Engineers at Purdue University have developed a technique that could result in more accurate “ultra-wideband” radio signals for ground-penetrating radar, radio communications and imaging systems designed to see through walls.
The researchers first create laser pulses with specific “shapes,” which precisely characterize the changing intensity of light from the beginning to end of each pulse. The pulses are then converted into electrical signals for various applications.
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Your car’s engine loses 70 percent of its energy as waste heat — but Australian and Oregon scientists may have figured out an efficient way not only to recover that lost energy, but to at long last capture the power-producing potential of geothermal heat.
The trick is to convert it to electricity — and a promising way to accomplish this, the researchers have discovered, involves using extremely thin nanowires to potentially more than double the efficiency of thermoelectri
The newest Fraunhofer developments in hydrogen technology can be seen at the Hydrogen + Fuel Cells Stand at the Hanover Trade Fair. The Fraunhofer Institute for Ceramic Technologies and Sintered Materials IKTS will display durable SOFC stacks with a power of 1 kWel. The fuel cells are intended for application in distributed power supplies and can be operated with either fossil fuels or biogas. In addition, an extremely thin Ag/Zn micro-battery for integration in sensor cards will be presented.
Scientists have been able to follow the flow of excitation energy in both time and space in a molecular complex using a new technique called two-dimensional electronic spectroscopy. While holding great promise for a broad range of applications, this technique has already been used to make a surprise finding about the process of photosynthesis. The technique was developed by a team of researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the Univ
University of California scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory working with a researcher from Chonnam National University in South Korea have found that magnetic fluctuations appear to be responsible for superconductivity in a compound called plutonium-cobalt-pentagallium (PuCoGa5). The discovery of this “unconventional superconductivity” may lead scientists to a whole new class of superconducting materials and toward the goal of eventually synthesizing “room-temperature” superconductors.
As gasoline prices climb ever higher and the U.S. Senate backs oil drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the possibility of a hydrogen economy — where drivers tank up on clean-burning hydrogen fuel — gleams more brightly. But two Northwestern University engineers stress the need to get more out of the fuel we are already using.
“A hydrogen economy is not a perfectly clean system,” said Scott A. Barnett, professor of materials science and engineering. “You
Grow grass, not for fun but for fuel. Burning grass for energy has been a well-accepted technology in Europe for decades. But not in the United States.
Yet burning grass pellets as a biofuel is economical, energy-efficient, environmentally friendly and sustainable, says a Cornell University forage crop expert.
This alternative fuel easily could be produced and pelleted by farmers and burned in modified stoves built to burn wood pellets or corn, says Jerry Cherney, the E.V.
Infrared Emitter From Heraeus Noblelight With Quartz Reflector
The benefits of infrared heating can also be enjoyed under vacuum. Heraeus Noblelight a company within the worldwide Heraeus precious metals and technology organisation, is showing infrared emitters for the semi-conductor sector at the Semicon Exhibition, which takes place in Munich from the 12th to 14th April. Thanks to a newly developed reflector, there have been significant improvements in heating processes carrie
Engineers and applied physicists have laid the foundations for a new type of “plug and play” laser — the Raman injection laser — and in the process, several key innovations in laser technology. The device combines the advantages of nonlinear optical devices and semiconductor injection lasers with a compact design, and may one day lead to wide-ranging applications in imaging and detection.
Published in the Feb. 24th issue of Nature, the proof of concept model was developed by Mari
A new ‘specimen access device’ (SPAD) to allow safe and fast access to spacecraft being tested in the Large Space Simulator chamber is now fully operational at ESA’s Test Centre.
The SPAD is basically a customised crane, carrying a basket to move an operator inside the Large Space Simulator (LSS). The LSS is a huge chamber at ESA’s European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) in the Netherlands, which can simulate the space environment. Its exceptional test volume makes it
Research could result in clean, inexpensive hydrogen fuel
Sunlight splitting water molecules to produce hydrogen using devices too small to be seen in a standard microscope. That’s a goal of a research team from the National Nuclear Security Administration’s Sandia National Laboratories. The research has captured the interest of chemists around the world pursuing methods of producing hydrogen from water.
“The broad objective of the research is to design and fabric
A unique rover-based life detection system developed by Carnegie Mellon University scientists has found signs of life in Chile’s Atacama Desert, according to results being presented at the 36th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference March 14-18 in Houston. This marks the first time a rover-based automated technology has been used to identify life in this harsh region, which serves as a test bed for technology that could be deployed in future Mars missions.
“Our life detec
Although NASA’s X-43A and other hypersonic airplanes use air-breathing engines and fly much like 747s, there’s a big difference between ripping air at Mach 10 (around 7,000 mph) and cruising through it at 350 mph.
These differences are even more pronounced when hypersonic aircraft sip rarified air at 100,000 feet, while commercial airliners gulp the much thicker stuff at 30,000. Aero-thermodynamic heating is a very big deal at Mach 10. The critical point comes where air changes f
Chemical engineers at Purdue University have made a discovery that may help to improve a promising low-polluting energy technology that combusts natural gas more cleanly than conventional methods.
The finding revolves around the fact that catalysts and other materials vital to industry have complex crystalline structures with numerous sides, or facets. Different facets sometimes provide higher performance than others, so industry tries to prepare catalytic materials that contai
Star Trek-like technology being developed at The University of Arizona might soon screen airplane passengers for explosives as they walk through a portal similar to a metal detector while hand-held units scan their baggage.
The new device is about 1,000 times more sensitive than the equipment currently used in airports to discern explosives. Rather than analyzing a swab from a person’s briefcase, the new technology could detect the traces of explosives left in air that passes
A wood-fueled electricity generating plant may be in your future.
In fact, the future is ’now’ in some Scandinavian countries, said Dr. Darwin Foster, Texas Cooperative Extension forestry program leader. “In Sweden, they’re already bundling up what we’re leaving in the forest after a timber harvest and using it as bio-fuel,” Foster said. “Bio-fuel” is all-inclusive term that includes any renewable resource used to generate energy. As with ethanol distilled fr
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