2ND GENERATION EXOSKELETON ROBOTIC SUIT

Portable laser devices to improve disease diagnosis

Portable devices that use a laser beam to probe bones, teeth, and other parts of the body for early signs of diseases like osteoporosis and tooth decay may seem like something out of science fiction. But those devices are moving closer to reality, according to Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN).

These new diagnostic tools will have the ability to see beneath the skin and detect disease, without exposing patients to X-rays. They embrace a technology that involves focusing a laser beam painlessly through the skin onto a bone or onto the surface of a tooth. After hitting its target, the beam returns to an electronic detector with imprinted information that can reveal whether disease is present. Called Raman spectroscopy, the technology is a mainstay tool in chemistry laboratories that is finding a new life in medicine.

The article describes growing medical interest in Raman-based devices, especially for diagnosing osteoporosis and other bone diseases, and for tracking the effectiveness of treatment. Another application may be in very early detection of tooth decay, so that dentists can treat soft spots on tooth enamel before “drill-and-fill” becomes the only option. The technique could also mean blood tests done without taking blood samples, the article indicates.

Ultra High speed Process

Researchers at Sun Yat-Sen University in China have demonstrated a way to record on ferromagnetic films using laser-assisted ultrafast magnetization reversal dynamics. The development will allow for practical use of new technology for recording more than 6,000 terabits (6 petabits) of data on a single 5-inch disc, using ultra-high-density magneto-optical storage devices.

The new ultrafast recording technique uses “time-resolved polar Kerr spectroscopy” combined with an alternating magnetic field strong enough to re-initialize the magnetization state of gadolinium-iron-cobalt (GdFeCo) thin films. The researchers showed that the magnetization reversal could occur on a sub-nanosecond time scale, which implies that next-generation magneto-optical storage devices can not only realize higher recording densities but also ultrafast data writing of up to a gigahertz — at least thirty times faster than that of present hard disks in computers.

Laser-assisted magnetic recording was demonstrated on a sub-picosecond time scale under a saturated external magnetic field. “We found that the rate of magnetization reversal is proportional to the external magnetic field,” says Tianshu Lai, “and the genuine thermo-magnetic recording should happen within several tens to hundreds of picoseconds when we apply a smaller magnetic field than the coercivity of the recording films.”

Rescue Robot in Action

You Tube Time Machine takes you back in Time

While YouTube has only been around for just over five years, video and moving pictures date back to the late 1800s, and some of those hundred-year-old videos are available on YouTube to view. At the same time, it's a little difficult to just go searching for all YouTube videos that were created in 1912. That's where the YouTube Time Machine comes in. If you're looking to just take a trip back in time and see some notable videos from a specific era, or you're just curious about the evolution of motion pictures over the years, YouTube Time Machine can help you see.

Simply drag the scroll bar at the top of the page to the year you'd like to travel back in time to, and you'll get a YouTube video that was made in that year. Of course the videos themselves have been uploaded much more recently, but you can, for example, watch the 1944 trailer for the movie Going My Way, or footage of the Titanic docked in Belfast from 1912, or even a 2005 Welsh's Grape Juice commercial.

This is where the YouTube Time Machine is both a time-suck and a useful tool for history buffs. While the collection of videos can't compare to a purely educational and reference site like CriticalPast, the YouTube Time Machine is useful for people who are curious about what types of videos were made in different time periods, and even see some notable footage from the years they select.

The YouTube Time Machine is fun, without a doubt, especially if you want to see, for example, what may have been news, popular movies, or hot music the year you were born. The trouble with it though is that once you've done things like look up your birth year or the year you graduated high school or something, you'll be there forever just scrolling around for interesting things to watch.

Future Food for Cities

Within the next decade you will be able to grow all of your vegetables in a box barely larger than your refrigerator. This surprising statement is the result of a class project at Singularity Universitythis summer. Here’s how they came to believe that this is true.
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