Reunited and It Feels So Good...

December 27, 2007

It's a winter sight as familiar as runny noses and salted sidewalks: one lone glove pathetically half-buried in curbside slush.

Now a Web site could help reunite a lone glove with its mate. Last month, Jennifer Gooch, a graduate student at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA, launched One Cold Hand, a lost-and-found website for missing mittens and forgotten gloves. Read the New York Times article here.

 

So if you live in Pittsburgh and find a stranded glove or mitten, you can mail it to One Cold Hand, #1007, 5032 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15289. Or you can drop it in a box at one of a dozen or so participating businesses. Once it finds its way back to Gooch, she'll photograph it and post the image to her site, accompanied by descriptive tags (leather, right, left, fingerless, chenille, bling) that aid the search. 

Gooch is planning to start up similar sites in Milan and Philadelphia. And she's hoping to showcase photos of the gloves in an upcoming art show and book.

Car Drives Underwater

December 21, 2007

In the 1977 film, "The Spy Who Loved Me" James Bond evades the bad guys by driving his Lotus Esprit underwater.

Now a two-seater car called the sQuba can do the same. Developed by the Swiss company Rinspeed, the vehicle can drive on land and then, with the push of a button, dive to depths of 33 feet.

On land, an electric motor drives the car forward. Underwater, two propellers in the stern and two jet drives in the bow propels it. In both environments: zero emissions. A self-contained oxygen system supply occupants with fresh air for breathing.

The car will be on display at the Geneva Motor Show in March, 2008. But don't hold your breath. Mass-production of the car is not being planned.

Bio-Batteries: Power From the People

December 20, 2007

This week, I wrote about a pacemaker powered by heartbeats. But biobatteries don’t stop there. Simon Levinson, a biophysicist at the University of Colorado Medical School in Denver, proposes that charged particles, called ions, naturally present in cells could be harnessed to make miniature batteries that power insulin pumps or pacemakers. A short description of the invention is here, and his patent can be read here.

This Is Your Skin on Cryo-Electron Tomography

December 11, 2007

For the first time, scientists have produced 3D images of human skin cells at a molecular resolution. This sounds really sciency and it is, but the images are gorgeous and you should have a look. Because this is what you're made of.

Until now, it's been difficult to image cellular components like proteins because other imaging techniques require that living tissue be treated with chemicals or coated in metal, which can alter the sample. This research, conducted by Achilleas     Frangakis, group leader at European Molecular Biology Lab uses a technique called cryo-electron tomography. Basically, they instantly freeze the tissue and then take pictures of it from different directions and then use a computer to compile those images into a 3D rendering.

The image above shows a human skin cell. Different colors represent different cellular organelles: cell-cell contact [sandy brown], nucleus and nuclear envelope [blue] with pores [red], microtubules [green], mitochondria [purple], and endoplasmic reticulum [steel blue].

This image shows cadherin molecules, proteins that ensure that cells within tissues are bound together.

You can read more about the research here, or get the academic paper here.

VR Could Accelerate Nanotech Reality

December 10, 2007

Today on Discovery Channel's News site, I have a piece about a specially designed nanoparticle that could offer targeted drug delivery. 

The potential medical applications for these kinds of molecular machines are far reaching. But a lot of work still needs to be done before nanorobots are zipping through our blood stream like Bay Watch patrols.

A group of researchers are working to accelerate that mission by using virtual reality simulations, which are helping to advance the understanding how to interact with and control nanorobots inside the body. They published their results in a recent issue of Nanotechnology.

In one real-time simulation, nanorobots equipped with chemical, temperature and other sensors are charged with finding specific proteins inside vessels with varying diameters and bringing the proteins back to an organ for drug deliver. Some robots are tasked with the same job but have no sensors.

The results show that nanorobots have a better chance of finding a target when they use sensors, and have more success in smaller vessels, where there are fewer obstacles floating around. 

It may seem obvious, but until the test is done, who knows. That's where VR comes in. It can also help researchers come up with a wish list of necessary technologies before they even exist. 

For more information, see NanoRobotDesign.

Electric Bike-Share Program Coming to the US

December 06, 2007

Despite the fact that Asia and Europe seem gung-ho over the notion of citywide bike-sharing programs, the U.S. still lags behind. We are a car-loving country with people who guard their autonomy and worship the vehicles that give it to us.

This week on Discovery's News site, I wrote a piece about a foldable electric scooter being developed by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The idea is to make these scooters available to commuters at conveniently located, one-way rental racks. While researching the piece, I was pleased to find out that there is one bike-share project being implemented next fall at the University of Washington, Seattle. Forty bikes from Intrago will be distributed among four station located at the edge of campus and made available to students, faculty and staff.

Bike-sharing is not a technology, but a transportation solution that could impact technology. For example, a lot of research is going into developing more fuel-efficient cars, but fuel-efficiency doesn't  solve congestion problems in urban areas. Electric bikes or scooters made available as part of city's mass transit plan could go a long way to preserving our autonomy while reducing pollution and traffic.

For more bike-sharing news and to see a world map of bike-sharing locations, see Paul DeMaio's blogspot.