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The interior of the NIF target chamber. Photograph: NIF

Issue no. 13, 2009 Published: Apr 03, 2009
Giant laser experiment powers up
Robot scientists can think for themselves
Researchers uncover 'vast' computer spy network
Aircraft could be brought down by DIY 'E-bombs'
Yeast-powered fuel cell feeds on human blood
Gene-engineered viruses build a better battery
Novel needle could cut medical complications
Fake company gets approval for risky trial

Giant laser experiment powers up
The US has finished constructing a huge physics experiment aimed at recreating conditions at the heart of our Sun. The US National Ignition Facility (NIF) is designed to demonstrate the feasibility of nuclear fusion, a process that could offer abundant clean energy. The lab will kick-start the reaction by focusing 192 giant laser beams on a tiny pellet of hydrogen fuel. To work, it must show that more energy can be extracted than is required to initiate the process. The California-based NIF is the largest experimental science facility in the US and contains the world's most powerful laser. It has taken 12 years to build. Experiments will begin in June 2009, with the first significant results expected between 2010 and 2012. Fusion is looked on as the 'holy grail' of energy sources because of its potential to supply almost limitless clean energy. But the challenge of creating a practical fusion reactor has eluded scientists for decades. Now, however, they believe they are nearing their goal. NIF will focus on a process known as inertially confined fusion, in which the extreme temperatures needed for fusion are achieved using ultra powerful lasers.
BBC News Mar 31, 2009	back to top

Robot scientists can think for themselves
Two teams of researchers say they have created machines that could reason, formulate theories and discover scientific knowledge on their own, marking a major advance in the field of artificial intelligence. Such robo-scientists could one day be put to work unravelling complex biological systems, designing new drugs, modelling the world's climate or understanding the cosmos. At Aberystwyth University in Wales, researchers have created a robot called Adam that can not only carry out experiments on yeast metabolism but also reason about the results and plan the next experiment. It is the world's first example of a machine that has made an independent scientific discovery - in this case, new facts about the genetic make-up of baker's yeast. Their next robot, Eve, will have much more brain power and will be put to work searching for new medicines. Meanwhile researchers at Cornell University in New York have developed a computer program capable of working out the fundamental physical laws behind a swinging double pendulum. Just by crunching the numbers - and without any prior instruction in physics - the Cornell machine was able to decipher Isaac Newton's laws of motion and other properties.
Reuters / Science Apr 02, 2009	back to top

Researchers uncover 'vast' computer spy network
Canadian researchers have uncovered a vast electronic spying operation that infiltrated computers and stole documents from government and private offices around the world, including those of the Dalai Lama. A team from the Munk Center for International Studies in Toronto said at least 1,295 computers in 103 countries had been breached in less than two years by the spy system, dubbed GhostNet. Embassies, foreign ministries, government offices and the Dalai Lama's Tibetan exile centres in India, Brussels, London and New York were among those infiltrated, said the researchers. The researchers concluded that computers based almost exclusively in China were responsible for the intrusions, although they stopped short of saying the Chinese government was involved in the system, which they described as still active. A spokesman for the Chinese Consulate in New York dismissed the idea China was involved. The network possesses remarkable 'Big Brother-style' capabilities, allowing it, among other things, to turn on the camera and audio-recording functions of infected computers for potential in-room monitoring, the report said. The system was focused on the governments of South Asian and Southeast Asian nations as well as on the Dalai Lama, the researchers said, adding that computers at the Indian Embassy in Washington were infiltrated and a NATO computer monitored.
Silicon.com / Reuters / New York Times Mar 30, 2009	back to top

Aircraft could be brought down by DIY 'E-bombs'
Electromagnetic pulse weapons capable of frying the electronics in civil airliners can be built using information and components available on the net, warn counterterrorism analysts. All it would take to bring a plane down would be a single but highly energetic microwave radio pulse blasted from a device inside a plane, or on the ground and trained at an aircraft coming in to land. Analysts at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism in Israel, have investigated electromagnetic weapons in development or used by military forces worldwide, and have discovered that there is low-cost equipment available online that can act in similar ways. For instance, the US and Russian military have developed electromagnetic pulse (EMP) warheads that create a radio-frequency shockwave. The radio pulse creates an electric field of many hundreds of thousands of volts per metre, which induces currents that burn out nearby electrical systems, such as microchips and car electronics. Speculation persists that such 'e-bombs' have been used in the Persian Gulf, and in Kosovo and Afghanistan. But much of what the military is doing can be duplicated by others. Once it is known that aircraft are vulnerable to particular types of disruption, it is possible to build a device that can produce that sort of disruption. And much of this could be built from off-the-shelf components or dual-use technologies, according to the analysts.
New Scientist Apr 03, 2009	back to top

Yeast-powered fuel cell feeds on human blood
Yeast cells feeding on the glucose in human blood might one day power implants such as pacemakers. A living source of power that is able to regenerate itself would eliminate the need for regular operations to replace batteries. A team at the University of British Columbia in Canada, has created tiny microbial fuel cells by encapsulating yeast cells in a flexible capsule. They showed the fuel cells can generate power from a drop of human blood plasma. Such fuel cells would be especially useful for devices, such as intraspinal microelectrodes for treating paralysis, which need to be implanted in places where replacing a battery is tricky. Conventional fuel cells rely on high-temperature catalysts such as platinum to strip electrons from fuels and generate a current. The idea with microbial fuel cells, which are being investigated as large-scale power sources, is to exploit the wide range of low-temperature catalysts - enzymes - found in living cells. The yeast-based fuel cell produces around 40 nanowatts of power, compared to the microwatt a typical wristwatch battery might produce. That might be enough power for some devices if it were coupled with a capacitor to allow energy to be stored. The yeast could also be genetically engineered to boost its power output.
New Scientist / Journal of Microelectrical Systems Apr 01, 2009	back to top

Gene-engineered viruses build a better battery
Researchers at MIT who have trained a tiny virus to do their bidding said they made it build a more efficient and powerful lithium battery. They changed two genes in the virus, called M13, and got it to do two things: build a shell made out of a compound called iron phosphate, and then attach to a carbon nanotube to make a powerful and tiny electrode. Such an electrode could conceivably make more powerful memory devices such as MP3 players or cellular telephones, and are far more environmentally friendly than current battery technologies. The technology is inherently green because it involves a live virus. The team said their genetically engineered viruses were designed to grow shells of amorphous iron phosphate. The material is generally not a good conductor, but makes a useful battery material when patterned at the nanoscale - a microscopic molecular scale. Lithium batteries are powerful and light, but they do not release their electrons very quickly. The virus-made material does, however. This translates into more battery power. The team is already working on a second-generation battery using materials with higher voltage and electrical capacity, such as manganese phosphate and nickel phosphate.
Reuters / Science Apr 02, 2009	back to top

Novel needle could cut medical complications
Each year, hundreds of thousands of people suffer medical complications from hypodermic needles that penetrate too far under their skin. A new device developed by MIT engineers aims to prevent this from happening by keeping needles on target. The device, which is purely mechanical, is based on concepts borrowed from the oil industry. It involves a hollow S-shaped needle containing a filament that acts as a guide wire. When a physician pushes the device against a tissue, she is actually applying force only to the filament, not the needle itself, thanks to a special clutch. When the filament, which moves through the tip of the needle, encounters resistance from a firm tissue, it begins to buckle within the S-shaped tube. Due to the combined buckling and interactions with the walls of the tube, the filament locks into place and the needle and wire advance as a single unit, according to the researchers. The needle and wire proceed through the firm tissue. But once they reach the target cavity - for example, a blood vessel - there is no more resistance on the wire, and it quickly advances forward while the needle remains stationary. Because the needle is no longer moving, it cannot proceed past the cavity into the wrong tissue.
EurekaAlert / MIT Apr 02, 2009	back to top

Fake company gets approval for risky trial
You would hope that a fake company, proposing to test a risky medical procedure, would be turned down flat. But that's not what happened in an elaborate 'sting' operation set up to probe the US system for protecting volunteers in clinical research. Trials of new drugs or medical devices can only begin if approved by an Institutional Review Board (IRB). Often these are attached to the hospitals or universities where the research will take place. But the task is increasingly being performed for profit by commercial IRBs, prompting fears that some may be rubber-stamping risky trials without proper scrutiny. Now it appears these fears may be justified. At a congressional hearing on 26 March, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) revealed the results of an investigation to test the responses of commercial IRBs. The GAO created a proposal from a fictitious company that wanted to test the ability of a gel, poured into the abdomen, to reduce the growth of scar tissue after surgery. The protocol for the trial matched multiple examples described as posing 'significant risk' by the Food and Drug Administration. The GAO submitted the proposal to three commercial IRBs, two of which rejected it. But Coast IRB of Colorado Springs approved the proposed trial by a unanimous vote, describing it as 'probably very safe'. It was also revealed that Coast approved all 356 proposals it received in the past five years, and earned USD 9.3m for its services in 2008 alone.
New Scientist Apr 02, 2009	back to top