• Using a giant light-gas gun to blast object into space

    Former scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) launch a company dedicated to, well, launching objects into space by using a giant gun; with a barrel 1.1-kilometers long, it uses compressed hydrogen gas to fire projectiles weighing 450-kilogram at six kilometers per second

  • Raytheon to export new ray gun

    Skin-heating Silent Guardian has attracted negative commentary from its earliest development days, and repeated requests for it from U.S. commanders overseas have thus been denied; foreign governments do not have such qualms

  • IBM's wants to make food smarter

    Big Blue offers systems for tracing the raw materials of food products through “an increasingly complex global supply chain”

  • New DARPA director seeks to deepen relations with universities

    Under the Bush administration, the relationship between DARPA, the Pentagon’s research arm, and leading U.S. universities became strained; the new director has embarked on a tour of university campuses to re-energize the government-academia cooperation in defense research

  • Penny-size nuclear battery developed

    Small nuclear battery, intended to power various micro/nanoelectromechanical systems, provides power density that is six orders of magnitude higher than chemical batteries

  • Day of charged-particles engine nears

    A Texas rocket company tests world’s most powerful ion engine; the engine uses radio waves to heat argon gas, turning it into a hot plasma — a state of matter in which electrons are no longer bound to atomic nuclei; magnetic fields then squirt the superheated plasma out the back of the engine, producing thrust in the opposite direction

  • Strap-on UGV kit

    Now you can turn you car into a UGV (unmanned ground vehicle): A retrofit from a Utah company allows you to turn your car into a UGV in about four hours

  • Princeton, Rice researchers develop new sensor for nitric oxide

    Researchers develop new nitric oxide detector; the sensor could now be incorporated into a portable, shoe-box-sized system ideally suited for mass deployment in large-scale unattended sensor networks

  • New advanced sensors developed

    Queen’s University Belfast researchers use Raman spectroscopy, which involves shining a laser beam onto the suspected sample and measuring the energy of light that scatters from it to determine what chemical compound is present; they mixed nanoscale silver particles to amplify the signals of compounds

  • U.S. military jets, vehicles to run on biofuels and animal-corpse grease

    Honeywell says the U.S. Air Force will buy 400,000 gallons of algae/weeds/corpse-fat jet fuel, and the U.S. Navy will take 190,000 gallons

  • Smiths Detection, AeroVironment show chemical-sensing UAV

    UAV technology combined with chemical sensors and advanced algorithms allow rapid aerial chemical detection and tracking

  • Wearable textile antenna for soldiers, first responders

    Finnish company demonstrated that an antenna can be built using textiles that can be worn and used for personal satellite communication

  • The day of military smart phones nears

    It is only a matter of time before we see military-related iPhone apps; the iPhone can use thousands of programs, and some of these are very useful for military personnel; officers see how useful the iPhone could be with software designed for military purposes; a military version of the iPhone, able to operate on a closed military network, would be a big help in the combat zone

  • ASE shows cargo and vehicle inspection system

    American Science and Engineering, Inc. combines its patented Z Backscatter technology with High Energy Transmission to offer enhanced scanning system for vehicles, cargo; system may be used in drive-by mode to scan stationary objects, or in portal mode to scan vehicles as they drive past the system

  • Raytheon uses millimeter-wave radiation to keep food safe

    Missile and defense contractor Raytheon offers a solution which uses millimeter-wave radiation to pasteurize food; new method is both healthier and more energy efficient than current pasteurization technologies