ScienceDaily: Top Technology News

---

• 'Metasurfaces' to usher in new optical technologies
• 'Hot spots' ride a merry-go-round on Jupiter
• Nanoscale spinning magnetic droplets created
• Breakthrough research shows chemical reaction in real time
• Distant planetary system is a super-sized solar system
• Playing action videogames improves visual search
• Bootstrapping biotechnology: Engineers cooperate to realize precision grammar for programming cells
• Hovering is a bother for bees: Fast flight is more stable
• New results indicate that particle discovered at CERN is a Higgs boson
• Chemical chameleon tamed: Researchers give floppy molecule a structure through solvent effects

'Metasurfaces' to usher in new optical technologies Posted: 14 Mar 2013 03:03 PM PDT New optical technologies using "metasurfaces" capable of the ultra-efficient control of light are nearing commercialization, with potential applications including advanced solar cells, computers, telecommunications, sensors and microscopes.

'Hot spots' ride a merry-go-round on Jupiter Posted: 14 Mar 2013 03:03 PM PDT In the swirling canopy of Jupiter's atmosphere, cloudless patches are so exceptional that the big ones get the special name "hot spots." Exactly how these clearings form and why they're only found near the planet's equator have long been mysteries.

Nanoscale spinning magnetic droplets created Posted: 14 Mar 2013 11:43 AM PDT Researchers have successfully created a magnetic soliton -- a nano-sized, spinning droplet that was first theorized 35 years ago.

Breakthrough research shows chemical reaction in real time Posted: 14 Mar 2013 11:43 AM PDT The ultrafast, ultrabright X-ray pulses of the Linac Coherent Light Source have enabled unprecedented views of a catalyst in action, an important step in the effort to develop cleaner and more efficient energy sources.

Distant planetary system is a super-sized solar system Posted: 14 Mar 2013 11:42 AM PDT Astronomers have made the most detailed examination yet of the atmosphere of a Jupiter-like planet beyond our Solar System. A spectrum reveals that the carbon to oxygen ratio is consistent with the core accretion scenario, the model thought to explain the formation of our Solar System.

Playing action videogames improves visual search Posted: 14 Mar 2013 11:13 AM PDT Researchers have shown that playing shooting or driving videogames, even for a relatively short time, improves the ability to search for a target hidden among irrelevant distractions in complex scenes.

Bootstrapping biotechnology: Engineers cooperate to realize precision grammar for programming cells Posted: 14 Mar 2013 08:18 AM PDT DNA sequences and statistical models have been unveiled that greatly increase the reliability and precision by which microbes can be engineered.

Hovering is a bother for bees: Fast flight is more stable Posted: 14 Mar 2013 08:06 AM PDT Bumblebees are much more unstable when they hover than when they fly fast, according to new research. Scientists used a mathematical model to analyze the way bumblebees fly at different speeds, showing that the bumblebee is unstable when it hovers and flies slowly, and becomes neutral or weakly stable at medium and high flight speeds.

New results indicate that particle discovered at CERN is a Higgs boson Posted: 14 Mar 2013 07:21 AM PDT Scientists working with CERN's Large Hadron Collider have presented preliminary new results that further elucidate the particle discovered last year. Having analyzed two and a half times more data than was available for the discovery announcement in July, they find that the new particle is looking more and more like a Higgs boson, the particle linked to the mechanism that gives mass to elementary particles. It remains an open question, however, whether this is the Higgs boson of the Standard Model of particle physics, or possibly the lightest of several bosons predicted in some theories that go beyond the Standard Model.

Chemical chameleon tamed: Researchers give floppy molecule a structure through solvent effects Posted: 14 Mar 2013 05:50 AM PDT How you get the chameleon of the molecules to settle on a particular "look" has been discovered by chemists in Germany. The molecule CH5+ is normally not to be described by a single rigid structure, but is dynamically flexible. By means of computer simulations, the team showed that CH5+ takes on a particular structure once you attach hydrogen molecules.

You are subscribed to email updates from ScienceDaily: Top Technology News To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now.	Email delivery powered by Google
Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610