TameBear: Emerging TechSpotting the innovations, trends and small revolutions marking the significant turning points and advances in technological evolution. A TameBear weblog.(Untitled)- August 29, 2006 Wind-Farm Watts: Australia is embracing renewable energy in a big way. They've just authorized construction of a $380 million 233 megawatt wind farm, enough power to meet the annual electricity needs of 133,450 homes. Futurismichttp://www.wisdomroad.com/tamebear/categories/emergingTech/2006/08/29.html#a811 (Untitled)- August 23, 2006 Generating Electricity from Photosynthetic Bacteria: Photosynthesis is the most efficient process for turning carbos into energy, and the process has been refined over thousands of years of evolution. Now University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers are studying ways to generate electricity by feeding a species of photosynthetic bacteria a steady diet of sunshine and wastewater. What's Next In Science & Technologyhttp://www.wisdomroad.com/tamebear/categories/emergingTech/2006/08/23.html#a809 (Untitled)- August 19, 2006 Trend Toward Home Backup Electric Generators: Standby electric power generators for homes are on the rise in areas where grid electricity outtages can last for hours or days. These are not the small noisy gas-guzzling backup generators... homeowners who can afford it are installing whole-home systems to generate as much as 40 kilowatts from propane, natural gas, or photovoltaics. The systems can be costly, but in some affluent neighborhoods they are becoming status symbols. Christian Science...http://www.wisdomroad.com/tamebear/categories/emergingTech/2006/08/19.html#a804 (Untitled)- August 19, 2006 Artifical Muscle Displays Enable More Lifelike Color: Today's plasma and LCD screens produce color images by mixing three basic colors of red, green, and blue. A new development in optics uses and adjustable diffraction grating technology to fine-tune those three basic colors, resulting in a much fuller range of colors than is currently possible, giving such a life-like viewing experience that it could be hard to go back to your old TV. The invention could begin showing up in competitively...http://www.wisdomroad.com/tamebear/categories/emergingTech/2006/08/19.html#a803 (Untitled)- August 11, 2006 Apple Thrashes Dell on Mac Pro Pricing: Apple is clearly bent on busting the long-standing myth that Macs cost more than Windows boxes. A well-reasoned price shopping comparison conducted just days after the release of the new high-end Intel-based Mac Pro demonstrates how some configurations can save buyers as much as $462 over an equivalent Windows system from Dell. (And while the Mac can also run the Windows OS and any Windows apps, the Dell will never be able to run Mac OS X!) The Inquirer...http://www.wisdomroad.com/tamebear/categories/emergingTech/2006/08/11.html#a800 (Untitled)- August 9, 2006 A Fillup from Liquid Coal: A brief article with lots of comment describes a bit of the history behind the process of extracting diesel fuel from coal, and a few of the companies currently involved. Wired Bloghttp://www.wisdomroad.com/tamebear/categories/emergingTech/2006/08/09.html#a798 (Untitled)- August 6, 2006 Quantum Leap: Fortune speculates on the future of computing in this imaginative piece based on recent developments in quantum computing. Their take: it's all closer than you may think, and they point to Freescale's commercial production of magnetic random access memory (MRAM) as first evidence. The quantum effect known as "Spintronics" in Freescale's MRAM will first be used in cameras for instant storage of images. Later it will be used for instant startup on laptops and other computers, and...http://www.wisdomroad.com/tamebear/categories/emergingTech/2006/08/06.html#a797 (Untitled)- August 6, 2006 Adding a Dimension: Microsoft will be presenting some new research and software next week at Siggraph. They're calling it "Photosynth", and essentially it's a tool for stitching together a bunch of photos to generate a 3D environment for a virtual walk-through. EE Times via The Speculisthttp://www.wisdomroad.com/tamebear/categories/emergingTech/2006/08/06.html#a796 |