ScienceDaily: Top Technology News

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• Team solves mystery associated with DNA repair
• Light used to remotely trigger biochemical reactions
• Engineers roll up their sleeves -- and then do same with inductors
• Study reveals a remarkable symmetry in black hole jets
• NASA probes prepare for mission-ending moon impact
• Bubble study could improve industrial splash control
• Lowering barriers to DNA-based nanomanufacturing
• Building better structural materials
• Video-game users: Who are sports gamers?
• Novel process is low-cost route to ultrathin platinum films
• Student engineers cook up devices for better cooking
• Head-mounted cameras could help robots understand social interactions
• No more lying about your age: Scientists can now gauge skin’s true age with new laser technique
• Venus transit and lunar mirror could help astronomers find worlds around other stars
• Mars rover Curiosity can be positioned with eclipses
• Biopolymer: Designer interfaces between biological and artificial systems
• Foam's future seen in space and industry
• Thin-skinned catalyst for chemical reactions: Yolk-shell nanocrystal structure offers greater selectivity for heterogeneous catalysis
• 12 matter particles suffice in nature: Limited number of fermions in standard model, physicists say

Team solves mystery associated with DNA repair Posted: 13 Dec 2012 02:23 PM PST Scientists have long sought to understand how a DNA repair protein, known as RecA in bacterial cells, helps broken DNA find a way to bridge the gap. In a new study, researchers report they have identified how the RecA protein does its job.

Light used to remotely trigger biochemical reactions Posted: 13 Dec 2012 02:23 PM PST Since Edison's first bulb, heat has been a mostly undesirable byproduct of light. Now researchers are turning light into heat at the point of need, on the nanoscale, to trigger biochemical reactions remotely on demand. The method makes use of materials derived from unique microbes -- thermophiles -- that thrive at high temperatures but shut down at room temperature.

Engineers roll up their sleeves -- and then do same with inductors Posted: 13 Dec 2012 02:23 PM PST On the road to smaller, high-performance electronics, researchers have smoothed one speed bump by shrinking a key, yet notoriously large element of integrated circuits. Three-dimensional rolled-up inductors have a footprint more than 100 times smaller without sacrificing performance. The research team used industry-standard two-dimensional processing to pattern metal lines on a very thin dielectric film before rolling, creating a spiral inductor.

Study reveals a remarkable symmetry in black hole jets Posted: 13 Dec 2012 02:19 PM PST Black holes range from modest objects formed when individual stars end their lives to behemoths billions of times more massive that rule the centers of galaxies. A new study using data from NASA's Swift satellite and Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope shows that high-speed jets launched from active black holes possess fundamental similarities regardless of mass, age or environment. The result provides a tantalizing hint that common physical processes are at work.

NASA probes prepare for mission-ending moon impact Posted: 13 Dec 2012 11:30 AM PST Twin lunar-orbiting NASA spacecraft that have allowed scientists to learn more about the internal structure and composition of the moon are being prepared for their controlled descent and impact on a mountain near the moon's north pole at about 2:28 p.m. PST (5:28 p.m. EST) Monday, Dec. 17.

Bubble study could improve industrial splash control Posted: 13 Dec 2012 11:23 AM PST For the first time, scientists witnessed the details of the full, ultrafast process of liquid droplets evolving into a bubble when they strike a surface. Their research determined that surface wetness affects the bubble's fate. This research could one day help eliminate bubbles formed during spray coating, metal casting and ink-jet printing. It also could impact studies on fuel efficiency and engine life by understanding the splashing caused by fuel hitting engine walls.

Lowering barriers to DNA-based nanomanufacturing Posted: 13 Dec 2012 11:23 AM PST Two major barriers to advancement of DNA nanotechnology beyond the research lab have been knocked down. This emerging technology employs DNA as a programmable building material for nanometer-scale structures. Many applications are envisioned, and researchers recently demonstrated synthetic membrane channels made from DNA. Until now, however, design processes were hobbled by a lack of feedback; assembly was slow and often of poor quality. Now researchers have removed these obstacles.

Building better structural materials Posted: 13 Dec 2012 11:23 AM PST When materials are stressed, they eventually change shape. Initially these changes are elastic, and reverse when the stress is relieved. When the material's strength is exceeded, the changes become permanent. This could result in the material breaking or shattering, but it could also re-shape the material, such as a hammer denting a piece of metal. Understanding this last group of changes is the focus of new research.

Video-game users: Who are sports gamers? Posted: 13 Dec 2012 10:27 AM PST From Gran Turismo to WWE Smackdown, sports-based video games represent a wide variety of pursuits. When it comes to the people who actually play those games, however, little is known. How do sports video game players fit their games into a larger sports-related context? How does their video game play inform their media usage and general sports fandom?

Novel process is low-cost route to ultrathin platinum films Posted: 13 Dec 2012 10:25 AM PST A research group has developed a relatively simple, fast and effective method of depositing uniform, ultrathin layers of platinum atoms on a surface. Platinum is a widely used industrial catalyst as well as a key component in microelectronics, so the discovery may have widespread application in the design and manufacture of platinum-based devices.

Student engineers cook up devices for better cooking Posted: 13 Dec 2012 09:11 AM PST Students in, of all things, a robotics class use engineering skills and advice from a chef to rig up devices to more accurately control cooking temperatures.

Head-mounted cameras could help robots understand social interactions Posted: 13 Dec 2012 08:18 AM PST What is everyone looking at? It's a common question in social settings because the answer identifies something of interest, or helps delineate social groupings. Those insights someday will be essential for robots designed to interact with humans, so researchers have developed a method for detecting where people's gazes intersect. The researchers tested the method using groups of people with head-mounted video cameras.

No more lying about your age: Scientists can now gauge skin’s true age with new laser technique Posted: 13 Dec 2012 08:18 AM PST While most of us can recognize the signs of lost youth when we peer into the mirror each morning, scientists do not have a standardized way to measure the extent of age damage in skin. Now a group of Taiwanese researchers has used a specialized microscope to peer harmlessly beneath the skin surface to measure natural age-related changes in the sizes of skin cells.

Venus transit and lunar mirror could help astronomers find worlds around other stars Posted: 13 Dec 2012 08:17 AM PST On June 6, 2012, Venus passed directly between Earth and the sun, in a so-called transit where the planet appears as a silhouette against the solar disk, something that will not happen again until Dec. 5, 2117. A team of Italian astronomers used the opportunity to perform an unusual and challenging experiment, looking at the sunlight reflected off the moon ('moonlight') to see how it changed during the transit. This technique could help scientists to find planets in orbit around other stars.

Mars rover Curiosity can be positioned with eclipses Posted: 13 Dec 2012 08:17 AM PST Observations from NASA's Mars rover Curiosity when Mars' moon Phobos crosses in front of the sun, like in September, help us to understand exactly where the rover is on the red planet. Researchers in Spain have developed a method for achieving precisely this.

Biopolymer: Designer interfaces between biological and artificial systems Posted: 13 Dec 2012 07:32 AM PST New developments in synthesis techniques have liberated the polymer MPC's potential for a huge range of medical and biological applications.

Foam's future seen in space and industry Posted: 13 Dec 2012 07:00 AM PST Materials designed with specialized thermal properties have been integral components of NASA's space shuttles and other launch vehicles for many years. Now, two thermal insulation systems developed by scientists at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida may have application for future exploration programs, as well as the commercial world.

Thin-skinned catalyst for chemical reactions: Yolk-shell nanocrystal structure offers greater selectivity for heterogeneous catalysis Posted: 13 Dec 2012 05:52 AM PST A team of researchers reports developing a nanocrystal structure capable of controlling catalysis with the pores of a skin-like membrane that can accept or reject molecules based on their size or chemical properties.

12 matter particles suffice in nature: Limited number of fermions in standard model, physicists say Posted: 13 Dec 2012 05:51 AM PST How many matter particles exist in nature? Particle physicists have been dealing with this question for a long time. The 12 matter particles contained in the standard model of particle physics? Or are there further particles with too high a mass to be produced by the experiments performed so far? These questions are now answered by a team of researchers in a new paper.

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