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Issue no. 37, 2002 Published: Oct 11, 2002
EU rules want to make internet broadcasts cheaper
Bell Labs pulls six patent applications
Radio waves could construct buildings in space
Camera gives safe new window into the body
Bacteria trained to build circuit
Real-time 2D to 3D video conversion unveiled
Exchange e-mails through handshake
Food scraps to power battery
Speakers of the future may be flat and flexible
Xbox converted to a Linux PC
Chess champion trounces Deep Fritz computer
Viruses infect 80 per cent of China's computers
Inventor says no more tears with baby-cry gadget

EU rules want to make internet broadcasts cheaper
The European Commission on Tuesday introduced plans to make it cheaper and easier for TV and radio broadcasters to play songs and music videos over the internet, according to a report by DowJones.com. Because internet transmissions extend beyond national boundaries to around the globe, until now, radio and TV companies had to obtain licenses from national bodies in every country where listeners and viewers accessed online transmissions. The new rules make it possible for broadcasters to shop around to get pan-European internet licenses from the bodies that collect royalties for singers and songwriters. The EU also wants the collecting bodies to make their fees more transparent, so the broadcasters will be able to select the most efficient and lowest cost license vendors. According the EU's antitrust chief Mario Monti the new rules will benefit 'both consumers and rights-holders' by increasing competition.
Telecom Paper Oct 09, 2002	back to top

Bell Labs pulls six patent applications
Bell Labs is withdrawing patent applications related to the work of its former star researcher Hendrik Schön. The laboratory fired Schön after a panel of outside experts concluded that Schön made up or altered data at least 16 times between 1998 and 2001. Bell Labs has now begun notifying the US Patent and Trademark Office and a handful of foreign patent offices that it is withdrawing applications for six patents. The six patents all involved long-term research so dropping the applications should not affect revenues for Bell Labs' beleaguered parent, Lucent Technologies. The patents concerned discoveries in the field of nanoelectronics, or creating molecule-sized electronic components. Those include research on 'organic electronics', molecular-scale transistors and superconductivity, or efforts to develop materials that conduct electricity without loss of power from electrical resistance.
Nando Times / AP Oct 07, 2002	back to top

Radio waves could construct buildings in space
Huge buildings could be conjured up in space using nothing more than focused radio waves to push individual components into place. Radio- controlled construction would get around the need to ferry heavy equipment into orbit and support the people who will operate it. Narayanan Komerath, an aeronautical engineer from the Georgia Institute of Technology, got the idea from a technique called 'acoustic shaping', in which sound waves are used to build solid objects in weightless environments. Using sound waves would be impossible in the airless vacuum of space, but Komerath reasoned that electromagnetic waves should also be able to create a force field that can push objects around. Komerath suggests sending a squad of solar-powered radio transmitters to the Earth's asteroid belt and blasting one of the rocks into small pieces. Radio waves from the transmitters would then shape the resulting debris into any desired structure. Individual parts could be fused together using focused sunlight or a more conventional adhesive, forming a space where astronauts could live and work shielded from radiation.
New Scientist Oct 09, 2002	back to top

Camera gives safe new window into the body
A camera that can see through clothes, skin and even walls without X-rays has been developed in what is being called one of the first great technological breakthroughs of the 21st century. The 'terahertz' camera, still in prototype form, is under rapid development by scientists in Oxfordshire. It is likely to have many applications, ranging from medical scanning to identifying concealed weapons on airline passengers. Unlike X-rays, it does not expose patients to potentially harmful radiation. Instead, it detects a form of ultra-high-frequency, or terahertz, energy waves naturally emitted by all objects. Nor does it require people to walk through a special scanner: anything that comes within range of the terahertz camera is exposed to its penetrating gaze. The researchers are now working on bringing image quality to commercial standards. They think that if the device were mass-produced, it could be available for a cost similar to that of a digital camera.
Daily Telegraph Oct 06, 2002	back to top

Bacteria trained to build circuit
Researchers at the Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute in Ibaraki, Japan, have found a way to use bacteria as nanoscale construction workers. Such bugs might form microbial machines that could repair wounds or build microscopic electrical circuits. The researchers used a grooved film to train the bacterium Acetobacter xylinum to exude neat ribbons of a biological building material - cellulose. The bug laid down strips at a rate of 4,000ths of a millimetre per minute. If the method can be extended to other materials, bacterial builders running on templates could find medical applications, such as healing wounds, the researchers think.
Nature Oct 08, 2002	back to top

Real-time 2D to 3D video conversion unveiled
New software that converts standard 2D video images into 3D viewing in real time has been unveiled. X3D Technologies claims it is the first system to make the conversion in real time. The system requires users to wear special glasses. Different signals are sent to the left and the right and the liquid crystal shutters on the glasses' lenses open and shut in sync with the images. This means the left eye only sees the left-oriented images and vice versa. The screen's normal flicker rate is doubled with a monitor attachment to about 120 images per second. At this rate the brain fuses the two images to create a flicker-free 3D illusion. But the key to the real-time video conversion is in the software, which uses image morphing technology to automate the process. This creates two images out of one, each tilted and distorted to generate the illusion of depth when combined. The software also has motion tracking algorithms that look a couple of frames in advance to ensure fluid 3D motion.
New Scientist Oct 07, 2002	back to top

Exchange e-mails through handshake
Wireless communication may become as easy as a handshake with new technology being developed by NTT in Japan that uses the human body's ability to conduct electric signals. NTT's technology is still being researched but the company confirmed data transmission through the body is possible at broadband speeds of up to 10 megabits per second. Attached to a PDA, the device developed by NTT can transmit weak electrical signals using human bodies as circuits. The technology would even work if the mobile device remained stored in a pocket or bag. Various uses are likely possible, such as exchanging telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and other information by just shaking hands or tapping someone on the shoulder. The technology could also allow people to communicate with machines in ways that require identification, such as tapping a door to get it to unlock or touching a desk to start a PC. Commuters could simply touch a station gate for immediate passage.
CNN / AP / New Scientist Oct 07, 2002	back to top

Food scraps to power battery
Researchers at the University of the West of England (UWE) in Bristol have developed a microbial fuel cell about the size of a mobile phone that could be powered by organic household waste. So far, their fuel cell runs only on sugar cubes, since these produce almost no waste when broken down, but they aim to move on to carrot power. The researchers are using the cell to run a small light-sensitive robot but they say when a series of the cells are connected they could run domestic appliances. The bacteria-driven cell, which would cost about €15, directly converts biochemical energy into electricity. It uses E. coli bacteria to break down carbohydrates and release hydrogen atoms. The cell also contains chemicals that drive a series of redox, reduction and oxidation reactions, stripping electrons from the hydrogen atoms and delivering them steadily to the fuel cell's anode. This creates a voltage that can be used to power a circuit. The organic battery can produce eight times as much energy as other microbial fuel cells.
CNN / Reuters / New Scientist Oct 10, 2002	back to top

Speakers of the future may be flat and flexible
Researchers at US research firm SRI International have created speakers made of a thin sheet of silicone. The material is stretched over a frame and coated on both sides with electrodes. When an electric signal is sent across the sheet, the electrodes cause the silicone to contract or expand and create sound waves. Because silicone and the electrodes can be made transparent, SRI's material could be built into televisions and allow the screen to double as a speaker. It would be possible to make transparent speakers and produce movie-theatre-like sound where dialogue is really coming from the person's mouth, according to one of the researchers. Meanwhile, London-based NXT has developed a different flat-speaker technology. Unlike SRI's all-in-one material, NXT must attach magnet- and-coil actuators to the back of polymer sheets to create vibrations. NXT has licensed its technology to more than 250 manufacturers, who are testing it in stereos, notebooks and cars, among others. NXT is now testing transparent speakers that can be embedded in a TV screen.
Silicon Valley / Dow Jones / AP Oct 08, 2002	back to top

Xbox converted to a Linux PC
A hacker group specialising in software for Microsoft's Xbox announced on Monday the release of the first full version of Linux for the game console. The Xbox Linux Project selected version 9 of French company Mandrake's release of the open-source operating system. The new Xbox version takes all the features of the PC version of Mandrake Linux 9 - including the Gnome user interface, OpenOffice software and the Mozilla web browser - and adapts them to run on the Xbox. The Xbox is just as powerful as any comparable PC with Mandrake Linux 9 and can be used for office applications, the internet, games or as a web, file or database server, according to the project organisers. To run, the homebrew software requires an Xbox outfitted with a 'mod chip', a grey-market add-on that typically has to be soldered to the Xbox's main circuit board. Once installed, the chips shut down security systems built into the console, allowing it to run unauthorised software, legally and illegally copied game discs and import games.
ZDNet Oct 09, 2002	back to top

Chess champion trounces Deep Fritz computer
World champion Vladimir Kramnik outwitted the world's most powerful chess computer Deep Fritz to win the second and the third game in a eight-game match dubbed the 'Brains in Bahrain' contest. The first game was drawn, just like the fourth game played on Thursday. German-built Fritz is capable of evaluating 3.5m moves per second and the contest is a sequel to Gary Kasparov's 1997 battle with super- computer Deep Blue in New York. The computer won that contest. Under the new rules, Kramnik was given the computer two weeks before the contest to practice against the new software and assess its style. Fritz won the opening skirmish even though he began with the aggressive Scotch Opening, precisely the kind of tactical manoeuvre experts say computers do not understand well. As he had done in the previous two games, Kramnik confused Fritz with an early gambit of queens and then slowly outplayed the computer in a brilliant display of chess.
CNN / Reuters Oct 09, 2002	back to top

Viruses infect 80 per cent of China's computers
Viruses have infected at least 80 per cent of China's computers, the official China Daily newspaper reports, highlighting the vulnerability of one of the world's biggest PC and internet markets. Thursday's findings were the result of a six-week survey conducted by the National Computer Virus Emergency Response Centre. 'Only 16 per cent of computer users we sampled this year reported they were free from any virus attack, while last year nearly one in three users said they suffered no computer infections,' said the centre's chief engineer, Zhang Jian. Half of the infected machines had suffered data losses, problems browsing the web, or other damage.
Yahoo / Reuters Oct 10, 2002	back to top

Inventor says no more tears with baby-cry gadget
A Spanish inventor, intrigued by his son's incessant crying, has designed a detector that he says will tell harassed parents within 20 seconds if their baby is hungry, bored, tired, stressed or uncomfortable. Electronic engineer Pedro Monagas said the gadget called 'Why Cry' would go on sale in Spain by the end of the month for € 95. Monagas said he identified five distinct crying types, which the gadget is able to recognise. The Catalan inventor, who plans to give a share of any profits to a baby charity, is already working on a more advanced model to 'make the family environment a little easier'.
Yahoo / Reuters Oct 09, 2002	back to top