You are browsing the archives of 2011 August.

Credit: American Society for Engineering Education/SMART.

This should be welcome news (via the DOE): This afternoon, the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness along with the Business Council, Business Roundtable, US Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers and the American Chemistry Council announced that 45 businesses (including many big names) have committed doubling the number of internships they offer in 2012. Another five businesses agreed to lesser but substantial boosts in their internship numbers.

What’s the net affect? According the news release, around 6,300 new offerings should result.

Here’s a list of the companies that stepped forward

Alcoa Incorporated
American Express Company
AT&T
Bayer AG
*Bechtel Corporation
BNSF Railway
Boeing
Broadcom Corporation
Cardinal Health
Carus Corporation
Caterpillar
*Chevron Corporation
Conductix-Wampfler
ConAgraFoods Inc.
Dell Inc.
Duke Energy Corporation
DuPont
Eaton
Facebook
Fluor Corporation
FMC Technologies
General Electric
Intel Corporation
*Johnson and Johnson Inc.
JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Kawasaki Motors Corporation US.
Longview Fibre Paper and Packaging Inc.
Lubrizol Corporation
Mastercard
McKesson Corporation
MeadWestvaco Corporation
Nalco Company
NextEra Energy Resources
Nordson Corporation
*PCC Structurals Inc.
Power Cubers Inc.
Simon Property Group Inc.
Spectra Energy Corporation
Special Products and Manufacturing Inc.
Sprint Nextel
Suffolk Construction
Sungard
Sunoco Inc.
Symantec
TE Connectivity
Tektronix
*Texas Instruments IncTextron Inc.
Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc.
Xerox Corporation

* = committed to increase, but not doubling

Share

A new graphic biography about physicist Richard Feynman has just been published. I don’t have particular “heroes,” but I have always wished I could emulate Feynman’s wisdom, wit and mellow attitude about the physical world. So, I have been looking forward to the completion of this work by writer Jim Ottaviani and illustrator Leland Myrick.

The book is being billed by some as a “graphic novel” and I acknowledge that for many people, graphic novel is synonymous with “comic book.” But, I am a bit old school on this: For me, a graphic novel is what Lynd Ward, Frans Masereel and similar artist–storytellers do (did?), and at the other end of the spectrum are pop/pulp comic books. I have no craving love of the comics idiom, but I get that many adults and teens do enjoy them immensely. And, I have known several cartoonists, pre- and post-computer era, and can appreciate the artistry and technique that goes into comics, so I am not trying to disparage comics, per se.

But, except for extreme cases, such as Ward et al, I tend to think use of the term graphic novel should be an appellation that is earned based on both strong story and compelling graphics, not something that is a self-proclaimed label. (Ironically, the term can also backfire suggesting a warning: Comic-heads, beware. Serious storyline ahead.)

Among more modern publications, I think the work of Art Spiegelman (Maus) and often R. Crumb (Book of Genesis) show how the comics template can find synergy with a story that results in a final product that is far superior than words alone. So, sometimes the shoe fits.

Thus, I give credit to the author–artist team of Jim Ottaviani and Leland Myrick for self-labeling their work a “comic” and leaving it up to readers and critics to bless it with other labels. Ottaviani has been creating comics about science and scientists via a project called G.T. Labs and has covered subjects that range from the Moon Race and magicians to archeologists and “atom bomb-era” politicians and physicists. The only one of these I have actually read is Fallout (2001) and I remember thinking it was quite good.

I haven’t had a chance to read Feynman yet, but G.T. Labs provides a nice size excerpt (large pdf) that I plan on looking at tonight. Check it out.

Share

Octoberfest in Germany. Credit: senator86; Wikepedia, Creative Commons license

It’s September, which means Octoberfest season is almost here. Ever wonder what really makes those delicious brews?

I just came across this fun piece of science about the domestication of yeast microbes, those friendly little beasts that make lager beers for us.

The domestication of plants and livestock, a crucial development in human history, has been pretty well documented through the ages. Not known, however, is the history of microbe domestication, despite their importance for food and beverage production, and in modern times, for biofuels.

Luckily (I guess), the ability to map genome sequences means that the “family tree” of microbes can be mapped and the connection between the working-class brewmeisters and their free-range cousins can be established.

Lager beers date back to the 15th century and are brewed using the “allotetraploid hybrid” yeast, Saccharomyces pastorianus. In a new paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, an international team of geneticists and biochemists report using genome sequencing to relate the domestic yeast to several related, wild species. They speculate that lager beers are the happy result of a change in the way now-domesticated yeast metabolizes sugar and sulfites.

They conclude, “This study shows that combining microbial ecology with comparative genomics facilitates the discovery and preservation of wild genetic stocks of domesticated microbes to trace their history, identify genetic changes, and suggest paths to further industrial improvement.”

I’ll drink to that! Prost!

See: “Microbe domestication and the identification of the wild genetic stock of lager-brewing yeast,” by Diego Libkind, et. al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (doi: 10.1073/pnas.1105430108)

Peter adds: “DIY brewing has had sustained popularity (estimates range from 0.5–1.5 million home brewers in any given year in the US, producing around 9 million six-packs). The new issue of Wired describes how low-cost DIY genome sequencing is starting to emerge among biohackers. It won’t be long before these trends collide with some genome-hacked yeast to make some super brews.”

Share

Transphorm, one of the companies that will be receiving ARPA-E and private investment funding, uses gallium nitride transistors to tackle the current level of power conversion losses (10%). Credit: Energy Information Administration.

ARPA-E announced a new round of seed awards, $1.5–$6 million each, which the agency says will unlock a total investment of $100 million when private capital is included. The awards cover interesting enterprises that are involved with flow batteries, waste heat energy recovery via thermoelectrics, biofuels or innovative new approaches to biofuels or waste heat recovery. It also says awards related to projects to diminish or replace reliance on rare-earth elements will be made in September.

Here is what was announced yesterday:

Phononic Devices (ARPA-E, $3 million; private, $11 million): The company uses advanced semiconductor materials to capture and convert wasted heat produced by factories, power plants and vehicles. In addition, Phononic wants to use these devices as efficient cooling systems. In an ARPA-E document (pdf), the company claims its technology can improve thermoelectric efficiency from less than 10% today to more than 30%. This is expected to result in a $/W energy savings of 75% for power generation and 60% for cooling, respectively.

Primus Power (ARPA-E, $2 million; private, $11 million): Although the ARPA-E release implies that Primus has developed a flow battery, I think it is more accurate to say that the company has developed low cost, long-lived electrodes for flow batteries.

OPX Biotechnologies (ARPA-E, $6 million; private, $36.5 million): OPX Bio uses bacteria to produce a liquid biofuel using electricity and carbon dioxide. This liquid biofuel is being designed to replace petroleum fuel at a competitive cost. OPX Bio technology can be traced to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the University of Colorado, Boulder.

Fritz Prinz/Stanford University (ARPA-E, $1.5 million; private funding, $25 million): Prinz and Stanford are commercializing what they call an All-Electron Battery. The AEB is a new type of energy storage device based on moving electrons instead of ions, and “uses electron/hole redox instead of capacitive polarization of a double-layer.” They claim it can withstand 1,000s of charges without showing a significant drop in performance.

Transphorm (ARPA-E, $3 million; private, $25 million): Transphorm uses a system based on gallium nitride high electron mobility transistors to cut power waste during power conversion (without electromagnetic interference tradeoffs) by efficiently and quickly switching electrical currents, for example in bridge converters and inverters.

ARPA-E says it will be making its next round of awards in September. Interestingly, it says the September announcement will include up to $30 million in awards “to a series of innovative projects to keep America’s manufacturers competitive by reducing the need for expensive “rare earth” materials from China.”

Share

Here’s what we are hearing:

PPG to form fiber glass joint venture with Harsha in India

PPG Industries announced that it has signed a letter of intent with Harsha Exito Engineering Private Limited (India) to establish a 50-50 joint venture for the manufacture and sale of fiber glass reinforcement products. “We are encouraged by the prospect of continuing to expand PPG’s global reach, particularly in emerging markets,” says Thomas P. Kerr, PPG vice president, fiber glass. According to Kerr, the projected expansion of the Indian economy will help drive demand for fiber glass in such end-use applications as infrastructure, transportation and wind energy.

New Energy’s Latest SolarWindow coatings for generating electricity on see-through glass lead to increased transparency, improved color

New Energy Technologies announced that researchers developing its SolarWindow technology, capable of generating electricity on see-through glass, have developed a first-ever working prototype using new electricity-generating coatings that lead to increased transparency and enhanced color—attributes important to consumer acceptance of a commercially viable product.

Freedonia Group: US demand for products and services used in shale gas development will grow to $52 billion in 2015

Industry activity continues to escalate in the emerging Marcellus, Haynesville and Fayetteville shale plays. While shale gas drilling will slow from the rapid buildup of the 2005-2010 period, the industry will bring more than 8,000 new producing wells online through 2015. Increasing demand for drilling and completion products and services for new shale gas wells will be accompanied by growing markets for workover, restimulation and well site reclamation services in those regions where production is maturing. These and other trends are presented in “Shale Gas: Products & Services,” a new study from The Freedonia Group Inc., an industry market research firm.

Canadian government invests in fuel cell bus development

The Government of Canada has initiated a series of university-industry partnerships which includes a project to further develop fuel cell technology for buses. Through the Automotive Partnership Canada, in conjunction with the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, $85 million is available for a range of projects aimed at enhancing the Canadian automotive industry.

Schott Solar to supply 67,000 solar modules to Thailand

Schott Solar announced that it has received a large order from Thailand. The solar company, with manufacturing locations in Albuquerque, N.M., Germany, Spain and the Czech Republic, will be delivering 67,000 photovoltaic modules for two solar power plants that Phoenix Solar Singapore has been building just north of Bangkok since June. The two sites will achieve peak output of 9.7 and 6.2 megawatts. From December 2011 on, they are expected to supply an annual yield of around 25,000 MWh of environmentally friendly solar electricity to as many as 10,000 Thai households.

Share