Team Germany! Team Germany won first place in the 2009 Solar Decathlon by applying photovoltaics to every available surface. I had been rooting for Virginia Tech for their use of aerogel as insulation that allowed natural light to shine through, but it only ranked 13 out of 20 competitors. Team Germany’s Cube House was considered…
Read MoreA new video from composer John Boswell: “A musical tribute to two great men of science. Carl Sagan and his cosmologist companion Stephen Hawking present: A Glorious Dawn – Cosmos remixed. Almost all samples and footage taken from Carl Sagan’s Cosmos and Stephen Hawking’s Universe series” Hey, this ain’t Friday–now that the music’s over, don’t…
Read MoreThe National Academies have just announced that they are soliciting applications for the next two sessions of their Christine Mirzayan Science and Technology Graduate Fellowship Program. One is a Winter-Spring session (Feb. 3 – April 28, 2010) and the other is a Summer session (Aug. 30 – Nov. 19, 2010). Both take place in Washington,…
Read MoreGood news came yesterday to the Nano/Bio Interface Center at the University of Pennsylvania when it learned it won an $11.5 million grant from the Nanoscale Science and Engineering Centers of the National Science Foundation. According to a Penn release, “the grant will support multidisciplinary research at Penn designed to explore and control the function…
Read MoreMaybe this is old news, but I didn’t know there was a “Public Service Loan Forgiveness” federal program. In brief, if you work in a “public service” job for at least 10 years, and are still holding federal loan debt you can have the outstanding amount erased. I am not sure how many individuals still…
Read MoreA trio of organizations in the Seattle area is gearing up to offer advanced training and certification in burying and permanently storing carbon dioxide underground. With $1 million in funding from the DOE, the Pacific Northwest National Lab, the Environmental Outreach and Stewardship Alliance and the Washington Society of Professional Engineers are developing a carbon…
Read MoreACerS-Wiley is currently seeking new authors or volume editors for textbooks, handbooks or reference books on ceramics and ceramics-related topics. By publishing with ACerS-Wiley, you are joining a team of highly trained professionals who are dedicated to producing quality books – from production to marketing, sales and distribution. And, you can be sure that you…
Read MoreACerS is sponsoring a two-day course on Ceramic Injection Molding Sept. 16-17. The course is being held in San Diego, Calif. The course is a good opportunity for engineers, QC specialists, designers and technical sales professionals to get a good immersion in injection molding. The course will cover IM’s history Competing technologies, related technologies Powders,…
Read MoreLumenhaus is Virginia Tech’s zero-energy home that can be completely powered by the sun and geothermal energy. Other sustainable features include the use of passive energy systems, radiant heating and building materials made from renewable and/or recyclable sources. The College of Architecture and Urban Studies is entering the house in the U.S. Department of Energy’s…
Read MoreIf you’ve ever had a pregnancy in the family, you know that the first two trimesters go by relatively quickly, but the last trimester seems to take forever. Days crawl by. Now, I see a similar phenomenon being played out in the science community, where the rest of this summer and much of the fall…
Read More