Beware of Easy to Make Nukes

By Mark Anderson 09.22.08

Portrait: Mario Hugo

In the past, malefactors seeking to enrich uranium to bomb-grade quality needed either a highly conspicuous industrial plant or specialized equipment that was hard to obtain and relatively easy to monitor. But there's a new method on the horizon, and it's potentially far easier to hide.

For the past four years, Charles Ferguson has been tracking the progress of a technology known as laser isotope separation. Still experimental, it requires only a warehouse-sized space and the kind of lasers within reach of a high school science geek. "The A. Q. Khan network is old-school," Ferguson says, referring to the Pakistani scientist who sold bomb secrets to Iran, Libya, and North Korea. "The next Khan network could use this new technique."

WMD experts often overlook laser enrichment because it's not yet productive enough for industrial use. That's a serious mistake. In 2002, dissidents exposed laser experiments in Iran; at least a dozen other countries are known to have dabbled in the technique.

Bottom line: The US needs to develop its own small-scale laser-enrichment operations, which it could study to learn more about the telltale signs of illicit setups. For example, key equipment used for the faux projects could then be flagged for additional monitoring. If authorities can learn to track these small-scale operations, they have a decent chance of bringing the clandestine potential of laser uranium enrichment in from the cold.

Bomb Factories

Uranium enrichment facilities are getting smaller—and easier to hide.

Gaseous Diffusion
This Cold War-era method of enriching uranium is expensive and difficult to conceal. It consumes large amounts of energy (which can be monitored easily) and requires industrial facilities of several acres, almost always conspicuous in satellite imagery. Gas Centrifuge Separation
This process takes less space and energy than diffusion but poses other inconveniences to would-be proliferators. Few manufacturers are capable of producing the necessary precision-tooled centrifuges, a fact that makes equipment easier to track. Laser Isotope Separation
Off-the-shelf technology can be used to run this emerging enrichment method. It takes relatively little space and consumes virtually untraceable amounts of energy, so a secret laser separation facility can operate in an unassuming warehouse.

Charles Ferguson is Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Tech Stocks to Keep Tanking

Chismillionaire disagrees with this article and feels Tech and Healthcare will be the best performing sectors in the next 3 year period. While the returns may not be great, they will outperform the market as a whole.

Google, Apple, Microsoft and other tech stocks will likely continue to slide until a bailout package gets passed, which won't likely happen until the House reconvenes on Thursday. Meanwhile, some Wall Street analysts think this is a buying opportunity for anyone who can wait for stocks to bottom out. But it could be tricky.

"Nobody will buy any [stocks] right now because there's a huge uncertainty. People are liquidating their positions. It's just brutal, and it will continue to be brutal until some kind of bailout package gets agreed upon," says Jeffrey Lindsay, an internet investment analyst with Bernstein Research. "But we aren't going to have a shantytown in Central Park again. It won't be like the 30s."

AppleTech analysts and venture capitalists were optimistic that Silicon Valley would escape the financial crisis unscathed, but Monday's bloody trading session paints a different picture. Shares of some of the biggest tech companies -- including IBM and Oracle -- got knocked in the cross-fire, after the House rejected a bailout package and the stock market tanked.

Still, Lindsay thinks there could be some buying opportunities for brave investors who aren't risk averse.

"There's going to be a bull market when this is over," he says. "We said Google would be a good buy if it broke $400. We don't think it will stay below $400 for very long."

That goes for other internet stocks, too.

"If this continues for a couple more days, and Yahoo falls below $15 per share, shares could be very cheap. We think eBay's extremely cheap, too," says Lindsay.

Investors might want to wait before buying Apple, though, which is grappling with its own problems. Apple opened low on Monday after a pair of analysts said the company could get hit by sluggish PC sales and slowing consumer spending. It was particularly disconcerting news ahead of the fourth quarter, which is usually Apple's strongest, thanks to holiday sales.

"People are putting the breaks on spending on everything," says Trip Chowdry, a Global Equities Research analyst. "Until oil prices are fixed, there is no way I could say Apple is a good buy. When oil returns to 2003 levels -- or $25 per barrel -- then I think Apple will be a good investment. Until that happens, I think the stock could hit $50 or $60 per share."

UPDATE: The post now includes Trip Chowdry's title information.

Private Rockets could Boost Military too

Elon Musk's Space Exploration Technologies just put the first privately developed rocket into orbit. That's not only a breakthrough for the space community. It has huge military consequences, too -- if the company can turn the one-time launch into a regular event.

The U.S. military relies on satellites to spy on enemies, relay orders and guide unmanned planes. But putting a satellite into orbit is an enormously expensive undertaking. "Humanity has spent hundreds of billions of dollars on space exploration in the past half century, and the numbers have not changed: about $10,000 a pound to put something in low Earth orbit," said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity, when speaking with Wired's Carl Hoffman. Only a few, government-backed companies offer these Maybach-priced services. Which means every aspect of the satellite business happens at a slow crawl. Satellites are built, oh-so-deliberately, to have zero defects -- and then take forever to replace, once the inevitable errors happen.

For decades, the military has tried to break this bind of inflated costs and limited suppliers. The Pentagon would rather send up satellites in a hurry, and cheaply -- kind of like how airplanes are flown today.

"For as long as I've been in this game -- 20 years -- the military [has] said they're going to cut launch costs in half," says Theresa Hitchens, who looks at space issues for the Center for Defense Information. "It's never happened."

Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, is promising to cut that $10,000-per-pound price in half. No wonder the Air Force has committed more than $100 million to the company, founded by PayPal's Elon Musk. Darpa has made major investments, as well. "The military now has a stick to poke and prod the traditional big launch providers (Boeing and Lockheed Martin) into actually being competitive and saving the taxpayer money instead of just sucking off the government teat," former Air Force space officer Brian Weeden tells Danger Room.

But that stick only gets sharp if SpaceX can pull off the launch trick more than once. The company's first three efforts were disasters. And there's no guarantee the next three won't be disasters, too. "Musk will need 20 or so launches before he knows how reliable his technology is -- and how much it really costs," Hoffman wrote. And even if Musk can get these relatively-simple, relatively-small Falcon 1 rocket launches together, the real test will be whether the heavier, farther-reaching Falcon 9s will work out as planned.

It's not just American launch costs that could go down. The next SpaceX rocket is supposed to carry a Malaysian reconaissance satellite into orbit. "This could be the beginning of a general diffusion of on-orbit capability of all sorts and a loss of U.S. ability to call the shots in space," says long time satellite-watcher (and former CIA officer) Allen Thomson.

The kind of satellites could change, as well. Some in the Defense Department -- especially within Darpa -- have been pushing for a shift, "relying on large, expensive, orbiting ducks to larger distributed constellations of microsatellites," Weeden notes. Think of it as the IBM mainframe to Google server cluster evolution of computing."

This gives you is multiple advantages. First, you no longer care about China's (or anyone else's) kinetic kill ASAT [anti-satellite] capability. If you have a couple hundred nodes in your satellite system and they take out a handful, who cares? Properly designed, the system is protected against outages and just routes around them. Second, such a system means you need to launch lots of small satellites into orbit meaning you can take advantage of new, cheaper vehicles like Falcon. Third, you can launch your constellations incrementally in phases and upgrade to new generations of satellites with each increment, as long as the mesh in with the older satellites, instead of waiting 20 years.

Pike isn't sure the space game is really about to change all that much, however. Anti-satellite weapons will still be much cheaper send up than satellites. "It continues to be the case that the ASAT does not have to achieve much more than half orbital velocity, and the ASAT kill vehicle can be a small fraction the size of the satellite," he tells Danger Room. "So the cost of the satellite is on the order of 100 times the cost of killing the satellite -- a factor of two change in launch costs does not alter this. And if the satellite operator can achieve such reductions, then in principle so can the ASAT shooter."

WSJ's Top 10 Executive MBA Programs

Executive M.B.A. programs make a big promise: They'll turn up-and-coming managers into full-fledged leaders, showing them how to think strategically, inspire their staff and expand the business.

So, which schools do the best job of delivering on that bold talk? That's what we set out to measure in The Wall Street Journal's first survey of executive M.B.A. programs.

• PODCAST: Hear more about unorthodox teaching tactics used by executive M.B.A. programs, as improvisation guru Bob Kulhan talks with The Journal's Emily Glazer.

The Journal Report

• Unconventional offerings round out programs -- and students.
• Career advice used to be off-limits for executive M.B.A. students. No longer.
• Companies praise executive M.B.A. programs for making managers better -- and more loyal.
• If executives can't come to the school, the school comes to the executives.
• Advanced management programs aim to give elite executives high-end crash courses on crucial topics.
• By teaming up with institutions around the world, programs offer managers a more global education.
• Intrepid students commute up to 18 hours to attend their chosen executive M.B.A. program.
• See the complete Executive M.B.A. Rankings report.

Working with Management Research Group and Critical Insights, we asked thousands of students and hundreds of companies to rank executive M.B.A. programs in a host of categories, with a focus on how well they develop management and leadership skills. The result is a ranking of 25 schools world-wide that takes into account the rigor needed to build tomorrow's corporate leaders and C-suite executives.

Topping the list: Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management, which ranked No. 1, and the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, which came in No. 2. The two schools have among the largest E.M.B.A. programs, with 406 students currently enrolled in Wharton's two programs and 843 candidates in the seven Kellogg programs, including three international partnerships and a satellite campus in Miami.

What set Kellogg and Wharton apart? The schools got high marks from companies -- nearly double those of their nearest competitors -- which gave them a clear lead overall. And those stellar grades far outpaced their lower marks from students.

Kellogg and Wharton were ranked at the top more often by companies by a wide margin over their competitors. What's more, corporate scores varied the most in our surveys, with the leaders outpacing the middle of the pack, and the middle schools leaving the laggards far behind. That variation and wide lead shifted the overall rank in favor of Kellogg and Wharton.

Sally Ryan for The Wall Street Journal

In contrast, student survey scores showed less variation. Kellogg, for example, which ranked No. 15 in the student survey, had a score much closer to that of the leading schools. In a few cases, like that of the No. 1 school in the student ranking, the University of North Carolina's Kenan-Flagler Business School, a school's student score was strong enough that the school made the top five.

In all, we surveyed 4,060 students and recent grads from 72 executive M.B.A. programs at 53 business schools in nine countries on how well their program enhanced leadership and management skills; 62% responded.

We also surveyed 455 human-resources and executive-development managers at companies across 23 industries, on the value of the education provided by E.M.B.A. programs. More than 200 officials completed the survey, for a response rate of 44%.

Last, we looked at how well the programs met employers' and graduates' expectations when it came to enhancing their management acumen. We measured what employers wanted out of the programs -- largely, improved management and leadership skills such as managing change and strategic thinking. Then we asked students how well their programs delivered those skills, and weighted their responses to arrive at a final score.

In all cases, survey questions were developed and survey results analyzed in collaboration with Management Research Group, Portland, Maine. To calculate the final ranking, the corporate and student ratings were each given 40% weight, and the skills rating 20%. (For more information on the methodology, please see "How the Rankings Were Compiled.")

View Slideshow

Wharton was No. 1 with companies and received top marks from students for its curriculum. The program "allows a platform so you can step up to the next level, start implementing [the tools used in the program] and be a well-rounded manager beyond your specific area of expertise," says Wharton grad Will Tilton, director of global product supply for Shire Pharmaceuticals in Chesterbrook, Pa.

Kellogg came in a close second with companies and received high marks from students for its curriculum and program features. Kristen Dickey, human-resources director of Chicago-based Orbitz Worldwide Inc., says the program's focus on interactive marketing makes it especially attractive to e-commerce companies like Orbitz: "It's a unique feature that we benefit from." The company sponsors several Kellogg E.M.B.A. students.

Rounding out the top 5: the Thunderbird School of Global Management, at No. 3, lauded by students for its global-business focus; the University of Southern California's Marshall School of Business, at No. 4; and the University of North Carolina's Kenan-Flagler Business School, at No. 5.

UNC, Thunderbird and USC also led the student rankings, getting high marks for program quality, leadership education, faculty quality and program support. USC, UNC and Emory University's Goizueta Business School were top rated in the management and leadership skills ranking.

Four international schools made the overall list: ESADE and IESE, both of Spain; IPADE, which runs executive M.B.A. programs in Mexico; and the University of Western Ontario in Canada. London Business School's joint program with Columbia University's Business School also earned a spot in the top 25.

Eyes on the Prize

The survey also provided a window into students' thinking about the programs: what drives them to pursue executive M.B.A.s, what they get out of them -- and how they choose a program in the first place.

Students said E.M.B.A.s are a way to develop leadership skills without losing more than a few days a month in the office. (Unlike traditional M.B.A.s, these programs are usually held every other weekend and often involve distance learning.) And students can take the methods they learn in class and use them immediately to tackle real-world business problems.

One survey respondent summed it up neatly: "Learn on Friday and Saturday, apply on Monday."

When it comes to choosing a program, the top factor was the school's reputation (noted by 51% of students in the survey). Take the case of one survey respondent who earned an executive M.B.A. from Kellogg. The school "has a significant reputation in marketing and branding," wrote the student, who said he needed that credibility to move into a different job at work.

Since graduating, he added, "I've been short-listed for a couple of very good international opportunities."

Some schools have excelled by creating a reputation around other specialties. Frank Wilson, director of finance for the Chicago Police Department, chose Thunderbird because of its focus on international markets. Before applying, the 46-year-old emailed a Thunderbird professor about how much the program would teach him about doing business in Brazil. Mr. Wilson has traveled there and hopes to work in Latin America one day.

The professor replied within a day, pointing out a course that covers the region. Mr. Wilson says he would have had to attend a European school to get the same international-management exposure he found at Thunderbird.

Faculty, of course, make up a huge part of a school's reputation -- and weigh heavily on students' decision-making. In the survey, 78% of students said they considered their school because of its distinguished faculty. Indeed, as schools compete for students, they often bend over backward to secure their best faculty for executive M.B.A. programs.

Jessica Kourkounis for The Wall Street Journal

Students inside of Jon M. Huntsman Hall at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia on September 15, 2008.

At Columbia Business School, Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz co-teaches a weeklong elective course on globalization. At New York University's Stern School of Business, Edward Altman, known for developing the Z-score formula for predicting bankruptcy, has taught executive M.B.A. students for many years.

Students rated Thunderbird, UNC, Emory, the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business and Cornell University's Johnson School as the top five for faculty. For John Burdett, an Emory graduate, the little things made the biggest difference. "Professors had the ability to get information down to our level and explain things in a simple manner," says Mr. Burdett, chief operating officer at TicketBiscuit LLC, an event-management and ticket-sales company in Birmingham, Ala. "That, for me, is an extreme talent."

Surprisingly, respondents said cost and location were relatively unimportant when it came to picking a program. And that was true whether or not their company helped pay the bill. Nearly 34% of students said they paid their own way, which can range from $65,000 to $160,000 for tuition alone. (The median out-of-pocket cost survey respondents reported was $45,000.) About 30% of respondents said their employers paid the entire bill, while 13% said their companies paid between 51% and 99% of the cost.

Meanwhile, many students traveled hundreds or thousands of miles to attend class. While about 64% of students traveled less than 50 miles one way to attend these programs, 7% commuted up to 200 miles and nearly 9% trekked more than 1,000 miles one way.

So, what did the programs deliver? Many midcareer professionals said the degree is a genuine career booster that led to a larger role in their organizations and helped them move into management. Overall, 24% of those surveyed say they have been given both a raise and promotion since they started classes, while 30% expect both in the next year.

A Rapid Payoff

Companies, meanwhile, liked programs that delivered a quick return on investment -- employees who were able to apply what they had learned immediately.

Behind Wharton and Kellogg, companies surveyed ranked the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business as the top program in overall quality, followed by Duke University's Fuqua School of Business and the University of Michigan's Ross School. The companies said schools are doing a better job all around at helping to hone general management and leadership skills among employees who attend. Nearly half said the programs have improved in the past five years. Some 26% said they expect to see those skills put to use immediately, and another 26% expect so within a year of graduation.

Said one employer, who echoes the sentiment of many who answered the survey: "The experience immediately improves critical decision-making skills, general business acumen and increases confidence."

The survey also showed that companies are seizing on E.M.B.A. education to motivate employees, build bench strength and hold on to talent. Overall, 64% of human-resource-development managers who responded to the survey regard E.M.B.A. programs as a talent-retention tool. And 55% called the degree a critical business investment.

Take the executive M.B.A. fellowship program at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. The company funds the degree for about eight employees a year, which helps those on the executive track feel rewarded, says Carol Pledger, a managing director at Goldman Sachs. "It broadens the leadership and business skills of our people," she says.

What's more, employers say the newly minted grads who have been sponsored have a sense of gratitude to the company and are more likely to stay. Allstate Insurance Co. found that workers with new degrees performed "about 20% better and are 80% less likely to leave the company," says Marsha Love Morrow, Allstate's director of leadership and performance capacity. The Northbrook, Ill., insurer covers as much as 100% of employees' executive M.B.A. costs.

Of course, since the programs carry hefty price tags and require time away from the job, companies typically sponsor only their best performers -- and many companies simply don't sponsor any.

J. Emilio Flores For The Wall Street Journal

Students enter Popovich Hall where classes are held at Marshall School of Business.

Room for Improvement

The student and corporate surveys also showed that schools have a ways to go in several areas. A few companies complained that some programs taught students to solve business problems like academic exercises. One respondent said executive M.B.A. students are "more likely to try to run a project along the lines of some classroom exercise...without regards to practicality in our company."

Some students, meanwhile, had issues with technology. Many schools conduct classroom sessions, team meetings and project work via distance technology such as videoconferencing, but some students say the technology doesn't always work well or enhance the education. Similarly, few schools scored well with students when it came to teaching executives how to manage remotely or virtually -- increasingly a requirement in a global business environment.

Then there's flexibility -- a big issue that many schools have tried in vain to address. Most programs schedule classes every other weekend, and a few offer weeklong sessions spread over about two years, with distance learning in between.

And, regardless of schedule, graduates say they spent a big chunk of their time studying and preparing for class; indeed, 38% spent more than 15 hours a week on class assignments. Course work was definitely an issue for Steven Zell, senior vice president, director of operations and marketing at Valueworks LLC, a Manhattan-based investment-management company.

"It's safe to say that I haven't seen some of my friends in two years," says Mr. Zell, who earned his executive M.B.A. at NYU's Stern School.

—Mr. Srivastava is a former Wall Street Journal staff reporter. He can be reached at reports@wsj.com. Alina Dizik, Emily Glazer and Jennifer Merritt contributed to this article.

Counting Cells in Seconds

Counting shadows: A new cell counter uses the imaging chip from a digital camera to record the “shadows,” or diffraction signatures, from cells in blood and other samples. Simple algorithms allow cells to be identified and counted because each cell type has a unique signature. In this image taken with the cell counter, yeast cells are circled in blue, red blood cells are circled in red, and beads are circled in green. Credit: Aydogan Ozcan

Clinical tests for identifying and counting normal and bacterial cells in blood and other samples can tell doctors the source of a bacterial infection or help them monitor the immune health of people with HIV. But conventional cell counting is costly and time-consuming. A simple, lensless imaging system being developed by researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, uses a chip like the one found in a digital camera to count and distinguish different types of cells in blood and drinking water, and simple algorithms to identify and count the cells. The imager could be carried in a device the size of a cell phone and used to monitor water quality and to provide cheap diagnostics in rural and underdeveloped areas.

The imager can find small numbers of cells in a large, unprocessed sample. A water or blood sample is loaded onto a glass slide above a light-sensing chip identical to those used in consumer digital cameras; then it's illuminated from above. "What we record is not an image but a diffraction signature," says Aydogan Ozcan, an assistant professor of electrical engineering at UCLA who's developing the cell counter. Unlike conventional microscopes, which take detailed pictures of very small samples, Ozcan's diffraction technique is rapid and inexpensive. The blurred, pixellated images created by his cell counter are of such low quality that Ozcan doesn't call the system a microscope. But these images contain just enough information to identify and count cells, which is all that's needed for many clinical diagnostic applications.

Cell counting is usually done using machines called flow cytometers, which cost up to hundreds of thousands of dollars. The technique must be performed in the lab and requires multiple steps. Conventional microscopes can also be used to find and count cells, but microscopes are costly and the process is complex. "If you wanted to screen for a few bacterial cells in a few milliliters of water, you'd need to do hundreds of tests with a regular microscope," says Ozcan.

In Ozcan's method, as light passes through a given type of cell, the light diffracts or bends in a characteristic way. Each cell type has a unique diffraction signature that depends on its size, shape, and an optical quality called refractive index. Ozcan has compiled a library of characteristic diffraction signatures for different cell types. After his cell counter takes an image, it quickly consults his library to determine the number of cells of each type in the sample. These calculations don't require much processing power and could be done in a mobile device such as a cell phone, says Ozcan.

The counter has high throughput--while it's capable of detecting small numbers of cells, it can image as many as 100,000 cells in a 20-centimeter-squared field of view in one second. The counter can, for example, determine the concentration of red blood cells in an unprocessed blood sample with 90 percent accuracy. Red blood cell count can be used to diagnose anemia, to monitor malaria, and to monitor patients' responses to chemotherapy.

"What [Ozcan] is doing has potential for hand-held devices that work in the field," says Alexander Revzin, an assistant professor of biomedical engineering at the University of California, Davis. Rezvin has begun a collaboration with Ozcan to develop a cheap, diffraction-based test for counting T cells in HIV patients--a measure of the health of the immune system that's used to determine when to start drug treatment and whether it's working. "Obviously a poor-resource setting is one target, but it doesn't just need to be used in Africa if this is a robust technology," says Rezvin.

"This is a very practical technique," says Mehmet Fatih Yanik, an assistant professor in the Research Laboratory of Electronics at MIT. "Ozcan's work can significantly reduce the cost and effort required for cell counting, allowing its commonplace use even in Third World countries for a variety of medical applications."

So far, Ozcan's group has developed protype cell counters on the lab benchtop. Next, he says, he'll convert a cell phone into a mobile diagnostic lab by taking out the camera lens and putting in the imaging chip and a mechanical system to load microscope slides.

High Efficiency Generators for Hybrid Vehicles

Piston power: In an unconventional engine design, a rod with a piston at either end shuttles between two combustion chambers. Magnets at the center of the rod move past metal coils (orange) to create an electrical current. Credit: Peter Van Blarigan, Sandia National Laboratory

An unconventional engine design is attracting attention as a potential alternative to hydrogen fuel cells or conventional engines in some hybrid vehicles. Called the free-piston engine, it could be used to generate electricity as efficiently as fuel cells yet cost less.

Free-piston engines aren't new: they were invented in the 1920s. But the increased recent focus on hybrid cars has led a growing number of research groups and automakers to start research programs to develop the technology. Unlike in conventional engines, there is no mechanical connection between the piston and a crankshaft (hence the name free-piston). Since the design allows for improved combustion and less friction, the engines could be far more efficient in generating electricity than either conventional generators or newer fuel-cell technology.

Having a cheap and efficient way to generate electricity is becoming more important as automakers develop electric vehicles with onboard generators for recharging the battery pack and extending range. Such vehicles, called series plug-in hybrids or extended-range electric vehicles, are to be sold starting in late 2010. (Click here for a comparison of different hybrid and electric vehicle types.) The first will use generators based on conventional engines. But later models could incorporate fuel cells or other unconventional generators, such as free-piston engines.

The potential high efficiency of free-piston engines gives them an advantage over conventional generators, and their ability to use a variety of fuels is an advantage over hydrogen fuel cells. What's more, free-piston engines don't require expensive materials such as the platinum catalysts needed in fuel cells, so they could be cheaper too.

Automakers such as GM, Lotus, and Volvo have started to investigate the possibility of using such engines in future vehicles. Meanwhile, in the past couple of years, an increasing number of academic research teams have started developing the engines. So far, most have focused on computer simulations. An exception is a research group at Sandia National Laboratory led by Sandia researcher Peter Van Blarigan that has been testing physical components of free-piston engines. He is assembling a complete free-piston engine prototype, a project that he expects to complete within a year.

In conventional internal combustion engines, multiple pistons are connected via rods to a crankshaft that, via the transmission, drives the wheels. Free-piston engines do away with the crankshaft: the pistons aren't connected to anything. Instead, two opposing pistons just shuttle back and forth inside a chamber. To generate electricity, the pistons could be equipped with rows of magnets that shuttle past metal coils to create an electrical current.

Van Blarigan's experiments suggest that these engines could be 50 percent efficient at generating electricity--close to the efficiency of hydrogen fuel cells and much more efficient than conventional generators. Free-piston engines are efficient in part because they have fewer moving parts than conventional engines do. The engine configuration also makes it practical to tune the engine so that the fuel in a combustion chamber burns very quickly. Faster combustion allows the engine to get more work out of a given amount of fuel, improving efficiency. It can also improve emissions.

The free-piston design can also allow the engine to be instantly optimized for different fuels, such as hydrogen, natural gas, ethanol, gasoline, and diesel. Ideally, drivers could use whatever fuel is cheap and readily available.

The development of free-piston engines, however, is still at an early stage. "The free-piston has some unique features--simplicity and variable compression--which make it intriguing," says Gary Smyth, the science director of GM's Powertrain Systems Research Lab. "But [they] also pose a number of challenges."

Van Blarigan says that one major concern is the sound of the engines: the fast explosions are very loud and will be difficult to muffle. But perhaps the biggest issue is control. In a conventional engine, the movement of the pistons is constrained by the rods and crankshaft, which help even out any variations from cycle to cycle. The free-piston engine is more flexible. That allows for using different fuels, but it makes necessary some sort of active control mechanism to ensure that each cycle is the same: variations could cause poor performance and increased emissions. High-speed computers and the ability to electronically control piston movement in a free-piston generator (via the coils and magnets) could help engineers solve this problem.

Whether the engines will be significantly cheaper and more efficient than conventional engines is unclear, says John Heywood, a professor of mechanical engineering at MIT. "There's been enough development to say that it works. But with very different engine geometries, it's hard to work out just how good it is. Is it really better?" As research progresses, it will need to answer questions about efficiency, emissions, performance, and especially cost, Heywood says.

Meanwhile, conventional internal combustion engines keep getting better, which could make it difficult for the free-piston design to get a foothold.

Will Science Obviate Religion?

A debate last week provided strong opinions, but no final answer

By Greg Soltis Posted 09.29.2008 at 5:12 pm 21 Comments

Last Monday at New York's Pierre Hotel, outspoken atheist Christopher Hitchens and physicist/theologian Monsignor Lorenzo Albacete met to tackle the question of whether or not science makes belief in God obsolete.

According to the forum's hosts, Newsweek editor Jon Meacham and Washington Post columnist Sally Quinn, religion riles its vilifiers when it makes truth claims without evidence -- at least evidence that would hold up in a court of science. The conflict seems to stem from a difference in understanding as to what evidence and truth truly are.

This discrepancy of perspective was clear in a statement made by Monsignor Albacete: "Religion is a different form of knowledge that has its own evidence."

"The credibility of the gospels is crucial," he said. "Faith without evidence: I don't know what that is."

When rattling off his gripes with religion during the question-and-answer session, Hitchens argued that believers seem to love God out of a requirement, not out of freedom. "The compulsory love of someone you must fear is something of a celestial North Korea," said Hitchens.

But Monsignor Albacete discovers truth in religion's ability to connect with his daily life. "If I can't relate doctrine to why I care about what I care, then it is all just theoretical matter and you can substitute the Great Lizard for Christ for all I care."

Humans have always tried to find patterns and explanations for why things are the way they are. And religion can provide a relevant avenue for doing so, just as science does.

The Uncanny Valley

Spooked? In our first episode of The Science of YouTube, we take a ride down into the Uncanny Valley and explore that familiar-yet-different feeling

By Abby Seiff Posted 09.29.2008 at 2:31 pm 2 Comments

Way back in 1919 Sigmund Freud postulated his concept of the uncanny. In the (cleverly named) The Uncanny, Freud explored a problem of aesthetics—when something is both familiar and unknown the experience of viewing it can be strongly unsettling. Fifty years later, roboticist Masahiro Mori presented his own work on the uncanny. Drawing heavily on his predecessor's work, Mori developed his "uncanny valley" hypothesis.

The deceptively simple chart progresses from the decidedly not-human (a factory robot, for instance) to something that would be indistinguishable from ourselves (whether it's a perfect computer graphic or these guys). One might guess that as the objects in questions become more human, they become more familiar to us, and so it goes. Until, that is, we hit the uncanny valley. Once the robot or graphic or toy or not-quite human creature becomes too human like (and yet not human like enough to be indistinguishable), we can't handle it. Viewing these things stimulates a feeling of repulsion (they're familiar! Yet unknown!) not readily eradicated. If we hope to make a future where robots are folded into the mainstream, the argument goes, we must be mindful these potential obstacles.

But enough theory!

In this first episode of our newest series, The Science of YouTube, John Pavlus and Christopher Mims of Small Mammal wrench open our psyches and explore the reasons why, right about now, you're feeling so unsettled.

Porsche Hands out Big Bonuses Again

STUTTGART, Germany — Bonuses are going up this year at Porsche AG. The German automaker said in a statement that it will give all of its employees €6,000 bonuses, the equivalent of $8,667. In 2007, Porsche handed out €5,200 bonuses, the equivalent of $7,511.

Porsche is one of the most profitable automakers in the world. In comparison, hourly Ford employees who are members of the United Auto Workers received checks for $1,000 in bonuses earlier this year.

Porsche cited "the company's exceptionally positive business development this year" in its bonus announcement. The company also noted that "workers will receive €1,500 in honor of the 60th anniversary of the brand, which the sports-car manufacturer is celebrating in 2008. The Executive Board intends this jubilee payment as a 'thank you' to all employees for their high degree of commitment and their special dedication." The U.S. equivalent of €1,500 is $2,165.

What this means to you: Oh, to be a Porsche employee in these tough times.

Mercedes Benz McLaren SLR 722 Roadster

PARIS — As Mercedes-Benz winds down its long-running alliance with McLaren, the partners are preparing to launch one of their final joint efforts, the limited-edition Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren Roadster 722 S. It will be formally unveiled this week at the 2008 Paris Auto Show.

The Roadster 722 S will go on sale in January in a limited run of 150 cars. Given its exclusivity and position, the price is rumored to exceed $1 million.

The Roadster 722 S has more muscle than the standard Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren Roadster. Its supercharged 5.5-liter V8, hand-built in Affalterbach by AMG, delivers 641 horsepower and 605 pound-feet of torque, compared with 617 hp and 575 lb-ft for the standard SLR McLaren Roadster (which lists for a mere $495,000).

Fitted with a beefed-up five-speed automatic gearbox, the Roadster 722 S boasts a top speed of 208 mph, with 0-60-mph acceleration in less than 3.7 seconds. To enhance handling, the car gets stiffer springs and shocks, and the body has been lowered 0.4 inch.

The two-seater features a carbon fiber-body painted in crystal antimony gray, with a fully retractable folding soft top. The cockpit is trimmed in carbon fiber, leather and Alcantara, with red stitching and red seatbelts for contrast.

What this means to you: Truly one of the world's fastest — and most exclusive — convertibles.

Senate Approves $25 Billion Loan for AutoMakers

WASHINGTON — President George W. Bush is expected to sign a bill shortly that will give automakers a $25 billion loan to help them retool factories to build more efficient models, such as the electric Chevrolet Volt. The U.S. Senate voted over the weekend to pass a stopgap budget bill that includes a $7.5 billion appropriation to cover $25 billion in federally guaranteed low-interest loans to the auto industry.

The House of Representatives passed the bill last week. The loans, which must be repaid and are not a free bailout, are designed to help automakers retool to build more fuel-efficient vehicles to meet the stricter fuel economy rules passed last year. Under the loan rules, only vehicles that get 25 percent fuel economy than their competitors can qualify for the aid.

However, the cash flow may be impeded a bit to the Motor City, since the U.S. Energy Department said that the process of handing out money could take up to 18 months after the bill is signed.

The Detroit Free Press reported that the loans will be made at low interest rates, with about 5 percent interest, rather than the 15-20 percent that auto suppliers and automakers have access to in today's tight credit market.

Ford said the loan program is "a key enabler to Ford's plan to pursue advanced technologies and deliver leading fuel economy."

What this means to you: Detroit automakers are by no means out of the woods, but this move should ease the pressure a bit and help speed the development of more fuel-efficient cars and trucks. — Anita Lienert, Correspondent

24-Karat Gold iPod Nano is a Violent Mugging Waiting to Happen

Quick question: How do you make one of the world's most stolen gadgets, well, more enticing? If we're talking about iPods, which we are, then you slap 24 and 18 karat white gold all over the newest models, and then send them out into the subways inside the pockets of the today's filthy rich. Of course, for a mere $644 for the Nano and $823 for the Touch, you too can slap this cutpurse bling beacon to your side and hope for the best. Good luck, and we hope the pickpockets of your community enjoy the playlist you've selected for them. [Goldstriker via Born Rich]

CNN Compares Tina Fey Parody to Real Palin Interview

Segment from CNN's Late Edition, September 28, 2008
"That was the first time I've ever heard the parody on SNL actually use exactly what was said... It was a rough week for her."

Star Wars Prequel Trilogy: Concept Art (PICS)

In the early stages of pre-production, filmmakers turn to artists to help shape and evolve what will become their final vision for their movie... Here's a sample of some of the fine art from the likes of Iain McCaig, Doug Chan, Warren Fu, Ryan Church, and much more, as they helped shaped the previsualization for Lucas' Star Wars Prequel Trilogy...

read more | digg story

5 Upcoming Remakes of 80s Movies (That Must be Stopped)

.Nothing from the 80s belongs in today's world. The themes we cared about then are sad reminders of how naive we once were, and the fashion trends that interested us are even sadder reminders of how idiotic we were.

read more | digg story

Hamann Aston Martin Vantage

LAUPHEIM, Germany — Hamann has created a kit for the V8 Vantage Coupe and Roadster, which adds Aston Martin to its list of tuned exotics.

A retuned ECU gives the 4.3-liter V8 23 extra horsepower and the 4.7-liter a 30-hp boost. Buyers can also opt for Hamann's sport exhaust system that supplies the already powerful Aston Martin with an additional 20 hp.

The Vantage's new appearance is the result of a unique front fascia with two-piece spoilers, side skirts, a three-piece rear diffuser and a custom rear spoiler. Other exterior modifications include a roof scoop and 21-inch alloys that combine with lowering springs to help finish off the look. Hamann notes that all the pieces are available in fiberglass or lightweight carbon fiber.

The interior features Hamann accoutrements like an aluminum pedal set and floor mats. The German tuning specialist has yet to release a price on its kit for the sporty Aston Martin.

What this means to you: Hamann keeps it clean and doesn't take away from the classy Aston Martin look. — Mike Lysaght, Correspondent

Top 10 Banned Books

Here is a list of the most challenged books of all time.

read more | digg story

Collection of Unusual Clock Designs

A unique collection of unusual clock designs. Tic Toc...Tic....Toc

read more | digg story

Plummer: 'My Sex Injury Made Shatner A Star'

| From wenn.com |

Veteran actor Christopher Plummer is livid an injury he suffered during from a one-night stand meant that William Shatner played his part in Henry V - because it made the Star Trek actor a star.

Plummer was lined up to perform in the Shakespeare play in 1956 - but an unplanned romp left him unable to take to the stage, according to New York gossip column PageSix.

He says in his autobiography In Spite Of Myself: "I woke up alone the next morning... (pain) all around my groin and lower abdomen... I started to whimper like a whipped dog. 'So this is what syphilis is like?' I thought. 'I suppose I deserve it, but Christ, how the hell was I to know?'

But instead of being struck down by the disease, Plummer had dislodged a kidney stone and had to undergo a medical procedure with a surgical wire to resolve the problem.

He adds, "It began to sink in... Shatner, my understudy, would have to go on... (It) instantly brought back the pain. I screamed for a nurse who jabbed me with more morphine.

"I knew then that the Sob (son of a b**ch) was going to be a 'star.'"

Man receives new leg after drink at his local pub

Not many people walk into a bar and walk out with a new leg.

But that’s what happened to David Huckvale, 42, who needed a £40,000 bionic leg to walk again.

The father-of-two popped down to his local pub on the same day surgeon Alistair Gibson, who specialises in fitting the computer-controlled limb, was there for a pint.

When the two happened to meet Mr Gibson mentioned he had a spare leg and could fit Mr Huckvale for free.

Mr Huckvale had his leg amputated when he was 29 after a benign tumour was removed.

Before the chance encounter, he had been limping around in a false leg, which didn’t fit properly and walked with the help of crutches and was sometimes in a wheelchair.

Mr Huckvale had read about the bionic leg available in the US and was saving for one – but had only managed to put away a fraction of the required £40,000.

He even bought a lottery ticket every week in the hope he might get a windfall.

Mr Huckvale told the Sunday Mirror: “I have been blessed by a miracle. I can now play in the garden with my two girls. Alistair has given me my life back.”

Mr Gibson said he was pleased to have been able to help.

Microsoft Launches Website for New Xbox Experience

Check out some videos showing what to expect from the 360 dashboard reboot.

By Kris Pigna, 09/28/2008

Microsoft still hasn't given an exact release date for when the "New Xbox Experience" dashboard overhaul will be released, but if you want to get an early impression of what to expect (coated in a delicious glaze of Microsoft's promotional exaltations), then head over to their new website -- itself modeled on the new navigation method coming in the update -- that's filled with videos that do just that.

Among the promotional videos to watch are an overall recap of what the new features will include (hosted by none other than Xbox Live GM Marc Whitten and Xbox Live corporate vice president John Schappert), as well as videos specifically showing off the new friends features, and how the Avatars work. That Avatar video, by the way, has the tag-line "Dress yourself up, or go a little wild," which at least seems to indicate the ability for virtual streaking, but it's more likely just an unfortunate choice of words.

Again, there's still no release date, but a recent rumor indicated this overhaul would go live in November. We'll have more on the New Xbox Live Experience soon, so stay tuned.

Bailout Bill Fails, DOW Plunges 700 points

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The fate of the Bush administration's $700 billion financial bailout plan was abruptly thrown in doubt Monday as a House vote turned against the controversial measure.

The next steps were not immediately clear but supporters were scrambling to put it up for another vote.

What was supposed to be a 15-minute vote stretched past the half-hour mark as leadership scrambled for support. Investors who had been counting on the rescue plan sent the Dow Jones industrial average down as much as 700 points while watching the measure come up short of the necessary support, before rebounding slightly. The key stock reading was down more than 500 points.

The measure needs 218 votes for passage, but it came up 13 votes short of that target, as the final vote was 228 to 205 against. About 60% of Democrats voted for the measure, but less than a third of Republicans backed the measure.

President Bush is "very disappointed" by the House vote, his spokesman Tony Fratto said Monday.

A four-hour debate included impassioned pleas for and against the measure from Democrats and Republicans alike. Even some of those arguing the legislation must be approved were quick to point out problems with it.

But in the end, the vote began with both Democratic and Republican leadership telling their members the only way to protect the economy from a spreading credit crunch was to vote for the difficult to swallow measure.

"Our time has run out," said Rep. Spencer Bachus, the ranking Republican on the House Financial Services Committee. "We're going make a decision. There are no other choices, no other alternatives."

The vote comes after lawmakers and the Bush administration finalized legislation following a weekend of high-stakes negotiations over the controversial measure, which is designed to get battered U.S. credit markets working normally again.

"Today is the decision day," said Barney Frank, D-Mass., on the House floor. "If we defeat this bill today, it will be a very bad day for the financial sector of the American economy and the people who will feel the pain are not the top bankers and top corporate executives but average Americans."

House Minority Leader John Boehner told his members, many of whom objected the measure, that the had accept something he and many of them found distasteful.

"If I didn't think we were on the brink of an economic disaster it would be the easiest thing to say no to this," Boehner said. But he said lawmakers needed to do what was in the best interest of the country.

Leading House Republicans signed on to the proposal on Sunday after expressing earlier reservations. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Sunday he hoped for a vote in that chamber by Wednesday at the latest.

Earlier on Monday, President Bush and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke hailed the measure and urged Congress to move quickly to pass it.

Bush, speaking at the White House, called the proposed measure "an extraordinary agreement to deal with an extraordinary problem." He said he is confident the measure will win bipartisan support.

"With this strong and decisive legislation, we will help restart the flow of credit so American families can meet their daily needs and American businesses can make purchases, ship goods and meet their payrolls," Bush said.

Bush acknowledged that many voters were opposed to helping out Wall Street with tax dollars, but said there is little choice to move forward with the plan. He said most if not all of the tax money spent to buy distressed mortgage-backed securities should be recouped when the Treasury sells them in the coming years.

"Every member of Congress and every American should keep in mind - a vote for this bill is a vote to prevent economic damage to you and your community," Bush said.

Bernanke, who had spent hours before Congress last week testifying in favor of the measure, issued a brief statement promising that it would restore the flow of credit to households and businesses. "I look forward to swift passage of the legislation," he said.

Buying troubled assets

The core of the bill is based on Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's request for authority to purchase troubled assets from financial institutions so banks can resume lending and so the credit markets, now virtually frozen, can begin to operate more normally.

But Democrats and Republicans - concerned about the potential cost - have added several conditions and restrictions to protect taxpayers on the down side and give them a chance at some of the potential upside if the companies benefit from the plan.

Key negotiators for the financial rescue plan were e busy trying to line up votes on Capitol Hill on Sunday. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., told CNN he believes a majority of representatives on both sides of the aisle can and will support the bill.

On Sunday evening, the House Republican working group, which stringently opposed earlier drafts of the plan and offered a counterproposal, indicated it would support the bill, and its members are encouraging other Republicans in the House to do the same.

"Nobody wants to have to support this bill, but it's a bill that we believe will avert the crisis that's out there," House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, told reporters.

But the bill did draw some opposition during the morning debate.

Rep. John Culberson, R-Texas, said the measure would leave a huge burden on taxpayers. "This legislation is giving us a choice between bankrupting our children and bankrupting a few of these big financial institutions on Wall Street that made bad decisions," he said.

Other conservative Republicans argued the bill would be a blow against economic freedom.

Thaddeus McCotter, R-Mich., said the bill posed a choice between the loss of prosperity in the short term or economic freedom in the long term. He said once the federal government enters the financial market place, it will not leave. "The choice is stark," he said.

But there were also Democrats who opposed the bill for not doing enough to help those who taxpayers facing foreclosure or needing unemployment benefits extended, or taxing Wall Street to pay for the rescue package.

"Like the Iraq war and patriot act, this bill is fueled by fear and haste," said Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas.

The crisis and a proposed fix

Banks and Wall Street firms, worried about both their own needs for cash and the condition of other institutions, essentially stopped loaning money to one another in recent weeks. That choked off the money being made available on Main Street in the form of mortgage loans, business loans and other consumer borrowing.

The crisis stems from problems in mortgage-backed securities, which saw their value plunge as home prices have gone into their worst slide since the Great Depression and foreclosures have soared to record levels. In turn, the market for trillion of dollars worth of those securities held by major firms evaporated, sending them down to fire sale prices and raising the risk of widespread failures among the nation's major financial firms.

Under the plan, Treasury will buy the mortgage backed securities, either directly from the firms or through an auction process. It may also arrange to provide guarantees for the securities up to their original values in return for premiums they would charge current holders of the securities.

To make the legislation more politically palatable, the bill calls for the government, as an owner of a large number of mortgage securities, to exert influence on loan servicers to modify more troubled loans to help prevent additional foreclosures. It also provides that the government will take equity in the firms that sell the securities to the government, and limits pay packages for top executives.

The legislation comes amid great upheaval in the nation's financial system. On Monday morning, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., which insures deposits at failed banks, arranged for the sale of the banking assets of Wachovia (WB, Fortune 500), the nation's No. 4 bank holding company, to Citigroup (C, Fortune 500) for $2.2 billion in stock.

That follows three weeks of other shocks: the Treasury Department's seizure of mortgage finance firms Fannie Mae (FNM, Fortune 500) and Freddie Mac (FRE, Fortune 500); Wall Street firm Lehman Brothers' bankruptcy filing; rival Merrill Lynch (MER, Fortune 500) purchase by Bank of America (BAC, Fortune 500).

In addition, the Fed bailed out insurance giant American International Group (AIG, Fortune 500), loaning it $85 billion in return for a nearly 80% stake. while Washington Mutual (WM, Fortune 500), the nation's largest savings and loan, became the largest bank failure in history.

Japanese Matrix Trilogy Blu-ray Collection Arrives in the Nebuchadnezzar

Japan, not content to be our betters with just internet service providers, is upping the ante again with this extravagant Ultimate Matrix Collection Blu-ray limited edition set. Available only in the Land of the Rising Sun, this set includes a 7-disc collection, which can be stored inside a 2-foot model of the Nebuchadnezzar. The seven discs include Blu-ray versions of The Matrix trilogy and The Animatrix, as well as three standard-definition DVDs featuring "making-of" documentaries. The Ultimate Matrix Collection is currently slated for a Japan-only release on December 17 for about $375. [WHV via OhGizmo]

Diora Baird Sizzles In Maxim… and Star Trek!?

Diora Baird may be known for being a super busty hottie, but soon she’ll be known as the super busty green alien hottie from J. J. Abrams’ Star Trek. According to Maxim magazine, Diora will be playing one of the infamous green-skinned Orion slave girls in the upcoming Star Trek remake. Here’s the skinny:

Let’s hope you keep things together in the new Star Trek flick. Who are you playing?
I play the green girl. There you have it.

So you’re an alien?
Um, I would assume so—unless I was born with a skin disease. In the original series, there were these infamous green women that Captain Kirk would hit on, and so without giving too much away, I’m one of those green girls.

Now if you have clue as to what I’m talking about, check out this video of an Orion slave girl in action, and if you don’t know who Diora Baird is, check out these sizzling photos from the latest issue of Maxim magazine.

Megan Fox Is Wet in a Dress in Her Next Movie of the Day

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Karolina Kurkova Does DT-magazine

Karolina Kurkova is a model from the Czech Republic and she can come wake me up any day of the week, make me breakfast and give me a good morning BJ. Yes, I am that romantic. Anyhow, she is appearing nude in DT Magazine.

Guitar Hero: The Spectator Version

People not smart enough to learn how to play a real guitar play Guitar Hero. GH enables any store clerk from Winnipeg to become Slash, Kirk Hammett or Angus Young.

Nikki Whelan Does Sweaty Breasts

Nikki Whelan used to play a part in Australian soap Neighbours. And if she is going to borrow a cup of sugar every morning dressed like this she can move in next to me right now.

Janet Jackson Sexually Assault A Fan

Not all that many years ago Janet Jackson caused the world to come to a virtual standstill when she popped out a star covered tit during the Superbowl half-time show. If her new stage show is anything to go by she is planning to make the world self-destruct this time with her sexy new stage show. Man, you’d almost go out and buy a ticket, forget about the crap music and leave the wife at home.

Detect Epidemics Before They Start

Photo: Bruce Gilden

Back in May 1993, as a medical resident at the University of Arizona, Mark Smolinski volunteered for a shift with the state's Department of Health. Right after he started, Arizona and neighboring states were struck by a deadly outbreak of an unidentified respiratory illness. The young doctor found himself face-to-face with an emerging epidemic, part of a team that spent sleepless months struggling to contain the outbreak. "I was going from hospital to hospital trying to determine the patients' exposures," he recalls of his harrowing first assignment. "Almost all the cases were under the age of 30, and it had a very high mortality rate."

The researchers finally identified the culprit — which eventually infected 53 people, 60 percent of whom died — as a new strain of hantavirus. They pinned the outbreak on a confluence of ecological and social factors: Wet weather during an El Niño year spawned heavier-than-normal vegetation. That in turn fueled an unusually large population of deer mice, which harbor the virus. The victims were exposed when they rummaged through closets or gardened, inhaling dust laced with mouse droppings, urine, or saliva. The disease soon receded, but Smolinski was hooked on the rush he got from investigating outbreaks. "It seemed like a career that would never be dull," he says. "That has certainly proven true."

These days, Smolinski's business card at Google.org, the philanthropic arm of the Mountain View behemoth, identifies him simply as "threat detective." He's director of the organization's Predict and Prevent Initiative, a global health program. The 46-year-old's job is to channel money — one insider estimates up to $150 million — into projects and technologies that will help catch outbreaks like hantavirus wherever they crop up. What's even more ambitious is Smolinski's desire to push disease surveillance "two steps to the left of the epidemic curve." The strategy: Draw on Google's search acumen to predict hot spots before the first case of some imminent calamity hits the hospital.

Smolinski faces a daunting landscape. More than 300 new diseases have emerged since 1940, many the result of jumps from wild animal to human. Outbreaks are expected to increase as environmental degradation thrusts humans into ever-closer contact with wildlife and as climate change alters the life cycles of disease vectors — like El Niño did to the deer mouse. Meanwhile, older diseases are rapidly crisscrossing the planet. "West Nile, which has been around in Africa since antiquity, appeared in 1999 in New York, and in three years it spread throughout the country," Smolinski says. "Now it is one of our endemic diseases."

Yet even though the next West Nile or HIV is just a plane flight away, the global public health system remains focused on responding to diseases after they've spread. That needs to change, Smolinski says. And he's hardly alone in his thinking. "The government and organizations that care about the health of the country and world need to think very carefully about whether our current approaches to controlling disease are sufficient," says Nathan Wolfe, a UCLA epidemiologist who specializes in identifying and studying new diseases. "If they do, they'll find that we are like the cardiologists of the 1950s, waiting for heart attacks to occur." A major study in Nature this year found that, despite the SARS and H5N1 avian flu scares, the areas most likely to harbor some new outbreak — like Malaysia, hit by the Nipah virus, or Kenya, which recently had a Rift Valley Fever outbreak — were least likely to have the kind of disease surveillance systems that let health pros monitor clusters of symptoms or animal die-offs.

Number of emerging infectious diseases reported worldwide.

To change that, Smolinski plans to lend Google's in-house technology expertise to companies and nongovernmental organizations already at work in the developing world. One effort involves extending traditional surveillance closer to the source of epidemics, beginning in outbreak-prone regions of Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. With the right network in place, Smolinski says, a farmer in Vietnam might send an SMS when chickens start dying or a kid has an unexplained fever. That information alone, of course, means little — "chickens die all the time from Newcastle disease," Smolinski says. "It doesn't have to be avian flu." That's where the search company comes in. Google.org partnered with HealthMap, a Web crawler that Smolinski says can reveal outbreak patterns hidden in vast amounts of public data. (The Global Public Health Intelligence Network, a Canadian project, used similar Web-scanning software to help detect the first signs of the SARS outbreak.)

Google.org is also looking at for-profit companies inventing and manufacturing low-cost medical diagnostic tools. "Molecular sequencing methods have gotten less expensive in the developed world," Smolinski says — cheap enough to be used to identify viruses in the field. Combine that genetic knowledge with open source information — farmers' SMSes, hospital reports, climate data, and satellite imagery — and Smolinski thinks researchers can begin not only to find early outbreak patterns but also understand the conditions most likely to create the next interspecies leap.

Despite Predict and Prevent's numerous resources — several multimillion-dollar, multiyear grants, plus 1 percent of Google equity — turning emerging disease research into a predictive science in some of the poorest health care systems in the world remains a long shot at best. But the man who once served as an epidemic intelligence officer at the Centers for Disease Control and was director of a landmark National Academy of Science study on future microbial threats has a record of achieving the unthinkable in public health. As vice president of biological programs for the nonprofit Nuclear Threat Initiative, Smolinski led the formation of a disease surveillance program in the Middle East, somehow coaxing Egypt, Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority into sharing outbreak data and lab results. This collaboration has already succeeded in containing cross-border flare-ups of mumps and other infections. "One thing that became clear is that health was a great tool to get people to work together, because they are in the same boat when it comes to infectious diseases," Smolinski says. "And if you can do it there, you can do it anywhere."