Erasable E-paper Can Be Printed, Erased, Reprinted Over 250 Times (video)

by Jaymi Heimbuch

from: http://www.treehugger.com/

Image via video screengrab

Researchers have created a new e-paper can be printed and erased over and over again, and they hope it can be a reusable solution for the posters and signs printed by the millions for bus stop ads and store front displays.

Reuters reports that the new e-paper, by researchers at the Industrial Technology Research Institute, can be printed with a thermal printer like that used for fax machines. And when it's ready to be erased, one only needs to flip a switch and it's ready to be printed again -- up to 260 times.

The e-paper can produce different colors for more dynamic posters, and doesn't require a backlight. It is different from e-paper devices because it is essentially just the display, disconnected from any device that might update the display. The e-paper is printed with one image, and that's it until it is erased and reprinted. In the past, we've seen researchers excited about replacing paper signs or billboards with e-ink displays that can be updated on a whim, but this e-paper is a closer equivalent to the single-use printed posters we're used to, only they can be reprinted.

The researchers think it is a perfect solution for printing fewer posters and signs; however, it looks like it has a long way to go before it could really be considered a replacement for more colorful paper posters.

The posters still don't have the bright, crisp look that storefronts and advertisers would want. Yet, that could improve with time and already, an A4 sized piece of the e-paper will only cost about $2 -- and when it can be printed up to 260 times, that's quite cheap.

The only question is does a piece of e-paper used 260 times have a smaller footprint and environmental impact that 260 of the same sized printed paper posters? It would be interesting to see the life cycle analysis of the product.

Researchers hope to have the product available for the market within two years. But again, an LCA would be something we'd like to see before considering this a smart replacement for paper.

New elastic polymer self-heals in just one minute

By Yun Xie
From http://arstechnica.com/

Dominique Bersier and Gina Fiore for Adolphe Merkle Institute, Case Western Reserve University, US Army Research Laboratory.

Self-healing polymers are extremely sought after by scientists, as they have many useful—not to mention lucrative—applications. Back in 2009, we reported a polyurethane-based polymeric material that heals itself in roughly an hour when exposed to UV light. That particular polymer, made by Biswajit Ghosh and Marek W. Urban, would be useful as a protective coating for phones, cars, etc. It worked based on the principle of having a reactive chemical component that would split open when physically damaged to create two reactive ends that can then covalently link together under UV light to repair itself.

In a recent issue of Nature, Mark Burnworth and his colleagues report a different type of self-healing material, one that can repair itself in about a minute under UV light. Burnworth’s polymeric material also doesn’t function on the basis of forming chemical bonds between organic compounds for repair. Instead, it relies on localized heating and metal-ligand interactions.

Burnworth and his team used rubbery oligomers, poly(ethylene-co-butylene), as the core of their material. They attached ligands, 2,6-bis(1’-methylbenzimidazolyl)pyridine (Mebip), that can bind to metals at the ends of the oligomers. To form long polymers, the researchers added either zinc (Zn²⁺) or lanthanum (La³⁺) ions to the solution of oligomers. The metal ions form metal-ligand complexes with the Mebip, linking the oligomers with one another.

For their self-healing tests, Burnworth and his team shaped the polymers into films that were 350 to 400 µM thick. They purposefully cut the polymer to about 50 to 70 percent of the overall thickness of the film. When the cuts were exposed to two consecutive 30-second rounds of UV light (320 to 390 nm wavelength at an intensity of 950 mW cm^-2), the cuts sealed up. The healed material was comparable in toughness to the original polymeric film, and images from atomic force spectroscopy show that the cuts essentially disappeared.

This process works because complexes of Mebip with metals are chromophoric, so they can absorb light of a specific wavelength, such as light in the UV range. Once they absorb light, they get into a higher energetic state and then lose that energy by giving off heat. Thus, when the researchers exposed the cuts to UV light, there was heating at the surface of the polymeric film—enough heating to reach over 220°C in 30 seconds. The heat quickly depolymerizes the area around the cut. Once the UV light is turned off, the liquidized area cools, reforms the ligand-metal complexes, and seals up the cut.

The healing process can be localized, as you only need to hit damaged areas with UV light. The researchers also show that the healing process would still work if the polymer was under a load of about 8 kPa. They suggest that different ligands could be used to cover a range of absorbable wavelengths. Thus, you could selectively tailor the wavelength of light to heal different types of damaged materials.

Burnworth and his colleagues have made a significant step in getting us closer to having self-healing polymers on the market. Their approach is quite different than that of Ghosh and Urban, which we described previously. While Burnworth’s method certainly heals quicker, it also produces a dramatic increase in surface temperature during healing. Such a huge temperature surge could be disadvantageous for certain applications.

Nature, 2011. DOI: 10.1038/nature09963 (About DOIs)

Ancient Human Trash Heaps Gave Rise to Everglades Tree Islands, Research Suggests

From: http://www.sciencedaily.com/

Everglades National Park Florida USA. Garbage mounds left by prehistoric humans might have driven the formation of many of the Florida Everglades' tree islands, distinctive havens of exceptional ecological richness in the sprawling marsh that are today threatened by human development. (Credit: iStockphoto)

ScienceDaily (Mar. 21, 2011) — Garbage mounds left by prehistoric humans might have driven the formation of many of the Florida Everglades' tree islands, distinctive havens of exceptional ecological richness in the sprawling marsh that are today threatened by human development.

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Tree islands are patches of relatively high and dry ground that dot the marshes of the Everglades. Typically a meter (3.3 feet) or so high, many of them are elevated enough to allow trees to grow. They provide a nesting site for alligators and a refuge for birds, panthers, and other wildlife.

Scientists have thought for many years that the so-called fixed tree islands (a larger type of tree island frequently found in the Everglades' main channel, Shark River Slough) developed on protrusions from the rocky layer of a mineral called carbonate that sits beneath the marsh. Now, new research indicates that the real trigger for island development might have been middens, or trash piles left behind from human settlements that date to about 5,000 years ago.

These middens, a mixture of bones, food discards, charcoal, and human artifacts (such as clay pots and shell tools), would have provided an elevated area, drier than the surrounding marsh, allowing trees and other vegetation to grow. Bones also leaked phosphorus, a nutrient for plants that is otherwise scarce in the Everglades.

"This goes to show that human disturbance in the environment doesn't always have a negative consequence," says Gail Chmura, a paleoecologist at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, and one of the authors of the study.

Chmura will be presenting her research on March 22, at the American Geophysical Union's Chapman Conference on Climates, Past Landscapes, and Civilizations.

In a previous scientific investigation of tree islands, Margo Schwadron, an archeologist with the National Park Service, cut through the elevated bedrock at the base of two islands and discovered that it was actually a so-called "perched carbonate layer," because there was more soil and a midden below. Later, a team including Chmura's graduate student Maria-Theresia Graf performed additional excavations in South Florida and found more of the perched carbonate layers.

Chemical analysis of samples of these curious perched layers revealed that they are made up partially of carbonates that had dissolved from the bedrock below, Chmura says. The layer also contains phosphorus from dissolved bones, she adds. Her team concluded that trees are key to the formation of this layer: During South Florida's dry season, their roots draw in large quantities of ground water but allow the phosphates and carbonates dissolved in it to seep out and coalesce into the stone-like layer.

The perched carbonate plays a key role in letting tree islands rebound after fires: because it does not burn, it protects the underlying soil, and it maintains the islands' elevation, allowing vegetation to regrow after the fire. Humans are now threatening the existence of tree islands, by cutting down trees (whose roots keep the perched layer in place) and artificially maintaining high water levels year-round in some water control systems, which could cause the layer to dissolve.

Chmura's team now wants to explore exactly when trees started growing on the tree islands.

The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by ScienceDaily staff) from materials provided by American Geophysical Union, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Stirling Engine Made with Soda Cans Spins to 860 RPM (Video)

by Michael Graham Richard
from http://www.treehugger.com/

Photo: Youtube

You Can Use the Sun as a Source of Heat

Stirling engines are a type of heat engine. They convert heat into mechanical work (you can find out more about how they work here), which means that it is possible to use the sun as a source of heat to general clean power. The video below shows a working stirling engine build out of soda cans that spins up to almost a thousand RPM!

Here's a non-soda-cans stirling engine (suspended at the center of the dish) that uses a solar concentrator as a source of heat instead of candles. It's a bit more sophisticated, to say the least, but it works on the same principle.

Photo: Public domain

The Stirling engine is noted for its high efficiency (up to 40% in practice, same as the Carnot cycle in theory), quiet operation, and the ease with which it can use almost any heat source. This compatibility with alternative and renewable energy sources has become increasingly significant as the price of conventional fuels rises, and also in light of concerns such as peak oil and climate change. This engine is currently exciting interest as the core component of micro combined heat and power (CHP) units, in which it is more efficient and safer than a comparable steam engine. Stirling engines (especially free-piston types) are also being considered by NASA for use in space exploration. (source)

Via Youtube

Pedal-Powered Washing Machine Gets Big Company Backing

by Jaymi Heimbuch

from: http://www.treehugger.com/

Photo via Gizmag

Bike-powered washing machines aren't a new idea; however, at least one big appliance company is backing up the idea. Haier, an large electronics company out of China, showed off a human-powered washing machine concept at IFA 2010. It's fairly simple -- an exercise bike collects energy as the person pedals, and the charging battery then powers the washing machine. Supposedly 20 minutes of work is enough to wash one load of clothes on cold cycle. The idea of using human power to get off grid even a little bit is tempting -- and of course gyms are becoming quick to harness the power of people exercising. But could it work at home?

Gizmag writes, "The rationale behind Haier's IFA display is that, like almost every major electronics manufacturer, it's keen to make consumers aware of its environmental commitment...That's not to say that the human-powered washer is a total gimmick. Haier told us that it is gauging consumer response at the show and might consider bringing the idea to market."

Even with a big company looking at pushing it forward, whether or not someone would bring this into their home is up in the air. I can see it being like one of those NordicTrack systems that seem so brilliant around the holidays when we're keen to loose a couple pounds but loses its shine a couple weeks later. After all, the Cyclean hasn't exactly taken off in the last four years.

But I have to say, as someone who likes to cycle for exercise and multitask, I'd definitely consider something like this. It'd not only save me money from the energy bill each month, but I'd be able to quit my gym and save money there too. Not a bad deal. And I'd be forced to exercise since being lazy means no clean clothes.

Even with Haier's backing, it seems very unlikely to be popular if it makes it to market. Plus, the bigger environmental issue with washing machines isn't their energy use but their water use. A bike-powered system would be better suited for the clothes dryer portion of a wash load.

Would you use it? Or better yet, would you convert your existing washing machine to run on pedal power?

Notre Dame Begins Test Run of iPads With a Paperless Course

by Jaymi Heimbuch, San Francisco, California
from: http://www.treehugger.com/

Photo by Jaymi Heimbuch

The University of Notre Dame is taking the use of e-readers in classrooms seriously, embarking on a one year study of how the devices integrate into classrooms. The first course to have students use an iPad instead of any text books is Project Management, a class with 40 students that will not only use the iPad as a book, but will also be encouraged to use it for everything else in daily life and report back their impressions (hmmm, could that possibly have been at Apple's request?). Apple is making a big push to turn iPads into the next big thing in education. The company wants to corner the market for electronic readers in schools, and has been discussing getting text books into digital format for some time now with major text book publishers. This new test run with Notre Dame could have big consequences for how speedily the device replaces paper books in schools.

The move isn't without competition. The Kindle has been touted as the solution for textbooks in schools for a couple years, though when it had a test run at Princeton, the students were less than impressed, wanting something easier to interact with instead. And Barnes & Noble, while not yet getting close to the classroom with their e-readers, has started angling for students to use e-books for their studies.

Tuaw reports that while the iPad is more than just an e-reader, allowing students to do a lot more with not just the ebook but with searching for articles and other information as well, the Notre Dame course professor, Corey Angst, wants to make clear that the iPad is part of a bigger kit of resources for students. No one device has come close to being a catch-all for students, but Apple is hoping to inch closer to the iPad being one tool that can't be left out of any classroom.

Whether or not the use of e-readers in classrooms makes a difference on the environmental footprint of scholastic is yet to be seen. While thousands of paper books can fit into one device, reducing the number of trees sacrificed to the printing industry, the embodied energy of electronics, let alone their e-waste at end of life, creates a massive footprint for the devices. Which will end up having the smaller footprint in the long run depends on many factors, including how thoroughly students use e-readers as opposed to books. It'll still be years until we know which is "better" and until then, we're using the earth's resources from both sides -- trees and water for books, and raw materials, electricity and recycling energy for e-readers.

Photos of the Very Rare Pink Katydid

by Jerry James Stone, San Francisco, CA

from: http://www.treehugger.com/

Photo via Flickr

What you are looking at is the very rare and very pink katydid. First discovered back in 1887, the pink katydid is so rare that they occur once out of every 500 individuals. You have a better chance of spotting a unicorn in the wild.

Of course, the color pink alone isn't very common to the animal kingdom, flamingos aside. It's the result of a condition called erythrism, similar to the recessive gene that afflicts albino animals.

Katydids are large, leaf-shaped and usually green. They are named after a song they sing: katy did katy did katy did. Their green skin makes them somewhat hard to find for insect-chowing predators. But the pink ones are not afforded the same luxury.

While people have tried to produce pink katydids in captivity, there had been little success until last year. The New Orleans Audubon Insectarium had acquired both a pink male and a pink female katydid which resulted in a litter of new pink babies.

Like this article? Follow me on Twitter or friend me on FacebookPhoto via Flickr

Photo via Photobucket

Photo via Wikimedia Commons

Fastest Book Scanner Ever Captures Flipping Pages with High-Speed Camera

The technology blows away the competition by scanning 200 pages a minute

By Jeremy Hsu

From http://www.popsci.com/

Super-Fast Book Scanner A high-speed camera eye takes speed-reading to a new level ... at least for Johnny 5 University of Tokyo/IEEE Spectrum

A new super-fast book-scanning technology could make publishers cringe even more than when they heard about Google Book Search. A University of Tokyo researcher has developed a "book flipping scanning" method that does exactly what it sounds like, digitizing 200 pages per minute, according to IEEE Spectrum. The Japanese researchers hope to enable a digital library for Japanese manga comics.

The scanner's camera runs at 500 frames per second, and captures rapidly flipping book pages in two modes. First, a regular line shines on the page to capture text and images. The second mode then manages neat the trick of reconstructing the curved, distorted pages in their original form. A laser device projects lines onto each page that the system can use to recreate the 3-D page model and correct the deformed lines.

Google's own proprietary book-scanning technology seems to use some sort of infrared camera to capture the 3-D shape of book pages, but the book lies flat and the page-turning mechanism is unclear. Other book scanners boast of capturing about 50 pages per minute, which is four times slower than the new method.

Masatoshi Ishikawa -- the University of Tokyo researcher behind the book-scanning marvel -- previously developed the fastest robot hands in the East, so he's probably not too worried about tiring out human hands by flipping book pages.

Miniaturized versions of this technology could eventually find their way into our smartphones for completely legal digitizing delights. Or it might combine with the robot hands to bring Short Circuit's Johnny 5 to life.

[via IEEE Spectrum]

Synthetic Alcohol Gives Drinkers a Buzz Minus the Hangover, Addiction

By Clay Dillow

From: http://www.popsci.com/

Prost! senator86

 

Still feeling the sting of New Year's Eve all these days later? A synthetic alcohol substitute developed from chemicals similar in composition to Valium could give users the pleasant feelings of tipsiness without affecting the parts of the brain that lead to barroom brawls, crippling addiction, and sleeping in your car.
Unlike all those bunk point-of-sale hangover remedies, this headache-eluding synthetic is being developed by some serious brainpower at Imperial College London. Professor David Nutt, one of Britain's top drug experts, was recently relieved of his position as a government advisor for comments about cannabis and MDMA. Now, he's trying to change the way Britons think, and feel, about getting drunk.

By harnessing benzodiazepines like diazepam, the chief ingredient in anti-anxiety med Valium, Nutt sees a future of drinking without becoming addicted, belligerent or -- and here's the kicker -- intoxicated. Using one of thousands of possible benzos, researchers are working to tailor a colorless, tasteless synthetic that could eventually replace the alcohol content in beer, wine and liquor. Drinkers could toss back as many glasses of the swill as they want but would remain only mildly drunk from first drink to last, keeping good-timers within legal limits whether they like it or not. If one did find the buzz too intense for a particular task -- say, driving home after a long night at the pub -- those warm feelings of inebriation could be instantly turned off with a simple antidote pill that mutes the synthetic's effects on brain receptors.
The skeptics (and delinquents) among us wonder exactly why Nutt and company think that people who enjoy getting roaring drunk would voluntarily switch to a tipple that lacks the knock-down power of authentic alcohol, but as a matter of public health it's not such a far-fetched idea. After all, alcohol has been both a bringer of good cheer and destroyer of lives for thousands of years now, and a 21st-century update to an ancient favorite could be in order. In the meantime, we're sticking with scotch.
[Telegraph]

Get Your Trebuchet Ready, It’s Time For Punkin Chunkin!

• By Curtis Silver
• From Wired.com

Some of the Pumpkin Launching Contraptions Found at Punkin Chunkin (image: Discovery.com)

The staples of the Thanksgiving holiday are ingrained in our brains and we prepare accordingly year after year. The turkey in the oven, full of stuffing and gizzards. Pumpkin pie cooling on the counter while the Detroit Lions find a way to lose on yet another Thanksgiving day game. Family and friends gather to celebrate togetherness and give thanks for the good things in their lives. Somewhere, an air cannon launches a pumpkin several thousand feet into the air, the crowd cheering as it comes crashing to the ground. Ah, Thanksgiving. Wait, what was that last one?

The Thanksgiving tradition takes a little twist up in Sussex County, Delaware with the annual Punkin Chunkin World Championships. Since 1986, the annual festival is held to benefit the St. Judes Children’s Research Hospital and Childhelp® organizations. The festival is a three day event where hardened engineers and D.I.Y. garage gurus build all kinds of wicked contraptions with one common goal. To launch pumpkins as far as possible. For the second year in a row, you can catch all the pumpkin destruction this Thanksgiving on the Science Channel. With two specials airing on Thanksgiving night, Science Channel isn’t skimping on the pumpkin launching coverage. Both specials are hosted by Mike Senese and Zach Selwyn, who you might remember from the Science Channel show Catch It, Keep It.

The first special The Road to Punkin Chunkin airs at 8pm EST on Thanksgiving. The show follows Senese and Selwyn as they travel around the nation to visit the headquarters of some of the competitors for a behind the scenes look at building the pumpkin launching machines. The seed splattering fun continues at 9pm EST with the Punkin Chunkin event itself. While the press release stuff is all well and good, I wanted a first hand opinion of the event, so here’s some first person perspective from Mike Senese.

I’ve been following Punkin’ Chunkin for a while, and this year I can’t be more excited to be attending in person. I got a small preview a month ago when I visited with a few teams that were building and tuning their chunkers - the size and force of the machines is awesomely impressive when you experience it in person. One thing that is particularly exciting this year is watching the evolution of the sport - there are a few teams that are bringing brand new machines that push the traditional catapult and trebuchet designs into revolutionary territory, redesigning the mechanism with highly engineered designs and never-before seen systems. The distances are staggering (closing in on 2000′ for trebuchets, over 3000′ for torsion catapults, and air cannons hitting just about 4500′), and pretty soon someone will break the mile, which will be an amazing moment. And at the end of the event, they roll a cargo truck out onto the field and let all the teams blast it to pieces. With pumpkins. Awesome!

For more, check out Mike’s website for a great program to simulate launching with a trebuchet. Or head over to Science Channel for a behind the scenes tour of some of the best machines and a look at the other events at the festival including the chili cook-off (no festival would be complete without it,) contests and concerts. There are also some minor time wasting puzzles and games as well. What? You need some video? Got it.

The Road to Punkin Chunkin and the Punkin Chunkin special air Thanksgiving night, starting at 8pm EST on the Science Channel.

Man uses remote to control his 'bionic bottom'

A man whose bowel was damaged in a motorcycle crash has been given a bionic bottom.

By Nigel Bunyan

From: http://www.telegraph.co.uk

Ged Galvin Photo: SWNS

Ged Galvin, 55, now presses a remote control to open his bowels and go to the toilet.

The IT project manager from Barnsley, south Yorkshire, almost died when an off-duty police officer pulled out in front of him in her car.

Mr Galvin suffered massive internal injuries and had to be fitted with a colostomy bag until surgeons at the Royal London Hospital could perform the complex operation to rebuild his bottom.

The medical team took a muscle from above his knee, wrapped it around his sphincter, and then attached electrodes to the nerves.

These are now operated by a palm-sized remote control that he carries in his pocket.

“It’s like a chubby little mobile phone,” he said. “You switch it on and off, just like switching on the TV.

“They call me the man with the bionic bottom, but that doesn’t bother me. My gratitude to the surgeons is endless because what they have done is a miracle.”

Mr Galvin, who had previously endured the indignity of carrying a colostomy bag, added: “I thought that in these days of modern medicine surely there was something they could do. They'd mended everything else - why not this? Anything was better than a colostomy bag.

“The operation changed my life and gave me back my pride and confidence. Because of the remote control I can lead a normal life again.”

The father-of-two is resigned to having the muscles in his bionic bottom replaced every five years.

Biofuels Breakthrough: Making Fuel From Air With Engineered Microbes

Written by Nick Chambers, Editor

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In what could be a major breakthrough, Joule Biotechnologies announced that it has directly produced fuel from the plentiful carbon dioxide in the air around us using highly engineered photosynthetic microbes.

• » See also: Kansas Students Run Retro VW Beetle on Batteries and Biodiesel
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Inside specially designed reactors, Joule’s engineered microbes thrive off of sunlight and CO2. In return, depending on the type of organism, they can produce straight ethanol, diesel or a number of other types of hydrocarbons.

Although the process sounds similar to algae-produced biofuels, the Joule process is incredibly (and beneficially) different for several reasons:

• Doesn’t produce biomass
• No agricultural feedstock needed
• Can be conducted on non-arable land
• Doesn’t need fresh water
• Produces fuel directly without the need for extraction or refinement

Apparently Joule has discovered some unique genes inside these microbes that produce the enzymes responsible for directly making the molecules found in diesel. From there, engineering organisms to make other fuels was a simple step. At this point, production of the fuels has only been done in the lab, but Joule has plans to open a pilot plant in early 2011.

Source: Biofuels Digest

Image Credit: Joule Biotechnologies

7 Intriguing Genetically Modified Fruits & VeggiesS

By Ecoist

Genetically modified food is one of great controversies of our time. Supporters point to wonderful possibilities of nutrient-packed food and solving world hunger, while critics fear unknown effects on human health. But whatever one’s opinion the matter, one thing is clear: some genetically modified fruits and vegetables are awfully intriguing! Here are 7 of the most interesting examples:

Graisins

(Image via Elanso)

The graisin (or giant raisin) is a raisin which has been genetically re-programmed to grow far beyond its normal size. It was produced by Japan’s National Institute of Genetics, which is unsurprising given that nation’s love for large fruits of all kinds. And while they taste exactly the same as small raisins, graisins are sure to make dinner guests stare in awe!

Grapples

(Image via Wikipedia)

Originally funded by UNICEF and created for Third World aid efforts, a grapple is simply a genetic cross between a grape and an apple. The fruit keeps the size and shape of the apple, the texture of the grape, and the flavor of both while providing a potent, high-strength dose of vitamin C.

Pluots

(Image via Palomar.edu)

Plums and apricots are delicious fruits in their own right, but combined, they form the genetically modified treat known as the pluot. Described by WiseGeek as “an intensely flavored fruit”, pluots are heavily fortified with vitamin C and have no sodium or cholesterol.

Tangelo

(Image via TeamSugar)

“Should I have a tangerine or a grapefruit?” No longer need this question be asked! Lovers of each fruit can now get the best of both worlds with this sweet hybrid, which boasts a ton of fiber, vitamin C, and a slightly tart taste!

Colorful carrots

(Image via MSNBC)

Could colorful, genetically-modified carrots like those pictured here be the secret to absorbing more calcium? Two Texas researchers say yes – and they’ve created a carrot they claim allows people to absorb 40% more calcium than normal carrots to back up their claims!

Diabetes-fighting lettuce

(Image via FloridaTrend)

Diabetes is one of the most frustrating and life-threatening illnesses out there. Living with it (at minimum) means daily, sometimes painful insulin injections – until now. University of Central Florida professor Henry Daniell has created a genetically modified strain of lettuce (pictured above) that carries the insulin gene. The lettuce cells protect the insulin on its journey through the digestive tract, and when the insulin reaches the intestines, the body’s natural insulin-producing response is triggered.

Lematos

(Image via FreeWebs)

Okay, so a lemon and a tomato aren’t the most natural of pairs, but that didn’t stop Israeli researchers from bringing us the Lemato! Unlike other genetically altered fruits and veggies (which were created primarily for health reasons), it appears that the lemato was solely an experiment to determine if it was possible to make tomatos give off the scent of lemons. Mission accomplished!

Scientists Force Fungus to Have Sex to Create Biofuel

Written by Bryan Nelson

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Austrian scientists are putting the ‘fun’ in ‘fungus’ by forcing organisms which are usually asexual to have sex instead.

The hope is that the fungus would then be easier to breed, which would allow researchers to create organisms that are more efficient at degrading cellulose for the purpose of making biofuel.

Originally discovered in the Solomon Islands during World War II eating away at the canvas and garments of the U.S. Army, scientists have long known that the soil fungus Trichoderma reesei was particularly good at converting cellulose– a major component of plant biomass– into glucose. But until now it has been difficult for researchers to improve the fungus because it was believed to be asexual.

Due to the fact that sexual organisms exchange and mix their genetic material when they breed, their traits can be more easily manipulated artificially. Under the assumption that Trichoderma reesei was asexual, scientists looking to improve the fungus were instead limited to techniques like dosing the fungus with radiation or chemicals in order to alter its genetic profile. But that process only created random or unpredictable mutations.

But for the first time since its discovery 50 years ago, scientists can now make the fungus have sex.

Past studies have shown that Trichoderma reesei is genetically identical to another species of fungus, Hypocrea jecorina, which it so happens is capable of sexual reproduction. The primary difference between the two organisms was that Hypocrea jecorina seemed capable of assuming both the male and female roles, whereas Trichoderma reesei seemed only capable of assuming the male role.

So scientists got a novel idea: Why not breed the male-oriented Trichoderma with a female-oriented Hypocrea? The result was a successful mating– the Trichoderma lured into having sex could now be artificially selected for their advantageous genetic traits.

The findings could have largescale ramifications. Researchers want to employ the organisms to make use of the otherwise useless cellulose in sawdust, weeds and other plant scrap to make biofuel. Thus, the primary benefit of fungus sex could be to turn bush into biofuel. But the newly sexualized fungus can also help farmers. Since Trichoderma includes species that help plants by killing harmful fungi, they can be put to use protecting crops we use for food.

Source: LiveScience

Image Credit: V. Seidl, Vienna University of Technology

Universal ‘Rubik’s Cube’ Could Become Pentagon Shapeshifter

• By Noah Shachtman

Even by the standards of the Pentagon fringe science arm, this project sounds far-out: “programmable matter” that can be ordered to “self-assemble or alter their shape, perform a function and then disassemble themselves.” But researchers backed by Darpa are actually making progress on this incredible goal, Henry Kenyon at Signal magazine reports.

One day, that could lead to “morphing aircraft and ground vehicles, uniforms that can alter themselves to be comfortable in any climate, and ’soft’ robots that flow like mercury through small openings to enter caves and bunker complexes.” A soldier could even reach into a can of unformed goop, and order up a custom-made tool or a “universal spare part.”

One team from Harvard is working on a kind of “generalized Rubik’s Cube” that can fold into all kinds of shapes. Another is trying to order large strands of synthetic DNA to bind together in a “molecular Velcro.” An MIT group is building “self-folding origami” machines that “use specialized sheets of material with built-in actuators and data. These machines use cutting-edge mathematical theorems to fold themselves into virtually any three-dimensional object.”

The Programmable Matter project is five months into its second phase, which is supposed to wind up early next Spring. When they’re done, the researchers ought to “assemble four or five three-dimensional solids of a specific size and shape from a set of building blocks.”

Intel, which has done a bunch of programmable matter work on its own, is looking beyond those basic steps. Way, way beyond. The malleable stuff could one day “mimic the shape and appearance of a person or object being imaged in real time, and as the originals moved, so would their replicas,” according to their website. “These 3D models would be physical entities, not holograms. You could touch them and interact with them, just as if the originals were in the room with you. ”

[Illo: Darpa]

Iron-based Catalyst To Replace Platinum For Cheaper Hydrogen Fuel Cells

Hydrogen fuel cells need catalysts to accelerate the chemical reactions inside them, but the problem is that they are very expensive because the catalysts are made of precious materials like platinum. The new catalyst is based on iron, nitrogen, and carbon which are far less expensive than platinum which ranges between $1,000 to $2,000 an ounce. Although these three non-precious materials were used for hydrogen fuel cells before, they didn’t react too well making the cells unpractical.

Researchers at the Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique, Quebec have managed to increase the power of the catalyst to 99 amps per cubic centimeter at .8 volts which is 35 times better than previous iron-based catalysts. With just a few improvements the INRS scientists should soon reach the 130 amps per cubic centimeter, which is the minimum amount for hydrogen fuel cell catalysts. According to Jean Pol Dodelet, leader of the INRS team, this iron-based catalyst is just as good as platinum catalysts which means that hydrogen fuel cells will become cheaper, and in time, better.

“We thought nobody would ever meet [the benchmark for hydrogen fuel cells]. For the very first time, a non-precious metal catalyst makes sense,” said Hubert Gasteiger, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at MIT. Gasteiger is only one of the researchers who praised INRS’ breakthrough which is “quite surprising” if it were to quote Radoslav Adzic, researcher and fuel cell catalysts-developer at the Brookhaven National Laboratory.

Although other researchers have tried, the INRS team used a different approach, and they increased the number of the catalytic sites in the iron-based material. They figured that if they would have more active sites, then the number of reactions within the material will increase. These catalytic sites are “obtained” by heating a graphite-like form of carbon called carbon black which reacts and creates “gaps” when in contact with ammonia and iron acetate. Then the researchers used nitrogen atoms to link gaps’ opposite sides which eventually result in active catalytic sites.

According to Dodelet, their iron-based catalyst performs best in PEM fuel cells which work at low temperatures, and feature a high power density. He also said that there are other non-precious metal-based catalysts which work in alkaline cells, however, these catalysts will not operate in an acidic environment like the one found in PEM fuel cells.

“We solved the problem,” said Dodelet, but he admits that the catalyst needs further improvements because it has two major flaws - the former is its durability which has to be increased as after 100 hours, the reactions in the cells were halved; and the latter is the fact that catalysts can operate as fast as the reactants allow them, but the oxygen and protons transportation will have to be improved by fuel cell engineers as Dodelet’s team only develops the catalysts.

I don’t think that it will take too long before these obstacles will be overcome, and it is quite possible that in the near future automakers will get their hands on cheaper hydrogen fuel cells which means that we will be able to buy hydrogen cars at lower prices.

Five Brain-Manipulating Technologies That Prove Dollhouse Exists Right Now

By Annalee Newitz

Joss Whedon's new show Dollhouse is about a secret organization that supplies mind-wiped sex ninjas to the rich. It's not set in the future because neuromanipulated technoslaves could exist today. Here's proof.

1. We can erase people's memories.
Back in October a study was published in Neuron that proved an enzyme called CaMKII can erase bad memories while you recall them. In Dollhouse, the "actives" have their own memories erased first, and then new memories implanted. The brain-erasure technology is actually the cornerstone of the operation, as it's what turns the actives into blank slates ready to be reprogrammed. Right now, with the cooperation of desperate people, scientists could be using CaMKII to erase their old lives. Then they'll just need to implant new personalities and emotions.

2. We can regulate people's moods with microchips.
Right now, there are a series of implantable microchips on the market that send out electrical impulses over your nerves that can soothe a depressed person or reduce seizures. Some call them neurological pacemakers, and we are discovering new things about them every day - such as the fact that some can cause instant orgasm. Wipe somebody's brain, then install these brain pacemakers, and you might start shaping a whole new person by controlling what gives them pleasure and what makes them depressed.

3. We can use brain implants to steer animals left and right.
Several years ago, neuroscientists invented a little rat-sized brain implant that sent directional signals to the rodent's brain. Using a handheld remote, scientists sent electrical signals to the parts of the rats' brains connected to right and left whisker sensations - and could induce the rats to turn right or left at the press of a button. Dubbed the "robo-rat," the creatures could be used for complicated search and rescue efforts that require crawling into small places. Or they could be the beta version for a more nefarious technology implanted into humans' brains that would allow a corporation like the Dollhouse to remote-control an active's every move, right down to which street they turn on.

4. Infrared brain scans can predict what people want.
As we reported last week, researchers have discovered that a simple infrared brain scan can reveal patterns in brain activity that show simple preferences. Ask a person whether they'd rather have a dog or a cat, and this scan will give you the answer. This is the first step towards knowing how to shape people's preferences. If scientists could trigger a reaction in your brain that reversed the pattern, they might be able to turn a cat person into a dog person and vice versa.

5. Human-computer interfaces link human brains directly to computers.
You may have heard of BrainGate, a technology that uses electrodes sunk into your gray matter to convert electrical impulses from your brain into computer commands. It is currently used by people who are profoundly paralyzed to communicate by moving a cursor around. If we can open up communication between brain and computer like that, it stands to reason that the communication might be two-way. Who is to say there is no secret organization using a BrainGate-esque technology to reprogram people's thoughts?

Obama Promises Science-Centric, Eco-Friendly Presidency

By: Kit Eaton

President Obama's Inaugural speech included a clutch of promises and observations that will have scientists, medical researchers and environmentalists in the US and around the world breathing a sigh of relief.

"We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its cost," is Obama's key phrase, and it contains a multitude of subtle points.

"Rightful place" is at first a dig at George W. Bush's sidelining of scientific thinking during his two presidential terms. It's no secret that Bush's personal beliefs pushed many science issues into the background, and Obama's words suggest he holds science in higher regard for its role in our modern world. Wielding "technology's wonders" is immediately a powerful phrase underlining the benefits that science and technology can bring, and it is specifically referenced in terms of improving health care, rather than bringing economic success or just "new gadgets."

While Bush spoke of health care in both his inauguration addresses, it was in broad, political and economic terms: "We will widen the ownership of homes and businesses, retirement savings and health insurance" came in the second, while "Government has great responsibilities for public safety and public health," in the first. Throughout his presidency "tricky" health care issues like high teenage pregnancy rates and stem cell research were dealt with from a decidedly moral, as opposed to scientific viewpoint. "From the day of our Founding, we have proclaimed that every man and woman on this earth has rights, and dignity, and matchless value, because they bear the image of the Maker of Heaven and earth," is a line from Bush's second speech that underlines this--and explains why in 2006 he used the presidential veto to stop a bill that would've freed up more federal money for stem cell research.

In an interesting moment in 2005 Rep. Henry Waxman clashed very publicly with Bush's science adviser, accusing the administration of actually fudging its scientific models on climate and health care--and of underlining scientific "uncertainty" to quash research and laws with results or intents counter to Bush policies.

Climate issues were downplayed often during Bush's early years in power, and in 2002 when the EPA surprised the administration by issuing a report that supported theories that global warming had a significant human component, Bush dismissed it thus:
"I read the report put out by the bureaucracy."

President Obama, on the other hand, made a direct reference to climate issues in his speech, and gave tacit support to the theory global warming is man made: "we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the spectre of a warming planet." That neatly tied global war catastrophes to the environment too.

Obama also promised to actually respond to the issue of climate change: "We will harness the Sun and the winds and soil to fuel our cars and run our factories," is a guarantee that more environmentally-friendly policies will be coming out of the White House, particularly in terms of alternative energy sources. It's impossible to "consume the world's resources without regard to effect," he noted, going on to suggest that "the world has changed, and we must change with it."

It sounds very much like the winds of change are blowing through the corridors of power in Washington, and bringing new regard for science, medicine, and the environment along with them.

[via New Scientist, image: Getty]

SmartHand: Cyborg Limbs Will Feel Like User's Own

| posted by Kit Eaton

SmartHand is a European collaborative project to develop a next-generation robotic prosthetic limb, and as part of the project Swedish researchers have successfully demonstrated a neat psychological trick that makes wearers feel like an artificial limb is actually part of their body.

A report published by the team at the Karolinska Institutet and Malmö University Hospital shows success in what's known as the "rubber hand" illusion. Amputees' brains can be fooled into thinking that a fake hand is actually wired into their nervous systems, despite the fact that the hand has no sensory inputs whatsoever.

It's a similar effect to the solution discovered by V.S. Ramachandran to alleviating phantom limb pain: In his work the brain is fooled into thinking it's getting sensory inputs from a missing limb by an optical illusion with a mirror, and the mental side-effects of this relieve pain. The work challenged the existing medical thinking that damaged severed nerve endings were the cause of the pain.

In the Swedish case, Prosthetic limb users were subjected to a different visual trick: Someone visibly touched the artificial hand while out of the patient's sight their arm stump was being stimulated. Apparently the illusion is very convincing, and the deep psychological basis for the effect was further demonstrated by subconsciously-induced sweating when the "rubber" hand was pricked by a needle. The results suggest that the artificial hand has been completely adopted into the user's body image at a neurological level.

The research team sees this as evidence for a possible new way of connecting up future prosthetic limbs sensor-equipped hands to a patient, and it's potentially a much simpler solution than having to directly couple electronics into the nervous system surgically. And since the illusion is similar to Ramachandran's study, there's a possibility that phantom limb pain may also be reduced.

The research into the more mechanical aspects of SmartHand have produced an amazing thought-controlled product that's ever-evolving, with the goal of totally replacing a missing forelimb with a sophisticated robot. But it's not alone: in the US there's Dean Kamen's robotic limb project.

This device is already so sci-fi-ishly sophisticated it's been dubbed the "Luke arm" after the artificial limb given to Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars movies. Kamen's project is concentrating on developing the motorized engineering and nerve-input interface--it's directly wired into patient's nerves to control its motors--but has already shown remarkable results. Famously one test subject felt so much at ease operating the arm that he was able to rest a mug on a nearby table without watching, and carrying on a conversation at the same time.

Kamen's work was initially aimed at replacing limbs lost by soldiers on duty, but the Luke arm and SmartHand suggest that limb-loss victims of all types, through accidents and as civilian war casualties, have amazing artificial limbs to look forward to in the future. They'll work just like the real thing, maybe even being stronger, and they just might feel like they're a natural part of the body. But the costs will have to be driven down from multi-million-dollar levels.

[via Medgadget]

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Discovery in Turkey Comes from Major Iron Age Site

Archaeologists in southeastern Turkey have discovered an Iron Age chiseled stone slab that provides the first written evidence in the region that people believed the soul was separate from the body.

University of Chicago researchers will describe the discovery, a testimony created by an Iron Age official that includes an incised image of the man, on Nov. 22-23 at conferences of biblical and Middle Eastern archaeological scholars in Boston.

The Neubauer Expedition of the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago found the 800-pound basalt stele, 3 feet tall and 2 feet wide, at Zincirli (pronounced "Zin-jeer-lee"), the site of the ancient city of Sam'al. Once the capital of a prosperous kingdom, it is now one of the most important Iron Age sites under excavation.

The stele is the first of its kind to be found intact in its original location, enabling scholars to learn about funerary customs and life in the eighth century B.C. At the time, vast empires emerged in the ancient Middle East, and cultures such as the Israelites and Phoenicians became part of a vibrant mix.

The man featured on the stele was probably cremated, a practice that Jewish and other cultures shun because of a belief in the unity of body and soul. According to the inscription, the soul of the deceased resided in the stele.

"The stele is in almost pristine condition. It is unique in its combination of pictorial and textual features and thus provides an important addition to our knowledge of ancient language and culture," said David Schloen, Associate Professor at the Oriental Institute and Director of the University's Neubauer Expedition to Zincirli.

Schloen will present the Kuttamuwa stele to a scholarly audience at the meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research on Nov. 22 in Boston, the major annual conference for Middle Eastern archaeology. Dennis Pardee, Professor of Near Eastern Languages and Civilization at the University of Chicago, will present his translation of the stele's 13-line inscription the following day at the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, also in Boston, in a session on "Paleographical Studies in the Near East."

German archaeologists first excavated the 100-acre site in the 1890s and unearthed massive city walls, gates and palaces. A number of royal inscriptions and other finds are now on display in museums in Istanbul and Berlin. Schloen and his team from the University of Chicago have excavated Zincirli for two months annually since 2006.

"Zincirli is a remarkable site," said Gil Stein, Director of the Oriental Institute. "Because no other cities were built on top of it, we have excellent Iron Age materials right under the surface. It is rare also in having written evidence together with artistic and archaeological evidence from the Iron Age. Having all of that information helps an archaeologist study the ethnicity of the inhabitants, trade and migration, as well as the relationships of the groups who lived there."

The stele was discovered last summer in a small room that had been converted into a mortuary shrine for the royal official Kuttamuwa, self-described in the inscription as a "servant" of King Panamuwa of the eighth century B.C. It was found in the outer part of the walled city in a domestic area—most likely the house of Kuttamuwa himself—far from the royal palaces, where inscriptions had previously been found.

The inscription reads in part: "I, Kuttamuwa, servant of Panamuwa, am the one who oversaw the production of this stele for myself while still living. I placed it in an eternal chamber(?) and established a feast at this chamber(?): a bull for [the storm-god] Hadad, ... a ram for [the sun-god] Shamash, ... and a ram for my soul that is in this stele. …" It was written in a script derived from the Phoenician alphabet and in a local West Semitic dialect similar to Aramaic and Hebrew. It is of keen interest to linguists as well as biblical scholars and religious historians because it comes from a kingdom contemporary with ancient Israel that shared a similar language and cultural features.

The finding sheds a striking new light on Iron Age beliefs about the afterlife. In this case, it was the belief that the enduring identity or "soul" of the deceased inhabited the monument on which his image was carved and on which his final words were recorded.

The stele was set against a stone wall in the corner of the small room, with its protruding tenon or "tab" still inserted into a slot in a flagstone platform. A handsome, bearded figure, Kuttamuwa is depicted on the stele wearing a tasseled cap and fringed cloak and raising a cup of wine in his right hand. He is seated on a chair in front of a table laden with food, symbolizing the pleasant afterlife he expected to enjoy. Beside him is his inscription, elegantly carved in raised relief, enjoining upon his descendants the regular duty of bringing food for his soul. Indeed, in front of the stele were remains of food offerings and fragments of polished stone bowls of the type depicted on Kuttamuwa's table.

According to Schloen, the stele vividly demonstrates that Iron Age Sam'al, located in the border zone between Anatolia and Syria, inherited both Semitic and Indo-European cultural traditions. Kuttamuwa and his king, Panamuwa, had non-Semitic names, reflecting the migration of Indo-European speakers into the region centuries earlier under the Hittite Empire based in central Anatolia (modern Turkey), which had conquered the region.

But by the eighth century B.C., they were speaking the local West Semitic dialect and were fully integrated into local culture. Kuttumuwa's inscription shows a fascinating mixture of non-Semitic and Semitic cultural elements, including a belief in the enduring human soul—which did not inhabit the bones of the deceased, as in traditional Semitic thought, but inhabited his stone monument, possibly because the remains of the deceased were cremated. Cremation was considered to be abhorrent in the Old Testament and in traditional West Semitic culture, but there is archaeological evidence for Indo-European-style cremation in neighboring Iron Age sites, although not yet at Zincirli itself.

In future excavation campaigns, the Zincirli team, generously supported by University trustee Joseph Neubauer and his wife Jeanette, plans to excavate large areas of the site in order to understand the social and economic organization of the city and its cultural development over the centuries. Schloen and his associate director Amir Fink hope to illuminate Iron Age culture more widely through this richly documented ancient city.

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PHOTOS

A funerary monument recovered in southeastern Turkey reveals that people who lived in an important Iron Age city there believed the soul was separate from the body. They also believed the soul lived in the funerary slab.
(Photo: Eudora Struble, University of Chicago)

Students looking at stele recovered in Zincirli are Virginia Rimmer and Benjamin Thomas, both Ph.D. students in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations of the University of Chicago. The inscription on the stone reveals the first evidence that people in the region believed the soul was separate from the body.
(Photo: Eudora Struble, University of Chicago)

A funerary monument recovered in southeastern Turkey reveals that people who lived in an important Iron Age city there believed the soul was separate from the body. They also believed the soul lived in the funerary slab.
(Photo: Eudora Struble, University of Chicago)

Students looking at stele recovered in Zincirli are Virginia Rimmer and Benjamin Thomas, both Ph.D. students in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations of the University of Chicago. The inscription on the stone reveals the first evidence that people in the region believed the soul was separate from the body.
(Photo: Eudora Struble, University of Chicago)

David Schloen (left), Director of the Neubauer Expedition, and Amir Fink, Associate Director, on site at Zincirli in August 2008
(Photo: Sandra Schloen)

A sketch that is a reconstruction of the citadel at Zincirli.
(Photo: Robert Koldewey)

The northeast city wall of the site of Zinceril.
(Photo: Eudora Struble, University of Chicago)

The geomagnetic map showing the buried walls
(Photo: Jason Herrmann, University of Arkansas)

Neubauer Expedition Photos for Download

• Photo 1: The soul in the stone - A funerary monument recovered in southeastern Turkey reveals that people who lived in an important Iron Age city there believed the soul was separate from the body. They also believed the soul lived in the funerary slab.
  (Credit: Eudora Struble, University of Chicago)
• Photo 2: Students looking at stele recovered in Zincirli are Virginia Rimmer and Benjamin Thomas, both Ph.D. students in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations of the University of Chicago. The inscription on the stone reveals the first evidence that people in the region believed the soul was separate from the body.
  (Credit: Eudora Struble, University of Chicago)
• Photo 3: David Schloen (left), Director of the Neubauer Expedition, and Amir Fink, Associate Director, on site at Zincirli in August 2008
  (Credit: Sandra Schloen).
• Photo 4: A sketch that is a reconstruction of the citadel at Zincirli.
  (Credit: Robert Koldewey)
• Photo 5: The northeast city wall of the site of Zinceril.
  (Credit: Eudora Struble, University of Chicago)
• Photo 6: The geomagnetic map showing the buried walls.
  (Credit: Jason Herrmann, University of Arkansas)