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johannessimon81

3D-solar cells much more efficient - 1 views

www.bitsofscience.org/ar-cell-energy-efficiency-6206

technology PHY science space

shared by johannessimon81 on 06 Sep 12 - No Cached
  • johannessimon81 on 06 Sep 12
     
    3-dimensional silicon solar cell produces at least 250% of the power of a basic silicon solar cell.
  • LeopoldS on 10 Sep 12
     
    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"
santecarloni

Occupy Federal Science: "Transformative" Research Can't Come From Milquetoast | The Crux | Discover Magazine - 4 views

blogs.discovermagazine.com/...rch-cant-come-from-milquetoast

science research

shared by santecarloni on 14 Dec 11 - No Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • LeopoldS on 15 Dec 11
     
    I like this one "The kind of idle pastime that might amuse physicists is to imagine drafting Einstein's grant applications in 1905. "I propose to investigate the idea that light travels in little bits," one might say. "I will explore the possibility that time slows down as things speed up," goes another. Imagine what comments these would have elicited from reviewers for the German Science Funding Agency, had such a thing existed. Instead, Einstein just did the work anyway while drawing his wages as a technical expert third-class at the Bern patent office. And that is how he invented quantum physics and relativity." There is an even more pointer example of the Prussian academy of sciences reviewing the Dr. application of Hertz ...
  • dejanpetkow on 16 Dec 11
     
    Shocking. What is federal research funding for? No, wrong question. Instead maybe: What is federally funded review for?
Nicholas Lan

Infinite Stupidity | Conversation | Edge - 0 views

edge.org/...e-conversation-with-mark-pagel

technology innovation BIO

shared by Nicholas Lan on 09 Jan 12 - No Cached
  • Nicholas Lan on 09 Jan 12
     
    amusing take on innovation A tiny number of ideas can go a long way, as we've seen. And the Internet makes that more and more likely. What's happening is that we might, in fact, be at a time in our history where we're being domesticated by these great big societal things, such as Facebook and the Internet. We're being domesticated by them, because fewer and fewer and fewer of us have to be innovators to get by. And so, in the cold calculus of evolution by natural selection, at no greater time in history than ever before, copiers are probably doing better than innovators. Because innovation is extraordinarily hard. My worry is that we could be moving in that direction, towards becoming more and more sort of docile copiers.
Lionel Jacques

Artificial energy harvesting tree - 1 views

www.solarbotanic.com

BIO NRG

shared by Lionel Jacques on 11 Jan 12 - Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • Lionel Jacques on 11 Jan 12
     
    The idea has been around for already some time (2008) but I like it despite the challenges/trade-off: visible vs IR photovoltaics, black leaves would be better... Piezo + classical PV would already be great... Optimizing the leave shape & distribution for both wind and sun energy harvesting could be interesting...
santecarloni

Artificial Braneworlds Made to Collide In Lab - Technology Review - 4 views

www.technologyreview.com/...27537

metamaterials cosmology PHY

shared by santecarloni on 31 Jan 12 - No Cached
pacome delva liked it
  • santecarloni on 31 Jan 12
     
    Physicists have simulated two universes colliding inside a metamaterial--  Now, this is cool (if it is true...)
  • ...1 more comment...
  • LeopoldS on 01 Feb 12
     
    we... the article is a bit overblown in my view ... except maybe the last paragraphs: "The collision between universe's is a variation on this theme. "The "colliding universe" scenario can be realized as a simple extension of our earlier experiments simulating the spacetime geometry in the vicinity of big bang," he says. He simulates an expanding universe using concetric rings of gold separated by a dielectric. "When the two concentric ring ("universe") patterns touch each other ("collide"), a Minkowski domain wall is created, in which the metallic stripes touch each other at a small angle," he says. Being able to recreate these exotic events in the lab is certainly interesting but it is beginning to lose its novelty. The problem is that this work is not telling us anything we didn't know--the universe behaves the same way inside a metamaterial as it does outside. What Smolyaninov needs is a way of using his exotic materials to do something interesting. In other words, he needs a killer app. Any ideas? "
  • Luzi Bergamin on 05 Feb 12
     
    Hm, they use more or less everything I don't especially like. They are nonmagnetic, so the relation materialGR is already rather weak. Usually, experimentalists prefer nonmagnetic media, since they are cheaper and broadband. At least the broadband is no argument here, since the frequency defines the "mass", which I find a rather strange point of view. And finally, they use strong anisotropy as a model of "time", which is rather problematic. Of course, the spatial direction with eps<0 appears in the wave equation with the same sign as time. But this does not mean that it behaves like time. But to teach material physicists that time is more than just a different sign in the wave equation seems to be as hopeless as to teach them that a black hole is more than something that absorbs all light... SIGHHH
  • LeopoldS on 10 Feb 12
     
    Luzi I miss you ...
Guido de Croon

Crowd sourcing site for science funding - 4 views

www.rockethub.com/...scifund

shared by Guido de Croon on 11 Nov 11 - No Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • LeopoldS on 12 Nov 11
     
    nice - and we could be the first ones to propose something in the space category ... good ideas welcome! http://www.rockethub.com/projects/scifund/by_category/35-space
Luís F. Simões

At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future - NYTimes.com - 3 views

www.nytimes.com/...ab-dreaming-up-the-future.html

AI robotics elevator spaceelevator car Web of Things

shared by Luís F. Simões on 15 Nov 11 - No Cached
  • These are just a few of the dreams being chased at Google X, the clandestine lab where Google is tackling a list of 100 shoot-for-the-stars ideas. In interviews, a dozen people discussed the list; some work at the lab or elsewhere at Google, and some have been briefed on the project. But none would speak for attribution because Google is so secretive about the effort that many employees do not even know the lab exists.
  • tvinko on 15 Nov 11
     
    hmmm, I was wondering how many ESA employees do know that ACT does exist....
  • Isabelle DB on 16 Nov 11
     
    And my son studying at Stanford (he just sent me the same link !) follows the courses this semester of two of the teachers mentioned in the article, Thrun - very good and Ng - excellent
Luís F. Simões

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

gizmodo.com/...sts-reception-using-zero-power

antenna

shared by Luís F. Simões on 22 Feb 12 - No Cached
  • 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.
  • Luís F. Simões on 22 Feb 12
  • Luís F. Simões on 22 Feb 12
     
    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.
  • LeopoldS on 25 Feb 12
     
    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 - Technology Review - 2 views

www.technologyreview.com/...27598

stochastic probabilistic computing pattern_recognition robotics navigation

shared by Luís F. Simões on 23 Feb 12 - No Cached
  • 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. &nbsp; In the real world, of course, input signals are always noisy so a system that can cope with noise has an obvious advantage.&nbsp; 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.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Ref:&nbsp;arxiv.org/abs/1202.4495: Stochastic-Based Pattern Recognition Analysis
  • Luís F. Simões on 23 Feb 12
     
    hey! This is essentially the Probabilistic Computing Ariadna
  • LeopoldS on 25 Feb 12
     
    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 :-)
Tobias Seidl

Home | InnoCentive - 4 views

www.innocentive.com

innovation crowdsourcing ideas MONEY

shared by Tobias Seidl on 09 Feb 12 - No Cached
  • LeopoldS on 10 Feb 12
     
    yes, interesting site, am following it since some time
dejanpetkow

Metamaterials + Wireless Power Transfer - 2 views

www.sciencedaily.com/...140110153201.htm

technology science phy

shared by dejanpetkow on 21 Jan 14 - No Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • dejanpetkow on 21 Jan 14
     
    Put together two ACT topics and see what happens.
  • LeopoldS on 22 Jan 14
     
    I remember discussing this briefly and then discarding the idea - but don't remember why any more; duncan?
  • Thijs Versloot on 23 Jan 14
     
    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.
Thijs Versloot

Cognitive computing - 2 views

www.forbes.com/...puting-ushers-in-new-era-of-it

IT technology computing

shared by Thijs Versloot on 04 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • Thijs Versloot on 04 Feb 14
     
    Has this not been underway for quite some time now? Not sure if this 'new era' is coming any day soon. Thoughts?
  • johannessimon81 on 06 Feb 14
     
    If they want to give the computers "senses" they should also go ahead and give them a body slightly taller than humans ...and guns. So once they reach a critical level of consciousness they can really go to town... http://0-media-cdn.foolz.us/ffuuka/board/tg/image/1385/54/1385549501025.jpg
  • Paul N on 08 Feb 14
     
    Neural networks!!! However, indeed, "senses" will not make any sense towards human-like computing without bodies that physically interact with the world. That's where most of these things are going wrong. Perception and cognition are for action. Without action coming from the machine side all these ideas simply fail.
Daniel Hennes

The World's Largest Solar Plant Started Creating Electricity Today - 3 views

gizmodo.com/ted-creating-electr-1521998493

technology energy

shared by Daniel Hennes on 14 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • Daniel Hennes on 14 Feb 14
     
    The enormous solar plant-jointly owned by NRG Energy, BrightSource Energy and Google-opened for business today ... well yesterday, but still impressive!
  • ...1 more comment...
  • Athanasia Nikolaou on 14 Feb 14
     
    impressive! and google is among the owners.
  • LeopoldS on 15 Feb 14
     
    impressive pictures - looking at the 2nd to last and 4th to last one, I am wondering how this distributed individually control of the mirrors works - and idea?
  • Paul N on 21 Feb 14
     
    Machine learning obviously. Most likely neural networks :P On the other hand: http://sploid.gizmodo.com/the-worlds-largest-solar-plant-is-killing-birds-meltin-1525107821
Thijs Versloot

The risk of geoengineering (or when abruptly stopping..) - 2 views

www.sciencedaily.com/...140217200823.htm

geoengineering

shared by Thijs Versloot on 19 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • Thijs Versloot on 19 Feb 14
     
    The researchers used a global climate model to show that if an extreme emissions pathway -- RCP8.5 -- is followed up until 2035, allowing temperatures to rise 1°C above the 1970-1999 mean, and then SRM (Solar Radiation Management) is implemented for 25 years and suddenly stopped, global temperatures could increase by 4°C in the following decades.
  • Athanasia Nikolaou on 19 Feb 14
     
    Nice quantitative study. They treat the problem within the full uncertainty range of climate sensitivity parameter (much uncertain), very complete. However, at SRM ceasing, after an initial positive spike of Radiative Forcing, the rate of warming seems to return to rates predicted for the non-geoengineering case: "The 20-year temperature trends following SRM cessation are 0.2−0.6 °C/decade for the range of climate sensitivities (figure 5), comparable to those trends that occur under the RCP8.5 scenario without any SRM." I am actually working on a similar idea for deliberate Mars terraforming: aiming to cool the planet down before we introduce a positive Temperature raising feedback with greenhouse gases, maybe could be more efficient than warming itself.
johannessimon81

Cosmological model without accelerated expansion proposed - 1 views

www.nature.com/...e-may-not-be-expanding-1.13379

science cosmology

shared by johannessimon81 on 07 Aug 13 - No Cached
  • johannessimon81 on 07 Aug 13
     
    Redshift in this model is partially produced by a change in the masses of elementary particles (and atoms)
  • ...3 more comments...
  • Thijs Versloot on 25 Aug 13
     
    It seems to solve the problem of infinite energy density at the singularity in any case. I would love to see a way of experimentally verifying this, although most people seem to believe it is wrong. I read the following quote though by Dirac to Pauli "we all agree your idea is crazy, but the real question is it crazy enough to be correct?"
  • H H on 25 Aug 13
     
    As far as I can see, this is not untestable per se, rather an explanation to the redshift that is equivalent to accelerating expansion. It is not that the theory is untestable, rather just another way of looking at it. Kind of like that its sometimes convenient to consider light a particle, sometimes a wave. In the same way it could sometime convenient to view the universe as static with increasing mass instead.
  • Thijs Versloot on 26 Aug 13
     
    Well the premiss "matter getting heavier" may be up to falsification in some way or another. Currently, there is no absolute method to determine mass so it might even be plausible that this is actually the case. I don't think it is related but there is a problem with the 1kg-standards (1 official and 6 copies) where the masses seem to deviate.
  • johannessimon81 on 26 Aug 13
     
    It should not be impossible to verify a change in mass(es) over time. For example the electron cyclotron frequency scales ~e/m while the Hydrogen emission frequencies scale with ~m*e^4. Using multiple relationships like that which can be easily and accurately measured an increase in the mass of fundamental particles should - in principle - be detectable (even if the mass of the earth increases at the same time changing the relativistic reference frame).
  • Thijs Versloot on 26 Aug 13
     
    The Watt balance and a definition using the Planck's constant seems to do the trick and is currently being discussed. Would the electron charge not be problematic as it is related to Coulombs which depends on Amperes which is defined by Newtons which hence depends back on the mass again?
johannessimon81

Typewriters agains dataleaks - 0 views

www.themoscowtimes.com/...483028.html

shared by johannessimon81 on 07 Aug 13 - No Cached
  • johannessimon81 on 07 Aug 13
     
    The Russian government is purchasing typewriters to process sensitive documents to prevent theft of sensitive information. ?: Did they get this idea from Battlestar Galactica?
LeopoldS

Space News - September 9, 2013 - 4 views

bt.e-ditionsbyfry.com/...article.php

cubesat

shared by LeopoldS on 12 Sep 13 - No Cached
  • LeopoldS on 12 Sep 13
     
    why are we not getting these type of startups in Europe .... btw: Will is british
  • ...1 more comment...
  • dejanpetkow on 12 Sep 13
     
    Nobody in Europe would invest 13Mio $ (or the equivalent in €) venture capital for this idea, it's just a different mentality. In Europe, VCs start to get interested when the investment risk is significantly lower.
  • Juxi Leitner on 13 Sep 13
     
    I agree, the mentality is different, it's hard to find VC funding for hardware stuff, even more so if you wanna shoot your HW into space. but there is movement, e.g. pioneers.io, they are in vienna and are actively trying to get more VC funding (in europe) for HW and other engineering startups
  • LeopoldS on 13 Sep 13
     
    thanks for the link ... just read this blog ... http://pioneers.io/blog/space-race-2-0-putting-satellites-into-the-hands-of-everyone a lot of selling talk but fundamentally I agree that they have a point ... and as ACT we will face the criticism in not so long that we have not managed (nor tried hard enough) to convince ESA about the need to embrace this "new space"
Beniamino Abis

Snake Robots for Exploration - 1 views

www.sintef.no/...Snake-robot-on-Mars

technology space

shared by Beniamino Abis on 18 Sep 13 - No Cached
  • Beniamino Abis on 18 Sep 13
     
    The researchers are busy working on a feasibility study assigned to them by the ESA. The idea is that by combining a rover that can navigate over large distances with a snake robot that can crawl along the ground and can get into inaccessible places, so many more possibilities could be opened up, e.g. collecting samples from tight spots that the rovers cannot reach.
Thijs Versloot

30 squats? Get a bus ticket - 1 views

sploid.gizmodo.com/...@kcampbelldollaghan

fun

shared by Thijs Versloot on 14 Nov 13 - No Cached
  • Thijs Versloot on 14 Nov 13
     
    Funny idea.. Maybe we should install it on the coke machine downstairs? :)
pandomilla

Flexible, stretchable fire-ant rafts - 2 views

phys.org/...tretchable-fire-ant-rafts.html

bio science PHY

shared by pandomilla on 27 Nov 13 - No Cached
  • pandomilla on 27 Nov 13
     
    An ant raft stays on top of the water surface even when it is hardly pressed by a branch -- showing water repellency and buoyancy. What do Jell-O, toothpaste, and floating fire-ant rafts have in common?
  • ...1 more comment...
  • Dario Izzo on 27 Nov 13
     
    wow!! cool experiments ..... I had no idea
  • Paul N on 28 Nov 13
     
    It's a strategy the ants actually actively exploit in the wild: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A042J0IDQK4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r04kAnzgjR4
  • LeopoldS on 03 Dec 13
     
    somebody showed such videos some years ago in one of our talks on swarm cooperation ... probably Tobias? or P. Dario? ... still impressive indeed
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