entire Web this site Home > current tech-news tech-news archive Tech-news: Latest from the world of gadgetry and technology Collider halted until next year (Sep 24, 2008) The Large Hadron Collider near Geneva will be shut off until spring 2009 while engineers probe a magnet failure. The incident on 19 September caused a tonne of liquid helium to leak out into the experiment's 27km-long tunnel. Officials said the time required to fully investigate the problem precluded a re-start before the lab's winter maintenance period. Read more. Source: BBC Ultrasound to give feel to games (Sep 3, 2008) The power of ultrasonic waves has been harnessed to produce "virtual" objects in mid-air. The field of haptics – integrating computing and the sense of touch – has been around for some time but has required gloves or mechanical devices to impart a sense of feeling. Now, a team of Japanese researchers has developed a system that uses focused ultrasound to do the job. Read more. Source: BBC Google launches internet browser (Sep 2, 2008) Google is launching an open source web browser to compete with Internet Explorer and Firefox. The browser is designed to be lightweight and fast, and to cope with the next generation of web applications that rely on graphics and multimedia. Called Chrome, it will launch as a beta for Windows machines in 100 countries, with Mac and Linux versions to come. Read more. Source: BBC Intel details new core chip line (Aug 21, 2008) Intel has unveiled the processors that will form the core of its product line from 2009 onwards. Details about Nehalem, now officially called Core i7, were given at the Intel Developers Forum in San Francisco. The chips will appear in laptops, desktops and servers and with them Intel aims to boost processing ability, cut power use and improve graphics. Read more. Source: BBC Elastic electronics see better (Aug 8, 2008) A new camera designed with a curved detection surface allows imaging devices to see as animals do. The camera, inspired by the human eye, relies on the ability to construct silicon electronics on a stretchable membrane. In the future, these electronic membranes could be wrapped around human organs to act as health monitoring devices, say US-based developers. Read more. Source: BBC Say goodbye to the computer mouse (Jul 17, 2008) It's nearly 40 years old but one leading research company says the days of the computer mouse are numbered. A Gartner analyst predicts the demise of the computer mouse in the next three to five years. Taking over will be so called gestural computer mechanisms like touch screens and facial recognition devices. Read more. Source: BBC Your life will be flashed before your eyes (Jul 3, 2008) Babak Parviz wears contact lenses. But he's not yet using the new contact lenses he's made in his Seattle laboratory. Containing electronic circuits, they look like something from a science fiction movie. He's now going to add some extremely small light emitting diodes (LEDs), helping turn his prototype contact lenses into a sophisticated personal display - the tiniest one possible. Read more. Source: Guardian Roundest objects in the world created (Jul 1, 2008) When asked by the Pope to demonstrate his artistic skill, 14th century Italian painter Giotto di Bondone supposedly drew a perfect circle freehand and said: "That's more than enough." Now, an international group of engineers and craftsmen has gone him one better and built a pair of nearly perfect spheres that are thought to be the roundest objects in the world. Read more. Source: New Scientist Supercomputer sets petaflop pace (Jun 9, 2008) A supercomputer built with components designed for the Sony PlayStation 3 has set a new computing milestone. The IBM machine, codenamed Roadrunner, has been shown to run at "petaflop speeds", the equivalent of one thousand trillion calculations per second. The benchmark means the computer is twice as nimble as the current world's fastest machine (shown here), also built by IBM. Read more. Source: BBC Google to get new space age home (Jun 7, 2008) Google is to get a new home after signing a 40-year lease to build a high-tech campus on land owned by NASA. The 1.2m sq ft site will include a huge office complex, and research and development facilities. The search giant will pay an initial base rent of $3.66m a year for the undeveloped land at the NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View. Read more. Source: BBC Microsoft demos 'touch Windows' (May 28, 2008) Microsoft's next operating system (OS) will come with multi-touch features as an alternative to the mouse. It is hoped the successor will have a better reception than the much-maligned Vista OS, released last year. Scheduled for release in 2009 the new fingertip interface lets users enlarge and shrink photos, trace routes on maps, paint pictures or play the piano. Read more. Source: BBC Laser heats up the fusion future (May 19, 2008) The world's most powerful laser has heated matter to 10 million Celsius, hotter than the surface of the Sun. The Vulcan laser concentrated energy equivalent to 100 times the world's electricity production into a spot just a few millionths of a metre across. Writing in the New Journal of Physics, scientists said they could create the conditions for fractions of a second. Read more. Source: BBC NASA, Intel, SGI plan to 'soup up' supercomputer (May 8, 2008) NASA, Intel Corp., and SGI today announced the signing of an agreement establishing intentions to collaborate on significantly increasing the space agency's supercomputer performance and capacity. These organizations will work together on a project called Pleiades to develop a computational system with a capacity of one Petaflops peak performance (1,000 trillion operations per second) by 2009 and a system with a peak performance of 10 Petaflops (10,000 trillion operations per second) by 2012. Read more. Source: NASA Electronics' 'missing link' found (May 1, 2008) Details of an entirely new kind of electronic device, which could make chips smaller and far more efficient, have been outlined by scientists. The new components, described by scientists at Hewlett-Packard, are known as "memristors". The devices were proposed 40 years ago but have only recently been fabricated, the team wrote in the journal Nature. Read more. Source: BBC Nano switch hints at future chips (Apr 18, 2008) Researchers have built the world's smallest transistor – one atom thick and 10 atoms wide – out of a material that could one day replace silicon. The transistor, essentially an on/off switch, has been made using graphene [see image], a two-dimensional material first discovered only four years ago. Graphene is a single layer of graphite, which is found in the humble pencil. Read more. Source: BBC Powerful laser is 'brightest light in the universe' (Apr 10, 2008) Physicists have turned on the world's most powerful laser, whose pulses are more intense than any known light source in the universe. The incredible temperatures and pressures it generates when it hits a target will let scientists explore conditions found in exploding stars and the cores of giant planets. Read more. Source: New Scientist Matrix-style virtual worlds 'a few years away' (Apr 3, 2008) Are supercomputers on the verge of creating Matrix-style simulated realities? Michael McGuigan at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, New York, thinks so. He says that virtual worlds realistic enough to be mistaken for the real thing are just a few years away. Read more. Source: New Scientist Silicon chips stretch into shape (Mar 27, 2008) Normally fragile and brittle silicon chips have been made to bend and fold, paving the way for a new generation of flexible electronic devices. The stretchy circuits could be used to build advanced brain implants, health monitors or smart clothing. The complex devices consist of concertina-like folds of ultra-thin silicon bonded to sheets of rubber. Read more. Source: BBC Chemical brain controls nanobots (Mar 13, 2008) A tiny chemical "brain" which could one day act as a remote control for swarms of nano-machines has been invented. The molecular device – just two billionths of a metre across – was able to control eight of the microscopic machines simultaneously in a test. Writing in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, scientists say it could also be used to boost the processing power of future computers. Read more. Source: BBC Self-healing rubber bounces back (Feb 21, 2008) A material that is able to self-repair even when it is sliced in two has been invented by French researchers. The as-yet-unnamed material – a form of artificial rubber – is made from vegetable oil and a component of urine. The substance, described in the journal Nature, produces surfaces when cut that retain a strong chemical attraction to each other. Read more. Source: BBC Brain control headset for gamers (Feb 20, 2008) Gamers will soon be able to interact with the virtual world using their thoughts and emotions alone. A neuro-headset which interprets the interaction of neurons in the brain will go on sale later this year. "It picks up electrical activity from the brain and sends wireless signals to a computer," said Tan Le, president of US/Australian firm Emotiv. Read more. Source: BBC Nanowires allow 'power dressing' (Feb 14, 2008) Scientists in the US have developed novel brush-like fibres that generate electrical energy from movement. Weaving them into a material could allow designers to create "smart" clothes which harness body movement to power portable electronic gadgets. Writing in the journal Nature, the team say that the materials could also be used in tents or other structures to harness wind energy. Read more. Source: BBC Holographic displays step closer (Feb 7, 2008) Holograms could soon be helping monitor surgical procedures after a faster way to make the 3D images is discovered. The journal Nature reports the breakthrough by US researchers who developed a novel material in which holographs can be created in minutes. The images that the material can capture are almost as sharp as those broadcast on US television. Read more. Source: BBC Hypersonic passenger jet designed (Feb 6, 2008) A British firm claims to have designed a hypersonic passenger plane that could one day fly between Europe and Australia in less than five hours. The A2 aeroplane, designed by Reaction Engines in Oxfordshire, would carry 300 passengers at a top speed of 4,000 mph. The company said the aircraft, which is still at the concept stage, could be operating within 25 years. Read more. Source: BBC 'Darkest ever' material created (Jan 17, 2008) The "darkest ever" substance known to science has been made in a US laboratory. The material was created from carbon nanotubes – sheets of carbon just one atom thick rolled up into cylinders. Researchers say it is the closest thing yet to the ideal black material, which absorbs light perfectly at all angles and over all wavelengths. Read more. Source: BBC Gates hails age of digital senses (Jan 16, 2008) Apple boss Steve Jobs has unveiled the world's thinnest laptop, called the MacBook Air. The computer, which is 0.76 inches (1.93cm) at its thickest point, was unveiled at an event in San Francisco. The Apple head also launched online film rentals for iTunes users in the US from almost every major film studio, including Disney and Fox. Read more. Source: BBC Gates hails age of digital senses (Jan 8, 2008) The way people interact with computers is going to dramatically change in the next five years, Microsoft chief Bill Gates has told BBC News. He predicted that the keyboard and mouse would gradually give way to more intuitive and natural technologies. In particular, he said, touch, vision and speech interfaces would become increasingly important. Read more. Source: BBC BACK TO TOP

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