Astronomers using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope have discovered carbon molecules, known as 'buckyballs', in space for the first time. Buckyballs are soccer-ball-shaped molecules that were first observed in a laboratory 25 years ago.
Japanese-German micro/nanotechnology forum at the Micromachine/MEMS exhibition in Tokyo
In co-operation with the German Asia-pacific Business Association, IVAM Microtechnology Network launches the third Japanese-German Micro/Nano forum within the framework of the Exhibition Micro Machine/MEMS in Tokyo.
New EU-funded project to develop sustainable solutions for nanotechnology-based products based on hazard characterization
The Nanosustain FP7 project is funded for three years and has the objective of developing innovative solutions for the sustainable design, use, recycling, and final treatment of nanotechnology-based products.
SMIC and Virage Logic Extend Partnership to 40nm LL Process Technology
Partnership provides SoC designers with Virage Logic's highly differentiated IP for a broad range of SMIC process technologies.
Nanomaterial Supplier Illuminex Corporation Closes Angel Round Of Funding
Nanomaterial firm closes $500K angel financing round to commercialize patented nanowire array based technologies for solar cells, lithium-ion battery anodes, and thermal management materials all based on the company's core nanowire array production capabilities.
Fabrication of photoluminescent glass capsules containing high concentrations of uantum dots
Researchers in Japan have developed photoluminescent glass capsules containing multiple CdSe/ZnS core/shell quantum dots that retain their photoluminescence properties. With high emission brightness and the durability of glass, the capsule can be used as a fluorescent reagent in a wide variety of bio-applications, from basic research to clinical applications. Its brightness and durability could make it useful as a phosphor for electronics.
Do-it-yourself microtechnology for smaller companies
A European project has developed a one-stop shop to support companies, especially SMEs, in the rapid design and manufacture of novel micro-devices for use in applications ranging from medical diagnosis to mobile phones.
Attocube-WITTENSTEIN Research Awards 2010 verliehen
Preise fuer exzellente, anwendungsorientierte Diplom- und Doktorarbeiten.
CRAIC Technologies Release New 64-Bit Windows 7 Imaging Software
CRAIC Technologies, a leading manufacturer of UV-visible-NIR microspectrometers, today released the 64-bit version of its ImageUV imaging software package. This software is designed to collect, analyze and process images from CRAIC microscopes and microspectrophotometers running 64-bit versions of Windows 7.
A trick of the light
Unusual properties predicted in superconducting thin films could deliver perfect lenses and other novel applications.
Bright lights for live cells
Surface-selective fluorescent labeling enables cell tracking in the body while preserving initial cell function.
FDA Tuesday, Congress TODAY. More letters for DTCG.
I read with great interest Dan Vorhaus' post on the new letters sent to DTCG companies this week.
While it seems to me that these letters were probably planned beforehand, they may indeed be just trying to batch the "Publicized" I.E. Venture funded DTCG with the private funded DTCG. BEFORE, congress has a chance to sit down with the Big Money DTCG.....
I also disagree with his take that the FDA has worsened its position of trust with the LDT companies via these letters. In fact, what is going on as I speak with more LDT directors of labs, they are mad as hell. They are mad that these DTCG companies came in and screwed everything up in their nice little universe of LDT.
If anything, the FDA letters represent an effort to show clinically useful and ordered LDTs that they are siding with them and against the microcosm known as DTCG.
I think the Congressional Hearings on DTCG will prove the same here.
Back in 2007 when these companies launched, I expressed concern on my blog. I was concerned that these DTCG companies, which wanted to initially play down their clinical role, NITDOC loophole, would actually make the whole field look silly and create public distrust. I even predicted that this movement to "flip" a company I.E. "Create a revolution" may even lead to the death of personalized medicine
Unfortunately, that is exactly what has played out. At least the distrust part and definitely the confusion part. It appears the FDA is extending a lifeline to LDTs ordered by physicians and trying to amputate the DTCG arm of LDT.
LDT companies can either turn on the DTCG companies and devour them, thus saving themselves from onerous regulation or they can stay silent on DTCG at their own peril. This will be interesting to see how it all plays out.
One thing is for certain, what DTCG says or presents to congress will likely give lots of cannon fodder to the LDTs being used and ordered by clinicians and patients.....
Congress already has fodder to attack DTCG, they have been collecting it for a month. Wha? Those letters basically say "Give us everything. Tell us everything about how you funded and ran your companies. Tell us how you fixed your screw ups or didn't. We want it all. Emails, Texts, etc."
The Sherpa Says: This is not LDT vs FDA, this is Clinical LDT vs DTCG LDT vs FDA and The US Government. I think that if they fight it will be very ugly here. Congress needs to ask 1 question "Do you think you are doing medical testing? If not why not?"
Addendum: Video Sting from the GAO presented at the conference shows.
They are not only doing medical testing, they are giving medical advice.......
This industry is about to get blown up from the inside to protect the Clinically Useful and Valid labs. Those labs are about to feel the pain of a 2000 sample validation process......
Galileo's Finger, Science Museums, and the New York Times
Now a particularly enduring Catholic practice is on prominent display in, of all places, Florence’s history of science museum, recently renovated and renamed to honor Galileo: Modern-day supporters of the famous heretic are exhibiting newly recovered bits of his body — three fingers and a gnarly molar sliced from his corpse nearly a century after he died — as if they were the relics of an actual saint.
“He’s a secular saint, and relics are an important symbol of his fight for freedom of thought,” said Paolo Galluzzi, the director of the Galileo Museum, which put the tooth, thumb and index finger on view last month, uniting them with another of the scientist’s digits already in its collection.
“He’s a hero and martyr to science,” he added.
The above image--of Galileo Galileo's preserved finger in its reliquary as now on display in Florence’s history of science museum--and text are drawn from an article that ran in today New York Times. You can read the article--which traces the history of Galileo as well as his preserved fingers and other assorted remains--in its entirety by clicking here.
Image Caption: "Visitors looked at one of Galileo’s fingers, on display at the Galileo Museum in Florence." Photo by Kathryn Cook for The New York Times
Politicians Kill Climate and Energy Bill for 2010
The weather this summer is setting records all over the U.S.**  No one can be positive, but the very hot weather, the storms, the incredible amount of moisture in the air — it looks like it’s caused by a very volatile, changing climate. But our lawmakers see no threat in our incredible weather this year. They just ended the possibility of climate and energy legislation for 2010.  From the NYT:
“Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid abandoned efforts to reduce carbon emissions from the nation’s power plants yesterday, marking the first major legislative setback for President Obama, who entered office vowing to address climate change. Reid (D-Nev.) was cornered into the decision after a handful of Democrats and Republicans failed to be swayed by an 18-month effort in Congress to charge… . . . “
It’s easy to correct that sentence . . . “by the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history, caused by fossil fuels.”  Caused by oil and criminal negligence in drilling for it in deeper and deeper water. Our Congress moves at a glacial pace for many reasons, and in this case, they are not going to address something that is a real crisis — for purely political reasons. They won’t even have a public debate about it. A public debate about climate change and renewable energy versus business as usual is an essential thing for the American public to see because they don’t seem to know much about it. What the public does seem to know about it appears to be based on erroneous information that has come at them from a variety of special interest groups and lobbyists. That’s why we desperately need this public discussion.
But now we won’t get the bill we need, because our Congress has decided it’s just too risky for their political careers. As I have said before, American politicians care far more for their own careers than anything else, and they have blood on their hands as a result. Some environmental groups think this is a good idea because now we can 1) expect a better bill (on Planet Utopia, apparently) and 2) the bill would have done more harm than good. Maybe both things are correct, but now we have nothing, and there is no public discussion.
Do people really think that politicians are going to wise up and do the right thing next year (when we may have a more Republican Congress) if they can’t manage to do it this year, or the year before, or in 2008, or every year for the last three decades? Come on. This was the year to do it or lose it, and it looks like we lost it. Congress members cannot think ahead further than the next election cycle, to say nothing of looking ahead 20, 30, 100 years. They do not think long term.
Now our main hope to do something effective on climate change mitigation is the EPA, and the Republicans are [...]
Comic-Con Gauntlet Thrown: Fringe Producer Says Scientific Fact Must Yield to Story | Science Not Fiction
Spring boarding from Amos’ paper on Thursday’s Discover panel, I want to delve into some unexplored tension. The panel focused on how science could make storytelling better, and it included a mix of scientists and TV writers.
Jamie Paglia (Co-creator of Eureka) conceded that sometimes he’s had to “stretch the boundaries a little thin for my comfort zone,” and he was somewhat abashed thinking of those moments. But Fringe producer Zach Stentz threw down the gauntlet.
“Sometimes you have to break the rules to tell the story you want to tell,” he said, and ran a Fringe clip in which Olivia and Peter realize that Bell has extracted memories from Walter’s brain by removing actual pieces of Walter’s brain.
“He literally had his memories removed,” Stentz said. “We knew when we wrote it that memories aren’t stored in a discrete portion of your brain.”
Which I thought was a pretty direct challenge to Kevin Grazier, Sean Carroll, and Phil Plaitt, all scientists trying to make the case that accurate science can ratchet up the tension and provide a more satisfying resolution.
Alas, the argument never got going, and it left me wondering: where’s the line between acceptable and unacceptable scientific rule breaking?
Obviously we accept violations of physical laws all the time in our science fiction, but to my mind, it’s OK to break rules when doing so is a fundamental and permanent feature of the fictional universe: (Fringe’s alternative dimensions and creepy crawlies, Star Trek faster than light travel, The Force, etc.). Those concepts are fundamental to the universe of those shows, and once established, they become scientific laws unto themselves that other events must bend to.
And the audience is in on it. Everyone knows we can’t travel faster then light, so we accept a universe where we all agree that the technology exists. But the brains/memories plot device hinges on the audience being too ignorant to understand the inaccuracy. The rule breaking isn’t based on the paranormal or on advanced technology. It’s based on the audience not knowing better. That seems like the wrong kind of rule breaking to me.
Maybe I’m just being pretentious, I don’t know, but this seems as good a space as any to pick up the argument. Readers, what do you think? Am I just being a poor man’s Sheldon Cooper?
Comic-Con: Iron Man and the Scientists Who Love Him (His Movie, Anyway) | Science Not Fiction
Sure scientists enjoy the first Iron Man movie. They’re human beings after all, and that was a pretty decent movie. But I would never have expected scientists to love it for…well, for its approach to science.
At the NewSpace panel I attended yesterday, Mark Street, from XCOR, said he and a group of colleagues went to see the first film together.
“Our favorite part was the testing,” he said at the panel. “You know the part where he tries out the rocket boots, and he turns them on at like 10% and gets thrown onto the roof of car? We cracked up because that’s exactly what happens.”
Obviously, Street was joking, but his point was that Iron Man was one of the few movies to offer a smatter of realism in how science gets done: Have an idea, test it, have it not work right, try again.
“It never works the way you think it’s going to work the first time,” said Molly McCormick, an engineer who designs space suits for Orbital Outfitters.
At Discover’s panel Thursday, Discover blogger Sean Carroll, who I don’t think attended the space panel, made the same point on his own.
“Iron Man had the scientific method,” he said. “It didn’t always work.”
Exquisite Eco Villas!
The Indonesian Island of Bali has long caputred the imagination of the World. Recently there has been an explosion of eco friendly resorts. One resort that has been getting a lot of attention is Alila Villas Uluwatu a majestic resort located on the sloping hills in Bali’s Uluwatu region on the Southern Bukit Peninsula of the charming Indonesian island.
This beautifully designed complex straddles a striking white limestone cliff and an arid savanna on the tropical island’s arid Bukit Pennisula. The Alilas Villas resort is the first of its kind to achieve the highest level of certification for Environmentally Sustainable Development (ESD).
At the resort indoor and outdoor spaces blend together as verandas, canopies, bridges and passages weave through the resort. The architects drew inspiration for the stone walled court yards from the local farmer’s buildings, and the overall design is a fusion of low-slung vernacular Indonesian architecture and modernism. The villas are placed to follow the natural contour of the gently sloping land, leaving much of the local vegetation and natural formations intact and providing each with a view of the Indian Ocean.
NASA Spacecraft Camera Yields Most Accurate Mars Map
Valles Marineris, the "Grand Canyon of Mars," sprawls wide enough to reach from Los Angeles to nearly New York City, if it were located on Earth. The red outline box shows the location of a second, full-resolution image. Credit: NASA/JPL/Arizona State University - Larger image
A camera aboard NASA's Mars Odyssey spacecraft has helped develop the most accurate global Martian map ever. Researchers and the public can access the map via several websites and explore and survey the entire surface of the Red Planet.
The map was constructed using nearly 21,000 images from the Thermal Emission Imaging System, or THEMIS, a multi-band infrared camera on Odyssey. Researchers at Arizona State University's Mars Space Flight Facility in Tempe, in collaboration with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., have been compiling the map since THEMIS observations began eight years ago.
The pictures have been smoothed, matched, blended and cartographically controlled to make a giant mosaic. Users can pan around images and zoom into them. At full zoom, the smallest surface details are 100 meters (330 feet) wide. While portions of Mars have been mapped at higher resolution, this map provides the most accurate view so far of the entire planet.
The new map is available at: http://www.mars.asu.edu/maps/?layer=thm_dayir_100m_v11 .
Advanced users with large bandwidth, powerful computers and software capable of handling images in the gigabyte range can download the full-resolution map in sections at: http://www.mars.asu.edu/data/thm_dir_100m .
"We've tied the images to the cartographic control grid provided by the U.S. Geological Survey, which also modeled the THEMIS camera's optics," said Philip Christensen, principal investigator for THEMIS and director of the Mars Space Flight Facility. "This approach lets us remove all instrument distortion, so features on the ground are correctly located to within a few pixels and provide the best global map of Mars to date."
Working with THEMIS images from the new map, the public can contribute to Mars exploration by aligning the images to within a pixel's accuracy at NASA's "Be a Martian" website, which was developed in cooperation with Microsoft Corp. Users can visit the site at: http://beamartian.jpl.nasa.gov/maproom#/MapMars .
"The Mars Odyssey THEMIS team has assembled a spectacular product that will be the base map for Mars researchers for many years to come," said Jeffrey Plaut, Odyssey project scientist at JPL. "The map lays the framework for global studies of properties such as the mineral composition and physical nature of the surface materials."
Other sites build upon the base map. At Mars Image Explorer, which includes images from every Mars orbital mission since the mid-1970s, users can search for images using a map of Mars at: http://themis.asu.edu/maps .
"The broad purpose underlying all these sites is to make Mars exploration easy and engaging for everyone," Christensen said. "We are trying to create a user-friendly interface between the public and NASA's Planetary Data System, which does a terrific job of collecting, validating and archiving data."
Mars Odyssey was launched in April 2001 and reached the Red Planet in October 2001. Science operations began in February 2002. The mission is managed by JPL for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver is the prime contractor for the project and built the spacecraft. NASA's Planetary Data System, sponsored by the Science Mission Directorate, archives and distributes scientific data from the agency's planetary missions, astronomical observations, and laboratory measurements.
For More Information Visit http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2010-244
Someone Hacked @NASA_Astronauts Twitter Account
NASA's Twitter feed hacked, MSNBC
"It was like a discount electronics attack from outer space. Earlier today, NASA's Twitter feed for astronauts currently in space (@NASA_Astronauts) briefly broke with the standard space jibber jabber, jammed on the cap locks, and subjected followers to an onslaught of messages about "BRAND NEW PLASMA FLAT SCREEN TV!!! WHOLESALE LIST!"
The New Moon– absolutely still in the picture
The New Moon: That was the title of Andy Chaikin’s public talk this week at the 3rd annual Lunar Science Forum, held at NASA Ames Research Center and hosted by the NASA Lunar Science Institute (NLSI). He claims the title was not inspired by recent pop culture… phenomenon… but that is besides the point.
Some say NASA is abandoning the Moon. The future of manned spaceflight is unclear right now, and many are experiencing losses of jobs, but I want to look at something else: Who cares about the beauty of real scientific exploration? Judging by participation in the Lunar Science Forum this year, I would say a lot of people. Is the Moon ‘dead’? A resounding NO, judging from the highest attendance yet for the meeting, the amazing science results, and the many young faces of the Next Generation of Lunar Scientists and Engineers interested in the Moon. They are not going anywhere, and that message is loud and clear!
Forked impact melt. Credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University
I guess I should give the disclaimer that I work at the NLSI 
but also that I used to be a Mars person. Mars is still exciting, of course, but in the past few years the Moon really has become a whole new Moon, most obviously with the discovery of water in amounts different than expected (a simple statement with many scientific papers enveloped in it).
One of the highlights from the meeting for me was hearing that there are craters in the polar regions of the Moon that are estimated to have high levels of water available… less than 50 km from areas with near constant availability of sunlight. All the recent science about the Moon greatly informs human exploration… and what is better than having science and exploration walk hand in hand?
If you want to know more about the lunar science shared at the Forum, go to http://lunarscience2010.arc.nasa.gov/agenda; the talks will be posted there shortly.
In the meantime, keep dreaming about all the undiscovered secrets of the Moon: lava tubes, pockets of water, and combining awesome LROC image data with mini-RF data (really really cool insights!)
And it is only fitting that the Lunar Science Forum is being followed up by a NewSpace Conference. A New Moon indeed!