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Nurdles. Aglets. Bakelite. Cellophane. There's poetry in the myriad names of plastic, which seems fitting for a man-made substance that barely existed prior to World War II but will most likely outlast human civilization itself. And that's just the 100 billion tons of the stuff we've created so f...
Instantly sorting 15 trillion memory bytes to find the right answer to a "Jeopardy" question: Elementary, my dear Watson. Or so an IBM supercomputer named "Watson" set out to prove Monday, tackling trivia with the popular television game show's all-time human champs, Brad Rutter and Ken Jennings. "...
For more than a decade, polymer memory devices have lingered in the queue of novel organic candidates for "next-generation" computer data-storage-and-retrieval chip technology. The time for PMDs might finally be at hand ... even if the first application is the humble radio-frequency identification t...
Rocket and space shuttle contractors are orbiting U.S. space agency NASA, searching for the future of space flight through contracts that would privatize key missions. After the Space Shuttle Program completes its final flight this year, United Space Alliance -- the Boeing-Lockheed-Martin joint v...
An international crew of cosmonauts and astronauts reached orbit around Mars Thursday, marking a major milestone on a 520-day simulated journey to the fourth planet from the Sun. Now 245 days away from Earth, Mars500 crew members from Russia, France, China, Italy and Colombia are scheduled to land F...
Plastics, those ubiquitous malleable synthetic polymers so essential to the needs of virtually the entire spectrum of global business, have become the pulsing heart of the high-tech world. The universal insulator for the electrical and electronics industries, plastic materials can also be semi-insu...
Caregivers of people with epilepsy and related disorders harbor a major fear: that a seizure could occur without their knowledge. Now, a wristwatch-style device aptly named the "SmartWatch" can detect seizures and alert caregivers within seven to 10 seconds, explained Stanford University pediatric ...
Not all polymers are plastics, but all plastics are polymers. And organic polymer plastics, known mostly for being insulators, in some cases make excellent conductors and semiconductors. The term "all-polymer semiconductor" sounds almost like an oxymoron. Plastic is generally considered a poor med...
Johns Hopkins University scientists have deciphered the genetic code for a rare type of pancreatic cancer -- neuroendocrine or islet cell tumor -- that Apple CEO Steve Jobs told the world he'd been diagnosed with back in 2004. The discovery explains many of the cancer's troubling, highly variable pr...
Frantic parents concerned about their children's digital habits have found a new ally in the form of a study published in the latest issue of the journal Pediatrics. Roughly 10 percent of young video gamers suffer a pathological addiction to their games, the researchers found. "We aimed to measure t...
The need for more time to repair ominous-looking cracks in metal struts that support space shuttle Discovery's hefty exterior fuel tanks prompted NASA officials Thursday to call for a launch delay, moving the flight from a previously planned early February date to that month's end. The delay, which ...
Sprint on Tuesday announced that it will offer the HTC EVO Shift 4G smartphone later this month. The EVO Shift was to be unveiled later this week at the Consumer Electronics Show; however, the early arrival of Sprint's announcement may be a bid to steal the thunder from Verizon, which is expected to...
With electron microscopes and tiny wires far thinner than a human hair, DoE researchers have pinpointed key events in the life of a consumer electronics staple -- the lithium ion battery. Their findings could lead to smaller, longer-lasting, more powerful batteries ready to rev up next-gen electric ...
A University of Missouri professor has developed a "smart carpet" that monitors the movements of elderly persons and can detect the potential for a dangerous fall. The purpose of the flooring system is to help patients remain both independent and safe unobtrusively. With sensors under the carpet and...
A quantum mechanics experiment performed by physicists at the University of California in Santa Barbara has been honored by the journal Science as its Breakthrough of the Year. The researchers' work may shed light on just what actually gravity is, among other things. The team, led by Andrew Cleland,...
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