Process Engineering

Data gathered by Penn State engineers in a volunteer effort at the World Trade Center tragedy, suggests that simple, inexpensive microphones dropped into the rubble of a collapsed building may be able to aid search and rescue teams despite ground level noise.

Dr. Thomas B. Gabrielson, associate professor of acoustics and senior research associate at Penn State’s Applied Research Laboratory, says, “In conventional survivor searches, noise generating activities at the surface must be stopped

Penn State engineers have developed a low- cost, high-torque rotary motor, based on “smart” materials, that can be configured in a wide range of formats, including one as flat and thin as a CD case.

The inventors say that, in the flat format, the motor could be used to drive changes in the camber of airplane wings or fins, essentially shape-shifting the curvature of the wing or fin surface.

In other formats, the motor could work in tightly integrated spaces where other motors can

Oxford University researchers have devised a novel coil design for magnetic resonance (MR) application, devised specifically for deep organ MR where sensitive imaging and spectroscopy have been previously difficult.

Deep organ magnetic resonance requires maximised sensitivity and magnetic field homogeneity over a relatively large field of view (FOV). However, it is difficult to maximise both sensitivity and magnetic field homogeneity simultaneously. The sensitivity can be maximised by reduci

Details published in Jan. 10 issue of the journal Science

Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have developed a series of novel techniques in nanotechnology that hold promise for applications ranging from highly targeted pharmaceutical therapies, to development of nutrition-enhanced foods known as “nutraceuticals,” to nanoscopic sensors that might one day advance medical imaging and diagnostics. The research, published in the Jan. 10 issue of Science, was funded by

Nanoshell sensor opens door for new methods to exam single molecules

Nanotechnology researchers at Rice University have demonstrated the ability to precisely control the electromagnetic field around nanoparticles, opening the door for chemical screening techniques that could allow doctors, life scientists and chemists to routinely analyze samples as small as a single molecule.

The research is detailed in the current issue of Applied Physics Letters. It builds upon a widely u

When you buy a bottle of wine for the holidays, you are actually paying for more than a bottle. That’s because during the months or years that the wine was aging, as much as 15 percent of it was lost to evaporation.

Now, that loss of good wine can be prevented — and wine prices reduced — with an atomizer system that keeps the humidity inside and outside the barrels equal, thereby eliminating the evaporation that occurs as nature works to maintain equilibrium.

The system, develop