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Physicists Measure Elusive Persistent Current That Flows Forever

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 07:46:49 -0700

Frustration. How much current is produced? Can it be used as a power source? If you put a billion little circles in a group will they produce a usable amount of current? Is this merely an oddity?

Italian scientist reproduces Shroud of Turin - Science- msnbc.com

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:59:40 -0700

I admit that the Turin Shroud carbon dating was inconclusive in my opinion due to the burning and the fact that the shroud has dust the indicates a Levant origin. This work, however, puts those doubts to rest. The shroud is an obvious medieval fake - the work of a miracle should not be so easy to reproduce.

World Community Grid - View Thread - Discovering Dengue Drugs - Together (Phase 1) Completion

Thu, 27 Aug 2009 06:18:04 -0700

Hurray for the World Community Grid! Phase One of the dengue fever drug research program has been completed after two years. 3 million molecules have been examined and reduced down to a few thousand which may be useful as drugs to fight dengue fever, hepatitis C, West Nile, and Yellow fever.

Phase Two is starting soon, the few thousand remaining molecules will be tested further to see which of these needs to be tested in a real world laboratory.

In-vitro meat: Would lab-burgers be better for us and the planet? - CNN.com

Wed, 12 Aug 2009 12:04:30 -0700

The comments are the funniest. "I for one welcome cruelty free meat" is the best. Then there are the folks who lament how this will increase the population, so where will we all live? As if killing off large numbers of people due to malnutrition and starvation is a better answer.

Evolution machine speeds up search for better bugs - life - 26 July 2009 - New Scientist

Mon, 27 Jul 2009 12:25:32 -0700

This will revolutionize biotech as we know it. Currently, the process of identifying genetic changes that produce useful traits in bacteria is painstaking, cumbersome, and lengthy. The article presents the example of DuPont spending seven years and 100s of millions of dollars to create 20 changes so they can produce a chemical.

MAGE (multiplex automated genome engineering) can create thousands of changes in a few days for a few thousand dollars. Biotech is approach it's own singularity.

Im the next worlds smallest man | Metro.co.uk

Wed, 24 Jun 2009 17:56:38 -0700

ANOTHER INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION?

Fri, 01 May 2009 08:36:56 -0700

Michio Kaku talking about Molecular Manufacturing. Not bad, considering he's a public face with acceptably conservative views of futurism.

I, robot, am looking forward to a very bright future | The Japan Times Online

Mon, 13 Apr 2009 08:21:17 -0700

Synopsis: a robot hypothesized the function of certain genes in a yeast whose function was previously unknown, tested the genes, retested, and then announced the discovery.

Why is this exciting?

Because the rate of increase of scientific knowledge is limited by the number of scientists. Currently, scientists must be grown from embryos to adults, a process of 18 years, and then educated to graduate student level, another 4-6 years, before they can produce any useful data. A robot scientists, however, can be easily duplicated and mass produced. Science operates at the artisan level, not much different from 1700s manufacturing before mass production. This robot represents the same change to science as mass production to manufacturing: a multiple order of magnitude increase in speed and accuracy.

Single Atom Quantum Dots Bring Real Devices Closer (Video)

Wed, 04 Feb 2009 11:24:44 -0800

Spectacular! These quantum dots operate at ROOM TEMPERATURE with existing silicon technology. This is critical for getting technology like this from experimental labs into useable products. The article fails to explain how the quantum dots are manufactured - mass production is key to making anything cheap and plentiful.

Reading the fine print takes on a new meaning

Thu, 29 Jan 2009 08:08:00 -0800

35 bits per electron. Holey Moley, that's four bytes plus three checksum bits. You'd need less than 11,500 silicon atoms to get Bill Gates's 640K. Of course this isn't really true, since multiple atoms were used to create this effect. Still, there's plenty of room at the bottom, wherever the bottom is.