An Australian company is to build the world’s first automated laser system to track dangerous space junk.
A consortium headed by Electro Optic Systems Holdings has been awarded a $4.04 million grant from the Australian Space ResearchProgram (ASRP), which will go towards the $9 million cost. The project will be based at EOS’s current facility at Mount Stromlo.
via TG Daily.
Scientists, using three NASA satellites, have created a first-of-its-kind map that details the height of the world’s forests.
via TreeHugger.
It’s a modern-day version of Marco Polo’s journey halfway around the world – but is anyone at the controls?
A team of Italian engineers on Tuesday launched what has been billed as the longest-ever test drive of driverless vehicles: a 13,000-kilometer, three-month road trip from Italy to China, not in search of silk, but to test the limits of future automotive technology.
Two bright orange vehicles, equipped with laser scanners and cameras that work in concert to detect and help avoid obstacles, are to brave the traffic of Moscow, the summer heat of Siberia and the bitter cold of the Gobi desert before the planned arrival in Shanghai at the end of October.
via Xinhua.
Moderately intense pulsed laser light can force cancer cells to take up drugs from their environment. So say researchers at the University of Ulm in Germany who have used red light with a wavelength of 670 nm to expand the water contained in biological cells. When the laser is then switched off, the water retracts instantly and the cells can “suck in” drug molecules from a surrounding solution Photomedicine and Laser Surgery 28 429.
via optics.org.
Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute of Laser Technology in Aachen have devised a method for making made-to-measure, porous bone implants from degradable materials using a laser melting technology.
An alternative to titanium implants, degradable implants are intended to replace the missing pieces of bone only until the fissure closes itself up. That may last months or even years, depending on the size of the defect, the age and health status of the patient. A new implant improves the conditions for the healing process and emerged from the Resobone project of the federal ministry for education and research.
via spie.
Nathan Myhrvold and team’s latest inventions — as brilliant as they are bold — remind us that the world needs wild creativity to tackle big problems like malaria. And just as that idea sinks in, he rolls out a live demo of a new, mosquito-zapping gizmo you have to see to believe.
UK scientists claim to have developed laser technology able to sense hidden explosives.The technology could help to detect landmines and roadside bombs and to improve airport security.The team from St Andrew’s University produced a laser by “pumping” a type of plastic called polyfluorene with photons from another light source.They found the laser reacted with vapours from explosives such as TNT.The work was published in the journal Advanced Functional Materials.
via BBC News
It looks like a creature from science fiction, but Lunokhod 1 is real. Photo Credit: Lavochkin Association.
The Soviet robot lost on the dusty plains of the Moon for the past 40 years has been found again, and it is returning surprisingly strong laser pulses to Earth.
read more at Old Moon Rover Beams Surprising Laser Flashes to Earth.
For years, NASA has used satellites, lasers and other gizmos to monitor Earth’s atmosphere.
But as the nation’s worst ever oil spill continues to foul the Gulf of Mexico, the agency known for space travel has turned its eyes to the sea.
NASA scientists, including a team from Langley Research Center in Hampton, have been monitoring the spill for weeks. They provide updated images of the spill's reach and are pioneering ways to measure the amount of oil beneath the water's surface.
Read more at Daily Press.
The Army’s Green Light Escalation of Force, or GLEF system, is being tested in Afghanistan to assist Soldiers by giving them an interim step before escalating force.
read more at Army testing green laser kits in Afghanistan.
