Article Archive for July 2009
As part of the Google D.C. Talks series, Google’s Washington office hosted a special book talk with Chris Anderson, Editor in Chief of Wired Magazine and best-selling author of The Long Tail. In his new …
Read more… To understand how a fly’s tiny brain processes visual information efficiently enough to guide its aerobatic feats — and ultimately to build more capable robots — researchers in Munich, Germany, have set up …
Read more… University of Florida researchers were able to program bone marrow stem cells to repair damaged retinas in mice, suggesting a potential treatment for one of the most common causes of vision loss in …
Read more… The international media report that citizens from across the world are travelling, or seeking to travel, to Switzerland, where they hope to be helped to die. But this ’suicide tourism’ presents distinctive ethical, …
Read more… We haven’t heard much recently about so-called virtual worlds such as Second Life, in which you move around with your own avatar. Critics must be hoping they have disappeared up their own ether. …
Read more… Capco could face nearly $11 billion in claims but has only about $150 million with which to meet them, according to industry estimates.
If you had the opportunity to probe the future, make strategic choices, and view their consequences before making expensive and irretrievable decisions, wouldn’t you take advantage of it? Of course you would. And in a …
Read more… The military weighs a near-total ban on Twitter, Facebook, and all other social networking sites, arguing that the Web 2.0 destinations make it way too easy for hackers to gain access to the …
Read more… Yahoo Inc. invested billions of dollars in its Internet search engine during the past six years before realizing it made more sense to entrust the job to an outsider — hearkening back to …
Lawrence Lessig, author of “Free Culture,” visits Google’s New York office as part of the Authors@Google series.
MP3… Richard Jones is the author of the book Soft Machines: Nanotechnology and Life and a blog on the subject also named Soft Machines. From the University of Sheffield in the UK, where he is …
Read more… For most nonprofits, raising money means asking donors to write a check. But like music, maps and movies, charitable giving is also going mobile.
Read more… In a daring experiment in Europe, scientists used mosquitoes as flying needles to deliver a "vaccine" of live malaria parasites through their bites. The results were astounding: Everyone in the vaccine group acquired …
In Life Inc., award-winning writer, documentary filmmaker, and scholar Douglas Rushkoff traces how corporations went from being convenient legal fictions to being the dominant fact of contemporary life. Indeed, as Rushkoff shows, most Americans have …
We are just beginning to see a massive shift in military technology that threatens to make the stuff of I,Robot and the Terminator all too real. More than seven- thousand robotic systems are now in …
Brilliantly conceived as a relay of scientific stories, The Age of Wonder investigates the earliest ideas of deep time and space, and the explorers of “dynamic science,” of an infinite, mysterious Nature waiting to be …
Read more… Airlines, like other consumer businesses, are using social media channels like Twitter and Facebook to forge deeper relationships with passengers.
Read more… A Russian Dnepr rocket is set to place two British-built fast-response imaging satellites in orbit.
This clip from the “Five Ways to Save the World” details a cheap, simple, and low-risk way to compensate for global warming. If the reflectivity of clouds could be increased slightly, sufficient sunlight would be …
Read more… The British government has told civil servants: Go forth and tweet.
Read more… Maternal exposure to nanoparticles of titanium dioxide (TiO2) affects the expression of genes related to the central nervous system in developing mice. Researchers writing in BioMed Central’s open access journal Particle and Fibre …
Read more… Google Inc., which has long shown you different online ads depending on what you search for, will now help a single company show different TV ads, depending on who you are, where you …
In this prophetic talk from 2003, roboticist Rodney Brooks talks about how robots are going to work their way into our lives — starting with toys and moving into household chores … and beyond.
Niall Ferguson and James Fallows debate the statement by Zhou Xiaochuan, head of China’s central bank, calling for the replacement of the dollar as the dominant world currency with the creation of an international reserve …
Read more… Tracking down new active agents for cancer or malaria treatment could soon become easier – thanks to a computer program with which researchers from the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Physiology in Dortmund …
Read more… The island nation is locked in a fierce debate over how to pay off its creditors without ceding too much of its vaunted independence.
Read more… Nanoparticles are being developed to perform a wide range of medical uses – imaging tumors, carrying drugs, delivering pulses of heat. Rather than settling for just one of these, researchers at the University …
Read more… A new study challenges the traditional view that patents foster innovation, suggesting instead that they may hinder technological progress, economic activity and societal wealth. These results could have important policy implications, because many …
Read more… Verizon is giving some of its home broadband customers free access to thousands of Wi-Fi hotspots in airports and other public places, taking a page from competitors that already offer wireless Internet access.
Read more… A replacement for the black and white stripes of the traditional barcode is outlined by US researchers.
Read more… Combine a dash of sun, a pinch of carbon dioxide, and a designer organism and what do you get? According to Cambridge start-up Joule Biotechnologies, liquid fuel made from sunlight – or SolarFuel.
Read more… Japan’s government has come up with a not-so-new idea for creating jobs in its healthcare sector: attracting medical tourists. For months, a panel of experts has been meeting at the Ministry of Economy, …
Read more… Social networking websites such as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace will soon become the most insidious places on the Internet, where users are most likely to face cyber attacks and digital annoyances, according to …
The Silver Lining shows how managers can apply the time-tested principles of disruptive innovation to manage the ultimate business paradox: cutting costs while simultaneously innovating for growth. Based on deep academic research and lessons from …
America is addicted to fossil fuels, and the environmental and geopolitical costs are mounting. A federal program  on the scale of the Manhattan Project or the Apollo Program  to stimulate innovation in energy …
Looking for greater satisfaction in your work and personal life? Simply follow the clear, upbeat strategies for increasing your EI you will find in this book. Emotional intelligence (EI) has been called “advanced common sense” …
Read more… The meteoric rise of the Incan civilisation was driven by a sustained period of warmer weather, research suggests.
Read more… The oil and gas that fuels our homes and cars started out as living organisms that died, were compressed, and heated under heavy layers of sediments in the Earth’s crust. Scientists have debated …
Read more… High-throughput sequencing has turned biologists into voracious genome readers, enabling them to scan millions of DNA letters, or bases, per hour. When revising a genome, however, they struggle, suffering from serious writer’s block, …
Read more… Clinching deals for African mobile phone business, once a relatively low-risk proposition for growth-starved mobile operators, is not as easy as it was.
Read more… On Road Trip 2009, CNET News reporter Daniel Terdiman stops at the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo., to talk about how it implements technology.
CNN interview with Warren Buffett investee Wang Chuanfu of BYD, April 22, 2009 (3 of 3). Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway invested in Chinese automaker BYD in 2008. Charlie Munger has said about Wang Chuanfu: “This …
CNN interview with Warren Buffett investee Wang Chuanfu of BYD, April 22, 2009 (2 of 3). Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway invested in Chinese automaker BYD in 2008. Charlie Munger has said about Wang Chuanfu: “This …
CNN interview with Warren Buffett investee Wang Chuanfu of BYD, April 22, 2009 (1 of 3). Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway invested in Chinese automaker BYD in 2008. Charlie Munger has said about Wang Chuanfu: “This …
Lithium to save Bolivia’s economy? As ITN’s Lindsey Hilsum reports, the demand for lithium could transform Bolivia’s economy.
Prof. James B. Stewart, Steve Swartz, president of Hearst Newspapers, and Norman Pearlstine, chief content officer Bloomberg, L.P. discuss journalism trends and the future of print media.
Read more… As gains are made in artificial intelligence, scientists worry that advances could have dangerous consequences.
Read more… In a disturbing new projection, health officials say up to 40 percent of Americans could get swine flu this year and next and several hundred thousand could die without a successful vaccine campaign …
Whether you’re struggling to get by or well on your way to material wealth, sooner or later you’ll ask yourself: What does it all mean? It’s not that the quest for a comfortable life is …
RealAudio / WindowsMedia… The Internet was once a world without borders, a place where one’s physical location was the last thing to affect our online experience. Today, a new wave of location-based services is turning …
When something is sucked into a black hole, is it lost forever? Three decades ago, the American physicist Leonard Susskind and the British physicist Stephen Hawking began clashing over the answer to this question. Hawking …
Read more… The latest earnings season and job numbers provided some glimmers of hope for much of the valley. But not so for venture capitalists.
Read more… Look out Ichiro Suzuki and Daisuke Matsuzaka. A pair of baseball-playing robots that can pitch and hit with incredible results have been developed in Japan.
Read more… How fast is the Greenland Ice Sheet melting?
Read more… An award-winning invention by Stanford doctoral students Richard Gaster and Drew Hall may change who diagnoses diseases ranging from flu to the Human Immunodeficiency Virus. The invention, called the NanoLab, is a miniature, …
Today government agencies not only have official Web sites but also sponsor moderated chats, blogs, digital video clips, online tutorials, videogames, and virtual tours of national landmarks. Sophisticated online marketing campaigns target citizens with messages …
Global warming, environmental degradation, the rapid pace of technological innovation, and the economic stresses of globalization give rise to much speculation about the future. How will these dynamic factors affect society in the coming decades? …
Read more… US researchers have created ‘bacterial computers’ with the potential to solve complicated mathematics problems. The findings of the research, published in BioMed Central’s open access Journal of Biological Engineering, demonstrate that computing in …
Read more… Google Books, which includes the largest team of engineers working out of Cambridge, is making some in the publishing world nervous. The growing digital book project has been a force.
Read more… The Associated Press is moving ahead with plans for a system to detect unlicensed use of its content and potentially create new ways for the 163-year-old news cooperative and other media to make …
Read more… Countries are retreating to national regulations to protect themselves from international financial risk.
Read more… A US firm has demonstrated its technique that sends power through the air, powering and charging devices wirelessly.
Read more… The world’s first synthetic brain could be built within 10 years, giving us an unprecedented insight into the nature of consciousness and our perception of reality.
Read more… A young designer creates a device for sharing the stories that an heirloom picks up over time. Amina Nazari is a product designer by training, so it makes sense that she was mystified …
Read more… The Air Force envisions drones that could do the work of bombers and cargo planes and miniature ones that could spy inside a room.
Read more… Family planning officials in Shanghai are making home visits and slipping leaflets under doorways to encourage certain residents to have a second child in a bid to balance the city’s expanding senior…
Even as mega-banks topple, Juan Enriquez says the big reboot is yet to come. But don’t look for it on your ballot — or in the stock exchange. It’ll come from science labs, and it …
While news from Iran streams to the world, Clay Shirky shows how Facebook, Twitter and TXTs help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news, bypassing censors (however briefly). The end of top-down control …
Read more… Wade McGillis peered up at the structure propped like a high-tech stick figure – minus the head – on an elementary school roof. Then he examined the electronics attached to its spindly metal …
Genius 101 examines the many definitions of “genius,” and the multiple domains in which it appears, including art, science, music, business, literature, and the media. Dr. Simonton introduces the study of genius …
Read more… Olives dates and figs could become common in Britain within 20 years as global warming improves growing conditions for subtropical crops.
Read more… A tiny island nation in the Pacific Ocean – that could be wiped off the map because of global warming – is seeking to to set an example for the world by shedding …
Read more… Medical training programs are springing up in virtual reality, and they may bring big changes to the way health-care professionals learn their craft.
Read more… Legal services offering free, unlimited streaming of music, rather than downloads, are proliferating. But whether they can turn a profit is another matter.
Read more… With India a major source of high-skill professionals and the U.S. science and engineering work force increasingly dependent upon foreign talent, the two nations must devise farsighted, cooperative policies to facilitate the movement …
Read more… Amazon fended off Saturday accusations of Big Brother-like behavior after it quietly erased two George Orwell books from customers’ electronic book readers this week.
Read more… For brands such as Google and Twitter and, Microsoft hopes, Bing, a trademark might not be as useful as becoming a part of speech.
Read more… Airsage, the provider of vehicle traffic information to Google Maps and other clients, has secured the rights to tap into a vital tool for tracking congestion on roadways ‘” your cell phone.
Read more… To many parents, text messaging is an enigma — a practice their children engage in when they could just make a phone call or walk down the street to their friends’ houses. It …
Read more… Is the UK’s nuclear waste strategy in jeopardy?
Read more… Why are some people smarter than others? In a new article in Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, Eduardo Mercado III from the University at Buffalo, …
Read more… Scientists have long suspected that the sex chromosome that only males carry is deteriorating and could disappear entirely within a few million years, but until now, no one has understood the evolutionary processes …
Read more… Everyday human interaction is not what you would call perfect, so what if there was a third party added to the mix – like a metallic version of us? In a new article …
Read more… The push space has given to tomorrow’s power plants
Read more… myExperiment, the social networking site for scientists, has set out to challenge traditional ideas of academic publishing as it enters a new phase of funding.
Read more… A spike in car sales due to GM’s bankruptcy exit and the "Cash for Clunkers" program could provide a boost for in-car tech products
Read more… The UN discusses rules aimed at cutting the emission of greenhouse gases from shipping.
Read more… A team of researchers has mapped patterns of illicit drug use across the state of Oregon using a method of sampling municipal wastewater before it is treated.
Read more… A student team in the Virginia Tech College of Engineering is providing the blind with an opportunity many never thought possible: The opportunity to drive.
Read more… Ministers are to publish plans for a low-carbon future, which they say can make money while tackling climate change
Read more… Tracking rubbish with mobile tags to reduce waste.
Read more… The human brain can adapt to changing demands even in adulthood, but MIT neuroscientists have now found evidence of it changing with unsuspected speed. Their findings suggest that the brain has a network …
Read more… Europe’s next space freighter – Johannes Kepler – is being built for a mission to re-supply the space station in 2010.
Read more… In Denmark, there will be only one meaningful question asked: will the US and China come together to make meaningful concessions to reduce their environmental footprints?
Read more… After two recent plane crashes in which flight data recorders were lost, new consideration is being given to streaming data or other technologies.
Read more… Communications giant Cisco points to a worrying trend of cyber criminals mirroring successful business practices.
Read more… Police release a swarm of robot-moths to sniff out a distant drug stash. Rescue robot-bees dodge through earthquake rubble to find survivors.
Read more… The program is a joint venture with a biotech company founded by the genomics pioneer J. Craig Venter.
Read more… Cuts in routes and workers may help airlines weather the downturn, but if conditions worsen, some carriers may not survive.
Read more… Imagine a carbon sheet that’s only one atom thick but is stronger than diamond and conducts electricity 100 times faster than the silicon in computer chips.
Read more… Workers could be allowed to stay in their jobs after they turn 65 as part of Government plans to deal with the problems created by Britain’s ageing society.
Read more… Over the past 30 years Joël de Rosnay has been drawing on his expertise in biology and advanced technologies to investigate what is in store for the digital civilisation.
Read more… Twelve European companies launched a 400-billion-euro (560-billion-dollar) initiative to plant huge solar farms in Africa and the Middle East to produce energy for Europe.
Read more… Germany is well on its way to making the key mistake that is blamed for Japan’s ”lost decade” of economic stagnation in the 1990s — failing to clean up its banks decisively.
Read more… Findings suggested traditional news sites were typically ahead of blogs by two and a half hours when a story line spread.
Read more… Augmented reality  in which the real world is overlaid with virtual information  is now also making its way to smartphones, thanks to advances in both hardware and software.
Read more… Green fuel bill shock: Families face a charge of up to £120 to fund thousands of wind turbines
Read more… South Korea has obtained intelligence that North Korea last month ordered a military institute of computer hackers — known as Lab 110 — to "destroy" South Korean communications networks, news reports said.
Read more… As part of its turnaround plan, General Motors Corp. said Friday it plans to experiment with auctioning new cars on eBay , expanding on an existing partnership covering certified used vehicles on the …
Read more… Climbing into his Volvo, outfitted with a Matrics antenna and a Motorola reader he’d bought on eBay for $190, Chris Paget cruised the streets of San Francisco with this objective: To read the …
Read more… Scientists at Karolinska Institutet and Linköping University (Sweden) are well on the way to creating the first artificial nerve cell that can communicate specifically with nerve cells in the body using neurotransmitters. The …
Read more… A team of Canadian scientists and engineers, led by the University of Alberta and the National Research Council of Canada, will collaborate on a $3.39 million, three-year study to assess the potential effects …
Read more… Rather than fight the idea of students using the Web to communicate with each other, some educators are encouraging it.
Read more… A highly ambitious European project used basic cognitive function, eye-tracking and keystroke logging as the starting point for the study of human-computer interaction for translation. It could be the dawn of a new …
Read more… Paying people to save energy could curb climate change
Read more… Coffee drinkers may have another reason to pour that extra cup. When aged mice bred to develop symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease were given caffeine – the equivalent of five cups of coffee a …
Read more… Facebook is aggressively moving beyond the home page to pursue its mission to become a "social utility" that helps people "connect and share."
Read more… Carbon–the basis of all organic compounds–appears destined to supplant silicon as the material of choice for future semiconductors.
Read more… New cars sold in California must include windshields that block or absorb the sun’s rays beginning in 2012, the state’s Air Resources Board recently ruled.
RealAudio / WindowsMedia… Robert Shapiro says the challenges facing the Obama Administration will have repercussions for all of us for many years to come. [Kojo Nnamdi]
Read more… German auto maker Volkswagen hopes to turn out its first all-electric car in 2013, VW head Martin Winterkorn said.
Read more… On Mars, snow falls in the early morning from wispy, feathery clouds that many Earthlings would recognize as cirrus clouds, a Canadian-led research team has reported.
Read more… As Russia struggles to regain its economic momentum, health officials are facing a daunting problem: many young people are dying in their prime due to cheap cigarettes and dangerous cultural mores. Margaret Warner …
Read more… In the science fiction movie ‘Minority Report,’ set 50 years in the future, Tom Cruise’s character interacts with a computer display by moving his hands in front of it. It won’t take 50 …
Read more… An Australian video gamer has stolen thousands of dollars from a bank inside an online game and converted them into real-world money.
Read more… The first home in the UK which can learn from its residents and take decisive action and text if it is being burgled or the door has been left unlocked, will be unveiled this …
Read more… You do two things at motorway services: fill up one tank and empty another. US chemists have combined refuelling your car and relieving yourself by creating a new catalyst that can extract hydrogen …
Read more… Japan’s near-silent hybrid cars have been called dangerous by the vision-impaired and some users, prompting a government review on whether to add a noise-making device, according to an official.
Read more… US moonwalker Buzz Aldrin looks to new frontiers
Read more… Nothing gets the rumor mill churning like uncovering Cupertino’s latest patent applications. Get ready for another round of rumors.
Read more… Species around the world are still being lost despite governments pledging action to reverse the trend, a report warns.
Read more… For a long time, batteries were bulky and heavy. Now, a new cutting-edge battery is revolutionizing the field. It is thinner than a millimeter, lighter than a gram, and can be produced cost-effectively …
Read more… A human growth factor that stimulates blood stem cells to proliferate in the bone marrow reverses memory impairment in mice genetically altered to develop Alzheimer’s disease, researchers at the University of South Florida …
Read more… The world’s largest commercial satellite was launched into space, with a mission to provide phone service to cellular "dead zones" in North America.
Read more… New research, which reconstructs the extent of ice in the sea between Greenland and Svalbard from the 13th century to the present indicates that there has never been so little sea ice as …
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