The hottest biomedical buzzword promises new fuel, new drugs and more.

A new mathematical tool from Dr. Eran Halperin of TAU’s Blavatnik School of Computer Science aims to protect genetic privacy while giving genomic data to researchers.

The search for the best observatory site in the world has lead to the discovery of what is thought to be the coldest, driest, calmest place on Earth. No human is thought to have ever …

A rebate program in India would cut down on pollution and increase demand for more fuel-efficient cars, says an auto industry group

Gene-synthesis industry at odds over how to screen DNA orders.

If you’ve been laid off or are just looking for a new place to start your career—or life—over, here are 20 places in the U.S. where companies are hiring and the quality of life is …

Air pollution in eastern China during the last 50 years has led to a reduction in the amount of light rainfall of almost a quarter. This is revealed by an international study conducted with support …

Wal-Mart Stores said that its Web site has added almost 1 million new items through a new program that lets outside sellers market products on its Web site.

The U.S. will need to expand and modernize its outdated power transmission grid to incorporate more renewable energy sources, but balkanized ownership and regulation are going to make that process slow and difficult, according to …

Faster internet search engine processors could be the key to reducing the environmental impact of the worldwide web, according to scientists at the University of Glasgow.

Plans to construct "eco-cities" around the world were stunted by recession. But green developments are again luring governments and investors

Fast growing transgenic fish can revolutionise commercial fish farming and relieve the pressure on overexploited fish stocks. But what happens in the natural environment if transgenic fish escape?

Those small and sometimes inconvenient sticky labels on produce may eventually be replaced by laser "tattoo" technology now being tested by Agricultural Research Service (ARS) and University of Florida scientists.

A team of British scientists are developing plans for a spacecraft that could stop large asteroids from hitting the Earth

Futurist Thomas Frey is anticipating a new wave of Internet entrepreneurs.

The network has made digital an integral part of a series’ life cycle, from story development to sales

The world’s largest carbon capture project launched by a coal-fired power plant broke ground in July in Shanghai. After completion, which is scheduled before the end of this year, the project will capture as many …

Scientists at the University of the West of England are to design the first ever biological robot using mould.

Only a squawk from a sandhill crane broke the Arctic silence – and a low gurgle of bubbles, a watery whisper of trouble repeated in countless spots around the polar world.

A newly designed computational method has proven its usefulness in counting copies of duplicated genome sequences and in doing initial assessments of their contents. The number of copies of particular DNA segments can differ from …

Goofy videos weren’t on the minds of Len Kleinrock and his team at UCLA when they began tests 40 years ago on what would become the Internet. Neither was social networking, for that matter, nor …

Freeing up blocked renewable energy projects

Bob Metcalfe, General Partner, Polaris Venture Partners talks about the future of energy.

Bob Metcalfe led invention, standardization, and commercialization of the Ethernet local-area networking system for personal computers (PCs). In this discussion, he is joined by Cisco Senior Vice President Kathy Hill to discuss his experiences in …

Researchers have imaged single molecules in unprecedented detail, showing the chemical bonds that hold them together.

World-renowned novelist Mark Helprin offers a ringing Jeffersonian defense of private property in the age of digital culture, with its degradation of thought and language, and collectivist bias against the rights of individual creators. Mark …

As late as the mid 1980s, Iceland’s economy revolved around little else than a semi-robust cod-fishing industry. By the end of the century, however, it had transformed itself into a major player in world finance, …

Chatter about ensuing plans permeates any graduation, though it’s not common for the talk to surround which class projects will receive venture capital funding.

The hottest trend spotter in North America reveals powerful strategies for thriving in any economic climate. Did you know that Hewlett-Packard, Disney, Hyatt, MTV, CNN, Microsoft, Burger King, and GE all started during periods of …

Ray Kurzweil’s latest graphs show that technology’s breakneck advances will only accelerate — recession or not. He unveils his new project, Singularity University, to study oncoming tech and guide it to benefit humanity.

The man who helped usher in the environmental movement in the 1960s and ’70s has been rethinking his positions on cities, nuclear power, genetic modification and geo-engineering. This talk at the US State Department is …

DirecTV joins a growing list of cable, satellite and phone companies that are offering consumers a ‘multiscreen’ experience: the ability to watch shows on TV, computers and mobile devices like cell phones.

New York City will track its hundreds of building inspectors with GPS technology to make sure they are actually doing the inspections they report, the Department of Buildings said.

Manipulating tiny objects like single cells or nanosized beads often requires relatively large, unwieldy equipment, but now a system that uses sound as a tiny tweezers can be small enough to place on a chip, …

Biophysicists at the Technische Universitaet Muenchen are leading an effort to develop and apply models of the so-called lateral-line system found in fish and some amphibians. This sensory organ enables an animal, even in murky …

As economic turmoil creates more incentive to outsource, ExxonMobil is in talks with top Indian IT companies and Western multinationals

Tiny robots the size of a flea could one day be mass-produced, churned out in swarms and programmed for a variety of applications, such as surveillance, micromanufacturing, medicine, cleaning, and more. In an effort to …

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is hoping that the "Great California Garage Sale" will turn government clutter like surplus prison uniforms and office furniture into cash to bulk up the state’s depleted finances.

A new study on how technology could help to regulate climate change has studied hundreds of ideas, and selected three considered practical and able to be implemented quickly. The report’s authors propose the construction of …

The inaugural graduates of Singularity University, a Silicon Valley school backed by NASA, Google Inc., and tech industry luminaries like Ray Kurzweil, unveiled their grand visions for leveraging emerging technologies to solve humanity’s great…

The discovery of swine flu in turkeys in Chile raises concerns about the spread of the virus, a UN agency warns.

Siemens and Deutsche Bahn want to capitalize on federal funding for high-speed trains by making a push into the American market

A team of South Korean scientists have succeeded in engineering the bacterium E. coli to produce the industrial chemical putrescine. The research, published in the journal Biotechnology and Bioengineering, provides a renewable alternative to the …

In the past, if you wanted a solar-powered gadget, you typically had to shell out a lot of cash for something made by a company you’d never heard of. But that’s starting to change, as …

Engineers launch a radical plan to start removing CO2 from the atmosphere using man-made "trees".

China’s urbanization will rapidly accelerate, with 300 million people from rural areas expected to move to cites within 20 years, a senior official said.

A hybrid of silicon nanocircuits and biological components that mimics some of the processes that control the passage of molecules into and out of cells has been created by a team of scientists from UC …

The small, inexpensive autos favored in the soon-to-be No. 1 market make it tough to make a buck

Scientists have just completed an unprecedented journey into the vast and little-explored "Great Pacific Ocean Garbage Patch."

Australian and US solar cell researchers have achieved the highest efficiency for solar power, setting a new world record of 43 per cent of sunlight converted into electricity.

Scientists working collaboratively, at the same time, but in different locations around the world, can now do so thanks to ultra-high-speed, broadband networks and special software developed as part of a National Science Foundation-funded program …

A team of researchers from the University of Granada (UGR) has created a system with Artificial Intelligence techniques which notifies elderly people or people with special needs of the forgetting of certain everyday tasks. This …

Facebook is agreeing to give users more control over their information in response to concerns raised by Canadian privacy officials.

PG&E said it is seeking to build its first-ever facility that would pump compressed air into an underground cavern, using mainly wind energy produced during nonpeak hours, and release it to generate electricity during periods …

In the past, if you wanted a solar-powered gadget, you typically had to shell out a lot of cash for something made by a company you’d never heard of. But that’s starting to change, as …

New analysis shows that the water scarcity being experienced in southeast Australia started up to 15 years ago.

Julius Genachowski, the chairman of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, has vowed to defend net neutrality and to go after any company that violates it.

Old-style 100-watt light bulbs will be banned in Europe’s shops from next week in favour of new energy-saving models, but consumers groups on Wednesday gave the move a guarded welcome.

For over a century, scientists have been using electrical stimulation to explore and treat the human brain. The technique has helped identify regions responsible for specific neural functions — for instance, the motor cortex and …

Google has invited US motorists to share their progress — or lack thereof — with other drivers through the Internet giant’s online mapping service linked to smart phones.

Why invisibility and time travel may be around the corner

With its i-Tag toy tie-ins to James Cameron’s ‘Avatar’ movie, Mattel is just scratching the surface of what’s possible.

Barring the occasional thunderstorm, most Americans take the electric current behind their power buttons for granted, and assume the juice will be there when they’re ready to fire up an appliance or favorite tech toy. …

A well-insulated mug may keep your coffee somewhat warm, but now scientists have designed a high-tech mug that can keep drinks hot or cold at the perfect temperature for up to half an hour.

Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that has increasingly drawn some decidedly juvenile pranks, is looking to impose more discipline with new restrictions on the editing of articles.

People who repeatedly download copyright-protected films and music could have their Internet connection cut off under proposed laws the British government unveiled to tackle illegal file-sharing.

If you’re familiar with the overseas micro-lending space, then you’re familiar with Kiva. In 2008 ReadWriteWeb readers chose Kiva as one of their favorite web 2.0 apps . In 2009, the company continues to thrive. …

Burning plastic can give off less carbon dioxide than burying it, scientists claim in a Royal Society of Chemistry journal.

Trees around the world are colonising new territories in response to higher temperatures, a new global analysis reveals.

The Encyclopedia of Life, an online project launched in 2007 with the aim of creating a webpage on every known animal and plant species, has reached 150,000 entries in its second year.

Scientists say they have taken “a major step forward” in understanding how to reduce the severity of multiple sclerosis (MS), a university claimed today.

A Swiss government official is demanding that Google Inc. immediately take off the Internet any "Street View" images of Switzerland, and the company said Monday it would work to resolve problems with the privacy rights …

Borrowing from Mother Nature, a team of MIT researchers has built a school of swimming robo-fish that slip through the water just as gracefully as the real thing, if not quite as fast.

As the world’s oil supply continues to dry out every day, the question of what will replace oil and other fossil fuels is becoming more and more urgent. According to the World Coal Institute, at …

The Bay Area has become the nation’s hot spot for a microscopic technology that’s already being used for everything from keeping drill bits sharp to extending the usable life of cooking oil, and that one …

Will water, energy and food run low worldwide in 2030?

The boom in "smartphones", led by Apple’s iPhone, has inspired language learning tools that would have been inconceivable just months ago — and a Hong Kong firm is leading the charge.

MP3… Dr. J. (James Hughes) chats with W. Brian Arthur about his book The Nature of Technology, which argues that technologies have a natural history — are composed of prior technologies — and are subject …

The Nature of Technology is an elegant and powerful theory of technology’s origins and evolution. It achieves for the progress of technology what Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions did for scientific progress. Arthur …

Toyota shows off a violin playing robot and a two-wheeled human transporter — the latest products of its robots program that seeks to develop a practical human assistance robot by the early part of the …

William Ford Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian writer who has been called the “noir prophet” of the cyberpunk subgenre of science fiction. Gibson coined the term “cyberspace” in his short story “Burning …

European researchers have developed new control systems that let driverless vehicles communicate and cooperate with each other. Could fleets of high throughput rapid transit systems soon be cruising our cities?

The first US retreat for Internet addicts has opened its doors, welcoming a teenager that was captive to World of Warcraft online role-playing videogame.

From the shuttered factories of the rust belt to the look-alike strip malls of the sun belt-and almost everywhere in between-America has been transformed by its relentless fixation on low price. This pervasive yet little …

The New York Times bestselling author of American Fascists and the NBCC finalist for War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning travels in Empire of Illusion to the ringside of professional wrestling bouts at …

What do subprime mortgages, Atlantic salmon dinners, SUVs and globalization have in common? They all depend on cheap oil. And in a world of dwindling oil supplies and steadily mounting demand around the world, there …

MP3… The biologist on how synthetic organisms could be used to generate fuel, improve health and launch a new industrial revolution. [The Economist]

In this powerful talk, P.W. Singer shows how the widespread use of robots in war is changing the realities of combat. He shows us scenarios straight out of science fiction — that now may not …

Chris Marnay, Staff Scientist and Leader of the Technology Evaluation, Modeling, and Assessment Group at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory presents two alternative visions of how the power system might evolve to meet future requirements …

New technology designs are enabling a wide range of consumer and business products while creating the foundation for tomorrow’s “disruptive” forces.

The capitalist theory that worked in the previous decades needs to be reevaluated in the face of the financial crisis that has hit the global economy, economists concluded at a conference in Bangkok.

Isaac Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics need a makeover, according to a couple of AI boffins.

Rice Report of 2009 brought out by The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM) warns that India might become a net importer of Rice by 2020 in case it fails to maintain …

The rich have been getting richer for so long that the trend has come to seem almost permanent. But economists say — and data is beginning to show — that a significant change may in …

Farmers in sub-Saharan Africa and similarly poor nations have the most to lose as the Earth gets warmer, highlighting the need to supply them with drought- resistant seeds and more effective water irrigation.

Cholesterol can affect the flow of the electrical currents that generate the heart beat, according to a study from two UBC cardiovascular researchers.

The fight against a legal settlement that would give Google Inc. the digital rights to millions of copyrighted books is starting to resemble a heavyweight brawl in the library.

Bearish pronouncements on the greenback from Buffett and Pimco add to the market’s unease. Here’s what investors need to know

You’ve probably seen the supermarket tabloid articles with titles like ‘The 12 Foods Everyone Should Eat’ or ‘Four Foods for Peak Performance.’ Every week there’s another berry, grain or bafflingly-named compound that is the key …

The South Africa-based wireless service is gaining millions of developing-world users by emphasizing social change, not just music and games

Twitter is adding location to its globally popular microblogging service in a move that will let people see where "tweets" are coming from.

For the first time since 2004, international admissions to U.S. graduate schools are down. The deteriorating job market and problems with visas and financing are to blame

In what they describe as a step towards creating synthetic life, scientists transplant the genome of one bacterium into another.

Technology experts have warned that mankind should think before rushing into a world of autonomous robots as their development outpaces the ethical and legal issues surrounding their use.

Israeli scientists have developed new technology to fight biological identity theft after realising that DNA evidence found at crime scenes can be easily falsified.

Lorries that drive themselves could be on Britain’s roads within 10 years a new report predicts.

From heart-friendly margarines to sugary cereals that strengthen bones, once-demonized foods are being spiked with nutrients to give them a healthier glow – and consumers are biting, even on some that are little more than …

A program using $705 million from an economic stimulus package has been criticized as too vague.

Universities and community colleges are responding to a demand from the public for degrees or ad hoc courses on sustainability.

Campaigners are accused of holding back a green UK

The recession has caused some angel groups to take a look at the cost of coaching entrepreneurs and listening to their pitches.

Figuring out what Apple Inc. has in store for its next big product launch has become as popular a game as gathering to pick fantasy football drafts every fall.

Unlimited domestic phone calls are nearly standard feature for landline plans these days. Now, Vonage Holdings Corp., which helped pioneer that feature with its Internet phone service, is expanding it to most international calls as …

An old adage states, "As California goes, so goes the nation." If that’s true, then advocates of textbook reform — and college students bearing the brunt of spiraling textbook prices — have to be excited …

Google-owned YouTube has announced a deal with Time Warner to host an array of the company’s movie and television clips.

In the first study to look at what happens over the years to the billions of pounds of plastic waste floating in the world’s oceans, scientists are reporting that plastics — reputed to be virtually …

Mitsubishi and Nissan hope to leapfrog Toyota and G.M. by focusing on battery-powered cars rather than hybrids like the Prius and the Volt.

A venture capitalist aims to spark a biotechnology revolution with a $1 billion investment just north of Rochester.

There is no known cure for neurodegenerative diseases such as Huntington’s, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. But new hope, in the form of stem cells created from the patient’s own bone marrow, can be found ― and …

The Pirate Party, which first rose to prominence in Sweden during June’s European elections, has now been officially launched in Finland, the group’s leader said.

The world’s most wired metro area is extending city services with its U-city project. The U stands for ubiquitous

A $41 billion deal for China to buy Australian natural gas shows recent diplomatic tensions between the two countries will not trump their commercial interests.

The German government unveiled plans to get one million electric cars zipping around the country by 2020, offering sweeteners to jump-start national giants like BMW and Volkswagen into action.

Indian executive and author Aseem Prakash, seeing economic power shifting eastward, says many in business don’t need the American Dream these days

The company looking at developing a wave energy plant in south-east South Australia says it thinks wave power will become a major contributor to Australia’s power grid within 10 years.

As social networking sites explode in popularity, they have become the prime avenue for many job hunters

A startup called Mashery is helping companies take a page from Apple, Facebook, Twitter, and others to enlist the aid of outside software developers

Four technologies aim to use heat from the sun to make electricity. But which one has the edge?

Sixth Sense is a mini-projector coupled with a camera and a cellphone — which acts as the computer and your connection to the Cloud, all the information stored on the web.

Can the World’s most precious commodity last?

Australia’s government will ask the Senate Tuesday to approve plans to produce 20 percent of energy from renewable sources by 2020 after the house rejected a proposed carbon trading scheme.

Bolivians look to ancestors for flood advice

Combining synthetic biology and solar technology could provide a way to trap carbon dioxide and produce fuel.

Scientists say Asia’s failure to upgrade irrigation and water security will hit food supplies and stability.

The mega-mileage hype surrounding the Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf points to problems with performance ratings on new car technologies

A University of Queensland researcher has successfully completed a lab-scale test on a new technology which has the potential to revolutionise the way the world views and uses coal.

Scientific discoveries, futurist Juan Enriquez notes, demand a shift in code, and our ability to thrive depends on our mastery of that code. Here, he applies this notion to the field of genomics.

Juan Enriquez challenges our definition of bioenergy. Oil, coal, gas and other hydrocarbons are not chemical but biological products, based on plant matter — and thus, growable. Our whole approach to fuel, he argues, needs …

Asia must reform its water use to feed 1.5 billion extra people by 2050, according to a report to presented at a major conference.

NASA scientists have discovered glycine, a fundamental building block of life, in samples of comet Wild 2 returned by NASA’s Stardust spacecraft.

Scientists at the University of Calgary have found that methane emission by plants could be a bigger problem in global warming than previously thought.

The English version of user-generated online encylopedia Wikipedia hosted its three millionth article.

One of the nation’s wealthiest American Indian communities is a major investor in a start-up with the twin goals of making fuel from algae and reducing emissions.

Using tiny crystals called quantum dots, Johns Hopkins researchers have developed a highly sensitive test to look for DNA attachments that often are early warning signs of cancer.

NASA has completed the assembly of its Ares I-X rocket, the first new launch system dedicated to manned spaceflight in a quarter of a century.

Researchers have shown that engineered, self-organising DNA chunks could be used to build smaller, faster computers.

Internet users are finally coming round to the idea of paying for content.

You probably have cocaine in your wallet, purse, or pocket. Sound unlikely or outrageous? Think again! In what researchers describe as the largest, most comprehensive analysis to date of cocaine contamination in banknotes, scientists are …

A focus on short-term profits to the exclusion of all else led to the current financial crisis. And guess what? Companies with the steadiest moral compasses have sailed through it

Professor Jonathan Zittrain of the Oxford Internet Institute previews his book “The Future of the Internet — And How to Stop It.”

In a pioneering effort that generated massive amounts of DNA sequence data from 12 people, a team supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has demonstrated the feasibility and value of a new strategy …

Conservationists are turning their attention toward the sea as development pressures mean less land contiguously available for protection.

One of the early promises of the computer revolution was the environmental benefit of having less paper consumption and waste. Little did we know it then, but paper accounted for only a tiny portion of …

Debate on BBC Breakfast between Professor Mayer Hillman and Professor James Woudhuysen about the Carbon Ration Card proposal announced by Secretary of State for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs David Miliband in July 2006.

In his revolutionary bestseller, The Long Tail, Chris Anderson demonstrated how the online marketplace creates niche markets, allowing products and consumers to connect in a way that has never been possible before. Now, in Free, …

MP3… There have always been brilliant innovators working outside established institutions. With the emergence of open systems of innovation made possible by the Internet, now a far wider range of individuals, teams …

In the inaugural lecture of the Visions of a Sustainable World Speaker Series, Dr. Paul Raskin presents a history from the future which describes a sustainable planetary civilization and how we got there. Dr. Raskin …

Until now, creating the microchips that power all of our electronic gadgets has been a laborious, complex and time-consuming process costing billions of dollars.

A McKinsey consultant from Mumbai says India will retain its offshoring crown but could lose share to Russia and China if education doesn’t keep up

Brushes and bottles of mascara could be consigned to the dustbin after scientists discovered a way of making eyelashes grow longer.

A new book about Iceland’s economic plunge may provide a cautionary tale for much larger countries.

The US agency behind Voice of America said it is working on ways to slip news past tough Internet blockades in countries such as China and Iran.

As California moves forward with the first open-source digital textbook program in the nation this fall, the best content seems a lot less like Wikipedia and a lot more like traditional publishing.

President Barack Obama’s push for wind and solar energy to wean the United States from foreign oil carries a hidden cost: overburdening the nation’s electrical grid and increasing the threat of blackouts.

The Alpha Ventus project in the North Sea began producing electricity Aug. 12 and could someday power 50,000 homes

The race to economic health pits export-driven economies with strong social-assistance programs against those that count on consumer spending

Twitter’s been having a rough couple of weeks. A researcher looking into the attacks that knocked Twitter offline last week discovered another, unrelated security problem.

Research with tiny artificial muscles may yield a full-page active Braille system that can refresh automatically and come to life right beneath your fingertips.

Italian power company Enel said that it had started up a ground-breaking hydrogen-powered electricity plant producing no greenhouse gases.

Consumer prices were flat in July as energy costs fell, part of a price decline over the past 12 months that was the largest in 60 years

Friction limits the speed and efficiency of macroscopic engines. Is this also true for nanomachines? A Dresden research team used laser tweezers to measure the friction between a single motor protein molecule and its track. …

The warming of an Arctic current over the last 30 years has triggered the release of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, from methane hydrate stored in the sediment beneath the seabed.

College students fed up with spending hundreds of dollars to buy textbooks they only use once are getting some new rental options.

A South Korean biotechnology firm will early next year open a centre capable eventually of producing up to 1,000 cloned dogs annually, a company executive said.

Google Inc. is now enabling authors and publishers who release their work under Creative Commons licenses to distribute it through Google Books, a free service that allows users to search and read books online.

The battle to take control of the .eco internet domain aimed at green groups escalates.

The development of new products and services is key to business success, but a new study from North Carolina State University shows that businesses could do a much better job of evaluating new ideas in …

One of the largest glaciers in Antarctica is thinning four times faster than 10 years ago, research seen by the BBC suggests.

The same things that make Alaska’s marine waters among the most productive in the world may also make them the most vulnerable to ocean acidification.

Read more… By merging electronics and mechanics, German factories could drive the Continent’s revival

Read more… Sony, in a challenge to Amazon’s Kindle, unveiled plans to do away with the proprietary software on its electronic Sony Reader and convert its e-book store to an industry standard format.

Read more… Governments in the Middle East and North Africa are investing in censorship tools at the same time as they expand their media infrastructure, according to a new study of online censorship.

Read more… Robots in the sky and on the ground are transforming warfare, and the US military is rushing to recruit the new warriors that never sleep and never bleed.

Read more… Web 2.0 can help companies located in the same region share haulage space when transporting consignments. Pooling benefits the environment, reduces CO2 output and saves costs — experts put the figure at around …

Read more… Australia’s Senate votes down a plan to introduce a carbon trading scheme to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Read more… Hurricanes in the Atlantic are more frequent than at any time in the last 1,000 years, according to research.

Read more… Parts of India are on track for severe water shortages. according to results from Nasa’s gravity satellites.

Read more… Augmented reality (or AR) is fast becoming as ubiquitous a term as "Web 2.0." The field is getting noisier by the day, and AR as a field of research now has to co-exist …

Read more… Nearly a quarter of the biggest firms on the UK stock market will be unable to pay off their pension deficits, a report says.

Read more… The United States has won a wide-ranging ruling against Chinese trade practices that could provide massive market opportunities for American makers of everything from CDs and DVDs to music downloads and books.

Read more… Imagine a world where bright, energy sipping, cheap, durable LEDs light the world. A world where if you have enough light to see, you are connected.

Read more… The intellectual property issues raised by virtual worlds, such as World of Warcraft, EverQuest, There and Second Life, are truly intriguing and may be analyzed from a variety of perspectives. As virtual worlds …

Read more… A couple weeks back, I wrote an article detailing the dire job prospects for Europe’s Gen Y’ers. The gist: unemployment rates for the continent’s under-25s is roughly double that of older workers. And …

Read more… Erasing your files from ‘the cloud’ just got easier

Read more… Economist says investors burned by the collapse in the U.S. property market may be making the same mistakes now in China

Read more… When we absorb new information, the human brain reshapes itself to store this newfound knowledge. But where exactly is the new knowledge kept, and how does that capacity to adapt reflect our risk …

Read more… As China runs out of landfill space, it is racing to build incinerators, a growing source of toxic emissions.

The smallest organisms to use a biological compass are magnetotactic bacteria, however mysteries remain about exactly how these bacteria create their cellular magnets…. Read the full story

Read more… Researchers at Oregon State University have discovered that the circadian rhythms or biological "clocks" in some insects can make them far more susceptible to pesticides at some times of the day instead of …

As media ads dry up, phone outfits and Net providers could just slap content fees onto their bills. (Of course, this will upend the ad biz)… Read the full story

Japan’s Internal Affairs Ministry published the latest numbers on the country’s declining population on Aug. 11. The data doesn’t make for pleasant reading…. Read the full story

DNA tests on ancient remains reveals Neanderthals shared with modern humans a gene that gives an ability to taste bitterness…. Read the full story

The global economic crisis is wreaking havoc on shipping: Demand and prices have collapsed and ports are filling up with fleets of empty freighters. The crisis has fueled cut-throat competition and not all companies will …

As Washington moves to crack down on overseas corporate tax shelters, Bermuda is losing some of the financial-services companies that provide 40% of its GDP… Read the full story

One day, recharging stations for electric cars might be much more common than gas stations. If NewDealDesign has its way, they won’t look at all the same, however. The San Francisco design shop has teamed …

As Deng Hui looks out at a forest of towering turbines dotting his company’s wind farm north of Beijing, a cold, drizzly wind howls in his face, but he doesn’t mind…. Read the full story

If humans ever create a lunar base, one of the biggest challenges will be figuring out how to breathe. Transporting oxygen to the moon is extremely expensive, so for the past several years NASA has …

Google has lifted the lid on a new version of its search engine, allowing users to look at the results it will generate…. Read the full story

NIST researchers demonstrate sustained quantum computing in trapped ions… Read the full story

It might not be long until there is a gene scanner in every doctor’s office, as DNA sequencing becomes faster and cheaper…. Read the full story

‘Augmented reality’ blends the virtual and real world… Read the full story

Shanghai and Beijing are becoming lands of opportunity for recent American college graduates who face unemployment nearing double digits at home…. Read the full story

How biofuels can help aviation clean up its carbon… Read the full story

The first pictures are returned from the latest UK satellite designed to image areas struck by natural disasters. … Read the full story

When bees sting, they pump poison into their victims. Now the toxin in bee venom has been harnessed to kill tumor cells by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The researchers …

Schizophrenia waits silently until a seemingly normal child becomes a teenager or young adult. Then it swoops down and derails a young life…. Read the full story

A new tool developed by scientists at The University of Manchester will allow farmers to see under the soil to check how efficiently crop roots are using water and nutrients…. Read the full story

Economists fear a second wave of layoffs—this time from the public sector—could derail Britain’s economic turnaround… Read the full story

Educated in the West, these Chinese business people are finding new opportunities at home… Read the full story

The government launches a debate on how the UK can ensure its food supply will remain secure in the future…. Read the full story

Hundreds of California dealerships will let consumers haggle over the prices of new cars and trucks through the online marketplace…. Read the full story

An online productivity suite from a little known company is in the offing, IDG News Service reports… Read the full story

The Arctic Ocean has given up tens of thousands more square miles (square kilometers) of ice in a relentless summer of melt, with scientists watching through satellite eyes for a possible record low polar ice …

The Boeing Company is replicating its US business model in India and scaling up operations, eyeing a major chunk of the $31-billion military and industrial aerospace market…. Read the full story

Taobao.com, a fast-growing online shopping bazaar reminiscent of eBay, has become China’s newest Internet darling…. Read the full story

Read more… Newspapers are hurting all over the United States, but the pain is less severe at small publications like The Blackshear Times in Georgia.

Read more… The company that owns the photo agency Gamma has sought protection from creditors, the latest sign of distress for photographers as newspapers and magazines cut back.

Read more… The expansion will cost about $2.4 billion and connect the continent with Europe and Asia at higher speeds and lower cost.

Read more… The manicured lawns and carefully sculpted buildings of Huawei’s headquarters are a far cry from the sweatshop image of southern China’s factory belt.

Read more… Schools have the ability to drastically reduce cheating among their students – all they need to do is follow the relatively simple and inexpensive solutions suggested by research.

Read more… Imagine a tag on any product that would tell you how old the cheese is, or what wines work best with your favorite recipes.

Read more… Australia’s government said the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions will continue to increase without the introduction of its proposed trading system aimed at reducing them.

Read more… The outage that knocked Twitter offline for hours was traced to an attack on a lone blogger in the former Soviet republic of Georgia — but the collateral damage that left millions around …

Read more… Researcher iStrategyLabs just released new numbers on Facebook user demographics, and one figure stands out: the number of members who are 55 and older grew 25% in the last month …

Read more… Childhood obesity has quadrupled in the last 40 years, which may mean today’s children become the first generation to have a shorter lifespan than their parents, a leading obesity expert told the American …

Read more… Scientists have placed high-tech "spiders" inside and around the mouth of Mount St. Helens, one of the most active volcanoes in the United States. Networks such as these could one day be used …

Read more… Thomas M. Siebel, an I.T. heavyweight, believes information technology is a mature industry that will grow no faster than the larger economy.

Read more… The use of geo-engineering to slow global warming may increase the risk of drought, according to a paper in Science journal.

Read more… A plan to make 4,000 electric cars available for Parisians to pick up and drop off at rental stands still has some kinks to be worked out

Read more… Parisians and tourists, relax. That goofy looking tricycle equipped with loads of high-tech equipment roaming the streets is NOT some mad scientist’s invention on the rampage.

MP3… In his new book, Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle, Chris Hedges describes the polarities of the two societies he says we are now living in: One side …

Read more… Augmented reality, or the concept that you can add an additional layer to the world before your eyes, aka the "real world," using technology, is the next big tech trend. Already making its …

Read more… A "profoundly shocking" study has found that one in six young long-term jobless people in Britain were dead within a decade.

Read more… President Barack Obama’s push for wind and solar energy to wean the U.S. from foreign oil carries a hidden cost: overburdening the nation’s electrical grid and increasing the threat of blackouts.

Real Audio – Windows Media… Tweeting as you head to the delivery room. Confessing your adultery on national TV. Sharing your family photos on a public website. Some people say “TMI– Too Much Information.” Others …

Janine Benyus has a message for inventors: When solving a design problem, look to nature first. There you’ll find inspired designs for making things waterproof, aerodynamic, solar-powered and more. Here she reveals dozens of new …

Read more… A presidential visit followed by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s African tour cannot conceal a stark reality: China has overtaken the United States as Africa’s top trading partner.

Read more… Climate change is shrinking three of the nation’s most studied glaciers at an accelerated rate, and government scientists say that finding bolsters global concerns about rising sea levels and the availability of fresh …

Read more… James Patterson’s latest best seller, "The Angel Experiment," is a little different from his usual hits. The novel isn’t new; it came out four years ago. Its sales aren’t happening at bookstores, but …

Read more… Virtual reality allows people to experience the extreme ranges of sight and hearing that many animals have.

Read more… Visitors to websites of News Corp.’s newspapers will have to pay to read the news within the next year, chairman Rupert Murdoch said.

Read more… Ships with giant funnels which travel the world’s seas creating more clouds to deflect the sun’s rays could help cut global warming say scientists.

Read more… China’s economic miracle of the last decade has amazed the world. Now many wonder whether the Chinese can help to lead the world out of recession. But China has a huge looming problem …

Read more… State-owned Corporacion Minera de Bolivia began drilling to determine how much lithium lies beneath the Uyuni Salt Flats in the country’s southwest, said to hold the world’s largest reserves of the metal, a …

Read more… Researchers from the University of Tokyo have developed 3D holograms that can be touched with bare hands. Generally, holograms can’t be felt because they’re made only of light. But the new technology adds …

Read more… No one knows how the microblogging site and similar online social networks will make money, but investors see a new Web revolution

Read more… Utility CEOs have two conflicting missions: To help customers by keeping rates low, and to protect the environment by shifting to costlier green energy

Read more… Raising prospects for building a practical quantum computer, physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have demonstrated sustained, reliable information processing operations on electrically charged atoms (ions).

Read more… Many economists worry that too much of China’s growth has been fueled by aggressive, state-directed lending that could eventually result in a soaring government debt.

Read more… Turkey has agreed to offer Russia the use of its territorial waters in constructing a gas pipeline under the Black Sea, a move that will help Moscow maintain its energy dominance in Europe.

Read more… Cultivation of microalgae may contribute decisively to tomorrow’s energy supply. For energy production from microalgae, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology scientists (Germany) are developing closed photo-bioreactors and novel cell disruption methods.

Cyber guru Don Tapscott talks about how the New Generation is changing the world by developing new ways of thinking and interacting. His latest book is called Grown Up Digital.

Jim O’Neill, head of Global Economic Research at Goldman Sachs — who coined the acronym ‘BRIC’ to describe Brazil, Russia, India and China as the world’s leading emerging markets — provides an update on their …

Read more… A computer with DNA at its core can solve classic logical conundrums, according to Israeli researchers.

Read more… The Obama administration announced $2.4 billion in grants to make batteries, mostly for electric vehicles.

Read more… An emergency call center in the basement of the county jail in Waterloo, Iowa, became the first in the country to accept text messages sent to "911."

Read more… Rather than sticking to a single DNA script, human brain cells harbor astonishing genomic variability, according to scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies. The findings could help explain brain development and …

Read more… A new plastic beehive was launched in Britain on Wednesday to encourage people to keep bees in their gardens or on rooftoops to help boost declining honeybee populations.

Long Now Synthetic Biology Debate: Drew Endy Drew Endy is a biological engineer at Stanford University and a leading voice in the field of synthetic biology.

Read more… Two e-book readers due in late August aim to close Sony’s sales gap with Amazon, whose Kindle continues to sizzle

Read more… The uproar, including a lawsuit, over the removal of copies of 1984 and Animal Farm from Kindle devices comes as Amazon faces renewed e-book competition

Read more… When Shanghai blogger Isaac Mao tried to watch a YouTube clip of Chinese police beating Tibetans, all he got was an error message.

Capt. Charles Moore of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation first discovered the Great Pacific Garbage Patch — an endless floating waste of plastic trash. Now he’s drawing attention to the growing, choking problem of plastic …

Dried-up riverbeds, scorched earth and dying livestock all testify to droughts on an unprecedented scale across the globe. The devastating bushfires that hit southern Australia earlier this year are one of a range of consequences …

Made to mark the UN’s Water day. This film shows just how much water is used in everyday activities and food.

Read more… Two ships set sail to the North Pacific Ocean to study an accumulation of plastic refuse the size of Texas.

Read more… The electric power industry can achieve deep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 by building new nuclear plants…

Read more… Professor Declan Murphy and colleagues Dr Michael Craig and Dr Marco Catani from the Institute of Psychiatry at King’s College London have found differences in the brain which may provide a biological explanation …

Read more… Normally, virtual worlds are the setting of many online games and entertainment applications, but now they’re becoming a place for scientific collaboration and outreach, as well.

Read more… Despite major costs to taxpayers in the U.S. and Canada, government programs that offer rebates to hybrid vehicle buyers are failing to produce environmental benefits, a new UBC study says.

Read more… Rutherford’s analysis of back issues of the popular US magazine, Parents, maps how the portrayal of parental authority and children’s autonomy has changed over the last century.

Read more… A material for mopping up a chemical that shortens beer’s shelf life has been created by researchers.

Read more… Researchers in Japan have successfully grown replacement teeth in mice, according to a report in PNAS journal.

Thomas L. Friedman, three-time Pulitzer Prize winner for the New York Times and best-selling author, visited Brandeis University to talk about his latest book, Hot, Flat and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution and …

Read more… New Zealander foresters have just made the country’s first major sale of local carbon credits into the European market.

Read more… Brain cancer is among the deadliest of cancers. It’s also one of the hardest to treat. Imaging results are often imprecise because brain cancers are extremely invasive. Surgeons must saw through the skull …

Read more… A leading academic has called for an international debate on the ethics of using autonomous robots for war.

Read more… A cane equipped with the technology that retailers use to tag merchandise could help blind people avoid obstacles.

A presentation that took place on September 10, 2008 at MIT. Hosted by Ernest Moniz and presented by Peter Diamandis, with guest speakers Ray Kurzweil, George Church and Saul Griffith.

Read more… A team of German scientists has invented the world’s first printable batteries. They’re wafer-thin and environmentally friendly and can be made in large quantities for a fraction of the cost of conventional batteries.

Read more… Silicon Valley’s money-making engine is stalled as technology start-ups find it harder to sell themselves or go public. Part of the blame, entrepreneurs and investors say, falls on the big investment banks.

Read more… The new research field of synthetic biology will, in the medium term, open up a great deal of potential for combining novel genetic methods with engineering principles. This will facilitate the development, not …

Author and Carnegie Mellon alum Scott Berkun shows that much of what we know about innovation is wrong as he explores the history of innovation and creative thinking.

Removing half a billion people from poverty and into the productive workforce will profoundly affect on the world economy. India and China are doing just that with insane growth rates and lots of what used …

In Experimental Man, award-winning journalist, public radio correspondent, and bestselling science author David Ewing Duncan puts every aspect of his physical makeup under the microscope. His mission, as perhaps the most tested healthy person in …

Read more… Recent data has made it clear that Africa is being hit hard in the global recession as foreign investment funds are drying up.