Up to 20 million homes in Europe could be powered by clean renewable energy from the sea, according to ocean energy expert Teresa Pontes of Portugal, who was speaking at the EurOCEAN marine science and policy event in Galway today (12th May). She estimated that, by harnessing energy from waves and marine currents, Europe would produce around 200 TerraWatt (200 million megawatt) hours per year of electrical power.

“The oceans contain a huge energy resource with different origins,” said Ms. Te

Like the signals it emits, the radio may soon disappear from sight.

University of Florida electrical engineers have installed a radio antenna less than one-tenth of an inch long on a computer chip and demonstrated that it can send and receive signals across a room. The achievement is another step in the team’s continuing efforts to build an “ultrasmall radio chip” – a transceiver, processor and battery all placed on a chip not much larger than a pinhead – and one that could one

Wind tunnel tests of scale-model humpback whale flippers have revealed that the scalloped, bumpy flipper is a more efficient wing design than is currently used by the aeronautics industry on airplanes. The tests show that bump-ridged flippers do not stall as quickly and produce more lift and less drag than comparably sized sleek flippers.

The tests were reported by biomechanicist Frank Fish of West Chester University, Penn., fluid dynamics engineer Laurens Howle of the Pratt School of Engin

A group of researchers at the Public University of Navarre, together with Volkswagen Navarra, have designed an individual system for the intelligent detection of cracks in links in production assembly lines to which a detector of wear and tear in bolts has been incorporated.

The project is part of the joint working agreement that Volkswagen Navarra have had with the Public University of Navarre since 1997 and which has produced a number of results in the field of applied R+D. In this case i

Researchers at the Public University of Navarre and the Navarre Industry Association research centre have managed to increase by 30 to 500 % the superficial hardness and resistance to wear of metals and V5Ti alloys by means of applying nitrogen. These results could be of great use for different industrial applications in which these types of materials are employed such as in the aeronautic and biomedical sectors.

Economic losses

The wear and tear of tools and machine tools i

The car will not be the first application for fuel cells. This is one of the conclusions in the doctoral thesis of Robert van den Hoed, which he will defend on 17 May at TU Delft. “My research project confirms that large organisations such as in the automobile industry have trouble implementing radical changes.” A fuel cell powered car as a case to gain insight into radical innovation theory.

For years now, fuel cells running on hydrogen have been mentioned as an environmentally friendly a

Wooley technique ’linchpin’ to success

Using a technique pioneered by Washington University in St. Louis chemist Karen Wooley, Ph.D., scientists have developed a novel way to make discrete carbon nanoparticles for electrical components used in industry and research.

The method uses polyacrylonitrile (PAN) as a nanoparticle precursor and is relatively low cost, simple and potentially scalable to commercial production levels. It provides significant advantages over existing

Using improved processing equipment developed with support from the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Advanced Technology Program, American Superconductor Corporation (AMSC) has produced lengths of record-breaking high-temperature superconductor (HTS) wire.

The company recently announced that it achieved electric current carrying capacity in multiple 10-meter lengths of second-generation (2G) HTS wire equal to or better than 250 Amperes per centimeter of width, an indust

With often over 200 alarms installed on today’s ships, the risk of information overload is real. TELEMAS’ tool can track and manage alarms by taking input from the various computers and alarms on board and presenting them to the crew in a uniform and structured way.

With funding from the IST programme TELEMAS developed a middleware tool called Umbrella. “It brings together information from various data sources on board. For instance, you might have a cruise vessel that has over 1,

Australian scientists have developed a breakthrough low-cost, lightweight, concrete technology that is set to lower costs and speed up construction projects from residential homes to high-rise buildings.

HySSIL (High-Strength, Structural, Insulative, Lightweight) panels are manufactured using a new low energy, process developed by CSIRO Novel Materials & Processes. Dr Swee Liang Mak, who leads the HySSIL development team at CSIRO says, ’HySSIL is a revolutionary aerated cementitious (cement

A new type of polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) is being developed by researchers at the Department of Energy’s Sandia National Laboratories to help bring the goal of a micro fuel cell closer to realization using diverse fuels like glucose, methanol, and hydrogen.

This Sandia Polymer Electrolyte Alternative (SPEA) could help fulfill the need for new, uninterrupted autonomous power sources for sensors, communications, microelectronics, healthcare applications, and transportation.

Imagine throwing out your old shrimp shells after dinner–in a bag made of shrimp shells. In his doctoral dissertation, Mikael Gällstedt at the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden describes how we can make environmentally friendly packing out of garbage.

The number of grocery packages is constantly growing. Most packages are made of plastic, which both adds to the mountains of waste and uses oil reserves. There are good reasons to look for smart, environmentally friendly alternatives.

For the last few years scientists at the Nanometer Consortium at Lund University have been able to make nanowires, tiny wires just a few millionths of a millimeter “thick” and made of semiconducting material of great potential in the electronics industry. Now they have managed to produce “nanotrees,” in fact tiny forests on the same scale.

This is described in an article (“Synthesis of branched ‘nanotrees’ by controlled seeding of multiple branching events”) in the journal Nature Materials,

Researchers at Purdue University are working with industry to develop an “intelligent” system that could save U.S. companies $1 billion annually in manufacturing costs by improving precision-grinding processes for parts production.

“Precision grinding is currently an art that relies heavily on the experience and knowledge of employees who have been in the business for years,” said Yung Shin, a professor of mechanical engineering who is leading the Purdue portion of the research. “The problem

First demonstration that ’MAP’ laser technique can be used non-destructively on biomaterials; potential applications range from medical research to fiber optics

Researchers in the laboratory of Boston College Chemistry Professor John T. Fourkas have demonstrated the fabrication of microscopic polymeric structures on top of a human hair.

Fourkas, in collaboration with Boston College Physics Professor Michael J. Naughton and Professors Malvin C. Teich and Bahaa E. A.

Researchers are testing the feasibility of using radar technology to detect mold behind gypsum wallboard. A common problem, hidden mold can cause serious structural damage and health problems before homeowners discover it.

Hoping to develop a non-destructive and less expensive method than is now available to detect mold behind walls, Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) scientists are collaborating with humidity control expert Lew Harriman of Mason-Grant Consulting in a two-year feasibili