Saturday, July 28, 2007

Colossal Magnetic Levitation Wind Turbine Proposed

Colossal Magnetic Levitation Wind Turbine Proposed

(click to enlarge)

It's a vision of a magnetically levitated wind turbine that can generate one gigawatt of energy (enough to power 750,000 homes). This is the device proposed by a new Arizona-based company, MagLev Wind Turbine Technologies. The company claims that it can deliver clean power for less than cent per kilowatt hour using this wind turbine.

That's a pretty big deal actually. Today's energy is 10-15 cents per kilowatt.

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Thursday, July 26, 2007

Solar Energy Hits New 42.8% Efficiency Record

Team sets solar cell record

Using a novel technology that adds multiple innovations to a very high-performance crystalline silicon solar cell platform, a consortium led by the University of Delaware has achieved a record-breaking combined solar cell efficiency of 42.8 percent from sunlight at standard terrestrial conditions.

...

The consortium’s goal is to create solar cells that operate at 50 percent in production, Barnett said. With the fresh funding and cooperative efforts of the DuPont-UD consortium, he said it is expected new high efficiency solar cells could be in production by 2010.

...


“This is a solar cell that works,” Barnett said, adding, “This technology has the potential to change the way electricity is generated throughout the world.”

Barnett believes the 50 percent efficiency mark is just the beginning. “Our best inventions are in front of us,” he said. “The consortium has been a super team, and has worked to develop new devices and architectures based on a breakthrough design paradigm.”

Also see Researchers develop inexpensive, easy process to produce solar panels.

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Monday, July 23, 2007

The Future of Mind Control

I have here two movie clips that demonstrate the current state of affairs in the whacky world of mind control.

The first one shows a monkey moving a mechanical arm by thought.

The second one shows a guy lifting boxes in a virtual world, just by thinking about it.






The technology holds great promise for disabled people.

Even though this technology is being developed with disabled people as the major motive, they won't be the only ones that end up using the technology.

Imagine a day where people interact with their computer. By the time the technology hits the mainstream (at least a decade from now), computers will be small enough to be practically invisible.

We will have smoothly hooked up the Internet to our brains... or our brains to the Internet. It all depends on how you wanna look at it.

It might seem harmless enough, but in fact it is the beginning of our transcendance to something bigger.

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Sunday, July 01, 2007

Our Technological Future - Mixed Bag #21

Luddites across the globe... eat your heart out!

(And yes, I deliberately put all the cool stuff on top to piss off luddites.)

Be sure to watch this 'ere video. It'll blow your socks off.

Especially if your a Trekkie. Then you simply cannot afford to not watch it.

Microsofts Multi Touch Surface



DARPA's Better Bionic Arm: Our Most Limb-Like Prosthetic



Bear robot rescues wounded troops



Move to create less clumsy robots



Drivers Unwanted: MIT 'Robocar' takes a spin



Japanse man gives robot a woman's touch



First 100% Solar Powered Community In California Opens



Genome of DNA Pioneer Is Deciphered

Dutch try to grow enviro-friendly meat in lab

Single spinning nuclei in diamond offers stable quantum computing building block

Human Stem Cell Treatment Restores Motor Function in Paralyzed Rats

Japanese Researchers Develop Creepiest Robot Ever

Scientists Move Closer to Turning Skin Cells Into Tissues

New drug helps lose weight without going hungry

Serious diseases genes revealed

Large study links genes to 7 serious diseases

Autism symptoms reversed in lab

Scientists Use Embryonic Stem Cells to Regenerate a Heart

Scientists Reverse Mental Retardation in Mice

Gene therapy awakens the brain despite blindness from birth

Maryland Professor Creates Desktop Supercomputer

Monitoring the Brain in 3-D

Brain Boosters

First artificial life 'within months'

Potential cure for HIV discovered

Designer Enzyme Cuts HIV Out of Infected Cells

Nanosoccer debuts at RoboCup 2007

Cloned Pigs Help Scientists Towards A Breakthrough In Alzheimer's

Scientists find way to separate HIV virus from cells

Scientists find drug to banish bad memories

Parallel computing = 100 time faster than current PC

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