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Blog
Who Benefits From "Cash for Clunkers"?

The U.S. Senate is now deciding on whether to approve an additional $2 billion in funding for the government's "Cash for Clunkers" program. Should the Senate approve, President Obama is certain to approve extending the program, designed to replace old gas-guzzling vehicles with more fuel-efficient ones, by...

News: Energy

Philips Lumileds (San Jose, CA) expanded its LUXEON® Rebel family of LEDs with nine new emitters designed for illumination solutions such as recessed lighting, street lamps, and retrofit bulbs. The new LEDs...

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News: Energy

DOE announced the availability of up to $5.5 million from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to increase the use of higher ethanol blends up to E85 (85% ethanol/15% gasoline) by expanding refueling...

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News: Green Design & Manufacturing

Separating carbon dioxide from its polluting source - such as the flue gas from a coal-fired power plant - may soon become cleaner and more efficient thanks to a screening method developed by a Lawrence...

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News: Green Design & Manufacturing

Supertex, Inc. (Sunnyvale, CA) introduces a buck-mode LED driver IC with hysteretic current control and high-side current sensing. The HV9918 is ideal for a variety of solid-state lighting...

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Blog
Re-Inventing the Number

I had the opportunity to meet with an old friend of NASA Tech Briefs last week. Allen Razdow, who many design engineers may know as the inventor of Mathcad and the co-founder of MathSoft, was in town to talk to me about his new company and his new venture, a sort of “Wikipedia for numbers.”

The company, True...

News: Green Design & Manufacturing

In large cities across Asia, auto rickshaws (tuktuks) are one of the most important means of transportation. These tuktuks produce considerable CO2 emissions and air pollution, and their drivers are underpaid....

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News: Energy

Today, the NASA Innovative Partnerships Program and the Comparative Aircraft Flight Efficiency (CAFE) Foundation officially announced the Green Flight Challenge. The flight efficiency competition is for...

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News: Energy

Operating the air conditioning is the largest auxiliary energy drain on cars. In December 2008, DOE announced a project to study and develop thermoelectric heating and cooling systems. As partners in the project,...

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News: Energy
Improvements in Organic Photovoltaics on the Horizon
Organic photovoltaics, which rely on organic molecules to capture sunlight and convert it into electricity, have come a step closer to reality thanks to discoveries by NIST researchers. The scientists have deepened their understanding of the complex organic films at the heart of the devices.
Blog: Transportation
Computer Program Warns Weary Drivers

Although less publicized than alcohol, driver fatigue is a major contributor to auto accidents in the U.S. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) estimates that 56,000 sleep-related road crashes occur annually in the U.S., resulting in 40,000 injuries and 1,550 fatalities. According to the...

News: Green Design & Manufacturing

New cavity organic light-emitting diode (COLED) technology from SRI International and light-emitting polymers from Showa Denko K.K. (SDK) produce a highly efficient light source that could replace...

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News: Green Design & Manufacturing

Chinook – a $21.4 million supercomputer built by HP - has been commissioned for use by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the Department of Energy. It's primed to take on problems...

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News: Energy

This summer, University of Bath, UK researchers are constructing a “BaleHaus” made of prefabricated straw bale and hemp cladding panels on campus. Straw is a truly environmentally-friendly building material,...

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News: Energy

Over 30 French college students have collaborated to design the world’s first solar-powered blimp, Nephelios. One hundred years after the first flight across the English Channel by Louis...

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News: Energy

BaySpec, Inc. (Fremont, CA) introduces a Raman-specific 1064nm spectrometer designed for measuring microalgae, a promising future source of biofuels. Using the NunavutTM spectrometer, researchers were able...

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Blog
Good News, Bad News

You know that old adage, "I've got some good news and I've got some bad news"? Well, that pretty much sums up this year's Semicon West, which was held last week at San Francisco's Moscone Center.

Semiconductor West is the semiconductor manufacturing industry's annual trade show and technical conference. As such, it's a...

News: Green Design & Manufacturing

The world’s ocean surface temperature was the warmest on record for June - breaking the previous high mark set in 2005 - according to the NOAA. Additionally, the combined...

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News: Green Design & Manufacturing

Operating on just 150 watts, the powder-coated aluminum SafeSite® LED High Bay luminaire is designed to perform for over 10 years in demanding applications - three times as long as traditional HID fixtures, and...

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News: Energy

DOE is offering $52.5 million for research, development, and demonstration of concentrating solar power (CSP) systems that provide low-cost electrical power both day and night. CSP...

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Blog
Walter Cronkite, Friend of Space Travel

Walter Cronkite, arguably the best-known and respected television news anchor of the past half century, died last Friday at 92. Cronkite left an indelible mark on the face on television news journalism, covering many of the main events and interviewing many of the world’s key leaders shaping the 20th...

News: Energy

Wood science researchers at Oregon State University have made some surprising findings about the potential of microcrystalline cellulose – a product that can be made easily from almost any type of plant fiber –...

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News: Energy

The U.S. Department of Energy announced the availability of up to $85 million toward the development of algae-based biofuels and advanced, infrastructure-compatible biofuels. DOE seeks to bring...

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News: Green Design & Manufacturing

Smog is made up of an array of air pollutants, including mercury. One Ryerson University researcher has found that summer is the peak season for this atmospheric toxin, and that higher levels of mercury...

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News: Green Design & Manufacturing

There's a new way to fabricate efficient solar cells from low-cost and flexible materials. The new design grows optically active semiconductors in arrays of nanoscale pillars -...

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News: Energy

Scientists at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory have come up with an innovative approach that can safely and economically extract and convert...

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News: Green Design & Manufacturing

The accidental discovery of a bowl-shaped molecule that pulls carbon dioxide out of the air could offer new possibilities for dealing with global warming, including genetically engineering microbes to...

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Blog
Faking a Moon Landing

July 20 marks the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11, the first space mission to land on the Moon. Astronaut Neil Armstrong’s words - “One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” – arguably depict one of the finest moments in U.S. history. The landing was the culmination of a massive collective effort by the U.S....

News: Energy

Photovoltaic and wind energy plants, hydroelectric power stations, and biogas plants can be complex to design and maintain. In designing a hydroelectric power station, an engineer needs to...

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Webcasts

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On-Demand Webinars: Defense

From Data to Decision: How AI Enhances Warfighter Readiness

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Upcoming Webinars: Aerospace

April Battery & Electrification Summit

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Upcoming Webinars: Manufacturing & Prototyping

Tech Update: 3D Printing for Transportation in 2024

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Upcoming Webinars: Materials

Unleashing Epoxy's Potential: Ensuring Hermetic Sealing in Modern...

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Upcoming Webinars: Test & Measurement

Building an Automotive EMC Test Plan

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Upcoming Webinars: Aerospace

The Moon and Beyond from a Thermal Perspective

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