• Metamaterial sensor improves security, collision avoidance

    Engineers have developed a novel sensor which is more efficient, versatile, and cheaper for potential use in such applications as airport security scanners and collision avoidance systems for aircraft, cars, or maritime vessels.

  • Aerial platform helps in developing lightweight sensors for UAVs

    A research team at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) is developing an airborne testing capability for sensors, communications devices, and other airborne payloads. This aerial test bed, called the GTRI Airborne Unmanned Sensor System (GAUSS), is based on an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) made by Griffon Aerospace and modified by GTRI.

  • New design for clean nuclear fusion reactor unveiled

    Researchers have patented a nuclear fusion reactor by inertial confinement which, in addition to being used to generate electric power in plants, could be applied to propel ships. The fusion chamber shape and size can adapt to the type of fuel being used.

  • Military systems hibernate on the sea floor, then woken up remotely

    Almost half of the world’s oceans are more than four kilometers deep. This provides considerable opportunity for cheap stealth, but the vastness and depth make retrieval costs prohibitive. DARPA wants to developing deployable, unmanned, distributed systems which hibernate on the deep-ocean floor in special containers for years at a time. These deep-sea nodes would then be woken up remotely when needed and recalled to the surface

  • DARPA’s first FANG Challenge begun yesterday

    More than 700 participants, organized in 150 teams, yesterday begun collaboration to design the mobility and drivetrain systems of a next-generation, amphibious infantry fighting vehicle. The goal of the competition is to compress the design-to-production time of a complex defense system by up to a factor of five.

  • Neutralizing the effects of lethal chemical agents

    Organophosphorus agents (OPs) are used both in farm pesticides, and by terrorists and rogue states. About 200,000 people die each year across the world from organophosphorus agents (OP) poisoning, through occupational exposure, unintentional use, and misuse, mostly in developing countries like India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka and through deliberate terrorist activities. OPs include compounds like Tabun, which was developed in 1936 by German scientists during the Second World War, Sarin, Soman, Cyclosarin, VX, and VR. Researchers develop an enzyme treatment which could neutralize the effects of OPs.

  • Catching up: Indian and Chinese companies at the forefront of innovation

    In a few short years, the Chinese and Indian share of the world’s research and development centers has increased from 8 to 18 percent. A new study says that India and China invest more than the West in organizational innovation, that is, the implementation of a company structure that creates a favorable climate for new inventions.

  • Instant DNA analysis worries privacy advocates

    In the past, it took weeks to analyze a person’s DNA, but with new technology it can take less than a day, and in most cases less than two hours; Rapid DNA analyzers can process a DN sample in less than ninety minutes; these machines, the size of a household printer, are now being marketed to local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies around the country; privacy advocates worry

  • Laser weapon tracks, destroys drones, mortar rounds in mid-flight

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    A 50kW high energy laser (HEL) weapon technology demonstrator successfully passed demanding tests in Switzerland; in the first test, a massive, 15mm-thick steel girder was cut through from a distance of 1,000 meters; even more impressively, the HEL shot down several nose-diving target drones at a range of two kilometers; the drones were flying at speeds over 50 meters a second, but the system’s radar had no trouble picking up the incoming unmanned aerial vehicles at a distance of three kilometers, before they were destroyed by the laser beam at a 2-km range; the HEL also tracked and destroyed a steel ball measuring 82 mm in diameter and travelling at approximately 50 m/sec – replicating a mortar round – in mid-air

  • A 1-kilometer-long electric sail tether brings space sailing closer

    The electric sail (ESAIL) produces propulsion power for a spacecraft by utilizing the solar wind; the sail features electrically charged long and thin metal tethers which interact with the solar wind; using ultrasonic welding, researchers have successfully produced a 1-km long ESAIL tether; the produced tether proves that manufacturing full size ESAIL tethers is possible; the theoretically predicted electric sail force will be measured in space during 2013

  • Portable X-ray source offers a mobile terrorism prevention tool

    The hand-held scanners, or tricorders, of the Star Trek movies and television series are one step closer to reality now that a engineers have invented a compact source of X-rays and other forms of radiation; the radiation source, which is the size of a stick of gum, could be used to create inexpensive and portable X-ray scanners for use by doctors, as well as to fight terrorism and smuggling and aid exploration on this planet and others

  • A dandelion-shaped device to help in demining operations

    Decades of war have left land mines buried all over the Afghan countryside; they continue to go off, killing and maiming hundreds of  innocent people every year; last year alone, more than 812 people were wounded or killed in Afghanistan because of mines left behind after the armies retreated; two Afghan inventors designed a dandelion-like device for demining operations

     

  • Smartphones turned into secure and versatile keys

    It is already possible to open doors using an app — but we are a long way from seeing widespread acceptance of this in the market; now, researchers have developed a piece of software that will make the technology even more secure and versatile

  • Flexible electronics to make night vision more accurate, easier to use

    For soldiers and first responders, having accurate, high-resolution imaging capabilities may mean the difference between success and failure; electrical and computer engineers set out to make night vision more accurate and easier for soldiers, pilots, and first responders to use

  • Flexible electronics to make night vision more accurate, easier to use

    For soldiers and first responders, having accurate, high-resolution imaging capabilities may mean the difference between success and failure; electrical and computer engineers set out to make night vision more accurate and easier for soldiers, pilots, and first responders to use