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Issue no. 39, 2005 Published: Dec 16, 2005
Trapped ions important step towards quantum computing
Europe passes tough new data retention laws
Tech giants join to fund research
Japan to lead journey to centre of Earth
Violent video games alter brain's response to violence
Invention: Sonic watermarks
Cut emissions and pump more oil
Plasma engine passes initial test
HP unveils 'real-life' collaboration studio
Play-Doh can fool biometrics
Neural network sorts the blockbusters from the flops
The flimsiest clock in the world
Chameleon scarf coordinates with your outfit
Cracking da Vinci's coded smile

Trapped ions important step towards quantum computing
By encoding information in the quantum states of subatomic particles, quantum computers have the potential to make the latest Pentium chip look as outmoded as the abacus. But before such a device can even begin to compete, a way to scale-up individual quantum 'bits' must be found. Now, physicists in the US have made an important step towards this goal by creating an ion trap on a semiconductor chip. Such microscale traps could allow many qubits to be integrated in a workable quantum computer. A quantum computer would exploit the ability of quantum particles to be in superpositions of two or more states at the same time. These 'entangled' states, in principle, allow a quantum computer to outperform a classical computer for certain tasks. One of the most promising candidates for such a qubit is a trapped ion, whose internal energy states can be manipulated using a laser. Researchers at the University of Maryland have now made an ion trap from four alternating layers of aluminium-gallium-arsenide and gallium-arsenide grown on a substrate using molecular-beam epitaxy. By carefully controlling parameters such as electrode voltages and the laser wavelength, the researchers were able to produce a single cadmium ion in the trap and manipulate its quantum state.
PhysicsWeb / Nature Physics Dec 13, 2005	back to top

Europe passes tough new data retention laws
The European Parliament on Wednesday passed new, far-reaching data retention legislation for the telecommunications industry. The directive will require ISPs and phone companies to keep data on every electronic message sent and phone call made for between six months and two years. The parliament voted 378 to 197, with 30 abstentions, for a package already agreed to by the assembly's two biggest groups and member states, with European Commission backing. The law's aim is to help trace terrorists through communications records. However, opponents criticise it as a threat to the personal privacy of European citizens. Telecommunications providers will now have to keep data such as the time of each fixed and cell phone call made in Europe, whether a call is answered or not, the duration of the call, and other details that can help trace the caller. On the internet side, they will be required to retain information on the times people connect to the internet, people's IP addresses, and details pertaining to e-mail messages and VoIP calls. The content of the communications will not be recorded.
ZDNet Dec 14, 2005	back to top

Tech giants join to fund research
With US funds for basic computer science research at universities in decline, three of the industry's leading companies are joining to help fill the void. The fruits of the research will be non-proprietary and freely licensed, University of California computer scientists said in advance of the formal announcement Thursday. Each of the three companies, Google, Microsoft and Sun Microsystems, has agreed to support the project with $500,000 a year for five years. The companies will also underwrite a $7.5m centre on the Berkeley campus, the Reliable, Adaptive and Distributed Systems Laboratory. The centre will focus on the design of computing systems that are more dependable. The new Berkeley laboratory's research focus will be to apply advances in the use of statistical techniques in machine learning to web services - from maps to e-mail to online calendars - which have become an increasingly important part of the commercial internet.
International Herald Tribune / NY Times Dec 15, 2005	back to top

Japan to lead journey to centre of Earth
An ambitious Japanese-led project to dig deeper into the Earth's surface than ever before will be a breakthrough in detecting earthquakes including Tokyo's dreaded 'Big One', officials said Thursday. The deep-sea drilling vessel Chikyu, which means the Earth in Japanese, is scheduled to embark in September 2007 on a voyage to collect the first samples of the Earth's mantle in human history. The project, led by Japan and the US with the participation of China and the EU, seeks clues on primitive organisms that were the forerunners of life and on the tectonic plates that shake the planet's foundations. Chikyu is equipped with a 121-metre drill tower that can dig 7,000 metres below the seabed, nearly three times as deep as its predecessors. The first drilling spot is a seabed some 600 kilometres southwest of Tokyo, where many experts say an earthquake measuring eight on the Richter scale will occur sometime in the near future.
Physorg / AFP Dec 15, 2005	back to top

Violent video games alter brain's response to violence
A brain mechanism that may link violent computer games with aggression has been discovered by researchers in the US. Many studies have concluded that people who play violent video games are more aggressive, more likely to commit violent crimes, and less likely to help others. But critics argue that this merely prove that violent people gravitate towards violent games, not that games can change behaviour. But now psychologists from the University of Missouri-Columbia have found that people who play violent video games show diminished brain responses to images of real-life violence, such as gun attacks, but not to other emotionally disturbing pictures, such as those of dead animals, or sick children. And the reduction in response is correlated with aggressive behaviour.
New Scientist / Journal of Experimental Social Psychology Dec 12, 2005	back to top

Invention: Sonic watermarks
Counterfeiters and forgers will soon face a new challenge - creating fake credit or ID cards that generate the right noise. An audio watermarking scheme, developed at Philips's labs in the Netherlands, uses cards made from a polymer with a carefully distributed pattern of impurities buried inside. When the card is placed into a reader, a miniature loudspeaker injects sound into the material and a miniature microphone picks up the signal that comes out the other side. The signal will be distorted in a characteristic way as a result of the impurities in the card, and the resulting sound is checked against a stored reference to ensure the card is genuine. To make the system even more secure, the patent suggests using several speakers and microphones at different positions on the card. The system is cheaper and more reliable than an optical check, Philips reckons, because there is no need to focus light accurately and surface dirt cannot affect the readout. It would also be difficult for a forger to determine the buried pattern of impurities in order to copy it.
New Scientist Dec 13, 2005	back to top

Cut emissions and pump more oil
The energy industry has found a new way to dispose of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide: pump it back into the underground oil reservoirs from whence much of it came. Five million tons of CO2 has been successfully pumped underground into the Weyburn oil field in a pilot project in Saskatchewan, Canada. The CO2 is piped from the Great Plains Synfuels Plant, a giant 'gasification' plant near Beulah, North Dakota. Not only does the project dispose of the CO2, the pressure from the gas helps to extract more oil. The field's oil-recovery rate has been doubled, and its life extended for another 20 years, according to the US Department of Energy. However, not all oil fields can be used for CO2 injection and storage, so there is a need for other gas-storage sites. CO2 storage has been tried only in sedimentary rock, but the Northwestern and Southeastern US are made mainly of basalt rock. Research has proven that basalt can store CO2 with the unexpected benefit of converting the gas into solid calcium carbonate - chalk - in less than 18 months.
Wired News Dec 12, 2005	back to top

Plasma engine passes initial test
The European Space Agency (ESA) says initial testing of a new plasma drive for spacecraft has been a success. The 'double layer thruster' is a new kind of ion drive which could give much more power than existing versions. It works by accelerating charged particles between two layers of argon plasma, gas where the atoms have been stripped of electrons. ESA says it has 'proven the principle', and will proceed with simulations and perhaps bigger prototypes. The concept is very different from a conventional rocket engine powered by chemical reactions. Gas is ionised and the ions accelerated in a magnetic field, producing a small thrust. Although far less powerful than a chemical engine, an ion drive of realistic size can operate for much longer; for deep space missions it may prove a much better option. ESA believes the new double layer drives could be as small and economical as the one that is used on its Smart 1 Moon probe, but much more powerful, which would enable craft to accelerate and decelerate faster.
BBC News Dec 14, 2005	back to top

HP unveils 'real-life' collaboration studio
HP has introduced an online studio that aims to better mimic face-to-face meetings. The Halo Collaboration Studio features a specially designed room with three plasma screens and seating for up to six people. Studio-quality audio and lighting create a life-like image of the meeting participants in an identical studio at another location. Special software calibrates the colour and image settings, and data is sent over a dedicated high speed network to minimise network delays. In addition to the televised images of the people in the room, workers can share the images on a computer screen and use a special overhead high-magnification camera to zoom in on objects on the table. Halo was designed in part by Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks movie studio, one of HP's premier reference customers. The project will allow design teams in different offices to meet in a lifelike setting while cutting back on travel time. Each room costs about $550,000. Network and service fees make up for another $18,000 a month for US customers.
VNUnet UK Dec 13, 2005	back to top

Play-Doh can fool biometrics
Researchers from Clarkson University in New York have managed to fool biometric systems by making fingerprint copies using Play-Doh. Testing a range of biometric technologies the team created 60 fake fingers which were successfully authenticated by the combination of the fingerprint readers and their accompanying software in nine out of every 10 attempts. 'Digits from cadavers and fake fingers moulded from plastic, or even something as simple as Play-Doh or gelatine, can potentially be misread as authentic,' said Stephanie Schuckers, associate professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Clarkson University. But the research also highlighted ways of mitigating against such fraud. The team developed a technique for distinguishing live digits by detecting changing moisture patterns, successfully reducing the false detection rate to less than 10 per cent.
VNUnet UK Dec 13, 2005	back to top

Neural network sorts the blockbusters from the flops
Will the 3-hour special-effects-loaded remake of King Kong be a box office smash or a complete turkey? For movie producers, getting such questions right can be worth millions, and now they have a computer system to help them work it out before a film is even made. The system, developed at Oklahoma State University, uses an artificial neural network, especially trained for the purpose. Using data on 834 movies released between 1998 and 2002, the neural network can judge a film based on seven key parameters: the 'star value' of the cast, the movie's age rating, the time of release against that of competitive movies, the film's genre, the degree of special effects used, whether it is a sequel or not, and the number of screens it is expected to open in. This allowed it to place a movie in one of nine categories, ranging from 'flop' (total takings less than $1m) to 'blockbuster' (over $200m). The system cannot take into account the intricacies of the plot, but it can nonetheless get the revenue category spot-on 37 per cent of the time, and correct to within one category either side 75 per cent of the time, making it a 'powerful decision aid', according to the developer.
New Scientist / Expert Systems with Applications Dec 15, 2005	back to top

The flimsiest clock in the world
A Japanese watchmaker said Thursday it had created the world's first flexible digital clock which is as thin as camera film and can be bent around the curve of a wall. The clock is only three millimetres thick and offers better visibility from sharp angles and in poor visibility or high sunlight than existing models, Citizen Watch said. It can be set along the walls of a building or on round pillars of train stations or offices, letting people check the time from widely different positions, according to the company. The clock, measuring 53 by 130 centimetres, displays time in black numbers using technology developed by E Ink of the United States. It consumes less power than conventional digital clocks, with its battery life 20 times longer.
Physorg / AFP Dec 15, 2005	back to top

Chameleon scarf coordinates with your outfit
People lacking any sense of fashion no longer need worry about their scarf clashing with their clothes this winter. Researchers at Keio University in Tokyo, Japan, have created one that automatically changes colour to suit an outfit. Interwoven into the scarf material are pixels containing red, blue and green light-emitting diodes (LEDs), so adjusting the brightness of each type of diode turns the scarf a different overall shade. A small sensor embedded in the garment also enables it to identify the colour of the nearest item of clothing. A microcomputer then selects a suitable colour for the scarf itself to adopt. In the default setting, the microcomputer in the shawl is programmed to change to the coordinative colour of the input data. This means that if its owner is wearing dark blue, for example, the scarf will turn a tasteful shade of light blue to match. If, however, the wearer fancies making a more daring fashion statement, the scarf's computer can be configured to match more unusual colours together. Theoretically, around 4,000 colours can be generated.
New Scientist Dec 09, 2005	back to top

Cracking da Vinci's coded smile
A femme fatale with a mocking, ironic smile, a man in drag, an expectant mother or simply a housewife trying to hide the appalling state of her teeth. The true meaning of Mona Lisa's enigmatic smile has haunted art lovers for years, but scientists now believe they have hit upon a breakthrough. Using a computer programme designed to reveal the emotions of a face, they have worked out that Leonardo da Vinci's muse was 83 per cent happy, 9 per cent disgusted, 6 per cent fearful and 2 per cent angry. The study, which was carried out by researchers at Amsterdam University using 'face tracking' software, involved creating an 'average neutral expression' from a database of young female faces. By comparing this image with key facial features of a picture, such as the curve of the lips and the crinkles round the eyes, the computer programme is able to give a score for six basic human emotions: happiness, surprise, anger, disgust, fear and sadness. The technology could be used to create computers that change how they react in accordance with the user's mood.
The Scotsman Dec 15, 2005	back to top