Technology

The Internet, in "New Scientist", part 7

Part 7 of my series of comments on the New Scientist magazine series “Eight things you didn’t know about the internet” goes into the “carbon footprint” of the Internet: “ Is the net hurting the environment? ”, by Duncan Graham-Rowe. It’s easy to think tha ...

Blog Post - Barry Leiba - May 18 2009 - 10:02am

The Internet, in "New Scientist", part 8

Finishing my series of comments on the New Scientist magazine series “Eight things you didn’t know about the internet”, we have question 8, “ Could we shut the net down? ”, by Michael Brooks. It’s not clear to me what the question really means, and why it ...

Blog Post - Barry Leiba - May 19 2009 - 10:01am

DNA-Wrapped Carbon Nanotubes- Progress Toward Artificial Tissue?

Duplicating our organic tissue synthetically isn't as easy as it sounds.   Our bodily tissue is both soft and tough but modern implants- and replacement organs- will need to be as close to natural as possible to be effective. A team of Australian and ...

Article - News Staff - May 15 2009 - 10:18am

Most awesome of awesome light displays

Stephanie wrote about Tetris teaching us about self-assembly and solubility in this article. For a less academic but no less awesome Tetris-related enjoyment, check out the video below (or click this link). It comes with the following caption: ...

Blog Post - Becky Jungbauer - May 15 2009 - 10:09pm

Girls, Robots And Japan: Spelbots Tie For First In Robocup 2009

According to a Time magazine article, “The Male Minority,” women make up almost 60 percent of undergraduate students nationwide.   Science, technology and math are one of the few areas where men have superior numbers but the women are winning there too. Th ...

Article - News Staff - May 15 2009 - 11:58pm

Can zombies live again?

Some UCSB researchers managed to infiltrate the command-and-control system of a botnet, and got lots of information out of it, which they wrote up in a paper. ...

Blog Post - Barry Leiba - May 25 2009 - 9:00am

Structural Holes- Take Your Social Networking Advice From Madonna

In today's connected world, networking know-how can be a key resource in finding jobs and business opportunities, but a series of new studies by Dr. Yuval Kalish of the Leon Recanati Graduate School of Business Administration at Tel Aviv University s ...

Article - News Staff - May 16 2009 - 5:06pm

Say Goodbye to the Printed Textbook....

I remember distinctly lugging a backpack of textbooks across the frozen tundra of Michigan State University in January. On many occasions, the weight of the backpack was enough to send me skidding out of control on the ice. I hated dragging those books aro ...

Blog Post - Michael Windelspecht - May 17 2009 - 8:22am

LifeLike- EVL Lab Sets Out To Simulate Your (Evil) Twin

Is "Multiplicity" your favorite movie?   Have you ever wished you could be in two places at once or create an evil twin (and name him Skippy)?   A research project called LifeLike is trying to bring that a little closer to reality. Project LifeLi ...

Article - News Staff - Jul 22 2010 - 1:17pm

When Gadgets Lose Their Magic

Over at Wired, read about gadgets losing their luster: When Arthur C. Clarke went to the great geosynchronous orbit in the sky last year, he left behind a huge legacy, not least of which was a quote oft cited by Silicon Valley visionaries and wannabes. &qu ...

Blog Post - Michael White - May 19 2009 - 12:31am