Tech

Jun 25, 2013 02:31 PM EDT

Robot Based Off Hamster Ball Could Improve Crop Yields [VIDEO]

Self-driving cars and robots that can pour beer are all well and good, but researchers at the Technical University of Madrid have turned to hamsters as their muse in a rolling ball they say could be used to help monitor soil conditions on arable land.

Jun 24, 2013 08:23 PM EDT

ISS: Astronauts Start Daring House Cleaning Exercise

Two astronauts on board of the International Space Station started a daring spacewalk to clear space for a Russian space module to be installed later this year.

Jun 21, 2013 04:19 PM EDT

Proof-of-Concept Data System Could Lead to Far Superior Storage Chips

Researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology have proposed a new kind of data-storage system that could eventually lead to computer and data-storage chips capable of packing a far greater punch than today's options much faster and for much less energy.

Jun 21, 2013 01:53 PM EDT

Physicists Develop Table-Top Accelerator to Compete With the Big Guys

With popular devices shrinking with every new model, physicists at the University of Texas at Austin weren't going to be outdone, together developing a tabletop particle accelerator capable of generating energies and speeds previously reached only facilities hundreds of meters long and costing millions of dollars to build.

Jun 21, 2013 09:59 AM EDT

Wood and Tin Nanobatteries May Soon Hit the Market [VIDEO]

Wood and tin could make a miniscule, long-lasting battery, according to researchers at the University of Maryland.

Jun 20, 2013 06:48 AM EDT

Eco-Friendly Batteries Made Using Wood Slivers

Researchers at the University of Maryland have created a battery that is made of a sliver of wood, coated with tin. This eco-friendly battery is a 1000 times thinner than paper and can last longer than a commercial battery.

Jun 19, 2013 03:28 PM EDT

Sound Waves Open the Door to Advanced Placement of Nanowires

Through the use of sound waves, researchers at Penn State announced Wednesday they have devised a way to place nanowires in repeatable patterns - a discovery that could have significant ramifications in the manufacturing of the world's increasingly small devices.

Interlaced stack of electrodes that were printed layer by layer to create the working anode and cathode of a microbattery.

Jun 19, 2013 10:06 AM EDT

3D Printed Batteries can Help Make Miniature Medical Implants

Harvard researchers have now shown that lithium-ion batteries as tiny as a grain of sand could be printed using 3D printing technology. These batteries could be used to power tiny medical implants.

Jun 18, 2013 05:01 PM EDT

Quibbling Over Qubits: New Discovery Marks Milestone in Quantum Computer Science

Quantum bits, or qubits, are considered the basic building blocks of quantum computers, the futuristic machines that, once developed, promise to answer problems too complex for today's technology. And now, a team of researchers at the University of New South Wales has discovered a new way to distinguish between those small blocks, even when they are microscopic distances apart.

Jun 18, 2013 12:07 PM EDT

New Echolocation Technique Can Map a Room with the Snap of a Finger

Bats and dolphins are known to use echolocation to navigate, and there have been reports of some blind people being able to "see" the contours of a room based on how sound travels around. Now, researchers have developed a methodology that they believe will take the concept of echolocation to the next level.