Tech
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Tech
Tiny rockets may advance minisatellites
A new type of miniaturized rocket may bring microspacecraft one step closer to reality.
- Tech
Paint-on displays get closer to reality
By smearing on a coating and hardening it with light, researchers have created a new kind of electronic display.
- Tech
Deep Vision
Increasingly available virtual-reality gear gives scientists, engineers, and planetarium visitors new perspectives.
- Tech
Bugs on Mars
Undaunted by the hurdles on flight posed by thin air and a lack of oxygen, aerospace engineers are devising extraordinary flying machines resembling giant insects and windmills to make the exploration of Mars more rapid and effective.
- Tech
Live Tour: Joystick journeys reveal tumor interiors
A new holographic technique may someday enable doctors to skip certain biopsies and choose instead to take video excursions inside suspicious growths in skin or internal body linings.
- Tech
Cold Lighting
Solid-state light sources, such as light-emitting diodes, promise greater energy efficiency than do incandescent lamps. The Sandia National Laboratories has launched a Web site that offers articles, references, and other information on semiconductor-based lighting and its use for illuminating homes, offices, and public spaces. Go to: http://lighting.sandia.gov/
- Tech
Sowing neat rows of seeds on silicon
A new way to introduce foreign atoms into silicon with atomic-scale precision may help chip manufacturers over a looming hurdle.
- Tech
Taming High-Tech Particles
Researchers are beginning to study whether nanomaterials could have unintended negative consequences in the human body or the environment.
- Computing
Finding networks within networks
A new mathematical procedure, or algorithm, picks out those members within a larger network—for instance, related sites on the World Wide Web—that have especially close ties.
- Tech
Littlest catalysts get a lot of support
Tiny metal clusters used as catalysts are getting so small that presumably inert carrier materials that host them are also getting involved in the reactions.
- Tech
Beam Team: Unusual laser emits a band of light
A novel laser on a microchip emits a band of light rather than the single, pure color usually expected from a laser.
- Tech
Itsy chain turns bitsy gears
A tiny chain with links the size of biological cells offers a new way to deliver power to micromachines.
