ScienceDaily: Top Technology News

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• Experiments find strongest shapes with 3-D printing
• Petroleum use, greenhouse gas emissions of automobiles could drop 80 percent by 2050: U.S. report
• Curiosity Mars rover sees trend in water presence
• Causing collapse: Can one affect an atom's spin just by adjusting the way it is measured?
• Cell on a chip reveals protein behavior: In the future, artifical cells may produce complex protein structures on demand
• Negative-charge carrying molecular structures created
• Magnets are chaotic -- and fast -- at the very smallest scale
• Famous supernova reveals clues about crucial cosmic distance markers
• Researchers trap light, improve laser potential of MEH-PPV polymer
• Self-assembled nanostructures enable a low-power phase-change memory for mobile electronic devices
• Breakthrough in electricity storage: New large and powerful redox flow battery
• Leaping lunar dust: Electrically charged dust near shadowed craters can get lofted above Moon's surface
• Hubble gazes on one ring to rule them all
• Panorama from NASA Mars rover shows Mount Sharp

Experiments find strongest shapes with 3-D printing Posted: 18 Mar 2013 05:29 PM PDT Physicists are using 3-D printing to test complex qualities of shapes made via the computer. They are studying"jamming" and the structural properties of shapes.

Petroleum use, greenhouse gas emissions of automobiles could drop 80 percent by 2050: U.S. report Posted: 18 Mar 2013 12:16 PM PDT A new report finds that by the year 2050, the United States may be able to reduce petroleum consumption and greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent for light-duty vehicles -- cars and small trucks -- via a combination of more efficient vehicles; the use of alternative fuels like biofuels, electricity, and hydrogen; and strong government policies to overcome high costs and influence consumer choices.

Curiosity Mars rover sees trend in water presence Posted: 18 Mar 2013 10:33 AM PDT NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has seen evidence of water-bearing minerals in rocks near where it had already found clay minerals inside a drilled rock.

Causing collapse: Can one affect an atom's spin just by adjusting the way it is measured? Posted: 18 Mar 2013 10:30 AM PDT One of the most basic laws of quantum mechanics is that a system can be in more than one state -- it can exist in multiple realities -- at once. This phenomenon, known as the superposition principle, exists only so long as the system is not observed or measured in any way. As soon as such a system is measured, its superposition collapses into a single state. Thus, we, who are constantly observing and measuring, experience the world around us as existing in a single reality. Researchers now suggest one can affect an atom's spin just by adjusting the way it is measured.

Cell on a chip reveals protein behavior: In the future, artifical cells may produce complex protein structures on demand Posted: 18 Mar 2013 10:30 AM PDT For years, scientists around the world have dreamed of building a complete, functional, artificial cell. Though this vision is still a distant blur on the horizon, many are making progress on various fronts. Researchers in Israel recently took a significant step in this direction when they created a two-dimensional, cell-like system on a glass chip.

Negative-charge carrying molecular structures created Posted: 18 Mar 2013 10:30 AM PDT Chemists have synthesized organic molecular structures that move both positive and negative electrical charges -- a highly desired but often difficult combination to achieve in current efforts to create highly flexible electronic devices and other new technologies.

Magnets are chaotic -- and fast -- at the very smallest scale Posted: 18 Mar 2013 10:24 AM PDT Using a new type of camera that makes extremely fast snapshots with an extremely high resolution, it is now possible to observe the behavior of magnetic materials at the nanoscale. This behavior is more chaotic than previously thought. The observed behavior changes our understanding of data storage, researchers say.

Famous supernova reveals clues about crucial cosmic distance markers Posted: 18 Mar 2013 10:11 AM PDT A new study using data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory points to the origin of a famous supernova. This supernova, discovered in 1604 by Johannes Kepler, belongs to an important class of objects that are used to measure the rate of expansion of the Universe.

Researchers trap light, improve laser potential of MEH-PPV polymer Posted: 18 Mar 2013 07:53 AM PDT Researchers have come up with a low-cost way to enhance a polymer called MEH-PPV's ability to confine light, advancing efforts to use the material to convert electricity into laser light for use in photonic devices.

Self-assembled nanostructures enable a low-power phase-change memory for mobile electronic devices Posted: 18 Mar 2013 07:53 AM PDT Nonvolatile memory that can store data even when not powered is currently used for portable electronics such as smart phones, tablets, and laptop computers. Flash memory is a dominant technology in this field, but its slow writing and erasing speed has led to extensive research into a next-generation nonvolatile memory called Phase-Change Random Access Memory (PRAM), as PRAM's operating speed is 1,000 times faster than that of flash memory. Scientists have now developed a phase-change memory with low power consumption (below 1/20th of its present level) by employing self-assembled block copolymer silica nanostructures.

Breakthrough in electricity storage: New large and powerful redox flow battery Posted: 18 Mar 2013 07:50 AM PDT More and more electricity is being generated from intermittent sources of power, such as solar and wind energy. Powerful electric energy storage devices are necessary to level out corresponding irregularities in the power supply. Scientists have recently made an important breakthrough with the development of a redox flow battery that reaches stack power up to 25 kW, with a cell size of 0.5 square meters. This is eight times larger than the previous A4-sized systems.

Leaping lunar dust: Electrically charged dust near shadowed craters can get lofted above Moon's surface Posted: 18 Mar 2013 07:43 AM PDT Electrically charged lunar dust near shadowed craters can get lofted above the surface and jump over the shadowed region, bouncing back and forth between sunlit areas on opposite sides, according to new calculations by NASA scientists.

Hubble gazes on one ring to rule them all Posted: 18 Mar 2013 07:36 AM PDT Galaxies can take many forms -- elliptical blobs, swirling spiral arms, bulges, and disks are all known components of the wide range of galaxies we have observed using telescopes like the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. However, some of the more intriguing objects in the sky around us include ring galaxies like the one pictured in a new image -- Zw II 28.

Panorama from NASA Mars rover shows Mount Sharp Posted: 18 Mar 2013 07:33 AM PDT Rising above the present location of NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, higher than any mountain in the 48 contiguous states of the United States, Mount Sharp is featured in new imagery from the rover.

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