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The Next Generation of Explosives Trace Detection is Here
Launched in fiscal year 2020, NextGen Explosives Trace Detection (ETD) expands the scope of aviation checkpoints technology, resulting in the advancement of technologies that can quickly and accurately collect and analyze samples in a variety of ways, including from direct contact with the subject, non-contact sampling via vapors, and even through barriers.
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Greater Resilience Through Nature-Inspired Power Grids
Researchers are looking to nature to build better power grids that are more resistant to various potential disturbances like natural disasters or cyberattacks.
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AI Is Not All Killer Robots. It Is Far More Dangerous
Whatever Hollywood might say, AI is not all about killer robots in a far-off future. It is more mundane, more everyday - and much more ubiquitous. And thinking it just belongs in a sci-fi film is dangerous, since this leads to a sense it is not relevant or that it is even unreal.
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Airborne Optical Energy Relays to Create Revolutionary Power Distribution Network
DARPA’s program aims to design and demonstrate airborne optical energy relays. These relays are a critical component necessary to allow ground-sourced lasers to be coupled with high-altitude, efficient long-range transmission.
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“Shock-Darkened” Meteorites Offer Clues for Hazardous Asteroid Deflection
Planetary scientists identified a potential source of a special kind of meteorite. Its characteristics could explain certain discrepancies in how near-Earth asteroids are classified.
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Solar Harvesting System May Generate Solar Power 24/7
With all the research, history and science behind it, there are limits to how much solar power can be harvested and used – as its generation is restricted only to the daytime. A new type of solar energy harvesting system that breaks the efficiency record of all existing technologies. And no less important, it clears the way to use solar power 24/7.
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China’s Extensive Use of Genetic Information Sounds a Warning
As China increasingly relies on biometric data collection for public and national security purposes, it is time for democracies to address its role in their systems.
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Laser Takes Aim at Cockroaches
Cockroaches are a creepy pest found all around the world. They are famously resilient —- for years people believed they could even survive a nuclear bomb. What they can’t survive is the new laser and artificial intelligence system designed to kill them dead.
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U.S. Nuclear Testing Moratorium Launched a Supercomputing Revolution
On 23 September 1992 the U.S. conducted its 1,054th – and last — nuclear weapons test. After the test, and with the Soviet Union gone, the U.S. government issued what was meant to be a short-term moratorium on testing, but the moratorium has lasted to this day. This moratorium came with an unexpected benefit: no longer testing nuclear weapons ushered in a revolution in high-performance computing.
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Scientific Discovery for Stockpile Stewardship
Following the U.S. last nuclear test in September 1992, the Department of Energy’s national labs convened to develop a strategy and map out an R&D effort that would come to be known as the Stockpile Stewardship Program (SSP). Its mission was ensuring the readiness of the nation’s nuclear deterrent force without nuclear tests.
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Propelling Wind Energy Innovation
Motivated by the need to eliminate expensive rare-earth magnets in utility-scale direct-drive wind turbines, Sandia National Laboratories researchers developed a fundamentally new type of rotary electrical contact. The novel rotary electrical contact eliminates reliance on rare-earth magnets for large-scale wind turbines.
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Charging Cars at Home at Night Is Not the Way to Go: Study
The move to electric vehicles will result in large costs for generating, transmitting, and storing more power. Shifting current EV charging from home to work and night to day could cut costs and help the grid, according to a new Stanford study.
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Cobalt-Free Cathode for Lithium-Ion Batteries
Researchers have devised a way to make lithium-ion battery cathodes without using cobalt, a mineral plagued by price volatility and geopolitical complications. The innovation could lead to safer, longer-lasting power storage for electric vehicles and devices.
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Lithium-Ion Battery Material Improves Charging Speed, Storage Capacity
Researchers discovered a key material needed for fast-charging lithium-ion batteries. The commercially relevant approach opens a potential pathway to improve charging speeds for electric vehicles.
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To Out-Innovate Global Competitors, the United States Should Embrace Immigrant Talent
Immigration barriers for entrepreneurs and U.S.-educated STEM graduates hurt American innovation.
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The long view
New Technology is Keeping the Skies Safe
DHS S&T Baggage, Cargo, and People Screening (BCP) Program develops state-of-the-art screening solutions to help secure airspace, communities, and borders
Factories First: Winning the Drone War Before It Starts
Wars are won by factories before they are won on the battlefield,Martin C. Feldmann writes, noting that the United States lacks the manufacturing depth for the coming drone age. Rectifying this situation “will take far more than procurement tweaks,” Feldmann writes. “It demands a national-level, wartime-scale industrial mobilization.”
How Artificial General Intelligence Could Affect the Rise and Fall of Nations
Visions for potential AGI futures: A new report from RAND aims to stimulate thinking among policymakers about possible impacts of the development of artificial general intelligence (AGI) on geopolitics and the world order.
Keeping the Lights on with Nuclear Waste: Radiochemistry Transforms Nuclear Waste into Strategic Materials
How UNLV radiochemistry is pioneering the future of energy in the Southwest by salvaging strategic materials from nuclear dumps –and making it safe.
Model Predicts Long-Term Effects of Nuclear Waste on Underground Disposal Systems
The simulations matched results from an underground lab experiment in Switzerland, suggesting modeling could be used to validate the safety of nuclear disposal sites.