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IT IS too late for the war in Iraq, but soldiers could soon be wearing the ultimate in battledress: smart combat suits. In May, MIT opens its “Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies”—a dull moniker for perhaps the world's most expensive and fanciful experiment in fashion. MIT is leading an $80m five-year project, partly financed by the Pentagon, to develop fabrics that think. The dream is to make a uniform for future warriors that could neutralise chemical poisons, treat wounds, or hydrate soldiers in the desert by recycling body fluids. Like a dedicated mobile hospital, these fabrics could monitor combatants' heart rates,...

In a sign of growing discord over Web services guidelines, Microsoft has pulled out of a key Web services standards working group. Over the past month, IBM and Microsoft have been at odds with other companies around standards submissions, including a high-profile effort within the Web's leading standards organization, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Now Microsoft has upped the rancor by dropping out of a W3C working group focused on establishing rules for how businesses will send and receive data to one another via Web services. The company withdrew from the W3C's so-called choreography group because it determined that...

Flat Lens Could Significantly Enhance Object Resolution by Nicolle Wahl Toronto - Mar 28, 2003 By constructing artificial materials that break long-standing rules of nature, a U of T researcher has developed a flat lens that could significantly enhance the resolution of imaged objects. This, in turn, could lead to smaller and more effective antennas and devices for cell phones, increased space for data storage on CD-ROMs and more complex electronic circuits. "This is new physics," says George Eleftheriades, a U of T professor specializing in electromagnetic technology at the Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. Masahiro Fujita of Sony Corp. shows the company's newly developed small biped entertainment robot, SDR-4X II, at an unveiling in Tokyo, March 27, 2003. The prototype robot will be exhibited at ROBODEX 2003, to take place from April 3 to 6 in Yokohama, south of Tokyo.Photo by Issei Kato/Reuters TOKYO (Reuters) - Judging from the cooing at a demonstration of Sony Corp.'s diminutive SDR robot, few would dispute just how cute the humanoid machine is. Its creator Masahiro Fujita, who called it "him" instead of "it," seemed to feel genuinely guilty...

NASA scientists have invented a new video technology that helps police track down criminals. NASA Science News March 26, 2003 FBI and other law enforcement officers, whose investigations are normally down-to-Earth, recently have been seeking the help of two NASA scientists who study the Sun and storms like hurricanes. Why are specialists from such different worlds working together? The NASA researchers--using their expertise and equipment for analyzing satellite video--have created a new crime-fighting software tool called VISAR. Short for Video Image Stabilization and Registration, VISAR transforms dark, jittery images captured by security systems and video cameras in police cars into...

Engineers Create World's First Transparent TransistorCORVALLIS - Engineers at Oregon State University have created the world's first transparent transistor, a see-through electronics component that could open the door to many new products. The advance has been reported in a professional journal, Applied Physics Letters, and a patent has been applied for. The university is already consulting with major electronics companies about the findings and their potential applications. The discovery "is a significant development in the context of transparent electronics," the scientists said in their publication, but pointed out it's too early to tell what applications may evolve. "This is a...

Software breaks data-transfer record Traffic-sensitive transmission tool could speed science and entertainment. 27 March 2003 John Whitfield [graphic] The new protocol sends data at 7 gigabytes a minute. © GettyImages A new piece of software more than trebles the speed at which information can be sent over the Internet. It changes the way that computers monitor and respond to online traffic conditions. Steven Low, of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, and his colleagues have sent data 3,500 times faster than a typical broadband connection - at about 7 gigabytes a minute. This is a new speed record for...

Researchers at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory have developed a miniature device that can identify as little as a fraction of a spore of anthrax and other biological hazards within 30 milliseconds. The Calorimetric Spectrometer (CalSpec) device technology can accurately identify biological hazards such as anthrax almost instantly. The device can operate with only a fraction of a spore while isolating the DNA/RNA photothermal signature that allows for detection, identification and measurement of a substance. Such prompt detection and identification of hazardous materials could greatly enhance the protection of first-responder emergency personnel and the capabilities of early...

An enzyme-catalysed battery has been created that could one day run cell phones and laptop computers on shots of vodka. The key to the device is a new polymer that protects the fragile enzymes used to break down the ethanol fuel, scientists told the American Chemical Society's annual meeting in New Orleans on Monday. Enzyme-based batteries have the potential to be cheaper than fuel cells that rely on expensive platinum or ruthenium catalysts. "It sounds great," says Bob Hockaday, founder of the company Energy Related Devices and designer of a methanol-powered battery. "Enzymes are inexpensive and catalytically very active." Fuel...

<p>I recently upgraded the program (AWStats) used to generate the Website Usage pages. The old pages, though built with the new program, utilized the old format database which did not provide some fields. Those fields will be 0 or not present on the older reports.</p> <p>For some reason the reports switched to GMT some months ago, I switched back to PT this month. Each switch fouled the "Hours" graph for the month of the switch.</p>

Motorised boots to go into production in Russia Walking boots fitted with tiny combustion engines are set for production in Russia. Inventor Viktor Gordejev, from Ufa in the Ural Mountains, says the boots cut the energy of walking by about 70%. As soon as the wearer steps forward with one foot, the engines propel the other one forward. Mr Gordejev says inspiration came 30 years ago when he was serving in the Soviet army. He explained: "I always wished my boots had engines as we had to walk miles every day. That's how I came up with the idea." The...

Toshiba has unveiled a prototype fuel cell it hopes will become the power source for laptops in the future.The fuel cell breaks down methanol to generate power and, Toshiba claims, will provide enough juice to run a laptop for about five hours. To get the cell working, the alcohol fuel is provided in small 50cc cartridges. Toshiba hopes to put the fuel cell on sale in early 2004. Green energy Fuel cells which use chemistry to generate electrical power by breaking down substances such as hydrogen are already being touted as a green power source for the future, especially for...

Fashion designers from New York to Milan have filled the runways in recent weeks with all the latest Spring looks. Hemlines are up, heel heights are down and pink is all the rage. But regardless of what you think of this season's haute couture you should be made aware of a trend that's catching on... it could make you think twice before buying new clothes. Tiny specks capable of tracking virtually every single item are now being imbedded by manufacturers. This Orwellian technology, called RFID (radio frequency ID) will now be used by Italian clothing designer Benetton in the form...

Benetton to track clothing with ID chips Retail clothing chain Benetton will soon add technology to its garments that allows for real-time tracking of its inventory. Philips Semiconductor on Tuesday announced that it has provided partners with radio frequency identification (RFID) chips that they'll use in efforts to improve Benetton's supply-chain management system. What this means is that a box containing clothes of varying styles, colors and sizes can be scanned, and the information can be uploaded to Benetton's inventory tracking system instead of having to be checked in one piece at a time. The process could be faster, more...

McDonald's to offer wireless internet in US New YorkMarch 11 2003Would you like super-sized internet access with that burger and fries? In a further sign of the spread of wireless internet technology, McDonald's restaurants in three US cities will offer one hour of free high-speed access to anyone who buys a combination meal. Ten McDonald's in Manhattan will begin offering wireless WiFi, or 802.11b, internet access tomorrow, McDonald's spokeswoman Lisa Howard said. By year's end, McDonald's will extend the access to 300 McDonald's restaurants in New York City, Chicago and a yet-unannounced California town, Howard said. "You can come in...

Unmanned spy planes like those al Qaeda-seekers in Afghanistan--the Predator and Global Hawk--have been heroes in the war on terrorism. Now scaled-down versions costing under $100,000 and spanning as few as 5 feet are poised to hit the commercial market for everything from checking power lines to stopping ocean piracy. The new camera-equipped drones, known as unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, can be operated from the ground by just about anybody who can point and click on a computer screen. The UAV is guided by global positioning system signals beamed from satellites and 900- to 2,400-megahertz signals beamed from the...

TOKYO (Dow Jones)--Toshiba Corp. said Wednesday it has developed the world's first prototype of a methanol-type fuel cell system to run notebook personal computers. The new fuel cell, with average output of 12 watts and maximum output of 20 watts, can achieve about five hours of operation with a single cartridge of methanol fuel. Toshiba seeks to commercialize the product in 2004, the company said. Unlike current batteries that require recharging, users will be able to continuously operate PCs by replacing fuel cartridges. Fuel cells are widely seen as a potential replacement for lithium batteries used in portable devices,...

PITTSBURGH -- The race for smaller, faster, and more powerful computers and consumer electronics took a new spin as researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of California at Santa Barbara (UCSB) became the first to control electrons using electrical, rather than magnetic, fields. In its Jan. 23 edition, Science Express, the online portal of the magazine Science, published a report on the breakthrough of Jeremy Levy and David Awschalom. Levy is an associate professor of physics and astronomy at Pitt and director of its Center for Oxide-Semiconductor Materials for Quantum Computing ( http://cosmqc.net ). Awschalom is a...

Lovgate.C Worm Crawls Across WebLeading antivirus vendors post inoculations for newest pest. By Tom Krazit, IDG News Service Antivirus vendors are warning of a worm with high damage potential spreading across the Internet, with initial outbreaks Monday in Europe and Asia. The Lovgate.C worm, a variant of an earlier worm with the same name, propagates itself by replying to e-mail in a user's in-box with an attachment containing the bad code, according to Trend Micro, among the first to release alerts about the pest. The worm then installs a backdoor port that allows a remote user to access and modify...