ScienceDaily: Top Technology News

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• BOSS quasars unveil a new era in the expansion history of the universe
• The aftermath of calculator use in college classrooms
• Jellyfish-inspired device that captures cancer cells from blood samples could enable better patient monitoring
• A better route to xylan: Researchers find new access to abundant biomass for advanced biofuels
• 'Strain tuning' reveals promise in nanoscale manufacturing
• New power generation technique: Hybrid nanomaterial converts light and thermal energy into electrical current
• Oak Ridge National Laboratory's supercomputer named world’s most powerful
• First noiseless single photon amplifier
• New way to split water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen: Breakthrough for solar energy conversion and storage?
• Looking for information? Turn the pages with just your eyes
• CERN collider to become the world's fastest stopwatch?
• Surveying Earth's interior with atomic clocks
• Stable compounds of oxygen and 'inert' gas xenon predicted

BOSS quasars unveil a new era in the expansion history of the universe Posted: 12 Nov 2012 07:43 PM PST BOSS, the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey, is mapping a huge volume of space to measure the role of dark energy in the evolution of the universe. BOSS is the largest program of the third Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-III) and has just announced the first major result of a new mapping technique, based on the spectra of over 48,000 quasars with redshifts up to 3.5, meaning that light left these active galaxies up to 11.5 billion years in the past.

The aftermath of calculator use in college classrooms Posted: 12 Nov 2012 02:14 PM PST Math instructors promoting calculator usage in college classrooms may want to rethink their teaching strategies, experts say. They have proposed the need for further research regarding calculators' role in the classroom after conducting a limited study with undergraduate engineering students.

Jellyfish-inspired device that captures cancer cells from blood samples could enable better patient monitoring Posted: 12 Nov 2012 02:13 PM PST Tumor cells circulating in a patient's bloodstream can yield a great deal of information on how a tumor is responding to treatment and what drugs might be more effective against it. But first, these rare cells have to be captured and isolated from the many other cells found in a blood sample. Scientists are now working on microfluidic devices that can isolate circulating tumor cells.

A better route to xylan: Researchers find new access to abundant biomass for advanced biofuels Posted: 12 Nov 2012 12:03 PM PST Researchers have identified a gene in rice plants whose suppression improves both the extraction of xylan and the overall release of the sugars needed to make biofuels.

'Strain tuning' reveals promise in nanoscale manufacturing Posted: 12 Nov 2012 12:03 PM PST Researcher combined theoretical and experimental studies to understand and control the self-assembly of insulating barium zirconium oxide nanodots and nanorods within barium-copper-oxide superconducting films.

New power generation technique: Hybrid nanomaterial converts light and thermal energy into electrical current Posted: 12 Nov 2012 10:56 AM PST Researchers have created a hybrid nanomaterial that can be used to convert light and thermal energy into electrical current. The team built a prototype thermoelectric generator they hope can eventually produce milliwatts for use in devices such as self-powering sensors, low-power electronic devices and implantable biomedical micro-devices, they said. They have also coupled gold nanoparticles with copper sulfide nanoparticles for potential use in cancer therapy.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory's supercomputer named world’s most powerful Posted: 12 Nov 2012 07:13 AM PST The U.S. Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory is again home to the most powerful computer in the world, according to the Top500 list, a semiannual ranking of computing systems around the world.

First noiseless single photon amplifier Posted: 12 Nov 2012 07:10 AM PST Research physicists have demonstrated the first device capable of amplifying the information in a single particle of light without adding noise. The next step will be to build additional quantum teleportation into the experiment, which will make the noiseless amplifier more directly useful for long-distance communication.

New way to split water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen: Breakthrough for solar energy conversion and storage? Posted: 12 Nov 2012 06:59 AM PST Using the power of the sun and ultrathin films of iron oxide, Israeli researchers have found a novel way to split water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen. The breakthrough could lead to less expensive, more efficient ways to store solar energy in the form of hydrogen-based fuels.

Looking for information? Turn the pages with just your eyes Posted: 12 Nov 2012 06:04 AM PST Putting on a pair of novel data glasses with an OLED microdisplay allows you to see not only the real world, but also a wealth of virtual information. Imagine looking through a repair manual; the trick here is that you turn the pages using just your eyes.

CERN collider to become the world's fastest stopwatch? Posted: 12 Nov 2012 06:00 AM PST Heavy ion collisions at CERN should be able to produce the shortest light pulses ever created, computer simulations demonstrate. The pulses are so short that they cannot even be measured by today's technological equipment. Now, a method has been proposed to create the world's most precise stopwatch for the world's shortest light pulses, using a detector which is going to be installed at CERN in 2018.

Surveying Earth's interior with atomic clocks Posted: 12 Nov 2012 06:00 AM PST Have you ever thought to use a clock to identify mineral deposits or concealed water resources within the Earth? Some scientists are convinced that ultraprecise portable atomic clocks will make this a reality in the next decade. The scientists argue that these atomic clocks have already reached the necessary degree of precision to be useful for geophysical surveying. They say that such clocks will provide the most direct measurement of the geoid – the Earth's true physical form. It will also be possible to combine atomic clocks measurements to existent geophysical methods to explore the interior of the Earth.

Stable compounds of oxygen and 'inert' gas xenon predicted Posted: 12 Nov 2012 05:49 AM PST An international team of researchers has established stability of several oxides of normally inert xenon. These compounds are predicted to be stable at high pressures above 830,000 atmospheres, i.e. at pressures corresponding to Earth's mantle and readily achievable in the laboratory.

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