Lifeboat Foundation

Just as the single-crystal silicon wafer forever changed the nature of electronics 60 years ago, a group of Cornell researchers is hoping its work with quantum dot solids – crystals made out of crystals – can help usher in a new era in electronics.

The multidisciplinary team, led by Tobias Hanrath, associate professor in the Robert Frederick Smith School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, and graduate student Kevin Whitham, has fashioned two-dimensional superstructures out of single-crystal building blocks. Through directed assembly and attachment processes, the lead selenide quantum dots are synthesized into larger crystals, then fused together to form atomically coherent square superlattices.

Continue reading “Quantum dot solids: This generation’s silicon wafer?” »

Portland computer science research company Galois snagged a $6.2 million grant from the Department of Defense for a project that, if successful, could make the current battle between the FBI and tech giant Apple obsolete.

The three-year research contract comes from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and will fund research into quantifying privacy preservation systems.

‘Can you quantify how private a system is or isn’t and can you make a judgment about it,’ said Galois CEO Rob Wiltbank,…

Continue reading “Portland firm DARPA research could make disputes like Apple v FBI obsolete” »

Personally, I thought they already had one.

The U.S. government eyes cryogenically cooled circuitry for tomorrow’s exascale computers.

Google’s Deep Mind at work in hospitals — very nice.

A smartphone app piloted by the NHS could improve communication between hospital staff and help patients get vital care faster.

Boston Dynamics, a robotics company that Google bought back in 2013, has routinely wowed the world by releasing videos of robots that are growing ever closer to resembling the humanoid robots we see in science fiction movies. The company this week released what might be its craziest robot video yet that shows its next-generation Atlas robot opening doors on its own, walking through snowy terrains, and picking up 10-pound boxes. This is the move impressive robot design I’ve seen from Boston Dynamics yet, which is really saying something.

FROM EARLIER: Man buys $700 battery, discovers it’s just $30 worth of batteries stuffed in a big case

Continue reading “Google robot opens doors, picks itself up after getting knocked over in crazy video” »

Considering how many of these things have snuck up on us over the last few years, you’d think we’d be pouring money and resources into NASA’s manned space flight programs. But, no. NASA is still a criminally underfunded agency.

*sigh*

A meteor flew over the Atlantic earlier this month. But no one saw it.

Continue reading “Massive Fireball Meteor Lights up Night Sky Over the Atlantic, but No One Noticed” »

““You hear over and over and over again, from the pro-backdoor camp, that we need to strike a balance, we need to find a compromise,” says Cardozo. “That doesn’t work. Math doesn’t work like that. Computer security doesn’t work like that … It’s kind of like climate change. There are entrenched political interests on one side of a ‘debate,’ and on the other side is the unanimous scientific and technical community.””

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Boston Dynamics returns with a new robot to push and shove around — for science, of course. Luckily, Atlas will not let itself be bullied so easily.