• Metro Group, IBM lead Europe's largest RFID rollout

    IBM, German retailer Metro Group — the world’s fourth largest retailer — roll out Europe’s largest RFID project, using IBM technology; suppliers from China and Vietnam are already participating; health experts argue that implementing similar systems throughout the food supply chain would improve health and safety and protect consumers from tainted food; business analysts say RFID would increase efficiency and allow better management of inventories

  • TSA orders Qinetiq security system

    The U.S. Transportation Security Administration orders a dozen of SPO units from Hampshire-based Qinetiq as part of a campaign to bolster airport security; SPO units are cameras which use millimeter wave technology combined with software algorithms to screen people one at a time — and do so from a distance of a few meters

  • Tiny sensors detect toxic gasses

    MIT researchers developed a small detector the size of a match box which will detect minute quantities of hazardous gases, including toxic industrial chemicals and chemical warfare agents, much more quickly than current devices

  • Weapon-grade plutonium shipped cross-country

    The Department of Energy plans to scale down U.S. nuclear weapons program by consolidating special nuclear materials — read: weapon-grade material — at five federal sites by the end of 2012 and reducing the square footage and staff within those sites by 2017; nuclear materials will have to be shipped from different labs around the country to these five sites

  • DOE IG offers details of 24 October Oak Ridge security breach

    Certain areas of the U.S. nuclear labs are designated “limited areas” by DOE; employees are prohibited from bringing into these secure areas any equipment capable of transmitting data wirelessly; at Oak Ridge, 38 laptops had been allowed into restricted areas, and IG finds that nine of these laptops had later been taken on foreign travel — two of them to countries on DOE’ sensitive countries list

  • U.K. nuclear power plan draws fire

    A group of academics issue a report arguing that the established nuclear-power industry would inevitably move on to the use of fast-breeder reactors to manufacture plutonium for use as fuel, increasing the risk of nuclear weapons proliferation

  • Terrorists in Europe more difficult to track

    As intelligence services and law enforcement use ever-more-sophisticated technology to monitor and track terrorists, al Qaeda operatives and sympathizers are countering by using different measures to avoid detection; they avoid places that they assume are bugged or monitored, such as mosques and Islamic bookshops, use more sophisticated codes, and more

  • Cleveland BioLabs's candidate for radiation sickness treatment rejected

    Cleveland Biolabs developed treatment of gastrointestinal effects of acute radiation syndrome; DoD decided it was not interested

  • Lobster's eyes inspire hand-held detection device

    The crustacean’s impressive ability to see through dark, cloudy, deep sea water is guiding scientists in developing a ray that could be used by border agents, airport screeners, and the Coast Guard

  • Russia begins delivery of nuclear fuel to Iran's Bushehr plant

    As the Bush administration’s recent NIE report fatally weakens case against sanctions on Iran for its nuclear activities, Russia begins delivery of fuel to Iran’s Bushehr plant; in addition to intensified uranium enrichment program, Iran will soon be able to choose the plutonium path to a nuclear weapon

  • Spain tightens security of nuclear plants

    There are eight active nuclear power plants in Spain; recent incidents — Greenpeace activists breaching security in one plant; an employee trying to smuggle out uranium tablets in another — convinced the authorities that more must be done to secure them

  • New T-ray source would improve airport security, cancer detection

    Terahertz radiation does not have sufficient energy to “ionize” an atom by knocking loose one of its electrons, which is good news, because this ionization causes the cellular damage that can lead to radiation sickness or cancer; T-ray absorption patterns could not only detect but also identify a much wider variety of hazardous or illegal substances than X-ray

  • Self-powered biosensor sniffs out danger

    University of Glasgow students win prestigious competition with a device which can sniff out pollution and then generate its own electricity to set off an early-warning system

  • Companies join to create the RFID Consortium

    The consortium will license patents that are essential to making products supporting the UHF RFID Standards announced by EPCglobal and ISO/IEC

  • New York opposes extending Indian Point license

    Indian Point nuclear plants in Westchester County are surrounded by 20 million people within a 50-mile radius, more than any other reactor in the country; plants’ operator applied for a 20-year extension license, but the State of New York says plants pose too much risk and should be shut down