• New surveillance software knows -- and comments on -- what a camera sees

    Software developed which offers a running commentary on CCTV’s images to ease video searching and analysis; the system might help address the fact that there are more and more surveillance cameras — on the streets and in military equipment, for instance — while the number of people working with them remains about the same

  • Big and small robots showcase their skills at NIST Alaskan events

    In the main microrobotics event — the two-millimeter dash — the microbot from Carnegie Mellon University broke the world record held by Switzerland’s ETH Zurich with an average time of 78 milliseconds; the achievement was, well, short-lived: Less than an hour later, the French team shattered the mark with an average time of 32 milliseconds

  • BP's top kill effort stops oil flow

    BP, using a top kill device, last night managed to stop the flow of gas and oil from the wellhead into the Gulf; commander of U.S. Coast Guard says the company managed to “stabilize the wellhead”

  • New educational page for scientific information on topics related to 2010 oil spill

    University of Miami launches educational Web page for scientific information on topics related to the 2010 Oil Spill; designed for use by teachers, students, and general audiences, the site focuses on the ocean environment

  • Faulty cement plug may have caused oil rig explosion

    As part of the oil drilling process, a cement plug is placed at the bottom of the well in order temporarily to shut it off prior to pumping the oil out; while the cement is drying, mud is loaded into the top of the well to prevent a gas surge; before removing the mud, pressure tests are carried out to ensure the plug is holding; James Dupree, a senior BP official, has claimed that the results of the tests on the Gulf of Mexico plug, carried out on 20 April, were inconclusive — yet the mud was removed

  • Self-healing concrete developed

    University of Rhode Island researchers develop a new type of self-healing concrete that promises to be commercially viable and have added environmental benefits; a microencapsulated sodium-silicate healing agent is embedded directly into a concrete matrix; when tiny stress cracks begin to form in the concrete, the capsules rupture and release the healing agent into the adjacent areas

  • Italian-Russian reactor could be the first to achieve self-sustaining fusion

    As the interest in alternatives to fossil fuels grows, so does the interest in nuclear fusion; a Russian-Italian project will build a self-sustaining fusion reactor based on a design by an MIT scientist; the design employs a doughnut-shaped device which uses powerful magnetic fields to produce fusion by squeezing superheated plasma of hydrogen isotopes

  • Winners announced in Colorado Homeland Defense Alliance's innovation competition

    The winners of the Colorado Homeland Defense Alliance’s 4th Annual National Security Innovation Competition (NSIC) are the University of Ottawa, University of Connecticut, and University of Colorado; top prize goes to U Ottawa for blast mitigation materials

  • Efficacy of TSA's behavioral threat detection program questioned

    Between 2004 and 2008, more than two billion passengers boarded planes at the 161 U.S. airports in which TSA has deployed Behavioral Detection Officers (BDOs) under the Screening of Passengers by Observation Techniques (SPOT) program; the BDOs identified 152,000 passengers for secondary screening, which led to 1,083 arrests; none of those arrested, however, were terrorists or individuals who intended to attack the aviation system; GAO reports that since 2003, there were 16 instances in which airport screeners permitted people to get on planes who later were linked to terror plots

  • Pentagon directs basic research funds to applied projects, says report

    The U.S. Department of Defense has a $13.5 billion science and technology budget; about $1.9 billion — 15 percent of the total — is set aside for basic research; new study found that many of the projects funded under the basic research budget did not meet the definition of basic research used by the Pentagon

  • World's largest airship inflated Wednesday for the first time

    The world’s largest airship — 235 feet long and 65 feet in diameter — was inflated on Wednesday for the first time; the test took place inside the Garrett Coliseum in Montgomery, Alabama which, the proprietors state, can hold as many as 1,500 cattle (“with milking parlor”); the airship features many innovations, including propelling ducted fans which are mounted along the centerline of the hull rather than beneath it, so that the nose does not lift when more power is applied

  • Katrina, Rita cleaned up polluted, lead-laden New Orleans soil

    It appears that hurricanes Katrina and Rita, with all the devastation they have caused, made one beneficial contribution to the future of New Orleans: decades of Louisiana-type corruption and collusion between the oil industry and the state government have caused the city’s soil to be heavily polluted, laden with lead, arsenic, and other poisonous substances; the sediments washed into the city by the hurricanes have blanketed the polluted soil, resulting in a dramatic drop in the presence of lead and arsenic in the city’s soil — and in the blood stream of children in the city

  • Deep-water oil spills do most of the damage deep down

    Oil spills like the one in the Gulf do most of their damage in the deep; the oil visible on the surface accounts for only 2 percent of the oil spilling into the Gulf; most of the oil remains submerged in the form of droplets that only slowly make their way to the surface

  • Fears grow that Gulf oil could strike Florida

    Worries grow over the ecological and economic impact of the huge oil spill, with the most recent fears focused on its possible spread into a “loop current” that could carry the pollution to the Florida Keys and nearby tourist beaches; the U.S. government has already extended fishing closure to nearly 20 percent of the Gulf because of the contamination of harvested seafood

  • DARPA looking for automated insider threat spotter

    The U.S. National Counterintelligence Strategy asserts that “Trusted insiders — are targeting the US information infrastructure for exploitation, disruption, and potential destruction”; DARPA, the Pentagon research arm, is soliciting idea for technology which will automatically spot — and eliminate — insider threat to U.S. information infrastructure