QMC is pleased to offer high quantum yield quantum dots with reproducible FWHM uniformity, reliable system redundancy, and the ability to scale production to any quantity necessary for industrial purposes with modest capital expense (CAPEX) and low ongoing manufacturing costs. QMC’s ability to achieve economies of scale with automated production is unmatched and offers supply... Continue Reading →
LAB-GROWN NEURONS GIVE SCIENTISTS A REAL-TIME GLIMPSE INTO HOW THE BRAIN WORKS
Currently, researchers study the human brain by inference. Because they can’t closely observe a living brain in the lab as its owner goes about his day—they do the next best thing, tracking blood flow and electrical activity as subjects perform various tasks.Scientists, however, are now growing brain tissue in petri dishes to study neurons up close and personal.... Continue Reading →
$619 billion missed from federal transparency site
A government website intended to make federal spending more transparent was missing at least $619 billion from 302 federal programs, a government audit has found.And the data that does exist is wildly inaccurate, according to the Government Accountability Office, which looked at 2012 spending data. Only 2% to 7% of spending data on USASpending.gov is... Continue Reading →
Teenager Invents Water Purifier That Creates Electricity With No External Power
Last week, True Activist published a story about a 15 year old who invented a shoe insole that creates electricity while you walk. His device was a submission for this year’s “Google Science Fair” which features a number of brilliant inventions, many of which were created by teenagers and young children.Another finalist in this year’s... Continue Reading →
Humans Need Not Apply
Robots, software, and automatons of any sort don't need to be perfect to steal jobs from flesh-and-blood humans — they only need to be better than them.So goes the conceit of the above video, "Humans Need Not Apply."YouTube user CGPGrey makes interesting mini-documentaries, and the latest one addresses a topic we've touched on a number of... Continue Reading →
Autonomous robots: A self-organizing thousand-robot swarm
The first ever robot flash mob has assembled at Harvard University, where a thousand autonomous bots have arranged themselves into vast, complex shapes."Form a sea star shape," directs a computer scientist, sending the command to 1,024 little robots simultaneously via an infrared light. The robots begin to blink at one another and then gradually arrange... Continue Reading →
Tiniest Insect Genome Sequenced
The Antarctic midge, Belgica antarctica, is the continent’s only native insect... and it’s tough. The extremophile survives in the most intense landscape: freezing temperatures, desiccation, high salt concentrations, strong winds, and severe UV exposure. And it does all that with a surprisingly compact genome -- likely an adaptation to life in extreme environments, according to... Continue Reading →
Bioengineers build 3D tissue mimicking brain structure
A group of US scientists have managed to create a three-dimensional brain-like tissue featuring structural similarities to rat brain. Researchers hope that the new tissue could be used in the development of new treatments for brain dysfunctions.The brain-like tissue was bioengineered at the Tissue Engineering Resource Center at Tufts University in Boston. Professor David Kaplan... Continue Reading →
The High Price of Materialism
In this short animation, psychologist Tim Kasser discusses how America's culture of consumerism undermines our well-being. When people buy into the ever-present marketing messages that "the good life" is "the goods life," they not only use up Earth's limited resources, but they are less happy and less inclined toward helping others.The animation both lays out... Continue Reading →
Physicists make ‘tractor beam’ in water
They can control the movement of a floating ping-pong ball just by making a specific pattern of waves.By changing the pattern, they moved the ball around the tank in various ways, including pulling it closer like the famous beam from science fiction.The findings, published in the journal Nature Physics, have the potential to help contain... Continue Reading →