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Issue no. 11, 2008 Published: Apr 11, 2008
IBM races to make hi-tech memory
Google Earth maps refugee crises
New solution for pollution: CDs and DVDs
Scientists test solar energy balloons
'Darwin chip' brings evolution into the classroom
Robots seen doing work of 3.5 million people in Japan

IBM races to make hi-tech memory
Handheld gadgets storing thousands of hours of film footage could soon be a reality thanks to IBM scientists, who are working on a technology known as racetrack memory which uses tiny magnetic boundaries to store data. Currently most desktop computers use flash memory and hard drives to store data. Hard drives are cheap but not very durable and slow. By contrast flash memory is more reliable and much faster though it has a finite lifespan and is relatively expensive. The work being done on racetrack memory could produce a storage medium that is cheap, durable and fast. Ultimately racetrack memory could replace both flash and hard drives in computers and other gadgets, the researchers think. The racetrack memory stores data in the boundaries, known as domain walls, between magnetic regions in nanowires. The medium gets its name because the data races around the wire or track as it is read or written. The domain walls are read by exploiting the weak magnetic fields generated by the spin of electrons. The tiny amounts of power needed to exploit these fields means racetrack memory generates far less heat than existing devices.
BBC News / Science Apr 10, 2008	back to top

Google Earth maps refugee crises
Google unveiled a new feature this week for its popular mapping programs that shines a spotlight on the movement of refugees around the world. Users must have downloaded Google Earth and UNHCR maps to access refugee information. The maps will aid humanitarian operations as well as help inform the public about the millions who have fled their homes because of violence or hardship, according to the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, which is working with Google on the project. Although not all parts of the world are displayed at the same high resolution, Google has made an effort to allow users to zoom in closely on refugee camps. In the Djabal refugee camp in eastern Chad, which is home to refugees from the conflict in neighbouring Darfur, users can see individual tents clustered together amid a sparse landscape, and learn about the difficulty of providing water to some 15,000 people. Google Earth was launched three years ago and originally intended for highly realistic video games, but its use by rescuers during Hurricane Katrina led the company to reach out to governments and nonprofit organisations. Google Earth has since teamed up with dozens of nonprofit groups seeking to raise awareness, recruit volunteers and encourage donations. Among them are the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, the UN Environmental Program and the Jane Goodall Institute.
CNN / AP Apr 08, 2008	back to top

New solution for pollution: CDs and DVDs
In the future, CDs and DVDs could be made from air pollution. If plans to remove carbon dioxide from smokestacks succeed, the gas could be harnessed and turned into plastic products, new research suggests. Sucking the CO2 from smokestack emissions could enable a process by which the heat-trapping gas would be turned into a raw material for making polycarbonates, a type of plastic, and keep it from raising global temperatures even more, according to two groups of researchers from Aachen University, Germany and the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology Japan. CO2 is also cheaper and less toxic than other starting materials traditionally used to make plastics. Polycarbonates, which are easily worked and molded, are used to make many transparent materials, including CDs and DVDs, eyeglasses and drinking bottles. Both teams are developing methods to transform CO2 into the starting materials for polycarbonates.
MSNBC / LiveScience / CBC News Apr 08, 2008	back to top

Scientists test solar energy balloons
Giant solar energy balloons floating high in the air may be a cheap way to provide electricity to areas lacking the land and infrastructure needed for traditional power systems, researchers in Israel say. With many of the earth's sunniest spots falling in the middle of the ocean or desert, the balloons, designed by a team from the Technion Institute of Technology, could be used to harness the sun's energy in those remote areas. The helium-filled balloons, covered with thin solar panels, hover as high as a few hundred metres in the air, and are connected via a wire cable to an inverter, which converts the electricity into a form households can use. Initial research, both computerised and using a crude prototype, showed a balloon with a 3-metre diameter could provide about one kilowatt of energy, the same as 82 square metres of traditional solar panels. That is enough energy for an average person to operate a washing machine and drier. While 82 square metres of traditional solar panels may cost about USD 10,000, the target cost of the balloon is less than USD 4,000, with most of the savings coming from the minimal structural support needed.
MSNBC Apr 08, 2008	back to top

'Darwin chip' brings evolution into the classroom
A new 'Darwin chip' could make evolution as easy as pressing play. Researchers at the Scripps Research Institute in California have created an automated device that evolves a biological molecule on a chip filled with hundreds of miniature chambers. The molecule, which stitches together strands of RNA, became 90 times more efficient after just 70 hours of evolution. The experiment could be used in the future to evolve molecules - or even cells - to sense environmental pollutants. And by demonstrating natural selection in real-time, the device could also help dispel doubts over evolution in the classroom and beyond, according to the researchers. While Darwin used natural selection to explain differences between species, his principles also work at the level of molecules. RNA is usually used to create proteins from genes. But some kinds of RNA can perform tasks similar to protein enzymes. The researchers used just such an RNA molecule, or ligase, in their work.
New Scientist / PLoS Biology Apr 08, 2008	back to top

Robots seen doing work of 3.5 million people in Japan
Robots could fill the jobs of 3.5 million people in greying Japan by 2025, a thinktank says, helping to avert worker shortages as the country's population shrinks. The current fertility rate is 1.3 babies per woman, far below the level needed to maintain the population, while the government estimates that 40% of the population will be over 65 by 2055, raising concerns about who will look after the greying population. The thinktank, the Machine Industry Memorial Foundation, says robots could help fill the gaps, ranging from microsized capsules that detect lesions to high-tech vacuum cleaners. Rather than each robot replacing one person, the foundation said in a report that robots could make time for people to focus on more important things. Japan could save USD 21bn of elderly insurance payments in 2025 by using robots that monitor the health of older people, so they do not have to rely on human nursing care, the foundation said in its report. Caregivers would save more than an hour a day if robots helped look after children, older people and did some housework, it added. Duties could include reading books out loud or helping bathe the elderly.
Reuters Apr 08, 2008	back to top