• Brazilian police get biometric "Robocop" glasses

    Facial-recognition glasses have been deployed by Brazilian police ahead of the 2014 World Cup soccer tournament; the system can scan and compare four hundred faces per second using 46,000 biometric points for comparison; the technology will be tested at public events leading up to the World Cup

  • Computerized irrigation system saves money

    The University of Michigan is using a computerized irrigation system for its campus landscaping; the system uses information from a campus weather station that monitors wind speed, rain, temperature, and humidity to adjust irrigation schedules; the system allowed the school to reduce the amount of water used on irrigation by 22 million gallons of water on landscape irrigation each year — or 68 percent relative to the amount of water used before the system was installed — saving an estimated $141,000 a year

  • Dialing with your brain

    Researchers have developed a device that allows individuals to make a cell phone call using only their mind; the gadget non-invasively analyzes an individual’s electrical activity in the brain and translates those pulses wirelessly to dial a cell phone; in trials, the system was able to achieve 100 percent accuracy in the majority of test subjects after a brief period of training; researchers originally designed the system to help severely disabled people, but believe that it has a broad range of applications

  • 70-kg plane available for $39,000

    A Finnish company is offering a personal plane for about $39,000; the plane weighs only seventy kilograms; wingspan is nearly five meters, nose to tail 3.5 meters, and height 1.3 meters. maximum take-off weight is 200 kilograms; speed range is 70-140 km/h with a service ceiling of three kilometers

  • Chips may sabotage hi-tech weapons

    Countries producing sophisticated weapon systems do not want these systems to fall into the wrong hands; one idea is to plant a chip in these weapons which would allow the country that supplied them to destroy or disable them remotely; already there are worries that with chip manufacturing moving outside the United States, foreign powers may bribe or coerce chip manufacturers into planting “backdoor” circuits in chips these manufacturers sell American defense contractors

  • Rare Earth scientific breakthrough may increase their use

    Rare Earth metals are a series of elements that represent one of the final frontiers of chemical exploration; the vigorous reactivity of these substances, however, has made it difficult for researchers to transform them into stable materials with well-defined structures; when researchers succeed, the payoff can be enormous — rare Earth compounds have important applications in areas ranging from catalysis to clean energy

  • 3-D scanner iPhone app developed

    A Georgia Tech researcher develops an iPhone app that allows users to take 3-D scans of faces or other objects and share them by e-mail; in the latest update, users can also e-mail animated videos of their 3-D models; “There are professional, $40,000 3-D scanners out there; this won’t perform like those do, but for anything under $100, this is your best bet,” says the researcher

  • New cloth captures noxious gasses, odors

    Cornell university students develop a new cloth that can capture noxious gasses and odors — and that can be fashioned into masks or hooded shirts to be used by soldiers and first responders; the garments use metal organic framework molecules (MOFs) and cellulose fibers

  • Airports personnel don't report suspicions, mistrust technology

    An in-depth study of the behavior of security personnel at European air terminals, finds that only 23.6 percent of airport employees and 58 percent of security workers said that they alerted others when they saw something suspicious — and that 54.3 percent of the workers and 40 percent of security personal never raised the alarm or called a security code; only 53.1 percent of airport employees and 63 percent of security workers said they put complete trust in security technologies

  • New material cleans water of radioactive contamination

    NC State researchers develops material to remove radioactive contaminants from drinking water; the material is a combination of forest byproducts and crustacean shells; the new material not only absorbs water, but can actually extract contaminates, such as radioactive iodide, from the water itself; this material, which forms a solid foam, has applications beyond radioactive materials

  • Hi-tech goggles to reduce number of friendly fire incidents

    The modern battle-field is saturated with autonomous, remotely controlled platforms and weapons, and everything moves very fast; in addition, many of the engagements take place in close quarters; all these increase the risk of friendly fire; DARPA wants a small New York company to develop augmented reality goggles which will tell soldiers on the ground which air assets are nearby, bearing which weapons, thus resulting in more accurate destruction of enemy assets, less risk to friendly forces, and fewer civilian deaths

  • Keeping water pure with detection nanosensors

    Seven European countries, containing 35 percent of the European population, face a risk of water shortfall; University College Cork will coordinate a 3 million Euro EU project for the development of novel smart sensing materials for applications in water purification technology and clinical diagnostics

  • U.S. military robot to help detect radiation at Fukushima

    The modified a military robot to navigate around Fukushima plant and produce a color-coded map of radiation levels; the robot includes a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive detection kit that can identify more than 7,500 environmental hazards, including toxic industrial chemicals and volatile gases; it also has temperature and air quality indicators and night vision, and it can sense sounds up to 1,000 meters away; the robot joins other pieces of specialized equipment, donated by QineticQ to help Japan deal with the crisis

  • Wastewater-treatment system to produce electricity

    Scientists will bio-engineer bacteria to break down large amounts of solid waste using anaerobic digestion (without oxygen) in a reactor based on existing technology used by distilleries and pharmaceutical companies; they hope to be able to capture the gas from the process to generate electricity. Because the system would not produce other waste products, they also hope it could improve wastewater treatment in the developed world

  • Local Beaumont, CA officers attend special FBI training course

    Officers from the local police department in Beaumont, California have been selected to attend a special law enforcement training course at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia; located on a Marine base, the FBI Academy is highly selective, only choosing an estimated 1 percent of law enforcement officials in the United States to attend the special training; the ten week program consists of rigorous physical training as well as thorough lessons in the classroom; courses include Computer Environments for Law Enforcement, Investigative Interviewing, and Labor Law Issues for Law Enforcement Administrators; law enforcement officials train and live together in close quarters in an isolated, heavily wooded facility to help forge networks