebula will ensure valuable scientific data is protected by a secure data layer that is interoperable across all member states. In addition, the pan-European partnership fits in with the Digital Agenda of the European Commission and its strategy for cloud computing on the continent. It will ensure that services comply with Europe's stringent privacy and security regulations and satisfy the many requirements of policy makers, standards bodies, scientific and research communities, industrial suppliers and SMEs.

    Initially based on the needs of European big-science, Helix Nebula ultimately paves the way for a Cloud Computing platform that offers a unique resource to governments, businesses and citizens.
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    "Helix Nebula will lead these communities through a two year pilot-phase, during which procurement processes and governance issues for the public/private partnership will be addressed." And here I was thinking cloud computing was old news 3 years ago :)
jmlloren

COPENHAGEN SUBORBITALS - OPEN SOURCE AND NON PROFIT SPACE - 1 views

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    Our mission is very simple. We are working towards launching a human being into space. 
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    Nicholas this is project I mentioned while G&T-ing in Madrid.
Wiktor Piotrowski

FunSAT - Home - 1 views

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    A game built to help computers in solving satisfiability problems.  (in case the new version doesn't work, try the original one)
Nicholas Lan

Man builds working homemade hoverbike, doesn't die - 2 views

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    proper engineering. do this YouTube sensation and inventor Colin Furze is used to making insane things like retractable wolverine claws, working versions of the hidden blade and rope launcher featured in Assassin's Creed games, and even a homemade Iron Man suit. But this time he decided to do something even crazier and build a hoverbike, and surprisingly, he succeeded and didn't die in the process.
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    I'm always amazed when that guy doesn't die
jaihobah

Breakthrough method means CRISPR just got a lot more relevant to human health - 0 views

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    "scientists at Harvard University say they've modified the CRISPR method so it can be used to effectively reverse mutations involving changes in one letter of the genetic code. That's important because two-thirds of genetic illness in humans involve mutations where there's a change in a single letter."
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    "Efficient introduction of specific homozygous and heterozygous mutations using CRISPR/Cas9" http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature17664.html?WT.ec_id=NATURE-20160428&spMailingID=51249830&spUserID=MTEzODM0NjYzMzgS1&spJobID=903461217&spReportId=OTAzNDYxMjE3S0 As posted here previously, the number and importance of CRISPR is growing steadily, but still plenty of work to make it a reliable tool. Maybe, next work for the Molecular Engineering RF?
santecarloni

Red Wine, Tartaric Acid And The Secret Of Superconductivity  - Technology Review - 2 views

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    Last year, physicists discovered that red wine can turn certain materials into superconductors. Now they've found that Beaujolais works best and think they know why -- I soo knew it !!!
Ma Ru

Scientists solve the mystery of how beer goggles work - 1 views

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    From my favourite, "applied science" series... "If you've ever had one too many and tumbled into bed with a vision, only to be greeted in the morning by a sight you'd gnaw off your own arm to escape, take heart". [Edit] Ah, and before you suggest this is AFD hoax, here's the ref: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22260359
santecarloni

'Carpet' makes objects invisible to sound - physicsworld.com - 0 views

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    Researchers in the US have made a "carpet cloak" that makes objects invisible to sound waves. The device is the first such cloak to work in air and could be used to improve the acoustics in concert halls or even to control unwanted noise.
santecarloni

Physicist Derives Laws of Thermodynamics For Life Itself - Technology Review - 2 views

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    The laws of thermodynamics must apply to self-replicating systems. Now one physicist has worked out how
Marcus Maertens

Mars Curiosity Descent - Ultra HD 30fps Smooth-Motion - YouTube - 3 views

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    Interpolation of the images of the curiosity landing. Very nice work!
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    this is fantastic!!!
santecarloni

Physics of writing is derived at last - physicsworld.com - 0 views

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    While humans have been writing for at least 5000 years, we have surprisingly little understanding of the physics underlying how ink moves from pen to paper. Now, physicists in South Korea and the US have worked out a theory - backed by experiment - that suggests the ink's flow rate depends on a tug-of-war that is played out between the capillary properties of pen and paper.
LeopoldS

DLR paper with nice mention of ACT - 0 views

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    Quote: Recognizing the need to investigate and evaluate visionary aerospace concepts for their validity, several organizations employ specialized groups to do just this, like ESA's Advanced Concepts Team [2], Lockheed Martin's Skunk Works [3] or NASA's Team-X [4].
LeopoldS

Graphite + water = the future of energy storage - Monash University - 6 views

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    any idea how this works - who wants to have a closer look at it?
  • ...3 more comments...
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    Water is used for keeping the graphene stacks separate. Without water or some other separation method the different graphene stacks would just stick together and graphene would lose its nice properties (like a huge surface). So, water has nothing to do with energy but is just the material which keeps the graphene stacks at distance. The result is a gel. Still, energy needs to be stored in the gel.
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    and the different graphene layers act as anodes and cathodes??
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    Layer orientation in a gel is random. Additionally to that, cathodes and anodes are about charge seperation. Graphene layers are (as far as I understand) supposed to provide huge surfaces to which something, maybe a charge, can be attached. So do we need ions and electrons? Probably not. Probably just electrons which can travel easily through the gel. I guess the whole gel (and all layers inside) would be nagtively charged, making the gel blob a fluid cathode. But again, it's just a guess.
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    Wouldn't it be worth having a closer look?
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    it's still not clear to me how to get electricity in and out of this thing?
johannessimon81

Really nice article about change in the hierarchy model of large organizations (e.g. US... - 2 views

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    "Real leadership is about transforming the system, not just succeeding within or despite the system. Today, we know how to run organizations in ways that that lift up the human spirit, both for those doing the work and those for whom the work is done. So why don't we get on with it?"
Luís F. Simões

The Spray-On Antenna That Boosts Reception Using Zero Power - 1 views

  • Speaking at Google's new "Solve for X" event, Rhett Spencer from military technology firm Chamtech explained how the company has developed an aerosol spray that paints an antenna onto any surface, boosting local wireless reception without using any extra power.
  • the aerosol coats a surface with thousands of nanocapacitors. They somehow align themselves and act as a wireless antenna.
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    random idea: how about using this thing as the "pheromone" to be by released by robots in a swarm... Recognizing an area as being of interest, for some reason, would lead to more "pheromones" being released there. This would in turn attract other robots to the area, by virtue of having also maximization of connectivity to the rest of the swarm as part of the navigation algorithm.
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    If this works as they claim this would be really interesting. Still no clue how they might be able to make this work though! Anybody?
Luís F. Simões

Stochastic Pattern Recognition Dramatically Outperforms Conventional Techniques - Techn... - 2 views

  • A stochastic computer, designed to help an autonomous vehicle navigate, outperforms a conventional computer by three orders of magnitude, say computer scientists
  • These guys have applied stochastic computing to the process of pattern recognition. The problem here is to compare an input signal with a reference signal to determine whether they match.   In the real world, of course, input signals are always noisy so a system that can cope with noise has an obvious advantage.  Canals and co use their technique to help an autonomous vehicle navigate its way through a simple environment for which it has an internal map. For this task, it has to measure the distance to the walls around it and work out where it is on the map. It then computes a trajectory taking it to its destination.
  • Although the idea of stochastic computing has been around for half a century, attempts to exploit have only just begun. Clearly there's much work to be done. And since one line of thought is that the brain might be a stochastic computer, at least in part, there could be exciting times ahead.
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  • Ref: arxiv.org/abs/1202.4495: Stochastic-Based Pattern Recognition Analysis
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    hey! This is essentially the Probabilistic Computing Ariadna
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    The link is there but my understanding of our purpose is different than what I understood from the abstract. In any case,the authors are from Palma de Mallorca, Balears, Spain "somebody" should somehow make them aware of the Ariadna study ... E.g somebody no longer in the team :-)
santecarloni

Graphene Battery Turns Ambient Heat Into Electric Current - Technology Review - 0 views

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    "Physicists have built a graphene battery that harvests energy from the thermal movement of ions in solution." Can it actually work?
Marion Nachon

Human settlement project on Mars in 2023 - 4 views

shared by Marion Nachon on 07 Jun 12 - No Cached
LeopoldS liked it
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    A habitable settlement will be waiting for the settlers when they land. The settlement will support them while they live and work on Mars the rest of their lives
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    "no political mumbo jumbo, no taxpayer's money" real work!
santecarloni

Intel Reveals Neuromorphic Chip Design  - Technology Review - 1 views

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    Intel's goal is to build chips that work more like the human brain. Now its engineers think they know how
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