• Radiation fears cripple Japanese food exports

    Japanese agricultural exports have yet to recover from the 11 March earthquake and tsunami due largely to fears of radioactive contamination; to combat these fears, local governments have done all they can to assure consumers that their products are safe; consumers remain wary despite these reassurances, and as a result the Japanese agricultural sector is struggling

  • Autonomous multi-target, multi-user tracking capability

    An autonomous multi-sensor motion-tracking and interrogation system reduces the workload for analysts by automatically finding moving objects, then presenting high-resolution images of those objects with no human input

  • First quantitative measurements of Fukushima leakage

    Atmospheric chemists report the first quantitative measurement of the amount of radiation leaked from the damaged nuclear reactor in Fukushima; the researchers calculated that 400 billion neutrons were released per square meter surface of the cooling pools, between 13 March, when the seawater pumping operation began, and 20 March 2011

  • Bill calls for all utility plant worker background checks

    Senator Charles Schumer (D-New York) will introduce new legislation that would require all major utility plants to run background checks on its employees; the bill would require FBI background checks on all employees of all major utility plants, strengthening the current requirement which mandates such checks only at nuclear power plants

  • New task force helps protect Port of Virginia

    A new border security task force has been launched to help secure the Port of Virginia; the task force is comprised of ten officers and agents from a total of ten local, state, and federal agencies that will be responsible for securing the Port of Virginia against a variety of criminal acts including trade fraud, cargo theft, and the illegal smuggling of drugs, persons, currency, and weapons

  • Day of "solar" soldiers nears

    Researches develop wearable light-weight solar panels which will allow soldiers to generate power in the field and reduce the need for batteries for their electronic devices; they will also establish a power supply that keeps electronic devices operational throughout the duration of missions

  • Storing CO2 underground to extract electricity

    A team of scientists, led by the Berkeley Lab, hopes to become the first in the world to produce electricity from the Earth’s heat using CO2; They also want permanently to store some of the CO2 underground, where it can not contribute to climate change

  • Towing icebergs to provide fresh water for parched regions

    A third of the world’s population — more than two billion people — lives without access to clean drinking water, and studies show that the situation will only get worse; a French innovator has an idea: towing icebergs from the Greenland and Antarctica to regions most in need of fresh water; a computer simulation shows this solution to be viable and affordable

  • Solar-based method to provide safe water

    A revolutionary low-cost technique that uses sunshine to provide safe drinking water; solar disinfection (SODIS) of drinking water is an effective way of preventing water-borne diseases such as cholera, dysentery or polio — especially important in developing countries, where safe drinking water is often a precious rarity

  • Calls for more stringent standards in wake of increasing storm damage

    Researchers from a team funded by the National Science Foundation have examined some of last spring’s massive tornado damage and conclude in a new report that more intensive engineering design and more rigorous, localized construction and inspection standards are needed to reduce property damage and loss of life

  • Identifying Canadians from their date of birth, postal code

    Researchers find that 97 percent of Canadians can be uniquely identified from their date of birth and postal code; this means that if these to items of information, plus gender, exist in any database, even if it has no names or other identifying information, it would be possible to determine the identity of those individuals birth

  • Wire pops lock certified for US defense facilities

    The Access Control E-Plex 5800 lock from Swiss company Kaba was described as the first lock certified as meeting new DHS requirements for coded access that keeps track of which contractors or federal workers open which doors; at the DefCon event in Las Vegas, a security expert demonstrated how this high-security lock, certified for use in sensitive U.S. government facilities, can be easily opened with just a piece of wire

  • Boeing and Siemens join forces to protect smart grid

    In a bid to improve efficiency and security for the Pentagon’s electrical “smart grid,” defense giant Boeing has teamed up with German technology conglomerate Siemens to develop new technologies

  • New desalination technology to help solve world's water shortage

    Over one-third of the world’s population already lives in areas struggling to keep up with the demand for fresh water. By 2025, that number will nearly double; a new study argues that seawater desalination should play an important role in helping combat worldwide fresh water shortages once conservation, reuse, and other methods have been exhausted