Actual Technical Reviews

Scientists uncover ‘epigenetic’ switch for new brain cells’ growth

2009-01-09T04:54:00.000-08:00

Washington, January 9 (ANI): A new study conducted by neuroscientists at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine has shown that the birth of new cells, which depends on brain activity, is also influenced by a protein that is involved in changing epigenetic marks in the cell’s genetic material.

The finding reported in the journal Science takes the research team a step closer to unravelling the mystery as to what controls the birth of new cells in the brain’s hippocampus.

"How is it that when you see someone you met ten years ago, you still recognize them? How do these transient events become long lasting in the brain, and what potential role does the birth of new neurons play in making these memories?" says Hongjun Song, Ph.D., an associate professor of neurology and member of the Johns Hopkins Institute of Cell Engineering’s NeuroICE.

"We really want to understand how daily life experiences trigger the birth and growth of new neurons, and make long-lasting changes in the brain," the researcher added.

According to the researchers, making long-term memories might require long-term changes in brain cells, and one type of cellular change that has long-lasting effects is so-called epigenetic change that can alter a cell’s DNA without changing its sequence, but does change how and which genes are turned on or off.

Considering this reasoning, the researchers decided to look at the 40 to 50 genes known to be involved in epigenetics, and see whether any of them were turned on in mouse brain cells that had been stimulated with electroconvulsive therapy-shock treatment.

"It’s long been known that ECT induces neurogenesis in rodents and humans, so we used it as our test case to find what is triggered downstream to cause new cells to grow," says Song.

The researcher revealed that one gene turned on in response to ECT was Gadd45b, a gene previously implicated in immune system function and misregulated in brain conditions like autism.

With a view to determining that Gadd45b was turned up in response to brain activity, the team further examined mice experiencing a different activity. They found exposure to new surroundings also turned on Gadd45b in brain cells.

The researchers then tested mice engineered to lack the Gadd45b gene for their ability to generate new brain cells after ECT, in order to find out whether this gene is required for new brain-cell growth.

They injected the mice with a dye that marks new cells, and three days after ECT, examined the number of new cells containing that dye in brains from mice with and without the Gdd45b gene.

It was observed that while normal brains showed a 140 percent increase in cell number after ECT, brains lacking Gadd45b only showed a 40 percent increase.

"The question then was, How does Gadd45b do this? It’s been controversial that Gadd45b can promote epigenetic changes like global DNA demethylation, but we show that it can promote demethylation of certain genes," says Song.

When the researchers dissected mature neurons from normal mouse brains and looked for the presence of methyl groups at certain genes known to promote cell growth, they found that the genes had become demethylated after ECT.

However, doing the same thing with mice lacking Gadd45b did not result in demethylation, suggesting that the gene was indeed required for demethylation.

"We’re really excited about this-it’s the first time we’ve seen dynamic epigenetic DNA changes in response to brain activity," says Song.

"Now that we have the mice lacking Gadd45b, our next goal is to see if these mice have problems with learning and memory and how Gadd45b specifically promotes the demethylation to lead to these long-term changes in the brain." (ANI)

[Via hamaraphotos.com]

MI to produce lithium-ion car batteries

2009-01-08T01:53:00.000-08:00

LANSING, MI -- The following is a message from Governor Granholm:

Governor Jennifer M. Granholm lauded the announcement by A123 Systems that it is applying for $1.84 billion in federal loans to build the nation’s first commercial-scale lithium-ion advanced storage systems manufacturing plant in Michigan Wednesday.

“These technologies are exactly what we envision in our drive to make Michigan the alternative energy capital of North America and the advanced battery capital of the world,” Granholm said. “Michigan is the state that put the America on wheels, and this project is a major step to making Michigan the state that helps reduce the nation’s dependence on foreign oil.”

In November, A123 Systems was designated a Michigan Center of Energy Excellence and granted $10 million to establish a collaboration with the University of Michigan and Michigan State University to focus on the manufacture of rechargeable lithium-ion batteries in transportation and alternative energy sectors.

Granholm said the project outlined by A123 Systems is the type of project that could benefit from $100 million in refundable tax credits that she fought for in the closing days of the 2008 legislative session. The governor has pledged to sign that legislation into law.

In addition to putting state initiatives in place to encourage battery research, development and production in Michigan, the governor has also called on congressional leaders to enact federal investments in alternative energy technologies. In a letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) on November 6, Granholm urged them to “consider investments in new energy technologies that can provide more economy-changing jobs in the future. These investments can lead to not only further job creation, but also can help our nation develop the technologies needed to end our dependence on foreign oil. Green energy manufacturing is considered to be a perfect fit for Michigan.”

The International Energy Agency estimates that some $20 trillion will be spent worldwide on energy production in the next 25 years. According to the Center for American Progress, Michigan can create more than 60,000 new jobs by investing in alternative energy, including advanced battery storage, biofuels, wind and solar.

“Michigan has been the most aggressive state in the nation in developing our alternative energy capabilities through our Centers of Energy Excellence, 21st Century Jobs Funds, and even our high-tech tax credits available through the Michigan Economic Growth Authority,” Granholm said. “No state is better armed to create new technologies that produce renewable, sustainable energy, fight global warming, and reduce our dependence on foreign oil than Michigan.”

James C. Epolito, president and CEO of the Michigan Economic Development Corporation said the agency looks forward to working with A123 Systems on this project.

“We look forward to partnering with A123 Systems and others seeking to develop their alternative energy technology,” Epolito said. “Michigan’s talent, research and development capability and established manufacturing base can provide growing companies with an opportunity unmatched anywhere in the world.”

[Via www.connectmidmichigan.com]

How Green Is That Laptop?

2009-01-05T04:39:00.000-08:00

It's never that surprising to hear that some companies aren't nearly as "green" as they claim to be, but sometimes the examples are worth examining in detail. Last week, Ben Charny reportedThe Wall Street Journal that Apple Inc., which has gone out of its way to flaunt its eco-cred, doesn't always stack up so well to its competitors: "For example, Dell and Hewlett-Packard report buying much more clean energy than Apple; Dell 58 times more, and Hewlett-Packard five times more." in

Now, clean energy is a decent metric, though a computer's impact on the environment mostly depends on how much energy it consumes after it's purchased. On that score, MacBooks do okay. That said, I do wish these comparisons would look more broadly at product durability. A company making laptops that last, say, five years on average is likely greener than one whose computers last for just three, consuming fewer resources and spewing less hazardous waste—especially since e-recycling programs are often flawed. And, as EcoGeek's Hank Green reported last year, some of Apple's newer iPods and iPhones are designed to be virtually impossible to repair, which ends up encouraging people to junk their old gadgets and buy new ones.

For a longer discussion of this topic, Giles Slade's Made to Break is a fascinating book, and some of his insights on how businesses make short-lived products to encourage excess consumption should be taken to heart when trying to figure out just how green a company really is. True, the EPA considers "product longevity" as a factor in its EPEAT labeling for electronics, but that system is voluntary and doesn't work terribly well. Recommending that computers have "modular designs," say, hasn't stopped the average lifespan of personal computers from plummeting from six years in 1997 to two years in 2005. It's likely that rethinking the whole notion of "planned obsolescence" would involve very drastic regulatory (and probably cultural) changes. Maybe that's not desirable—maybe it's a good thing that our cell phones go out of style every 12 months. In the meantime, though, we could probably stand to require better buyback and recycling programs, for starters.

While we're on the topic, the Journal also had a shrewd dissection of Dell's claims to be "carbon neutral." Turns out, when Dell's executives fling that term around, they're only talking about Dell proper—they're not talking about Dell's suppliers or the people running Dell computers. Which basically means they're talking about just 5 percent of Dell's actual carbon footprint. And even that 5 percent achieves neutrality mostly via carbon offsets, which are often quite dubious (sure they're planting a forest—but how do they know the forest wouldn't have been planted anyway, or won't burn down next year?) Well-meaning corporate initiatives are nice, but they're no substitute for better regulation and carbon pricing.

[Via blogs.tnr.com]

Engineers design GPS technology for football

2008-12-29T06:40:00.000-08:00

When Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger fired a low pass on a recent Sunday against the Baltimore Ravens, his wide receiver, Hines Ward, scooped the ball up just before it hit the turf.

In this case, the referees - and the camera - had a clear view of the play. But what if their vision had been obscured, even with the multiple camera angles of today's National Football League?

That's where Priya Narasimhan and her students think they might be able to help.

Narasimhan is a computer engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University, and she and her students are equipping gloves and a football with remote sensing technology to measure everything from grip and trajectory to speed and position.

In the case of the Roethlisberger-Ward hookup, the technology would ultimately be able to tell without a doubt whether the ball was caught before it bounced off the ground.

It could also show such things as who actually has the ball in a pileup, whether a runner has crossed the goal line and whether a receiver has control of the ball before he goes out of bounds.

Narasimhan teaches a course at Carnegie Mellon in "embedded real-time systems," which is a fancy way of describing the kind of touch sensors, GPS receivers and accelerometers that the students are putting to use. But the football engineering project is not part of that course. Instead, it's a personal effort that grew out of the fact that Narasimhan, who grew up in India and Africa, found herself becoming a rabid Steelers fan after she moved to Pittsburgh seven years ago.

"When I moved here, I loved the people and their energy, and then I fell in love with football and I just started watching the Steelers and now, you can't get me out of the home on Sundays."

Impassioned as she was, she also found herself "throwing things at the TV many times when calls didn't go my way," and she began to wonder whether the wireless technology she was familiar with could help resolve some of those disputed decisions, as a further iteration of instant replay.

"You'd never want to replace the human referees because they make these calls based on years of experience, and no technology can replace that," she said. "But in addition to the instant replay, if you had a supplementary system that said this is exactly where the ball landed and where the player stopped with it, you could make these kinds of calls accurately."

So far, she and her squad of undergraduate and graduate students have focused on two things: gloves with touch sensors that can transmit that information wirelessly to a computer, and a football equipped with a global positioning receiver and accelerometer that can track the location, speed and trajectory of the ball.

Eventually, the same kind of sensors used in the gloves could be adapted to shoes, to measure stride and running patterns, or even shoulder pads, to calculate blocking positions and force.

The football the students are using is a regulation ball, but it's been partially unlaced and filled with couch cushion foam, said Aaron Harris, a junior mechanical engineering major from Los Angeles who briefly played cornerback for the Carnegie Mellon varsity squad.

The current prototype transmits information once a second and is only accurate to within 30 feet - obviously not good enough for practical application. A newer prototype, though, will transmit four times a second and will combine its data with information from fixed GPS receivers near the field to provide much tighter measurements.

Narasimhan said she would love to work with a college or pro team to see what measurements and information would be of most help to them, but doesn't have such an arrangement yet.

[Via nbbusinessjournal.canadaeast.com]

UC San Diego and Genentech Scientists Develop Potentially Disruptive Antibody Sequencing Technology

2008-12-19T00:30:00.000-08:00

Bioinformatics researchers at the University of California, San Diego and Genentech have developed a new, quicker way to sequence monoclonal antibodies – a process that is many times faster than the sequencing technology typically used by academic and industry researchers today.

Nuno Bandeira is the lead author on the Nature Biotechnology paper, and director of UC San Diego’s new Center for Computational Mass Spectrometry.

The breakthrough is detailed in the December 2008 issue of Nature Biotechnology, in an article titled, “Automated de novo protein sequencing of monoclonal antibodies.” In it, the authors propose a new shotgun protein sequencing method, which reduces the time required to sequence an unknown antibody to under 36 hours – a “dramatic reduction” compared to the most widely used technique today, which can take weeks or even months The technique is also faster than the complementary DNA (cDNA) sequencing approach commonly used in many laboratories.

While DNA sequencing technologies witnessed dramatic progress in recent years, protein sequencing has hardly changed in 50 years. As a result, today nearly all proteins are discovered using DNA rather than protein sequencing technology. While it works for most proteins (that are coded by DNA), it does not work for some important proteins, such as antibodies, that are not directly inscribed in genomes.

“Our new approach has the potential to be a disruptive technology for all protein sequencing applications,” said Nuno Bandeira, lead author on the paper and director of the new Center for Computational Mass Spectrometry (CCMS) at UC San Diego. “This project is a collaboration with Genentech, the leader in development of antibody-based drugs, and it illustrates the potential impact that this center and this technology can have on the biotech industry in California and around the world.”

CCMS is a joint effort between the Computer Science and Engineering (CSE) department of the Jacobs School of Engineering, and the UCSD division of the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology (Calit2). Bandeira’s co-authors on the Nature Biotechnology paper include CSE professor Pavel Pevzner, director of the Calit2-based Center for Algorithmic and Systems Biology (CASB); and three researchers from the Protein Chemistry Department of San Francisco-based Genentech: Victoria Pham, David Arnott, and Jennie R. Lill.

Shotgun protein sequencing will be particularly useful when complementary DNA (cDNA) or the original cell line is not available, or if there is a need to verify the integrity and effectiveness of an antibody after the cell has undergone changes subsequent to the original sequencing.

“Antibodies are indispensable in biomedical research and they are widely used as diagnostic and therapeutic agents,” said Genentech’s Jennie Lill. “DNA sequencing is routinely used in the initial characterization of monoclonal antibodies, but subsequent mutations and other changes mean that further protein level analysis is needed. So it is critical to sequence the antibodies for a variety of reasons, from monitoring the integrity of the molecule, to troubleshooting performance in pre-clinical assays.”

Until now, the only viable option for sequencing an antibody has been a process known as Edman degradation, named for Swedish chemist Pehr Edman. (The technique was used in the sequencing of insulin, for which the Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded in 1958.) While Edman degradation remains a low-throughput and time-consuming approach, no fast substitute for this technique was found in the last half-century.

Bandeira and his colleagues proposed to substitute this ancient technique with protein sequencing based on mass spectrometry.

While mass spectrometry routinely is used to sequence short fragments of proteins (called peptides), no techniques for sequencing entire proteins were available until recently. The key bottleneck has been computing rather than experiment, since the challenge of protein assembly is a puzzle rivaling the complexity of DNA sequencing.

The proposed Comparative Shotgun Protein Sequencing (CSPS) can be described as two-stage process: assembling mass spectra into long segments of a protein (SPS stage), and using similar proteins to order these segments into a complete protein sequence (comparative stage).

Bandeira offers a simple analogy for the algorithmic foundations of CSPS. “Imagine that the revised edition of a popular book has just been printed and that a competitor wishing to delay its release sneaks into the warehouse to shred all the books to pieces and destroys the original template,” observed Bandeira. “In this context, the SPS step allows one to reconstruct whole portions of the text by assembling snippets into sections and chapters (similar to a puzzle-solving approach), and the comparative step uses very old editions of the book to reorganize the parts back into a complete copy of the latest edition. By comparison with CSPS, competing protein-sequencing techniques are much more labor-intensive and would more closely resemble the process of asking the author to recite the whole book from memory.”

Replacing Edman degradation with CSPS enables sequencing at a fraction of the time. In addition, CSPS automatically detects post-translational modifications that might never have been observed with Edman degradation or even other mainstream peptide-identification strategies.

“CSPS makes it possible to correlate unexpected modifications with changes in antibody efficiency, while simultaneously tracking mutations,” said lead author Bandeira. “The process reveals unexpected changes that go undetected using traditional sequencing methods. This is critical for the biotech industry, because unexpected modifications may be vitally important for efficacy and safety of antibodies.”

Concluded co-author Pavel Pevzner: “CSPS opens up many possibilities for sequence discovery in the biotech industry compared with traditional methods.”

In their paper, the bioinformatics researchers admit that while CSPS can readily handle small protein mixtures, more work is needed in order for the technique to fulfill its full potential for complete-proteome analyses. Ongoing research in UC San Diego’s Center for Computational Mass Spectrometry will focus on ways to improve the method’s efficiency, reliability and robustness.

Publication: ‘Automated de novo protein sequencing of monoclonal antibodies,’ by Nuno Bandeira, Victoria Pham, Pavel Pevzner, David Arnott and Jennie R. Lill. Nature Biotechnology, December 2008, v26, n12, pp1336-1338. The project was supported by National Institutes of Health grant NIGMS 1-R01-RR16522.

Media Contact: Doug Ramsey, 858-822-5825

[Via ucsdnews.ucsd.edu]

Neuralstem files application to test stem cell technology

2008-12-19T00:19:00.000-08:00

Neuralstem Inc. has filed its first application to test its stem cell technology in humans in an effort to treat the incurable Lou Gehrig’s Disease.

If federal regulators approve the application early next year, the Rockville company plans to launch the trials in the first half of 2009 at Emory University, though a University of Michigan Medical School neurology professor will oversee the overall testing.

The company has raised more than $1.7 million in a stock offering to help pay for the trials. The fundraising, which elicited $2 million in gross proceeds and closed on Wednesday, entailed the sale of 1.6 million shares at a price of $1.25 per share, a nearly 43 percent discount from Wednesday’s closing price of $2.18.

In its first phase of clinical studies, Neuralstem (AMEX: CUR) has proposed testing whether its use of fetal stem cells and method of injecting them into a patient’s spinal cord, a process it recently licensed in from the Cleveland Clinic at Emory University, are safe and possible in humans. The company also hopes to see how effective the combination are in slowing the degenerative process that results in paralysis and eventual death in Lou Gehrig’s Disease, officially known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.

In a study published in the journal Transplantation, the company and Johns Hopkins University researcher collaborators showed that the stem cells extended the life of rats ridden with Lou Gehrig’s Disease.

Six to nine months after starting the U.S. trial, Neuralstem has said it plans to launch another in Taiwan, where the company signed an agreement with the China Medical University and Hospital of Taiwan.

It’s a key starting point for the small company, housed in Rockville’s Maryland Technology Development Center incubator, which has been developing the fetal stem cell technology for the past 13 years. It’s working on injecting fetal cells, a less politically charged option than embryonic stem cells, to replace dead or damaged nerve cells to help turn around such neurological disorders as ischemic spastic paraplegia and Huntington’s Disease.

“The filing of this IND is an important event for Neuralstem,” said CEO Richard Garr. “But it marks only the beginning of a process which includes working together with the FDA to approve the first human ALS stem cell trial; refining our understanding of how to optimize delivery of our cells into patients; and ultimately delivering a new treatment for patients with this currently incurable disease.”

[Via www.bizjournals.com]

Mobile fuel cells edge closer to replacing conventional batteries

2008-12-04T23:37:00.000-08:00

Here’s a slice of tantalising news for all those notebook owners suffering through the annoying inconvenience of lugging an extra battery pack to help prolong the extremely limited operation time associated with supposedly cutting-edge hardware.

Specifically, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DoT) has now changed previously obstructive regulations regarding the carriage of potentially hazardous materials, which could well lead to the emergence of tiny fuel cells capable of powering all manner of mobile devices for days rather than hours.

Long since thought to be the next step in delivering effective portable power, the advance of fuel cell technology has been repeatedly stymied by the DoT’s regulations, which found fault with the inclusion of flammable and/or corrosive materials such as methanol, butane and formic acid.

According to Sara Bradford, an energy and power systems consultant with Frost & Sullivan, the regulation amendment should now see fuel cell cartridges readily available for use within a couple of years.

The fuel cell technology provides its power by passing a small amount of fuel into a chip, which then results in the creation of electricity without combustion.

"We are closer, much closer, than even two years ago in terms of the companies’ internal designs, how they’ve met their milestones and just the amount of testing and evaluation that’s going on right now," Bradford said in a CBC report.

Marking the technology’s growing industry appeal, Massachusetts-based Lilliputian Systems is already working towards a 2009 launch for a cigarette pack-sized fuel cell that will power any portable device via a USB port.

Based on butane, a mere teaspoon of the cell’s fuel should provide around 20 times more energy than a conventional battery of the same physical size, according to Liliputian Systems vice president of business development Mouli Ramani.

And, in terms of pricing, the fuel cell system is expected to arrive with an initial outlay cost between $100 USD and $150 USD, while refill cartridges will then only cost up to $3.00 USD.

[Via www.thetechherald.com]

Is technology rewiring our brains?

2008-12-04T02:10:00.000-08:00

By MALCOLM RITTER, AP Science Writer

NEW YORK (AP) - What does a teenage brain on Google look like? Do all those hours spent online rewire the circuitry? Could these kids even relate better to emoticons than to real people?

These sound like concerns from worried parents. But they're coming from brain scientists.

While violent video games have gotten a lot of public attention, some current concerns go well beyond that. Some scientists think the wired world may be changing the way we read, learn and interact with each other.

There are no firm answers yet. But Dr. Gary Small, a psychiatrist at UCLA, argues that daily exposure to digital technologies such as the Internet and smart phones can alter how the brain works.

When the brain spends more time on technology-related tasks and less time exposed to other people, it drifts away from fundamental social skills like reading facial expressions during conversation, Small asserts.

So brain circuits involved in face-to-face contact can become weaker, he suggests. That may lead to social awkwardness, an inability to interpret nonverbal messages, isolation and less interest in traditional classroom learning.

Small says the effect is strongest in so-called digital natives - people in their teens and 20s who have been "digitally hard-wired since toddlerhood." He thinks it's important to help the digital natives improve their social skills and older people - digital immigrants - improve their technology skills.

At least one 19-year-old Internet enthusiast gives Small's idea a mixed review. John Rowe, who lives near Pasadena, Calif., spends six to 12 hours online a day. He flits from instant messaging his friends to games like Cyber Nations and Galaxies Ablaze to online forums for game players and disc jockeys.

Social skills? Rowe figures he and his buddies are doing just fine in that department, thank you. But he thinks Small may have a point about some other people he knows.

"If I didn't actively go out and try to spend time with friends, I wouldn't have the social skills that I do," said Rowe, who reckons he spends three or four nights a week out with his pals. "You can't just give up on having normal friends that you see on a day-to-day basis."

More than 2,000 years ago, Socrates warned about a different information revolution - the rise of the written word, which he considered a more superficial way of learning than the oral tradition. More recently, the arrival of television sparked concerns that it would make children more violent or passive and interfere with their education.

Small, who describes his modern-day concerns in a new book called "iBrain: Surviving the Technological Alteration of the Modern Mind," acknowledges he doesn't have an open-and-shut case that digital technology is changing brain circuitry.

Still, his argument is "pretty interesting and certainly provocative," although difficult to prove, says brain scientist Tracey Shors of Rutgers University.

Others are skeptical. Robert Kurzban, a University of Pennsylvania psychologist, said scientists still have a lot to learn about how a person's experiences affect the way the brain is wired to deal with social interaction.

Life in the age of Google may even change how we read.

Normally, as a child learns to read, the brain builds pathways that gradually allow for more sophisticated analysis and comprehension, says Maryanne Wolf of Tufts University, author of "Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain."

She calls that analysis and comprehension "deep reading." But that takes time, even if it's just a fraction of a second, and today's wired world is all about speed, gathering a lot of superficial information fast.

Wolf asks what will happen as young children do more and more early reading online. Will their brains respond by short-circuiting parts of the normal reading pathways that lead to deeper reading but which also take more time? And will that harm their ability to reflect on what they've read?

Those questions deserve to be studied, Wolf says. She thinks kids will need instruction tailored to gaining reading comprehension in the digital world.

Some research suggests the brain actually benefits from Internet use.

A large study led by Mizuko Ito of the University of California, Irvine, recently concluded that by hanging out online with friends - sending instant messages, for example - teens learn valuable skills they'll need to use at work and socially in the digital age. That includes lessons about issues like online privacy and what's appropriate to post and communicate on the internet, Ito said.

Rowe, the 19-year-old, said he and his buddies often debate whether technology might actually be bad for you. That includes kicking around the argument that computer use makes people socially inept.

Of course, he added, "we spend a lot of time on the computer and still have totally normal and perfect social lives."

[Via www.wavy.com]

Fujitsu unveils 3D vehicle viewing technology

2008-11-18T23:40:00.001-08:00

Japan's Fujitsu Labs has unveiled a new development in auto technology that provides a three-dimensional-style wrap around view for drivers. Using four vehicle-based cameras to process what the company calls "3-D virtual projection/point of view conversion technology," the driver is given a real-time view of his surroundings in the round.

Rear-view car cameras with dashboard video viewing have been common in Japan for many years, now just as the technology evolves to perfection the safety tool will debut publicly at the World Congress on Intelligent Transport Systems & ITS America's 2008 Annual Meeting and Exposition being held this week in New York.

Via Fujitsu

Company With Hybrid Battery Solution to Seek Billions From Energy Department

2008-11-18T06:48:00.000-08:00

AFS Trinity, a company in Bellvue, Wash., thinks it has licked the battery-life problem for hybrid cars, with its extra large capacitors. (Image: AFS Trinity)

The stumbling block for the plug-in hybrid, a vehicle designed to travel its first 40 miles or so every day on battery power, and the rest on gasoline, is the battery — particularly its durability.

For a long life, batteries typically need to be charged and discharged slowly, but electric cars make high demands on the battery — and not only when accelerating from a stop. They also use “regenerative braking,” where the drive motor is reversed, turning momentum back into current when the driver wants to slow down.

So in both acceleration and deceleration, the current flow can be so large it causes internal heating in the battery, shortening its life.

AFS Trinity Power, a small company in Bellevue, Wash., says it has the problem licked. In January, the company rolled out a small S.U.V. that uses lithium-ion batteries nursed along by common electrical storage devices called capacitors.

Capacitors take a trickle of energy and store it up so it can be released in great bursts. They can also take a huge slug of energy quickly, and then deliver it slowly. This is at the heart of AFS Trinity’s innovation.

Electrically speaking, the capacitors, which look like an 18-pack of shrink-wrapped Red Bull cans, sit between the batteries and the wheels, so the flow into or out of the batteries is always fairly gentle, even if the car is making jackrabbit starts or panic stops.

Together, they store very little energy — less than one kilowatt-hour, a tiny fraction of what the lithium-ion batteries do — but they can charge and discharge almost instantly, almost forever, without damaging themselves, said Edward W. Furia, chief executive of AFS Trinity.

His company calls its capacitors, which are larger than most in use, “ultra capacitors.” The combined system in the company’s prototype “has been going and going and going,” Mr. Furia said.

AFS Trinity announced on Monday that it had put the electric system through a ten-month test in which it was charged from a wall socket and then discharged in a pattern typical of a 40-mile drive, including accelerations and regenerative braking.

The testing, carried out by an independent lab, Mobile Power Solutions, of Beaverton, Ore., found that the buffered batteries lasted through 3,800 cycles, which would be more than 12 years for a car charged six times a week.

Unbuffered, the batteries lasted only 500 cycles — equivalent to less than two years.

Of course, most cars do not go 40 miles on most days, so gasoline use would often be zero. And while there is no accepted methodology yet for figuring the gas mileage of a plug-in hybrid, it could conceivably save many drivers several gallons of gas each week.

For its part, GM has been aiming for a plug-in hybrid sedan — the Volt — but has not yet settled on a battery, and durability has been one of the biggest issues. Given its current financial woes, a product that requires replacement under warranty in a few short years is hardly what that company needs now.

On Tuesday, the AFS Trinity said it plans to apply for a $2.5 billion loan from the Energy Department, under the $25 billion loan program created as part of last year’s energy bill.

Common belief has been that the money would go entirely to the Big 3 automakers, but AFS Trinity, and a partner, Ricardo, a British auto design company, believe they could take a factory that has been shut down — or will be soon — and convert it to build S.U.V.s with their electric system.

The company is showing off its “Extreme Hybrid” prototypes this week at the Los Angeles Auto Show.

[Via NYT]

CNN Hologram Technology May Change Web Conferencing forever

2008-11-05T05:02:00.000-08:00

This is awesome. The female reporter that you see in the CNN newsroom here is actually miles away but appears to be standing on stage inside the room courtesy the "hologram technology" that CNN is testing for the first time.

CNN Hologram Interview - Waxy

Now just imagine if Cisco extends this hologram technology to web conferencing. In fact, the next video is from Cisco itself where John Chambers of Cisco explains (or rather demonstrates) how CNN created that holographic news presenter on the Elections night.

Cisco on CNN Hologram Technology - Sam Sethi

[Via www.labnol.org]

“60 Minutes” To Feature Brain Signal Technology

2008-11-03T04:18:00.000-08:00

ALBANY– New York State Department of Health scientist Jonathan R. Wolpaw, M.D., will appear this Sunday, Nov. 2, on “60 Minutes” to demonstrate the progress of Brain Computer Interface (BCI) technology. The demonstration will show how severely paralyzed individuals can use their brain signals to send commands to a computer, allowing them to communicate independently.

“BCI technology provides the severely paralyzed with another way to communicate that does not depend on muscle control. Through further research our goal is to make this technology available for individual use,” said New York State Health Commissioner Richard F. Daines, M.D. “This ground-breaking work by Dr. Wolpaw and his fellow researchers keeps the state Department of Health’s Wadsworth Center in the forefront of the research and development of this life-altering technology.”

To date, six severely disabled people have used the Wadsworth BCI in their homes for as long as 2.5 years as part of the state Department of Health research study. The Department has produced a broadcast-quality video that is available to the media that illustrates the BCI technology. The video is also posted at www.wadsworth.org/bci.

Researchers at the state Department of Health, the Wadsworth Center and Helen Hayes Hospital have developed and successfully tested the BCI technology. Dr. Wolpaw, chief of the Laboratory of Neural Injury and Repair at the Wadsworth Center in Albany, has been a central figure in the field of BCI research and technology since its beginning in the late 1980s.

This Sunday, “60 Minutes” will feature a demonstration of how severely paralyzed people can use electrical signals from their brains, rather than muscles, to type characters or manipulate a cursor on a computer screen. The BCI uses a computer to track brain waves through a technology known as electroencephalography or EEG.

Users wearing an EEG cap look at a computer screen that rapidly illuminates different groups of letters. Their brains issue a particular electrical signal only when the letter they desire appears. With this system, a paralyzed individual can type or operate other devices with brainpower alone. Unlike many other BCI systems, the Wadsworth system uses brain signals recorded from the scalp, and does not involve surgery.

One of the BCI users featured on “60 Minutes” is Scott Mackler, M.D., Ph.D., Associate Professor, Departments of Medicine & Psychiatry, School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania/Philadelphia Veterans Administration Medical Center, who is afflicted with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. Dr. Mackler, who has lost almost all his motor skills, participates in the state Department of Health BCI study and uses this system at work to communicate in his laboratory and then at home to interact with his family.

” People with and without disabilities use computers to communicate and control their environments,” Dr. Wolpaw said. “Research has shown that people who have lost muscle control due to disease, neuromuscular disorders, or injury can use BCI systems by changing their brain activity so that a computer can detect their intent and translate this into device control.”

Lawrence S. Sturman, M.D., Ph.D., Director of the Wadsworth Center, said, “The Wadsworth Center has fostered innovative technology since its inception to develop new ways to help people in need. We are very proud of the development of BCI technology, and look forward to more progress to bring this new device to disabled people.”

The BCI home system is not yet available for use by the public due to the ongoing technical support currently required. The Department is exploring ways to reduce that requirement, which would enable much wider individual use of the system.

For additional information about BCI technology, people can contact the Wadsworth Center (www.wadsworth.org/bci or 518-486-2893), the Center for Rehabilitation Technology at Helen Hayes Hospital (888-707-3422) and the Brain Communication Foundation (www.braincommunication.org or 888-561-7840).

[Via www.northcountrygazette.org]

Thin Film Battery Maker Planar Energy Devices Raising $12M

2008-10-23T03:32:00.000-07:00

Energy storage and batteries are constantly named as the pressure points of the power grid, our gadgets, and the next-generation of electric vehicles — which is why many young startups are hard at work on new innovations. Planar Energy Devices, which was spun out of the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) last year, is working on thin-film and large format batteries that the company says can charge in seconds, have a high energy density, 400 to 500 life cycles, and are safer than traditional lithium ion batteries.

Scott Faris, Planar’s founder and CEO, who described himself as a entrepreneur that does spin-outs, said at the Dow Jones Alternative Energy conference this week that the company is looking to raise $12 million in a series B round of funding, which he hopes to close in the first quarter of 2009. After that the company is shooting for a series C round of around $20 million by the fourth quarter of 2010, and potentially an exit by 2012. Planar has already raised $4 million from Battelle Ventures, and Innovation Valley Partners.

The Orlando, Florida-based company has one technology platform for three types of applications: PowerPlane, which is micro battery applications, PowerCore, which is mid-sized, and PowerBlade, which is large battery applications. Planar is planning to have its first products — military applications and smart card technology — bringing in revenue in 2009, and starting volume production in 2010.

[Via earth2tech.com]

Fuel Cell (Hydrogen-Powered) Wheelchairs

2008-10-22T04:18:00.000-07:00

With the Japanese population aging rapidly, the fuel-cell wheelchair and cart applications have a bright future. In fact, Japan already has the world's highest proportion of elderly people. More than 20% are over the age of 65 and this figure is expected to rise to about 40% by 2050. Considering this population trend, no doubt there will be an increasing demand for these wheelchairs and carts from Kurimoto Ltd. in the future. Promoted as "Eco" fuel-cell powered means turning the “silver market” into green. Of course they are for other treehugging wheelchair users as well!

Previously here on Treehugger, we talked about the world’s first hydrogen generation plant in Japan. Building the infrastructure for the eventual commercialization of hydrogen is part of the Japanese Government’s plan to “build a hydrogen economy to sustain our precious earth.” Under the motto Moving Our Future Forward the Japanese government engages in a number of related research and demonstration projects.

One such project is the Japan Hydrogen & Fuel Cell Demonstration Project (JHFC Project), initiated by Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), aims to gather and share data in order to develop the roadmap for full-scale mass production and widespread use of FCVs. The JHFC Project involves a wide range of activities related to the use of fuel cell vehicles, which also includes consumer awareness campaigns.

We visited the latest consumer-focused campaign at the Roppongi Tsutaya store. This branch of the Tsutaya CD and video retail/ bookstore chain is set in the popular up-market Roppongi Hills neighborhood and attracts a very trend-aware Japanese and international audience. For one month part of the store was occupied by a Fuel Cell Car covered in colorful images to attract the attention of store visitors. Promotional banners and brochures informed about the JIFC Project and some workshops were aimed at children and teenagers, the future consumers who will hopefully grow into a world where hydrogen applications are more common-place.

Participating Fuel Cell Vehicles (FCV) included six cars, one bus and two types of hydrogen ICVs (internal combustion vehicles) developed by domestic and foreign automobile manufacturers, including Toyota, Nissan, Honda, Hino, Suzuki, Mazda, Daimler and GM. While fuel cell cars and busses have been much talked about, it is the small fuel cell powered vehicles that are the latest technological achievements.

We liked the fuel-cell wheelchairs, a fuel-cell electric cart and a fuel-cell electric assisted bicycle, developed by two Japanese companies that are not car manufacturers. Kurimoto Ltd. (Japanese manufacturer of industrial products) released its Fuel Cell Wheelchair IV in June 2006 and a Fuel Cell Cart II in May 2007 while Iwatani Corp. (Japanese gas and energy development and supply company) released the Fuel Cell Electric Assisted Bicycle in February 2008.

The wheelchair and the cart’s fuel-cell system is a 24V 250W PEFC Air Cooling External Humidifier. Both drive at a max. speed of 6km/h and their driving range is 10hours, 60km (H2 Storage 190g/4 canisters) and 5hours, 30km (H2 Storage 100g/2 canisters). Iwatani Corp., the manufacturer of the Fuel Cell Electric-Assisted Bicycle, has been working with hydrogen for about 50 years and holds the leading share (40%) of the hydrogen market in Japan.

Written by Alena Eckelmann at greenz.jp

Panasonic develops world’s smallest notebook fuel cell

2008-10-21T03:15:00.000-07:00

Panasonic today announced [JP] it developed the world’s smallest fuel cell for use in notebooks, reducing the size of its predecessor by 50%. The new model is sized at 270cc, which makes it as small as existing lithium ion batteries used in notebooks currently on the market.

Panasonic says the fuel cell will be positioned at the underside of notebooks and provides about 20 hours of power with 200cc of fuel. The prototype weighs just 320 grams. The fuel, highly concentrated methanol, can be stored in bottles.

Panasonic also developed a paperback-size fuel cell for use in cellular phones and other mobile devices. The company claims that this model is powerful enough to run portable TVs and that it can charge two devices at the same time. Weighing 350 grams, it measures 360cc.

Both products are to be commercialized in 2012. Panasonic will present the new technology to the general public during next week’s Hydrogen Energy Advanced Technology Exhibition [JP] in Chiba near Tokyo.

[Via www.crunchgear.com]

Alternative energy, virtual reality, innovative approaches to medicine

2008-10-09T02:44:00.000-07:00

Frontiers in Optics 2008 (FiO), the 92nd Annual Meeting of the Optical Society (OSA), will be held from Oct. 19-23 at the Riverside Convention Center in Rochester, N.Y. FiO 2008 will take place alongside Laser Science XXIV, the annual meeting of the American Physical Society's Division of Laser Science. Reporters interested in obtaining a badge to attend the meeting should contact Colleen Morrison at 202.416.1437, cmorri@osa.org.

FiO RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS

Following are a few of the many technical highlights to be discussed at the meeting. Additional technical highlights are available at http://www.osa.org/News/pressroom/release/10.2008/FiOTopics.aspx.

Reality to Go: 3-D Virtual Reality on Mobile Devices
A Potential New Tool for Brain Surgeons
New Optics for Improved Solar Power Generators
Using Algae to Convert Sunlight into Biofuel
Highest Power Tabletop Laser Ever Built

REALITY TO GO: 3-D VIRTUAL REALITY ON MOBILE DEVICES

If mere texting, talking, e-mailing and snapping pictures on mobile devices aren't enough to satisfy your data cravings, now there's the prospect of accessing and displaying 3-D virtual reality simulations and animations on them. New information architecture from researchers in Offenburg, Germany puts 3-D visualizations in the palm of your hand to make this possible.

By devising a novel information and communication architecture with optics technology, researchers created a new approach based on outsourcing to servers all the heavy number crunching required by computer animations and virtual reality simulations. After churning through it, the servers then provide the information either as stream (avi, motion JPEG) or as vector-based data (VRML, X3D) displayable as 3-D on mobile devices. Dan Curticapean and his colleagues Andreas Christ and Markus Feisst of Offenburg's University of Applied Science devised the approach.

"Since the processing power of mobile phones, smart phones and personal digital assistants is increasing—along with expansion in transmission bandwidth—it occurred to us that it is possible to harness this power to create 3-D virtual reality," says Curticapean. "So we designed a system to optimize and send the virtual reality data to the mobile phone or other mobile device."

Their approach works like this: Virtual reality data sent by the server to a mobile phone can be visualized on the phone's screen, or on external display devices, such as a stereoscopic two-video projector system or a head-mounted stereoscopic display. The displays are connected to the mobile phone by wireless Bluetooth so the user's mobility is preserved. In order to generate stereoscopic views on the mobile display screens, a variety of means can be used, such as a built-in 3-D screen or using lenticular lenses or anaglyph images viewed with special glasses having lenses of two different colors to create the illusion of depth.

The upshot of this new approach is improved realistic 3-D presentation, enhanced user ability to visualize and interact with 3-D objects and easier presentation of complex 3-D objects. "Perhaps most important," says Curticapean, "is the prospect of using mobile devices such as cell phones as a user interface to communicate more data with more people as an important component of mobile-Learning (m-Learning), given the ubiquity of mobile devices, particularly in developing countries."

Presentation FThM12, "3-D Mobile Virtual Reality Simulations and Animations Using Common Modern Displays," Thursday, Oct. 23, 12 p.m., Riverside Court Room, Rochester Riverside Convention Center

A POTENTIAL NEW TOOL FOR BRAIN SURGEONS

One of the primary ways of treating brain cancer is surgically removing the tumors. The risk of this sort of procedure is obvious -- it involves cutting away tissue from the brain, potentially severing nerve fibers and causing neurological damage. MRI and CT scans can reveal the extent of tumors, but only prior to surgery. These techniques rely on large instruments that cannot be used in the operating room, and during the operation the brain may relax and move, forcing surgeons to adjust where they are cutting to minimize the damage to the brain tissue.

During surgery, doctors make these adjustments by asking their patients to perform certain tasks while electrically stimulating parts of the brain bordering where they plan to cut. The electrical stimulation inhibits brain function in that region, revealing whether losing that tissue would cause permanent damage. Although slow, this is a good way to detect and protect critical areas of the brain.

Now Paul Hoy and his colleagues at the University of Southampton in England are developing a rapid and highly sensitive method for measuring brain function across the entire area during surgery. The method is based on observing blood flow in the brain. Active brain regions have increased blood flow, and this change can be observed by looking at light reflected off the brain because hemoglobin, the protein that ferries oxygen within the bloodstream, will absorb light differently depending on whether it carries oxygen or not.

Recently Hoy and his colleagues measured this signal on four people undergoing brain surgery and showed that their results agreed with the electrical stimulation. They hope that the technique will one day provide information quickly for neurosurgeons, and they are now collecting data that will lead to a clinical trial designed to test how effective the technique is.

Presentation FTuD3, "Optical Intraoperative Measurement of Function in the Human Brain," Tuesday, Oct. 21, 9:15 a.m., Highland D, Rochester Riverside Convention Center

NEW OPTICS FOR IMPROVED SOLAR POWER GENERATORS

A few years ago, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) launched its Very High Efficiency Solar Cell (VHESC) program. DARPA challenged the industry and the research community to make solar cells more efficient -- as measured by how well a solar cell converts the light it absorbs into electrical energy. The goal is to be able to provide soldiers in the field with inexpensive portable solar power generators -- the sort that would be no larger than a laptop and would be able to recharge that laptop in an hour or so.

The problem with making such small solar power generators is that even the most advanced solar cells available today are not efficient enough. The highest efficiencies demonstrated so far have been just more than 40 percent, but those demonstrations have taken place in carefully controlled laboratory settings and not with portable field units as the DARPA program calls for. Besides that, the most efficient laboratory cells rely on expensive-to-manufacture materials that cost some $50,000 to $70,000 per square meter. The sort of commercial solar panels you might buy today to have installed on your rooftop are much cheaper, but they are even less efficient, topping out at 16 to 17 percent. The DARPA program calls for efficiencies of 50 percent.

University of Rochester Professor Duncan Moore is part of a team reaching for DARPA's goal under the VHESC program. Their approach to achieving the higher efficiency involves using special coatings on solar cells that split light into colors like blue and red, which scientists estimate will increase efficiency by 50 percent. They then use different types of solar cell materials that each optimally absorbs energy from a different color light. Moore's research enhances this further by finding ways to intensify the light. In his Frontiers in Optics talk, Moore will describe how he is designing an optical cover for solar panels that concentrates sunlight -- much as a magnifying glass can concentrate sunlight enough that it can burn wood.

Presentation JWC3, "Optics for Solar Cells for Portable Power," Wednesday, Oct. 22, 5 p.m., Highland B, Rochester Riverside Convention Center

USING ALGAE TO CONVERT SUNLIGHT INTO BIOFUEL

Scientists at the University of California, Berkeley want to make micro-algae "less green." That is, they hope to modify the tiny organisms so as to minimize the number of chlorophyll molecules needed to harvest light without compromising the photosynthesis process in the cells. To that end, they have identified the genetic instructions in the algae genome responsible for deploying approximately 600 chlorophyll molecules in the cell's light-gathering antennae. The Berkeley researchers figure that the algae can survive with approximately 130 molecules.

Why go to this trouble? Researcher Tasios Melis argues that a larger chlorophyll antenna helps the organism survive in the wild but is detrimental to the engineering-driven effort of using algae to convert sunlight into biofuel.

The scientists want to divert the normal function of photosynthesis from generating biomass to making biofuels, that is, into products such as lipids, hydrocarbons and hydrogen. In this regard micro-algae are ideal because of their high rate of photosynthesis; they are perhaps 10 times more efficient than land plants. Melis says that the phrase "cellular optics" describes this general effort to maximize the efficiency of the solar-to-product conversion process.

Presentation JThB3, "Optical Properties of Microalgae for Enhanced Biofuels Production," Thursday, Oct. 23, 11:15 a.m., Highland A, Rochester Riverside Convention Center

HIGHEST POWER TABLETOP LASER EVER BUILT

Physicists at the University of Texas have built a tabletop laser that produces, at the present time, the largest peak power of any laser in the world: 1.1 petawatts (PW), or 1,100 terawatts (1.1 x 10^15 watts). A few (much larger) lasers have reached the petawatt level in the past (e.g. Livermore's NIF laser and Rutherford's Vulcan laser). The Texas laser, like the others, relies on chirping, a process in which a short laser pulse is stretched out, then amplified by a factor of a trillion, and then recompressed to a very short pulse size. In this case, the Texas laser delivers large energy (186-joule [J]) photons crammed into small time-frame (167 femtoseconds [fs]) bursts to achieve their high power. According to Texas scientist Erhard Gaul, the next goal is to produce 200-J energies packed into 150-fs pulses. Further on, peak powers of more than 100 PW might be possible. The immediate use for the Texas pulses is for studying the fusion of deuterium clusters and the production of particle acceleration using the immense electric fields produced when such a laser pulse passes through thin targets.

Presentation FWX3, "1.1 Petawatt Hybrid, OPCPA-Nd:glass Laser Demonstrated," Wednesday, Oct. 22, 5 p.m., Highland F, Rochester Riverside Convention Center

Source: Optical Society of America

New technology paves the way for the future of identifying proteins inside cells

2008-10-06T03:34:00.000-07:00

A new technology which enables scientists to identify proteins by making a map of the energy flow inside the protein is revealed today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) journal.

The scientists behind the new technology hope to develop a tool which can be used to analyse human cells and find out which proteins are present and in what quantities. Being able to sensitively analyse the protein make-up of cells is important because proteins are involved in every process in human cells, from facilitating immune responses to cell-to-cell communication, and when a cell becomes diseased, for example with cancer, the number of different kinds of proteins in a cell changes.

The new research outlines how an imaging technique known as coherent two-dimensional infrared spectroscopy, 2DIR, has been used to successfully identify proteins in laboratory tests. The technique uses an ultra short pulse of infra-red laser light to cause a vibration in one part of the protein molecule. The researchers then track the movement of energy from this vibration as it moves through the protein, building up an energy flow map of the protein which enables them to identify what kind of protein it is.

Professor David Klug from the Single Cell Proteomics project at Imperial College London, one of the authors of the new paper, explains the significance of their study: 'We have proved the principle that it is possible to use this type of spectroscopy to identify proteins and we are now looking to use this knowledge to develop a new tool that can be used to further a broad range of research including drug discovery, diagnostics, biomarker discovery and basic biology.

'This is the first time in over 20 years that a new method for identifying proteins has been discovered, and we're very excited about the possibilities that it will bring to our field.'

The technologies under development in the Single Cell Proteomics Project are focussed on improving the sensitivities of proteomic tools to allow single cells to be analysed. Currently, scientists identify and count proteins either by using antibodies or mass spectrometry. The new third potential method, 2DIR, has advantages over the existing methods because it could be more sensitive and provide additional information on how protein activity and function is modulated within cells. 'Counting the number of proteins is important, but not enough to understand the biology at work,' says Professor Klug.

Potential applications of these methods include the possibility to analyse single cancer cells found circulating in the bloodstream of patients and in the discovery of new biomarkers that might ultimately be used in screening and diagnosis.

The study of proteins, known as proteomics, is the next step for scientists following the identification of all the genes in human DNA in the human genome project. All human cells contain the same 20,000 genes but in different cells different genes are 'switched on' to produce different proteins, and it is the differences between proteins which distinguishes one type of cell from another, and a healthy cell from a diseased cell.

The Single Cell Proteomics (SCP) group at Imperial was established in 2006 with GBP5 million funding from the EPSRC and BBSRC, and will run for five and a half years. The project, which is managed under the auspices of Imperial's Chemical Biology Centre, aims to develop a raft of new measurement tools which will enable scientists to analyse proteins in new ways, with greater clarity and at faster speeds than ever before.

This PNAS paper was written in collaboration with Professor Keith Willison, Professor of Molecular Cell Biology at The Institute of Cancer Research, who is a co-holder of the GBP5M SCP grant. He says: 'The development of new single cell, single molecule approaches is vital in the hunt for rare cancer cells.'

Source: Imperial College London

Cell phone can unlock car, start engine

2008-09-25T00:37:00.000-07:00

TOKYO - A new Japanese mobile phone will automatically unlock the doors of its owners' cars and let drivers start their engines without using an ignition key.

The phone, built by Sharp Corp., uses a technology previously developed by Nissan Motor Co. called "Intelligent Key" that allows drivers enter and start their cars without removing their keys from their pockets or bags.

Cars equipped with the system sense when the correct key is nearby, automatically unlocking their car doors, and allow the engine to be started once the key is brought inside the car. Nissan said it has shipped about a million cars with the technology in Japan since 2002.

The new twist on this technology is that it is loaded in a phone. The service will work on the mobile network operated by NTT DoCoMo Inc., Japan's largest mobile operator.

The companies said in a joint press release Wednesday they will display the technology next week at CEATEC, a major technology conference in Tokyo. They are continuing development and aim to bring the phone to market sometime after March of next year.

Japanese phones are some of the most sophisticated in the world; most come standard with digital TV, music players, GPS, cameras that double as barcode scanners, and wireless credit cards.

[Via www.philly.com]

Nanotechnology, Revolution in the Field of Medicine

2008-09-24T05:23:00.000-07:00

By Marcia Henin

In the recent years, there has been a tremendous development in the field of nanotechnology. Nanotechnology is a field of applied science, which deals in building machines and bots at microscopic levels. Due to development in nanotechnology, there have been many developments in various fields of science, especially in the field of medicine.

With the help of nanotechnology, carrying out a complex heart surgery is very much possible. Doctors have started making use of nanobots to cure certain diseases. These nanobots also help in rectifying certain disorders in the human body.

Nanotechnology in Drug Development:

Recently, scientists are developing effective and better drug delivery systems using nanotechnology. Scientists are using nanoparticles to design a drug delivery system that may improve the pharmaceutical and therapeutic properties of a drug and help better processes such as Drug screening. Nanaoparticles have remarkable properties that drastically enhance the drug delivery. Due to their microscopic sizes, nanoparticles get an easy access in the cells.

There are numerous developments in the drug delivery owing to nanotechnology. One such development using nanotechnology is the transfer of drugs into the cytoplasm of cells through the cell membrane. This is an important development, because to hinder certain diseases from the body, the drug needs to enter the cell membrane.

To make a drug molecule effective in the body, it needs a triggered response. To do so, scientists are using nanotechnology. Scientists are developing drugs using nanotechnology that automatically activate, once they enter the human body.

Many researchers believe that it is possible to develop a drug delivery system that may prove beneficial in treating cancer and infectious diseases using nanotechnology. By far, they have identified six types of nano-enabled delivery systems that have considerable potential in treating cancer and other infectious diseases.

With the help of nanotechnology, scientists have developed injectable drugs, which are more pleasing for the patients, who receive them and at the same time are easy to administer.

[Via revolution-rv.com]

Instant DNA analysis on a chip

2008-09-23T01:18:00.000-07:00

University of Virginia (U.Va.) professor James Landers is known as ‘a master of compression’ because he has reduced an entire laboratory for DNA analysis to a chip the size of a common everyday microscope slide. His future handheld device may allow ‘physicians, crime scene investigators, pharmacists, even the general public, to quickly and inexpensively conduct DNA tests from almost anywhere, without need for a complex and expensive central laboratory.’ Landers said that with his a lab-on-a-chip, ‘it takes just 30 minutes to do the work it would take three technicians and three instruments to complete in a week.’ So far, this system exists only in the lab, but read more…

You can see above an artistic rendering of this future lab-on-a-chip. (Credit: James Landers at U.Va., and Jessica Norris for the artwork). This research project has been led by professor James Landers, and many members of his lab which is focusing on bioanalytical chemistry.

What would be the usages for such a credit-card-sized-system? “Such a device could be used in a doctor’s office, for example, to quickly test for an array of infectious diseases, such as anthrax, avian flu or HIV, as well as for cancer or genetic defects. Because of the quick turnaround time, a patient would be able to wait only a short time onsite for a diagnosis. Appropriate treatment, if needed, could begin immediately. Currently, test tube-size fluid samples are sent to external labs for analysis, usually requiring a 24- to 48-hour wait for a result. ‘Time is of the essence when dealing with an infectious disease such as meningitis,’ Landers said. ‘We can greatly reduce that test time, and reduce the anxiety a patient experiences while waiting.’”

It would also simplify genetic testing and the work of crime scene investigators. They “could collect and analyze even a tiny sample of blood or semen on the scene, enter the finding into a genetic database, and possibly identify the perpetrator very shortly after a crime has occurred. Likewise, agricultural biotechnologists could do very rapid genetic analysis on thousands of hybrid plants that have desirable properties such as drought and disease resistance, Landers said. ‘We can now do lab work in volumes that are thousands of times smaller than would normally be used in a regular lab setup, and can do it up to 100 times faster,’ he said. ‘As we improve our techniques and capabilities, the costs of fabricating these micro-analysis devices will drop enough to employ them routinely in a wide variety of settings.’”

This research work has been published in the Analytical Chemistry journal. According to this document from the University of Virginia (September 3, 2008), the journal published this work under the title “Purification of Nucleic Acids in Microfluidic Devices” (Volume 80, Number 17, Pages 6472–6479, September 1, 2008). Here are two links to this article, in an HTML version a PDF document (8 pages, 909 KB). The above artwork has been picked from this PDF version. and as

But even if the subject of this article is related to the microfluidic devices studied by Landers, I’m not sure that this article refers to the findings described in the introduction of this post. First, this article is co-signed by Jian Wen, Lindsay A. Legendre, Joan M. Bienvenue, and James P. Landers, all from the University of Virginia and University of Virginia Health Sciences Center. Meanwhile, the September 17, 2008 U.Va. news release quoted above mentions that Landers worked with Mathew Begley, professor of mechanical engineering; Molly Hughes, assistant professor of internal medicine, and Sanford Feldman, director of the Center for Comparative Medicine.

[Via blogs.zdnet.com]

Safety authority urges research into nanotechnology's use in food sector

2008-09-22T01:32:00.000-07:00

RESEARCH INTO the risks of using nanotechnology in food is "urgently" needed before products containing food manipulating particles hit the Irish market, the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) has said.

Little is known about the effects on the human body or the environment of this emerging food science and regulation of the industry is "deficient" a new FSAI report has found.

Food nanotechnology involves the use of tiny particles (nanoparticles) which can be 100,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair, to modify processed food. Nanoparticles can be used to change the taste and texture of food, extend its shelf-life, increase absorption of nutrients or kill harmful bacteria.

No foods currently on the Irish market use nanotechnology, the FSAI said, but "policies should be devised now in advance of their arrival".

The technology is used in some non-EU countries. In the US a nanoparticle product marketed as "OilFresh" is being used by restaurants to extend the life of deep frying oil, while giving crispier food.

Nanotechnology can also be used in food containers creating "active packaging" which could kill bacteria or indicate when food has gone off or is under threat from contaminants.

While nanoparticles are being used commercially, and it is anticipated the industry will be worth €15 billion globally in less than two years' time, little is known about its effects on human and animal health or on the environment, the FSAI said.

"Evidence is accumulating that engineered nanoparticles can cross natural barriers within the body, although the health implications of this, if any, are as yet unclear," the report said.

Nanotechnology may not only pose a risk to those eating processed food, but to workers who might inhale nanoparticles during the production stage.

There is also concern about the environmental risks of disposal of food or packaging containing nanoparticles, particularly in relation to how they might react with other substances or enter the food chain indirectly.

The report notes that, given the public response to genetically modified (GM) technology, the use of nanotechnology in food is likely to be contentious and the "safety of consumers exposed to nanoparticles through food must be assured".

The report calls for a EU-wide legislative framework to regulate the use of nanotechnology in food, including the introduction of mandatory labelling. A national list of products containing nanoparticles should be compiled and monitored by the FSAI.

"There are significant advantages associated with the development of nanotechnology in food production but as it is a relatively new process, its adoption by the food industry should be cautious," the FSAI said.

[Via www.irishtimes.com]

New architecture for single-electron devices allows CMOS-compatible large-scale fabrication

2008-09-18T01:40:00.000-07:00

(Nanowerk Spotlight) For nanoelectronics applications like single-electron devices to become practical, everyday items, they need to move from the highly individual and customized fabrication process typically found in laboratories to an automated, high-throughput and industrial-scale production environment. The reason this hasn't happened yet is that the various nanoscale pattern definition techniques used today – such as e-beam lithography, mechanically controllable break junctions, electromigration, electrodeposition, nanoscale oxidation, and scanning tunneling microscopy – generally are not suitable for large-scale parallel processing.
The fabrication of single-electron devices requires nanoscale geometrical arrangement of device components, that is, source and drain electrodes and Coulomb islands. Developing methods to fabricate nanoscale devices in large numbers at a time has been one of the major efforts of the nanotechnology community. A new study now demonstrates that this can be done with complete parallel processing using CMOS-compatible processes and materials. Furthermore, these single-electron devices can operate at room temperature, an essential requirement for practical implementations.
"We have demonstrated chip-level fabrication of room-temperature single-electron devices that does not use any of the sophisticated nanoscale pattern definition techniques that generally have intrinsic limitations for large-scale processing" Dr. Seong Jin Koh explains to Nanowerk. "Except for electrical measurements at the end, at no time was any device treated individually."
Koh, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington, together with his team has used a novel geometry and processes in which source and drain electrodes are vertically separated by thin dielectric films and are self-aligned, and the nanoparticles are attached on the sidewall of dielectric film acting as Coulomb islands.
This approach, described in a recent paper in Nature Nanotechnology, allows nanoscale geometrical control in complete parallel processing, paving a way toward fabrication of integrated systems of single-electron devices ("CMOS-compatible fabrication of room-temperature single-electron devices"). Fabrication of other nanoscale devices and sensors may also benefit from the approach described in this study.
"Our goal was to realize a nanoscale geometrical arrangement of device components in a way that can be achieved over a large area with parallel processing" says Koh. He then explains the three key aspects to this approach:
"First, the separation of the two electrodes is defined by the thickness of the intervening dielectric film and, therefore, can be controlled with sub-nanometer-scale precision over a large area by using film deposition techniques such as plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) and atomic-layer deposition (ALD).
"Second, the drain, dielectric layer and source are vertically self-aligned, maintaining the integrity of the source–drain gap along the periphery of the source/drain electrodes.
"Third, the Coulomb islands are positioned on the exposed sidewall of the dielectric film and, therefore, the lateral length may assume an arbitrary dimension. This liberty of arbitrarily choosing the lateral dimension of the device structure allows the use of photolithography and associated pattern definition processes within the framework of CMOS fabrication technology, enabling single-electron device fabrication in complete parallel processing."

Fabrication of single-electron devices. a–c, Schematic of the key process steps for the fabrication of the single-electron device structure. Definition of drain electrode through photolithography, deposition of chromium and lift-off (a). Vertical etching of PECVD oxide and top portion of source electrode using RIE. The drain electrode (Cr) is used as a hard mask and the sidewall of the PECVD oxide is formed along the periphery of the drain electrode (b). Attachment of nanoparticles on the PECVD oxide sidewall by immersing the wafer into gold nanoparticle colloid. Before immersion, the SAMs of (3-aminopropyl)triethoxysilane (APTES, (C₂H₅O)₃-Si-(CH₂)₃-NH₂) are formed to attract negatively charged gold nanoparticles (c). d–g, Schematic of process flow involving four photomask steps (only one device unit is shown; schematic is not to scale). First mask step: the source electrodes (Cr) are defined on the isolation oxide through photolithography/chromium deposition/lift-off (d). Second mask step: using processes a–c, each single-electron device is fabricated on top of every source electrode (e). Third mask step: the wafer is passivated with silicon oxide, followed by formation of vias through photolithography and RIE (f). Fourth mask step: the bond pads are defined using photolithography, deposition of gold and lift-off. Vias are filled with gold, connecting the source and drain electrodes to bond pads (g). h, Photograph of an actual fabricated chip mounted on a chip carrier. (Reprinted with permission from Nature Publishing Group)
The process developed by Koh and his team could find broad applications – basically all electronic devices that require extremely low power consumption and a high packing density could benefit from it.
In order to simplify device fabrication, Koh and his team used only one type of SAMs layer (APTES) to functionalize both the oxide sidewalls and source/drain electrodes.
"Although this procedure is sufficient to demonstrate parallel fabrication of arrays of room-temperature single-electron transistors, it also leads to stray nanoparticle attachment" says Koh. "With such non-ideal Coulomb island positioning, we have produced room-temperature single-electron transistors with a success rate close to 1%."
Of course, in practical device fabrication a much higher yield would be required and that will necessitate that the nanoparticles must be placed precisely and exclusively on the exposed sidewalls rather than randomly.
Koh mentions that one method by which this can be done is the selective formation of different SAMs on different surfaces to direct the nanoparticles to the desired locations, for example, positively charged SAMs on oxide sidewalls and negatively charged SAMs on source/drain electrodes.
"We have demonstrated the effectiveness of this selective surface functionalization on precise nanoparticle placement for our device geometry" he says. "Incorporating this method of controlled nanoparticle placement into our single-electron device fabrication is currently under way."
By Michael Berger. Copyright 2008 Nanowerk LLC [Via www.nanowerk.com]

The World's First Soft-Bodied Robot Tested by Zwick's Biaxial Testing Machine

2008-09-16T03:07:00.000-07:00

Researchers at Tufts University in the US are using a Zwick biaxial testing machine to test biological and engineered biocompatible materials for the development of the world's first soft-bodied robot.

Based on the neuromechanical system of the caterpillar Manduca sexta, the softbot prototype is approximately 30 cm long and made of silicone elastomer. The mechanical material characterization is performed at the Soft Materials Characterization Laboratory at Tufts' Advanced Technology Laboratory, led by Professor Luis Dorfmann.

The Zwick Roell biaxial testing machine is being used to characterize isotropic and anisotropic elastomers and thus helps the researchers to model the behaviour of the material. "Unlike vertebrates, caterpillars don't have bones associated with their muscles to provide a system of levers," says Professor Barry Trimmer, principal investigator on the project. "Though we know lots about vertebrate muscles we don't know a whole lot about caterpillars' muscles. Yet caterpillars can crawl up walls, grasp narrow branches or stems with sticky Velcro-like feet, and rotate their bodies almost full-circle as they sense their environment."

Understanding soft materials is one of the first steps to building a robot that, like a caterpillar, couldn't be made out of traditional hard materials.

Potential applications for the innovative robots include emergency search and retrieval, medical diagnosis and treatment, manufacturing and aerospace.

Though the soft-body robot prototypes won't be made with a material that can mimic all the properties of the natural cuticle, the group is aiming to make a soft-bodied robot using a biodegradable material, such as silk. "By developing a soft, flexible material that can degrade, a soft-bodied robot made of this material could enter the body as a diagnostic tool and not need to be retrieved," says David Kaplan, co-principal investigator on the project and professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering.

The Zwick machine is a custom built biaxial material testing system equipped with four linear independently controlled actuators of 2kN capacity. It is used to determine the constitutive functions for the in-plane response of isotropic and anisotropic materials. Each actuator is fitted with a loading fixture for applications of tensile or compressive loads to the test sample and a dedicated load cell. The actuator drive system’s travel resolution is 0.1µm, while the load cells resolution is 0.001N.

Zwick’s videoXtens extensometer, which is rigidly fixed to the machine frame, allows for non-contact strain measurements of materials that undergo medium to large deformations. The extensometer is equipped to capture both axial and transverse strains simultaneously in separate input channels. Camera lenses are interchangeable to permit different field of views and minimum theoretical resolution range from 0.3 µm to 6 µm. The testing software testXpert® II installed on a dedicated computer allows universities full customization of test procedures, loading sequences as well as standard DIN, ISO and ASTM test programs. To accommodate diverse testing protocols, custom-designed test fixtures can be designed by one of the lab engineers, and coupled with an appropriate force transducer. A water bath for characterization of materials in various solutions is also available.

"The Zwick machine has proved invaluable to us in our research," says Professor Dorfmann. "Understanding and characterization of anisotropic materials requires testing with such specialized equipment.”

[Via www.azom.com]

Carbon nanotube sorting with DNA

2008-09-16T02:35:00.000-07:00

(Nanowerk Spotlight) Current production methods for carbon nanotubes (CNTs) result in units with different diameter, length, chirality and electronic properties, all packed together in bundles, and often blended with some amount of amorphous carbon. These mixtures are of little practical use since many advanced applications, especially for nanoelectronics, are sensitively dependent on tube structures. Consequently, the separation of metallic and semiconducting CNTs is essential for future applications and studies. The tube diameter of semiconducting nanotubes is also important because the band gap depends on it.
Separation of nanotubes according to desired properties is still proving to be a challenging task, especially single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) sorting, because the composition and chemical properties of SWCNTs of different types are very similar, making conventional separation techniques inefficient.
The separation techniques for SWCNTs explored to date rely on preferential electron transfer on metallic SWCNTs treated with diazonium salts, dielectrophoresis, enhanced chemical affinity of semiconducting SWCNTs with octadecylamine, and wrapping of SWCNTs with single-stranded DNA. The selectivity of these methods can be further enhanced by vigorous centrifugation of prepared dispersions and the use of ion-exchange chromatography (IEX).

A structure model of DNA-wrapped carbon nanotube (Image: Dr. Anand Jagota)
Back in 2003, a DuPont-led research team found that DNA strands could be used to separate CNTs according to their electronic characteristics. The discovery was reported in articles in Science ("Structure-Based Carbon Nanotube Sorting by Sequence-Dependent DNA Assembly") and Nature ("DNA-assisted dispersion and separation of carbon nanotubes ") and cited later by Forbes magazine as one of the top five nanotechnology breakthroughs of 2003.
Ming Zheng of DuPont and coworkers have discovered an oligonucleotide sequence that self-assembles into a helical structure around individual nanotubes, creating DNA-CNT hybrids with electrostatic properties that depend upon the tube diameter and electrical properties. CNTs can be separated on the basis of these properties using anion exchange chromatography. The separation of metallic and semiconducting nanotubes is improved compared with other techniques, and separation on the basis of tube diameter has become possible.
The reason DNA wrap method is so interesting for CNT manipulation is that it introduces tools of traditional biochemical science to the nascent nanomaterials science, and promotes new growth points in both fields. DNA wrapping allows not only separation but also controlled alignment of CNTs. Based on these findings, in 2006 the National Science Foundation in the U.S. awarded a $1.25 million, 4-year research grant to develop new methods of manipulating CNTs in solution. Much of the project’s focus will be on the use of single-walled CNTs wrapped with single-stranded DNA. The DNA-CNT hybrid has proven effective in CNT dispersion and researchers hope it will also aid in sorting and placing the tubes (see our Nanotechnology Spotlight: "DNA wrappers for carbon nanotubes ").
In a new review article in Nano Research ("A DNA-Based Approach to the Carbon Nanotube Sorting Problem" – open access article), Zheng presents his team's current understanding of the DNA-carbon nanotube hybrid structure and separation mechanisms, and addresses future developments of the DNA-based approach.
Zheng explains to Nanowerk that different degrees of CNT separation can be classified: "A single-walled CNT can be either metallic or semiconducting, depending solely on its chiral index (n, m). As a consequence of their different electronic structures, metallic and semiconducting tubes have distinct chemical reactivities, and different physical properties such as polarizability."
Exploiting all these differences in order to separate the two types of tube constitutes one degree of separation.
Within the same electronic type, tube diameter determines surface area per unit tube length, affecting such quantities as linear charge density and effective hydrodynamic size for dispersed tubes. Separation by diameter is therefore also conceptually feasible and constitutes another degree of separation.
"The most demanding task, in our opinion, is to separate two species of the same electronic type and same diameter but different chiralities" says Zheng. "To a first order of approximation, these tubes have little difference in their electronic structures. The challenge in this type of separation is how to convert the minute difference into something macroscopically measurable and the DNA-based approach appears to be especially suited for this purpose."
In his review paper, Zheng highlights a few approaches that are representative for the current state of the field. One is Mark Hersam's work at Northwestern University on a gradient ultracentrifugation technique (see also our Nanotechnology Spotlight: "Conductive and tunable transparent coatings made from monodisperse carbon nanotubes "). The review centers on the chromatographic separation of DNA-wrapped carbon nanotubes developed by Zheng at his lab at DuPont. It explains the mechanisms of separation based on IEX and describes the current understanding of this process.
"So far, we have shown the capability of the DNA-based approach in metal/semiconductor CNT separation, and single chirality CNT enrichment for certain small diameter tubes" says Zheng. "The latter demonstrates the exquisite resolution power of the DNA approach. In addition to our own work, others have also employed IEX and SEC (size-exclusion chromatography) methods for DNA-CNT separation. The separated DNA-CNTs have found use in both fundamental studies and applications. In comparison with other separation approaches, chromatographic separation of DNA-CNTs offers higher resolution and requires shorter processing times."
Understanding the mechanisms of the DNA-based separation approach is of both scientific and technological significance. At the heart of the problem is the structure of DNA-CNT. Zheng notes that experimental evidence strongly suggests that the hybrid structure is dependent on both DNA sequence and CNT structure."So far, the structural information comes primarily from low resolution AFM obtained from dried samples. Whether or not it is relevant to the solution state structure is an open question. High resolution TEM and solution-phase techniques such as circular dichroism may provide a more accurate measure of the structure."
Future efforts in the field will include finding better DNA sequences for CNT separation. Given the astronomical size of the single-stranded DNA library available, the researchers are optimistic that such sequences exist.
"What is needed is a rational search strategy, based either on predictions of molecular dynamics modeling, or on some ingenious experimental design, in order to discover these sequences" says Zheng. He points out that some results also indicate that the length of the sequence might play an important role, generating another whole dimension of opportunity for DNA-CNT interactions.
By Michael Berger. Copyright 2008 Nanowerk LLC [Via www.nanowerk.com]

Access Control Robot is the future of security

2008-09-15T03:11:00.000-07:00

Human error is by far the biggest cause of intelligence failure and security breach. Late at night I find my apartment watchman fast asleep on the bench, I'm sure many of you must be facing a similar situation at work or home, where vulnerable human tendencies gave way to security threats. The Access Control Robot is an intelligent robot that can be used as a gatekeeper. With features like face recognition and ID scanning, the bot is capable of filtering the people at access point. It even has the capability to read papers, and note down and track the vehicles exiting and entering the premises. With the given status if red-alerts and terrorist acts, it's always better to be armed and ready. The Access Control Robot is a small step in enhanced security for modernized office buildings, office, bank and private villa etc.

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