News

Researchers from Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico have invented a dart-like, self-guided bullet for small-caliber, smooth-bore firearms that could hit laser-designated targets at distances of more than a mile (about 2,000 meters). Sandia is seeking a private company partner to complete testing...

Long hailed as windows to the soul, the eyes also might provide insight for researchers at the U.S. Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine (USARIEM), who are evaluating and working to improve methods for detecting traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) in soldiers while they are still...

Engineers have fired the Navy’s first industry-built electromagnetic railgun (EM Railgun) prototype launcher at a test facility, beginning an evaluation that is an important intermediate step toward a future tactical weapon for ships. The Office of Naval Research (ONR) is evaluating the first...

A new approach to motion capture technology is offering fresh insights into tennis injuries – and orthopedic injuries in general. Researchers from Ohio State University studied three types of tennis serves, and identified one in particular, called a “kick” serve, which creates the...

Researchers at the Polytechnic Institute of New York University (NYU-Poly) and Michigan-based REL, Inc. are creating a next-generation aluminum composite brake rotor potentially weighing 60 percent less than today’s cast iron rotors with triple the life expectancy. The...

MIT engineers created the “buckliball,” a hollow, spherical object made of soft rubber containing no moving parts, but fashioned with 24 carefully spaced dimples. When the air is sucked out of a buckliball with a syringe, the thin ligaments forming columns between lateral dimples...

Pioneering engineers at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow are developing an innovative technique, based on lasers, that could radically change asteroid deflection technology.The research has unearthed the possibility of using a swarm of relatively small satellites flying in formation and...

A team of researchers from Columbia Engineering and the University of Pennsylvania has figured out a way to measure nanopores — tiny holes in a thin membrane that can detect single biological molecules such as DNA and proteins — with less error than can be achieved with...

Bitumen and heavy oil are difficult to extract from reservoirs because they are thick and do not flow easily. There are several methods of extraction, one of which uses carbon dioxide-rich gas injections which helps liquify the bitumen for easier extraction, while presenting opportunities for...

Spread by mosquitoes, malaria is caused by a tiny parasite that infects human red blood cells. University of British Columbia researcher Hongshen Ma and his team designed a lab-on-a-chip device to better understand the changes in red blood cells caused by Plasmodium falciparum, the most...

A new imaging system could use opaque walls, doors, or floors as 'mirrors' to gather information about a given scene. The camera produced recognizable 3-D images of a wooden figurine and of foam cutouts outside of the device’s line of sight.The principle behind the system is essentially that of the...

Engineers from the NRL Spacecraft Engineering Department (SED) successfully demonstrated the robotic fluids transfer from a stationary platform to an Unmanned Surface Vehicle (USV) in wave heights greater than three feet. The Rapid Autonomous Fuel Transfer (RAFT) project exhibits the ability to...

Researchers at UCLA have used a standard LightScribe DVD optical drive to produce electrodes that not only maintain high conductivity but also provide higher and more accessible surface area than conventional ECs that use activated carbon electrodes.The process is based on coating a DVD...

Researchers at MIT are working on a system that would enable robot planes to follow standard hand gestures. The team recorded a series of videos in which several people performed a set of 24 gestures commonly used by aircraft-carrier deck personnel.The MIT researchers’ software represented the contents of...

Propulsion by a novel jet engine is the innovation behind a University of Colorado Boulder-developed aircraft that’s accelerating toward commercialization. Jet engine technology can be small, fuel-efficient, and cost-effective, at least with Assistant Professor Ryan...

NASA scientists are making progress in their preparations to mount a detailed research campaign aimed at solving a modern-day aviation mystery involving the unlikely combination of fire and ice inside a running jet engine. The investigation deals with the seemingly strange notion that ice...

Tomorrow's aircraft could contribute to their power needs by harnessing energy from the wheel rotation of their landing gear to generate electricity. They could use this to power their taxiing to and from airport buildings, reducing the need to use their jet engines. This would save on...

The firefighting robot, called the Shipboard Autonomous Firefighting Robot (SAFFiR), is being designed to move autonomously throughout the ship, interact with people, and fight fires, handling many of the dangerous firefighting tasks that are normally performed by humans. The humanoid robot should be able to...

Inspired by nature’s ability to shape a petal, researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have developed a new tool for manufacturing three-dimensional shapes easily and cheaply, to aid advances in biomedicine, robotics, and tunable micro-optics.Researchers developed a method...

A “Cheetah” robot gallops at speeds of up to 18 miles per hour (mph), setting a new land speed record for legged robots. The previous record was 13.1 mph, set in 1989. The use of ground robots in military explosive-ordinance-disposal missions already saves many lives and prevents thousands of other...

NASA's Robotic Refueling Mission (RRM) began operations on the International Space Station with the Canadian Dextre robot and RRM tools, marking important milestones in satellite-servicing technology and the use of the space station robotic capabilities. A joint effort between NASA and the...

Predicting how large numbers of visitors to major events will behave is difficult, even using evidence based on past experience. To prevent disasters, police, rescue services, and event organizers have to be able to identify dangerous bottlenecks, hidden obstacles, and unexpected escape routes...

To make a silicon solar cell, you start with a slice of highly purified silicon crystal, and then process it through several stages involving gradual heating and cooling. But figuring out the tradeoffs involved in selecting the purity level of the starting silicon wafer — and then exactly how much to heat...

All across America, trucks and tractor-trailers are transporting industrial explosives such as munitions, rocket motors, and dynamite on nearly every artery of the country’s interstate and highway system. America’s track record in transporting these materials is about as...