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Researchers stumble onto 'lava' generated quantum dots, could power future peripherals
Have you ever been playing around with molten metal salt, when you accidentally created hollow, soft-shelled particles that could one day increase hard disk storage or power future QLED displays? Us neither, but that's exactly what happened to scientists at Rice University when they were researching "tetrapods" to make solar panels more efficient. Through an apparently wacky coincidence, they removed a single ingredient from the tetrapod stew, which left behind tiny droplets of cadmium nitrate. Selenium then melted around those drops, which completely dissolved away, leaving a melted selenium ball with a hole in the middle. It turns out that those selenium "doughnuts" can be packed tightly onto a metal surface without touching, thanks to their soft shells, which could allow more bits to be packed onto a hard drive, or be used in quantum computers and next-gen displays. Since the dots are smaller than a living cell, it took the researchers an entire year to figure out what they'd made and how they did it -- luckily they didn't just bin the whole thing and start over.
Inhabitat's Week in Green: energy-harvesting toilet, LED lightbulb overhaul and a floating, solar-powered resort home
Each week our friends at Inhabitat recap the week's most interesting green developments and clean tech news for us -- it's the Week in Green. LED technology shone brighter than the summer sun this week as artist Bruce Munro unveiled plans for his largest lighting installation ever -- a field of thousands of LED flowers that will spring up next year at Australia's Ayers Rock. Best of all, the entire installation will be powered by solar energy! We also saw Rice University flip the switch on its new Epiphany Skyspace -- a green-roofed pavilion that's topped with a brilliant blue canopy of light. If you're still not convinced that LEDs are the future, we recently produced two videos that are sure to show you the light -- check out our interview with five professional lighting designers on today's state of the art LED bulbs and watch as we give Inhabitots editor Julie Seguss a light bulb overhaul that shaves over $400 off her utility bills. And if you're ready to make the switch, check out our guide to 24 gorgeous green lamps that look great with LED bulbs. This week saw some exciting new developments in the realm of renewable energy. First, a group of scientists in the UK developed a new energy-harvesting device that attaches to the joint between the thigh and shin. The device could be used to power monitors and mobile devices, to name a few possible applications. Meanwhile, scientists from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore have invented a new toilet that turns human waste into electricity while reducing the amount of water needed for flushing by up to 90 percent. That's what we call, win-win!
Rice University researchers create spray-on battery, powered bathroom tiles
Liquid solar cells are pretty neat, to be sure, but current-generating paint can be a hard color to match. Good thing, then, that researchers at Rice university have developed the perfect complement: a spray-on battery. By carefully layering five coats of specially formulated paint, the team has found a way to apply a thin coat of lithium ion storage to multiple surfaces, including glass, ceramics, steel and flexible polymers. Early experiments are promising -- after applying the process to nine ordinary bathroom tiles, the painted batteries were able to power a small array of LEDs (spelling "Rice") for six hours, consistently pumping out 2.4 volts of electricity. After 60 charge / discharge cycles, researches say the batteries retained most of their capacity. Neelam Singh, Rice graduate student and lead author of the team's report, says the technology will only improve when coupled with modern methods. "Spray painting is already an industrial process, so it will be very easy to incorporate this into industry," she said. "We really do consider this a paradigm changer." Scope out the processes (and its fruits) for yourself after the break.
Researchers tout efficiency breakthrough with new 'inexact' chip
Accuracy is generally an important consideration in computer chips, but a team of researchers led by Rice University are touting a new "inexact" chip (dubbed PCMOS) that they say could lead to as much as a fifteen-fold increase in efficiency. Their latest work, which won a best paper award at a recent ACM conference, builds on years of research in the field from the university, and is already moving far beyond the lab -- some inexact hardware is being used in the "i-slate" educational tablet developed by the Rice-NTU Institute for Sustainable and Applied Infodynamics, 50,000 of which are expected to wind up in India's Mahabubnagar school district over the next three years. As for the chips themselves, their inexactness comes not just from one process, but a variety of different measures that can be used on their own or together -- including something the researchers describe as "pruning," which eliminate rarely used portions of the chip. All of that naturally comes with some trade-offs (less defined video processing is one example given), but the researchers say those are often outweighed by the benefits -- like cheaper, faster chips that require far less power.
Ditching DRM could reduce piracy, prices, inconvenience
This may run counter to what your common sense tells you but, a new paper out of Duke and Rice University says that ditching DRM could actually reduce piracy. The study, which relied on analytical modeling, showed that while copy protection made illegally sharing content more difficult it had a significantly negative impact on legal users. In fact, the researchers say, "only the legal users pay the price and suffer from the restrictions [of DRM]." Many consumers simply choose to pirate music and movies because doing simple things, like backing up a media collection, is difficult with DRMed content. Even the most effective DRM is eventually broken, and fails to deter those already determined to steal. Meanwhile, abandoning these restrictions could increase competition and drive down prices (as well as remove a serious inconvenience), encouraging more people to legitimately purchase content. You can check out the November-December issue of Marketing Science for more details.
Researchers demo full-duplex wireless: double the throughput with no new towers
Back in February researchers at Stanford first taunted us with the possibility of simultaneous, two-way data transmission on the same frequency. Now some folks at Rice University are edging full-duplex communication closer to reality. By the time carriers get around to rolling out 4.5G networks, engineers could potentially double throughput without adding more cell towers and using only existing mobile hardware. With an extra antenna and some fancy software tricks, which allow the device to ignore locally produced signals, the Rice team was able to produce a connection ten-times stronger than previously published studies. Since the technology is based on existing MIMO setups, it may also prove the shortest route to asynchronous full-duplex transmissions. That means you'll be able to upload ill advised videos of your drunken antics (and suffer the consequences) that much faster, without having to pause the latest Maru clip. Check out the PR after the break. [Image credit: Jeff Fitlow/Rice University]
Rice University chemists bake graphene out of Girl Scout cookies, redefine low-carb diets (video)
Would you like some cookies? Well, you're gonna have to buy them, and then get thee to a Rice University chem lab, stat! The Texas institution of higher learning recently played host to Girl Scouts Troop Beverly Hills 25080, turning their om nom carbohydrated delights into billion dollar graphene. Resident scientist James Tour gathered his gaggle of grad students for a hands-on demo, walking the future Phyllis Neflers through the transformative steps that convert carbon-based material (see: a box of Samoas), into $15 billion worth of scientific loot -- or as one astute troopster put it, "... a lot of cash." Indeed it is young lady, but something tells us your well-earned Science in Action badge won't go too well with those cookie-bought Louboutins. Skip past the break for the full video and a little "Cookie Time" nostalgia.
Nanowire batteries now as 'small as possible,' could one day be included with nano toys
That black dot isn't a battery, it's an ultra-thin disc containing thousands of individual nanowire batteries. Rice University scientists claim their miniscule wires are "as small as such devices can possibly get," because each one comes complete with its own anode, cathode and gel-like electrolyte coating. This contrasts with previous examples we've seen, which bolted nanowires onto a chunky exterior cathode. On the other hand, these new all-in-one nano-batts only last for 20 charge cycles, so personally we're still betting on gooey Cambridge crude to be the next big thing in electricity. Full PR after the break.
Houston grandmother becomes host of first 'super WiFi' hotspot, proves you're never too old for wireless
This ain't your grandma's WiFi -- that is, unless your grandma is 48 year-old Leticia Aguirre. The Houston woman became the host of the very first "super WiFi" hotspot, earlier this week -- the new network takes advantage of unused UHF TV channels to bring internet service to underserved communities. In collaboration with researchers at Rice University, a Houston-based non-profit fittingly referred to as Technology for All (TFA), facilitated the setup and is in the process of deploying more whitespace hotspots across the area. The FCC approved use of whitespace for the new "super WiFi" back in September of last year. Full PR after the break.
Students use Wii Balance Board for kids' physical therapy system (video)
Nintendo's kid-tested, researcher-approved Wii Balance Board has struck at the heart of the medical supply industry yet again -- this time, the Bluetooth-connected scale is being used to help physically challenged children at Shriners Hospital in Houston. Seniors at Rice University hand-machined a set of force-sensitive parallel bars and programmed a monster-shooting game called Equilibrium to get kids excited about improving their walking gait, where they can play and score points with each proper step they take. The game automatically ratchets up the difficulty as patients improve, and handrails will play a part too, with a custom three-axis sensor box able to detect how much patients rely on the parallel bars (and dock points accordingly) in an effort to improve their posture. Yep, that sounds just a wee bit more useful than the Balance Board lie detector or the Wii Fit Roomba. Video after the break.
Silicon oxide forms solid state memory pathways just five nanometers wide
Silicon oxide has long played the sidekick, insulating electronics from damage, but scientists at Rice University have just discovered the dielectric material itself could become a fantastic form of storage. Replacing the 10-nanometer-thick strips of graphite used in previous experiments with a layer of SiOx, graduate student Jun Yao discovered the latter material worked just as well, creating 5nm silicon nanowires that can be easily joined or broken (to form the bits and bytes of computer storage) when a voltage is temporarily applied. Considering that conventional computer memory pathways are still struggling to get to 20nm wide, this could make for quite the advance in storage, though we'll admit we've heard tell of one prototype 8nm NAND flash chip that uses nanowires already. Perhaps it's time for silicon oxide to have a turn in the limelight.
Rice University nanodragster rolls on carbon buckeyball wheels, lives life .0005 inch at a time
Drag racing and nanotech seemingly go together like peanut butter and... very small rocks, but that hasn't stopped a team of researchers at Rice University from creating a microscopic car dubbed a "nanodragster." Its wheels are buckeyballs, the rear composed of 60 carbon atoms each, while its front wheels are made of p-carborane. This gives the car more grip at the back, meaning it'll pop wheelies just like a real dragster -- though only when running on a road paved with gold. Even then it doesn't go very fast, just .0005 inches per hour, meaning for those 1,327,000 days it takes to cover a quarter-mile its driver is free.
PRIME hand injury diagnosis system takes hold of innovation prize
It may look like little more than a pegboard and a force meter at present, but the PRIME hand-strength measuring device has already won first place at the IShow innovation showcase. Its magic lies in the custom software loaded onto the appended PDA, which makes it possible to accurately and repeatably diagnose hand and wrist injuries that doctors currently test for by squeezing and prodding. The Rice University students responsible for the Peg Restrained Intrinsic Muscle Evaluator have applied for a patent and are planning to commercialize the device, so we'll be looking for it on the next episode of House.[Via Physorg]
Probabilistic logic makes microchip more energy efficient
We'll be straight up with you -- there's a lot of fancy work going on with this one that laypeople will have a tough time grasping, but the long and short of it is this: a team from Rice University (Krishna Palem pictured) and Nanyang Technological University have created a microchip that "uses 30 times less electricity while running seven times faster than today's best technology." Already crying snake oil? Not so fast. By trashing the traditional set of mathematical rules (that'd be Boolean logic) and instead applying probabilistic logic, researchers have figured out how to deliver similar results with a fraction of the energy. The tech is being dubbed PCMOS (probabilistic CMOS), and could eventually end up in embedded systems and even cellphones. In the case of the latter, this type of chip will be able to display streaming video on a minuscule display with more artifacts than usual, but due to the small screen size and the human brain's ability to piece together nearly-perfect images, the errors involved would be all but forgotten. Meanwhile, your battery bar would still be nearly full. We always heard there was beauty in imperfections -- now, at long last, we finally get it.
Rice University rolls out new and improved "nanocar"
Nano-sized letters are one thing, but nothing impresses the nanotechnology community like creepy crawly nanotech, and some researchers from Rice University look to have fully delivered on that point with their latest so-called "nanocar." At about two nanometers in length, the new nanocar apparently doesn't represent a drastic reduction in size over the previous incarnation, but it does have the notable advantage of being able to "travel" across surfaces at room temperature (a temperature of 200° Celsius was required before). Interestingly, that breakthrough was actually discovered by accident, and was later able to be confirmed using a mix of time-lapse photography and a new tracking algorithm. As you might have guessed, however, they're still quite a ways away from being able to actually control the car, although the researchers say using six wheels instead of four could help with that, as could tracks to keep 'em going in one direction.[Via DailyTech]
Rice University turns skeleton into a data network
We've seen plenty of ideas and even a patent related to the employment of human skin in the transport of data. We've also seen our fair share of bone conducting audio products come to market in the last few years. Now in a synthesis of the two, scientists at Rice University have developed a technique whereby rattles to the skeleton can transmit information to gadgets and medical devices strapped on (or inside of) your meat sack. Their approach has resulted in "amazingly few errors" even when using low-powered vibrations. Great, soon our handshakes will transfer both biological and software-related viruses? Oh boy.[Thanks, Geetu]
Rice University scientists create a revolutionary single pixel camera
While most folks get real excited over a cam like the Seitz 6x17 Digital that shoots at 160 megapixels, Rice University researchers have decided that less is, in fact, more. Scientists at the esteemed academic ivory tower in Houston, Texas have determined a way to build a single pixel camera that they claim will be cheaper way to take pictures in the future. Using one photodiode and one digital micromirror device (DMD) -- which is used primarily in digital TVs and projectors to convert digital information to light (and vice versa) via its thousands of tiny mirrors -- light is "shined onto the DMD and bounced from there though a second lens that focuses the light reflected by the DMD onto a single photodiode." Then, the DMD's mirrors shuffle at random for each new light sample, creating a new pixel value. The pair of lenses and the DMD thus compress data from a bigger image (left) into a smaller approximation (right). That said, don't expect this technology to make your consumer digicam any cheaper real soon, as the prototype requires five minutes for the engineers to take a picture using this technique, and even then, they can only shoot still objects.
Nanomagnetic vortices could lead to bigger hard drives, faster RAM
You know, we were sitting in our editors' meeting the other day, and we all came to a very serious consensus about our reportage these days. There's been a serious dearth of vortices in our articles, and so we're going to do our darndest to bring you more coverage of these truly awesome swirling clouds. Fortunately for us, those egghead physicists down at Rice University know how to read our minds. A team over in Houston used a scanning ion microscope to create and measure "ultra-thin circular disks of soft magnetic cobalt" ranging in diameter from one micron to 38 microns. According to a press release issued by the university, the six micron wide (about the size of a red blood cell) magnetic vortex is "a cone-like structure that's created in the magnetic field at the disk when all the magnetic moments of the atoms in the disk align into uniform concentric circles." (Whatever that means.) Lead researcher Carl Rau, professor of physics and astronomy at Rice University, said that this new advance may lead to storage densities "in the range of terabits per square inch," and went on to say that "magnetic processors" and "high-speed magnetic RAM" may also be in the works. Now that we think about it, this is probably what would happen to the offspring of Storm and Magneto too.
