Stories

No chip manufacturer will take a chance on an innovative chip design without overwhelming evidence that it works as advertised. A new software-simulation system offers more accurate evaluation of promising — but potentially fault-ridden — multicore-chip designs.As a research tool, an...

High-gain nuclear fusion could be achieved in a preheated cylindrical container immersed in strong magnetic fields, according to a series of computer simulations performed at Sandia National Laboratories.The simulations show the release of output energy that was many times greater than the...

Clinicians who treat severe wounds may soon have powerful new diagnostic tools in the form of hyperspectral imaging (HSI) devices, calibrated to new NIST standard reference spectra, which will provide perspective on the physiology of tissue injury and healing.The team produced the first prototype...

Today, a typical computer chip might have six or eight cores, all communicating with each other over a single bundle of wires, called a bus. With a bus, however, only one pair of cores can talk at a time, which would be a serious limitation in chips with hundreds or even thousands of cores, which...

Some electric car companies have begun to change their ownership models. The French automaker Renault, for example, has reduced its prices under a model that has drivers buy the car, but rent the battery separately. The idea of renting out an electric battery separately has inspired an Israeli...

Robot squirrels have shown how real-life squirrels signal to snakes with heat and tail flagging. Through field experiments, researchers from San Diego State University and UC Davis aim to learn more about rattlesnake behavior.The engineering lab built a squirrel with a heatable tail and a tail...

Cornell chemists have developed a way to make porous metal films with up to 1,000 times the electrical conductivity offered by previous methods. Their technique opens the door to creating a wide variety of metal nanostructures for engineering and biomedical applications. The new method builds...

New algorithms could enable heaps of ‘smart sand’ that can assume any shape, allowing spontaneous formation of new tools or duplication of broken mechanical parts.Unlike many other approaches to reconfigurable robots, smart sand uses a subtractive method, akin to stone carving, rather than an additive method,...

The first prototype of a new, ultra-compact motor will allow small satellites to journey beyond Earth’s orbit. The goal of the micro motor: to drastically reduce the cost of space exploration.

Last week, Google released a video that demonstrated the potential of its self-driving car. The video showed a legally blind man, who after taking the driver seat of one of Google's robotic cars, maneuvered from his home, through neighborhoods, and into a commercial...

Researchers at the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science have for the first time demonstrated a method for converting carbon dioxide into liquid fuel isobutanol using electricity. The electrochemical formate production and the biological carbon dioxide fixation...

A tiny prototype robot that functions like a living creature could be safely used to pinpoint diseases within the human body. Called ‘Cyberplasm’, it will combine advanced microelectronics with latest research in biomimicry (technology inspired by nature). The aim is for Cyberplasm to have an...

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 recent event called the "Day of Unplugging" kicked off last week, challenging people to go without their cell phones and technology for 24 hours. The "digital detox" idea encourages everyone to step away from their computers and smartphones. Some people are opposed to the idea and see no need to unplug from...

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...