University of Michigan engineering researchers are working on a global satellite project that would help predict the intensity of a hurricane while it is developing. In coordination with NASA, Michigan Engineering Professor Chris Ruf is working on the Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite...

A new asteroid-deflecting idea proposes that paintballs shot into space could prevent a dangerous asteroid from colliding with Earth. The initial force from the paintballs would veer the asteroid slightly off course. The paint resulting from the splattered pellets would more than double the asteroid's sunlight...

For the first time, researchers power an implantable electronic device using an electrical potential — a natural battery — deep in the inner ear.The devices could monitor biological activity in the ears of people with hearing or balance impairments, or responses to therapies....

In a study presented at the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions 2012, an experimental device converted energy from a beating heart to provide enough electricity to power a pacemaker. The findings suggest that patients could power their pacemakers — eliminating the need for replacements when...

Diving into a pool from a few feet up allows you to enter the water smoothly and painlessly, but jumping from a bridge can lead to a fatal impact. The water is the same in each case, so why is the effect of hitting its surface so different?

The race is on to develop the most secure solution for storing CO2 in the Earth’s crust. A Norwegian company, Numerical Rocks AS, has developed a method for studying precisely how this greenhouse gas is bound inside rock.

Using a computational model they designed to incorporate detailed information about plants’ interconnected metabolic processes, scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory have identified key pathways that appear to “favor” the production of...

Stanford University scientists have built the first solar cell made entirely of carbon, a promising alternative to the expensive materials used in photovoltaic devices today. Unlike rigid silicon solar panels that adorn many rooftops, Stanford's thin film prototype is made of carbon materials that can be...

Researchers successfully tested a beaming technology that allowed humans and a rat to interact through virtual reality avatars. Using digital representations of themselves, the researchers enabled the rat to interact with a rat-sized robot controlled by a human participant in a...

Concussions are arguably football's most prominent injury, but they're also its most mysterious. With the help of Stanford University's football team, a group of Stanford doctors and neuroscientists is working to quantify the head trauma that players sustain during a game.

A Fort Jackson battalion is piloting a new training tool that will look familiar to many new soldiers. Virtual Battlespace 2, or VBS2, offers battlefield simulations that allow instructors to create new scenarios and engage the simulation from multiple viewpoints. The squad-management...

Over the past decade the only thing that has been able to slow the Army's premier combat vehicle hasn't been enemies on the battlefield, but rather the technological advancements added to the platform. While every vehicle is designed to have Space, Weight, and Power (SWaP) margin for incremental...

The U.S. Army has begun fielding new radar systems to protect forward- deployed forces. Several next-generation, mobile Counter Target Acquisition, or CTA radar systems are now able to provide soldiers with a 360-degree protective envelope or warning capability against incoming enemy rocket, artillery and mortar...

Michigan Engineering researchers can "pressure-cook" algae for as little as a minute and transform an unprecedented 65 percent of the green slime into biocrude. "We're trying to mimic the process in nature that forms crude oil with marine organisms," said Phil Savage, an Arthur F. Thurnau professor and a...

Currently, the modeling of supercritical-pressure flows through Large Eddy Simulation (LES) uses models derived for atmospheric-pressure flows. Those atmospheric-pressure flows do not exhibit the particularities of high density-gradient magnitude features...

A decoder was developed that decodes a serial concatenated pulse position modulation (SCPPM) encoded information sequence. The decoder takes as input a sequence of four bit loglikelihood ratios (LLR) for each PPM slot in a codeword via a XAUI 10-Gb/s quad optical fiber interface. If the decoder is unavailable, it passes the...

QuakeSim 2.0 improves understanding of earthquake processes by providing modeling tools and integrating model applications and various heterogeneous data sources within a Web services environment. QuakeSim is a multi-source, synergistic, data-intensive environment for modeling the behavior of earthquake faults individually, and as part...

HURON solves the problem of how to optimize a plan and schedule for assigning multiple agents to a temporal sequence of actions (e.g., science tasks). Developed as a generic planning and scheduling tool, HURON has been used to optimize space mission...

This software automatically processes Sally Ride Science (SRS) delivered MoonKAM camera control files (ccf) into uplink products for the GRAIL-A and GRAIL-B spacecraft as part of an education and public outreach (EPO) extension to the Grail Mission. Once properly validated and deemed safe for execution onboard the...

The 2012 Create the Future Design Contest — sponsored by COMSOL, Nordson EFD, and Tech Briefs Media Group (publishers of NASA Tech Briefs) — recognized innovation in product design in seven categories: Con sumer Products, Electronics, Machinery & Equipment, Medical, Safety & Security, Sustainable Tech...