The U.S. Dept. of Energy has publicised a list of discoveries it has made that it considers most important. It’s quite a large list and has links to more information on the discovery.

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio State University engineers have invented a radar system that is virtually undetectable, because its signal resembles random noise. The radar could have applications in law enforcement, the military, and disaster rescue. http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/noiserad.htm

Canadian scientists have developed a low-intensity ultrasound based device that can regrow bones and teeth.

Geoengineering involves changing our environment to suit human needs better. This article looks at ways geoengineers have thought about reducing global warming by not reducing greenhouse gasses, but by proactively doing something about it. Some pretty far out ideas, such as floating white plastic islands in oceans, space mirrors and lacing the atmosphere with sulphur Read more about Geoengineering[…]

Our faces express our emotions – apparently there are around 20 key facial movements expressed around 24 facial feature points, which betray our emotions. By scanning these points intelligently, and detecting things such as facial form, computers can read the emotions of those using them. Ideas posited in the article: websites advertising products directed at Read more about Computers reading emotions[…]

2 gravity wave detectors have been switched on, trying to prove and discover waves posited by Einstein as part of his theory of general relativity. The Americans have a huge isolated lab called LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) run by a few people from the LSU and California Institute of Technology in the middle of Read more about Measuring gravitational waves[…]

Using an arsenal of rockets, artillery and aircraft, China will try to blast the clouds out of the sky, a meteorologist told a Beijing magazine, through a technique which falls under the umbrella of “cloud seeding.” “We can turn a cloudy day into a dry and sunny one by shooting the clouds less intensively than Read more about Beijing to shoot down rain[…]

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn6344 The aim is to create a sealed reactor that can be delivered to a site, left to generate power for up to 30 years, and retrieved when its fuel is spent. The developers claim that no one would be able to remove the fissile material from the reactor because its core would be inside Read more about SSTAR – small, sealed, transportable, autonomous reactor[…]

The Erasmus University has studied the costs of leading an unhealthy life, and discovered (duh) that allthough smokers cost more to care for, they lead lives which are on average 10 years shorter than non-smokers, so they cost society less.

Only for a few minutes, but they can talk and move about a bit. No telling what the long term effects are, but they have to be better than staying asleep hooked to life support. The drug activates dormant parts of the brain around the damaged tissue, causing a sleepy waking period.

The USAF is playing around with alternative fuels to fly their planes with, as the amount they use anually accounts for half of the total US governmental useage of fuel. By mixing coal with normal fuel they have something that will decrease their reliance on normal petrol.

This New Scientist report is very sad if it’s true – apparently the banana’s we eat can’t reproduce themselves, and the trees that make them are being attacked by a lethal funghus. So pretty soon, no more banana’s from India!

The reason is an intestinal enzyme called CYP3A, which partially destroys drugs as they are absorbed. Grapefruit juice, like no other fruit juice, interferes with CYP3A, so the body ends up absorbing more of the drug. So if you want to get really REALLY fucked, drink this!

Turns out that air ionisers purify by putting out smog. So much so that they would cause a stage 2 alert in a major city.

It seems that the dust covering the moon is oxygen rich, and all you need to do to release it, is to heat it to high temperatures.

Well, we’ve been creating antimatter for quite some time now, but it’s slow to make, dangerous stuff and we have no real idea what to do with it! But now NASA has come up with a great idea – lets power spacecraft with it. Sounds cool if they can get it to work…

Not that I know how to turn a black hole off, for best results, but if I can capture the emissions from a black hole, I should be able to know everything that ever went into it. So for my next trick: turn the globe inside out as my pinhole black hole computer project gets Read more about My Quantum computer is a black hole[…]

Don’t you love things quantum?

It turns out that there’s a whole controversy going on about wind farms, which deliver ‘green’ energy. The BBC has a story listing 10 objections to wind farms, more than half of which are bunkum, but it turns out that one of the major problems they produce is RADAR clutter, which creates false positives (aircraft Read more about Wind Farms block RADAR[…]

They’ve grown a slime on a chip and forced it to grow in the shape of the bot thus encasing it entirely and finding some way of translating it’s movements to the movements of the robot. This makes it a ‘living’ robot. Currently it’s a bit boring as it moves away from light and moves Read more about Slime Controlled Robot[…]

Works on pigs! For at least 2 1/2 hours… well done, maybe we can do this to soldiers on the battlefields? HASAN ALAM gazes over the cold, motionless body of a pig lying on a stainless steel table before him. The animal has no pulse, no blood, no electrical activity in its brain, and its Read more about Suspended animation[…]

Which can mimic nuclear explosions – necessary due to the test ban treaties. Extreme science in the UK!

They last longer and go 4 times as fast as conventional ion thrusters (for spacecraft). The theory behind ion propulsion is also explained quite well in this article. To infinity – and beyond!

Explained as an epic rhyming poem.

How do objects and images move? Why do animals move? What is motion? […] This site publishes a free physics textbook that tells the story of how it became possible, after 2500 years of exploration, to answer such questions. The book is written to be entertaining, surprising and challenging on every page. With little mathematics, Read more about Free Physics Textbook[…]