DURHAM, N.C. – A device that can bestow invisibility to an object by "cloaking" it from visual light is closer to reality. After being the first to demonstrate the feasibility of such a device by constructing a prototype in 2006, a team of Duke University engineers has produced a new type of cloaking device, which is significantly more sophisticated at cloaking in a broad range of frequencies.
Tech
Many hopes are pinned on spintronics. In the future it could replace electronics, which in the race to produce increasingly rapid computer components, must at sometime reach its limits. Different from electronics, where whole electrons are moved (the digital "one" means "an electron is present on the component", zero means "no electron present"), here it is a matter of manipulating a certain property of the electron, its spin. For this reason, components are needed in which electrons can be injected successively, and one must be able to manipulate the spin of the single electrons, e.g.
New Haven, Conn. -- Many Americans have already taken action to reduce their energy use and many others would do the same if they could afford to, according to a national survey conducted by Yale and George Mason universities.
New Haven, Conn. — Water and energy are two resources on which modern society depends. As demands for these increase, researchers look to alternative technologies that promise both sustainability and reduced environmental impact. Engineered osmosis holds a key to addressing both the global need for affordable clean water and inexpensive sustainable energy according to Yale researchers.
A project to speed and further safeguard the shipping of thousands of radioisotopes in the United States and afar hits the highway this year, but researchers expect the benefits to extend well beyond.
Using radio frequency identification, or RFID, in conjunction with other technologies in use and being developed, the research team led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory aims to take the world of commerce to the next level of efficiency.
Thanks to an ingenious new strategy devised by researchers at University of California, Davis and Intel Corporation, computer network administrators might soon be able to mount effective, low-cost defenses against self-propagating infectious programs known as worms.
MADISON — Distorted cell-phone photos and big, clunky telephoto lenses could be things of the past.
University of Wisconsin-Madison Electrical and Computer Engineering Associate Professor Zhenqiang (Jack) Ma and colleagues have developed a flexible light-sensitive material that could revolutionize photography and other imaging technologies.
Their technology is featured on the cover of the January 5 issue of Applied Physics Letters.
Information obtained from a new application of photoacoustic tomography (PAT) is worth its weight in gold to breast cancer patients.
Troy, N.Y. – Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have developed and demonstrated a new type of light emitting diode (LED) with significantly improved lighting performance and energy efficiency.
The new polarization-matched LED, developed in collaboration with Samsung Electro-Mechanics, exhibits an 18 percent increase in light output and a 22 percent increase in wall-plug efficiency, which essentially measures the amount of electricity the LED converts into light.
Could a concept from information technology familiar to online file sharers be exploited to reduce road congestion and even traffic accidents? That is the question answered in the affirmative by researchers in California, writing in the International Journal of Vehicle Information and Communication Systems.
A way to make wind power smoother and more efficient that exploits the inertia of a wind turbine rotor could help solve the problem of wind speed variation, according to research published in the International Journal of Power Electronics.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 23 - Deriving plentiful electricity from sunlight at a modest cost is a challenge with immense implications for energy, technology, and climate policy. A paper in a special energy issue of Optics Express, the Optical Society's (OSA) open-access journal, describes a relatively new approach to solar cells: lacing them with nanoscopic metal particles. As the authors describe in the article, this approach has the potential to greatly improve the ability of solar cells to harvest light efficiently.
GAITHERSBURG, Md.—Electronic technologies could be deployed immediately and reliably to augment slower postal mail for distributing ballots to U.S. citizens living abroad, but using telephone, e-mail, and the Web to transmit completed ballots still faces significant, unresolved issues, according a new report* released today.
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — For those who love "green" compact fluorescent bulbs but hate their cold light, here's some good news: Researchers are closer to flipping the switch on cheaper, richer LED-type room lighting.
University of Florida materials science and engineers have achieved a new record in efficiency of blue organic light-emitting diodes, or OLEDs. Because blue is essential to white light, the advance helps overcome a hurdle to lighting that is much more efficient than compact fluorescents — but can produce high-quality light similar to standard incandescent bulbs.
Capsule endoscopy (CE), which is virtually a micro-camera, is a revolutionary diagnostic tool in diagnosing small bowel diseases, and CE can obtain 40-60 thousand images of the GI tract, though the number of the images for the lesions is smaller than 500 in most of the patients. The CE reader still has to scan ten thousands of the images one by one because the reader cannot make sure which images the lesions are in. So, it may be a big burden on the CE reader's eyes and energy.