“Fine ceramics” – a.k.a. advanced ceramics – gets a great boost from a new website launched by Kyocera. If you are expecting an ad blitz from the company, think again. Yes, there are some links to the company’s applications, but Fine Ceramics World is almost entirely about the ABCs and XYZs of cutting-edge ceramic technology.…
Read MoreApropos of this week’s event in the U.S., this week’s video is based on what’s been called “the best class at Berkeley.” It is taught by Richard Muller, and the approximately one-hour lecture and half-hour Q&A is sponsored by Univ. of California, Berkeley’s Friends of Science. Muller is a professor at Cal where he specializes…
Read MoreTwo Dutch high school students have captured the top prize in an annual competition sponsored by PANalytical, a supplier of analytical and X-ray diffraction equipment, to stimulate young people’s interest in science. This year’s prize – a week-long “Expedition to the Greenhouse World” in Spitsbergen, Norway – was awarded to Barbara Terlouw and Robin van…
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Read MoreWhy settle for one photon when you can get 200-300? That’s the idea behind a new material being developed by SiOnyx, a new Massachusetts company. The company using a method to reshape the surface of silicon to create cones that it says makes the material effectively function as “sponge for light.” is making a new type of silicon…
Read MoreThough looking sort of glum at the time, Ivan Bozovic is successfully leading Brookhaven Labs’ thin-film superconductor project. Researchers at DOE’s Brookhaven National Lab have developed a sandwich of thin films that, at the point where the films touch, offers a nanometer-sized area of superconductivity. Moreover, as reported in the Oct. 9 edition of Nature magazine, the superconductivity…
Read MoreA new report from BCC Research pegs the North American market for advanced structural ceramics at $2.7 billion in 2007 and predicts it will grow to $3.7 billion in 2012, for a compound annual growth rate of 6.0 percent. BCC breaks down the market by application into these segments: cutting tools and inserts; wear and corrosion;…
Read MoreA fascinating story is unfolding in Mbita, Kenya, where OSRAM – one of the world’s two leading lighting firms – is embarking on a program to improve the environment and the lives of more than 175,000 Kenya fishermen who live “off-the-grid,” in a remote area of the world with no access to electricity. These fishermen are…
Read MoreWe know from watching the blog post traffic that the post last week about the Solyndra’s cylindrical photovoltaic system was popular. Today, we offer a short video from Solyndra that illustrates some of the production (very robotic) and installation techniques. [flashvideo filename=wp-content/video/Solyndra2.flv /]
Read MoreWhat can a team of highly trained researchers from four different U.S. universities learn from the feet of a gecko lizard? According to the researchers, how to improve carbon nanotube-based material so that, for the first time, it demonstrates “directionally varied (anisotropic) adhesive force” and gripping power nearly three times the level of existing nanotube…
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