Student-designed device helps the visually impaired avoid hazards, day and night

Using a common laptop computer and a sophisticated head-mounted projection device, students at the University of Washington (UW) have created a system to help people with poor vision navigate around stationary objects.

The Wearable Low Vision Aid (WLVA) is the first portable device to draw attention to obstacles using an illuminated, vibrating crystal that projects a warning icon-a raster image

Some of the first data from a new orbiting infrared telescope are revealing that the Milky Way – and by analogy galaxies in general – is making new stars at a much more prolific pace than astronomers imagined.

The findings from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope were announced today (May 27) at a NASA headquarters press briefing by Edward Churchwell, a University of Wisconsin-Madison astronomer and the leader of a team conducting the most detailed survey to date of our galaxy in infrared l

New percolation model may allow researchers to study biochemistry at the atomic level A new report in the May 24 Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series A: Mathematical and Physical Sciences announces a mathematical model that will help researchers understand “cell signaling” and learn how single atoms travel along the circuitous pathways in a cell. The model is a new approach to look at percolation-the flow of a liquid or small particle through a porous material.

Astrophysical Virtual Observatory Proves To Be Essential Tool Active galaxies

Active galaxies are breathtaking objects. Their compact nuclei (AGN = Active Galaxy Nuclei) are so luminous that they can outshine the entire galaxy; “quasars” constitute extreme cases of this phenomenon, their powerful engine making them visible over a very large fraction of the observable Universe.

It is now widely accepted that the ultimate power station of these activities originates in sup

How would it feel to pick up a Boeing 777 while standing on an asteroid? Or to play with a yo-yo on Mars? Or even to explore a box that is larger on the inside than on the outside? All these things are now possible as scientists at the University of Reading are developing technology which allows computer users to touch, grip and even manipulate ‘impossible objects’.

The methods are still in their infancy, but the new technology has a variety of potential applications, including training sim

By linking biometrics with cryptographic authentication, the VIPBOB IST project has developed a new and more secure method of verifying a person’s unique identification number using an old-fashioned, but proven method – the fingerprint.

Biometrics refers to the measurement of certain properties of the human body, such as the ridges on the fingertip, the structure of this iris or the pattern of speech. Many of these properties are truly random – they are different even for genetically i

System crashes are not only annoying, they can bring a company to its knees. So IT specialists will welcome a way to measure the dependability of standard operating systems (OS). After conducting hundreds of computer-stress experiments, a European consortium has developed a new benchmarking method for commercial and open source systems.

Gone are the days when performance was all that mattered. What information technology people want – but rarely get – is a reliable system. Especially now th

Quasars are the most brilliant of cosmic fireworks, shining out across billions of light-years of space. However, a recent study done at Gemini Observatory shows that they appear to blaze forth from humdrum galaxies in the early universe, and surprisingly, not from the giant or disrupted ones astronomers expected.

According to an international team of astronomers that studied an assortment of these luminous objects near the edge of the observable universe, these pedestrian galactic surroun

As the Cassini spacecraft hurtles toward a rendezvous with Saturn on June 30 (July 1, Universal Time), both Cassini and the Earth-orbiting Hubble Space Telescope snapped spectacular pictures of the planet and its magnificent rings.

Cassini is approaching Saturn at an oblique angle to the sun and from below the ecliptic plane. Cassini has a very different view of Saturn than Hubble’s Earth-centered view. For the first time, astronomers can compare equally sharp views of Saturn from two very

Researchers at the University of Michigan have developed a new technique for drawing maps that could provide a valuable tool for showing human data such as census findings, election results or disease incidence.

The new technique produces cartograms—maps where sizes of areas on the map are in proportion to the population or some other variable, said Mark Newman, assistant professor of physics in the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts. Newman wrote a paper on the technique, which

Work has started today (May 25th) on the construction of an optical fibre network which will connect five radio telescopes to the giant 76-m Lovell Telescope at Jodrell Bank Observatory, operated by The University of Manchester in rural Cheshire, allowing it to operate with vastly improved sensitivity.

This e-MERLIN network will operate as single radio telescope spanning 217 km, with unprecedented sensitivity provided by the enormous data rates carried by the optical fibres. The combination

As the pace of the Modernising Government agenda increases, support for electronic service delivery is becoming an increasingly essential pre-requisite of most ICT strategies. e-Government is forcing a radical re-evaluation of the role played by websites, Intranets and customer service teams. Many local authorities are already using the Internet imaginatively to provide community information services with limited degrees of end user interaction. Others have developed or are re-designing existing cu

This image of the Arsia Mons shield volcano was taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA’s Mars Express.

This image shows a spectacular zone of collapse features on the southern flank of the giant shield volcano Arsia Mons (located at 239°E longitude and 10°S latitude, see the Mars map image).

The image was taken from an altitude of about 400 kilometres during orbit 263 of the Mars Express spacecraft.

The original image resolution was 20 metres pe

Computer scientists at the University of Essex have been awarded a grant to develop an intelligent robotic wheelchair.

Researchers from the Department of Computer Science will work alongside scientists from the Institute of Automation at Beijing in developing the advanced technology needed for a high performance, low cost RoboChair which will enable the elderly and disabled to gain increased mobility and live more independently.

The RoboChair will have a user-friendly man-ma

Like most creation stories, this one is dramatic: we began, not as a mere glimmer buried in an obscure cloud, but instead amidst the glare and turmoil of restless giants.

Or so says a new theory, supported by stunning astronomical images and hard chemical analysis. For years most astronomers have imagined that the Sun and Solar System formed in relative isolation, buried in a quiet, dark corner of a less-than-imposing interstellar cloud. The new theory challenges this conventional wisdom, a

Physicists at Lehigh University achieve supercontinuum generation in nonlinear fibers

Two physicists at Lehigh University have produced a rainbow of visible and invisible colors by focusing laser light in a specially designed optical fiber that confines light in a glass core whose diameter is 40 times smaller than that of a human hair.

Jean Toulouse, professor of physics, and Iavor Veltchev, research associate in Lehigh’s Center for Optical Technologies (COT), are among the