Penn State engineer has developed a new technology that uses light-activated glue to hold workpieces in position for machining, grinding and other manufacturing processes.

Dr. Edward De Meter, professor of industrial and manufacturing engineering, who developed the concept, says, “This new technology offers an alternative to mechanical clamping, the approach industries most often use. Capital investment for automated clamping is typically high and mechanical clamps can deform the w

Gazing out of the small aircraft window, the endless woods and the numerous lakes caught the eye as we flew from the rainy Netherlands towards beautiful Norway. The assumption that all Norwegians have a sailing boat came to mind, since almost every lake and every fjord has a small harbour with hundreds of boats. It is hard to imagine that these people would not be excited about other means of sustainable transport like the Nuna II.

The Nuna II team and the support crew were welcom

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have discovered that the addition of carbon nanotubes to a common commercial polymer, polypropylene, leads to dramatic changes in how the molten polymer flows. This process eliminates a widespread manufacturing headache known as “die-swell” in which polymers swell in undesirable directions when passing through the exit port of an extruder (a machine for producing more or less continuous lengths of plastic sections).

In time for the Olympic Games RWE SCHOTT Solar has begun operation of the country’s largest rooftop solar-energy unit in Athens. Supported by its Greek and German partners, this will help the company to further strengthen its market position in Greece.

“With this unit on the roof of the German School in Athens we aim to encourage the Greek government in introducing an incentive scheme along the lines of the German Feed In Tariff”, comments Dr. Winfried Hoffmann, Spokesman for the B

An electricity meter that sometimes runs backwards is just one of the cool aspects of Department of Energy near-zero-energy homes.

While low or no electric bills are an obvious benefit, high energy efficiency homes and businesses also reduce the amount of electricity that needs to be generated, thus reducing pollution, said Jeff Christian of DOE’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

In Tennessee, air pollution is of special concern as the state ranked third behind Cal

As the dog days of summer approach, the electrical grid feels the heat, but a new integrated data network may help the aging transmission system weather the season without another massive blackout like the one experienced over much of the Eastern United States and Canada last August.

The Eastern Interconnection Phasor Project will “go live” this summer providing the first real-time, system-wide data to utilities and transmission operators within the Eastern power grid.

“I

The world’s fastest solar-powered car is being driven through Sweden and Norway. Nuna 2 begins its journey on 14 August in Oslo and completes it on 21 August in Kiruna. It will primarily be driven on the E4, and will stop in Gothenburg, Linköping, Stockholm, Uppsala, Luleå, Kiruna, Narvik, and Andenäs.

There is also the possibility of short stops in other locations. “Journalists and photographers will also be able to take a look at the car at other locations near the route. Just c

A method that creates smooth and strong interfaces between metals and metal oxides without high-temperature brazing has been patented by researchers at the National Nuclear Security Administration’s Sandia National Laboratories, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, and the University of North Texas.

The method can improve magnetic random-access memories, which allow next-generation computers to boot up instantly yet retain their entire memories after power interruptions. Depositin

New legal requirements of the International Ship and Port Facility Security (ISPS) Code, developed by the International Maritime Organization (IMO), contain a multitude of internationally binding measures to provide better protection against terrorism aimed at ships and port terminals. Ships may be attacked and used for arms shipments or misused as a weapon. Ships and port facilities are exposed to a completely new threat potential since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

A University at Buffalo research team has invented a new way to synthesize quantum dots — luminescent nanocrystals made from semiconductor material.

Sometimes called artificial atoms, quantum dots have the potential to be used to build exciting new devices for biological and environmental sensing, quantum computing, lasers and telecommunications, among other applications.

The new technique developed by a team led by T.J. Mountziaris, Ph.D., professor of chemical and biolog

SOCOFER will be present at the INNOTRANS trade fair in Berlin from 21 to 24 September 2004. On this occasion, the French engineering company will present its know-how in railway infrastructure maintenance systems, as well as its expertise regarding shunting locomotives and other locomotives, and diesel railcar re-powering.

Forty years of experience in the railways sector and the successful management of a range of international projects – with 50% to 75% of sales generated in expo

A major foresight project on materials technology has been launched to put Norway’s need for expertise in nano- and materials technology on the agenda.

Norway hasn’t had a general R&D strategy for materials technology or nanotechnology since the 1980’s and is far behind the USA and the rest of Europe. In 1999, Bill Clinton allocated 500 million US dollars to nano research through the Nanotech Initiative. The same year, the Norwegian White Paper on Research was presented without ment

H2i Technologies of France is to present its new, innovative user-machine interface at the Electronica show to be held in Munich in the autumn. This cutting-edge, patented optoelectronic technology re-invents data-entry systems for industrial and medical equipment as well as consumer and household goods by making it possible for any surface to be fully interactive – thus leading designers and engineers to re-think the ergonomic and other features of the devices they make.

As the winner of

A nanocrystalline metal is one whose average grain size is measured in billionths of a meter, much smaller than in most ordinary metals. As the grain size of a metal shrinks, it can become many times stronger, but it also usually loses ductility. To take advantage of increasing strength with decreasing grain size, researchers must first understand a fundamental problem: by what processes do nanosized crystals of metal stretch, bend, or otherwise deform under strain?

A team of re

The Free-Electron Laser (FEL), supported by the Office of Naval Research and located at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility, achieved 10 kilowatts of infrared laser light in late July, making it the most powerful tunable laser in the world. The recently upgraded laser’s new capabilities will enhance defense and manufacturing technologies, and support advanced studies of chemistry, physics, biology, and more.

“No other laser can provide the same be

A significant breakthrough in the development of the highly prized semiconductor gallium nitride as a building block for nanotechnology has been achieved by a team of scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California at Berkeley.

For the first time ever, the researchers have been able control the direction in which a gallium nitride nanowire grows. Growth direction is critical to determining the