Charges to Go
Iowa State UniversityCell phone charged? Joe Hynek and his Iowa State University collaborators are working to make wearable solar charging devices useful and pretty.
Cell phone charged? Joe Hynek and his Iowa State University collaborators are working to make wearable solar charging devices useful and pretty.
Iowa State University engineers have designed a high-tech system to protect the bridges of Madison County from vandals. The remote monitoring technology could be applied to other structures where security is an issue.
The traditional "campus visit" has gone virtual, presenting new challenges for college enrollment officials as university websites become 24-hour admissions offices.
Members of the news media are invited to attend a special event marking a major technological leap forward for the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory.
The development of molecular manufacturing will be a hinge point in history. Like the invention of the printing press, steam engines, and computers, molecular manufacturing will transform business, industry, social structures, and the balance of world power. The question is not if, but when.
Using a patented design introduced by his professor, a K-State graduate student used a simple technique to improve the resolution of the gamma ray detector -- at a fraction of the cost of other techniques.
Precision mirrors to focus X-rays and neutron beams could speed the path to new materials and perhaps help explain why computers, cell phones and satellites go on the blink.
NASA researchers quarrel over how to network outer space.
Undergraduate engineers build 17-foot model of military surveillance airship that would hover at outer edge of atmosphere.
Isis Innovation, the technology transfer arm of the University of Oxford, is offering for licence a new and more reliable method for retrieving images from the web and from archive libraries.
A multi-organizational team is adapting for DOE use a technology that can help keep security adversaries out of DOE sites that contain nuclear assets. The DOE Office of Security and Safety Performance Assurance is exploring the potential to use directed energy weapons technology to help protect DOE nuclear assets.
A team of students from the University of Missouri-Rolla will try for another championship in solar car racing beginning July 17 in Austin, Texas. The race covers 2,500 miles, ending in Calgary, Alberta.
Humanoid robots RUBI and QRIO engage 1- to 2-year-old children in daily activities as part of a long-term project to investigate the uses of interactive computers in educational environments and to advance the field of real-time, social robotics.
The Florida LambdaRail Network, a next-generation Internet that is faster than any other education-based network in the Southeast and is among the top in the nation in speed and capacity, is now operating at Florida State University and nine other universities in the state.
Imagine if on September 11 rescue workers had been able to track each other with small locators emitting a signal that could penetrate through a building, metal, fire or smoke.
It took two centuries to cram the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., with more than 29 million books and periodicals, 2.7 million recordings, 12 million photographs, 4.8 million maps, and 57 million manuscripts; today it takes 15 minutes to churn out the digital equivalent.
The University of Arkansas is creating a center to test the durability of high-tech, high-speed fiber-optic communication devices made for the extreme environments faced by military and space flight equipment, thanks to an award from a local company that makes the devices.
A project to improve the false alarm rate and to standardize the certification of fire detection systems in cargo compartments of commercial aircraft is underway. Sandia's role in the project was to develop a physics-based Computational Fluid Dynamics model to analyze smoke transport in cargo compartments.
The federal government has asked engineering researchers to develop purely electronic systems to make the nation's power grid more reliable and efficient. Silicon-carbide, solid-state equipment will replace outdated and obsolete electro-mechanical devices.
Undergrad engineers answer challenge to make tractor useable by disabled volunteers at southern Maryland state park.
Open development of biological technology is crucial to US domestic security and to the health of our economy. Misuse of this technology in bioterrorism is a clear threat. Our first response to recent domestic bioterror attacks has been to pursue safety in regulation.
Researchers at USF's Center for Ocean Technology are taking underwater mass spectrometry equipment -- built to detect dissolved gasses and volatile organic compounds -- to ever greater depths to measure compounds at ever smaller concentrations.
Iowa State University researchers take innovative bridge beam to the breaking point: 595,000 pounds of load. That's more than the weight of seven semi trucks.
Dendritic NanoTechnologies Inc. at Central Michigan University makes precise denrimers that can be engineered for function and interior nanocontainer space available at low cost.
Alternatives to conventional solder, along with new electrically-conductive adhesives, are helping manufacturers get the lead out of consumer electronic products such as cellular telephones and electronic toys.
A multibeam Doppler radar that scans storms every 5 to 10 seconds is prowling the Great Plains through June in search of its first close-up tornado. The National Center for Atmospheric Research helped develop the Rapid-Scan Doppler on Wheels and a powerful technique to analyze its data in 3-D.
A special report looks at how technology is driving China's emergence as an industrial powerhouse -- and what that means for the world.
Iowa State University X-ray flow visualization facility allows researchers to see and take X-ray images of liquids, solids and gases flowing through a system.
Sophisticated signal processing techniques and simple proof-of-principle antenna arrays built from PVC pipe, aluminum foil and copper wire could revolutionize the way NASA obtains data from its Earth observing satellites.
Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology are helping public safety officials, building managers, child welfare authorities and others learn how to protect themselves from the dangers of clandestine methamphetamine laboratories.
A newly developed unmanned aerial vehicle could be the next tool in homeland security defense. The craft has no pilot -- not even one who controls it remotely from the ground. All aspects of flight are conducted without human intervention, making this UAV the first of its kind.
A new breed of rapid prototyping machine now in development can make everything from rockets to robots, batteries included.
Because a computer network cannot ward off every last Internet worm, it must sound an alarm the minute one slithers inside.
When the first matter came into being right after the big bang, what was it like? It may not have been quite as scientists have been describing it. That is one of the possibilities raised by four international teams of researchers.
In anticipation of a new federal safety requirement for passenger cars and trucks, engineers are busy perfecting a tiny sensor that can be placed on the wheels to monitor tire pressure and deliver accurate information to the driver.
A team of 15 student researchers is creating an experimental radar system designed to transform our ability to monitor rainfall. The students are building an array of sensors, to be deployed in Puerto Rico, that produces very accurate rainfall data to predict flooding, wind fields, and for crop hydrology.
Next-generation displays render images you can almost reach out and touch.
A new, one-of-a-kind robot uses the latest technology to help the visually impaired find their way when traditional guide dogs can't. The Robotic Guide is a combination of high-tech computer parts and a mobile base that assists the visually impaired in busy areas such as grocery stores, malls and airports.
Dr. Niloufar Haque, a neuroscientist who teaches at New York City College of Technology/CUNY, is sponsoring a conference on neurodegenerative diseases on April 15. Presentations to focus on Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases, Fragile X Syndrome, Epilepsy, and stress and the brain.
What leads to the success of Internet-based open-source software projects and emerging "open-content" collaborations? Those questions, which hold the key to a new era of sharing scientific knowledge, are being explored by Charles Schweik, a researcher at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
A team of first-year engineering students at Elizabethtown College have created a proximity sensor system that will help a disabled woman better maneuver her power wheelchair.
Websites for commuters are nothing new, but researchers in Sunnyvale, Calif., have developed an advanced system with a twist: in addition to tracking traffic congestion, the program crunches data from 14,000 sensors, in some cases every 30 seconds, to decipher evolving rush-hour patterns.
A professor is analyzing how "nanoscience" and "nanotechnology" are being defined and presented by the media. This information is important, he explains, because the media plays a major role in "framing" issues, such as a new technology's "promise" or "threat," in the public mind.
Geothermal researchers have developed sensors that can be placed in hotter and higher-pressure underground environments than previous instruments, a capability that is allowing geologists worldwide to make more precise measurements of subterranean conditions before and after large earthquakes occur.
K-State physics professors are developing ways to deliver to their students "nearly individualized information" that allow them to communicate with their students and the students with each other digitally.
IEEE Spectrum picks the 10 current automobiles that use technology to the greatest, most ingenious effect.
A virtual-reality drama, aimed at transforming the movie-going experience, is driving the development of "self-aware" computational agents that are able to improvise responses to the spontaneous actions of human users.
The U.S. Constitution may not provide direct answers to policy questions about the genetic engineering of human beings, but it does offer shared values that can help frame the debate about this developing technology, according to a Georgia Institute of Technology professor.
In a Feb. 17 media briefing at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, members of three independent research teams will jointly unveiling a new breed of energy-efficient, two-legged, powered robots with a surprisingly human gait.
Anja Mueller is working to improve heart valve replacement technology by creating a nonadhesive, medicated coating that will cover the artificial valves and prevent blood platelets and bacteria from sticking to heart valves installed in patients.