There were two other larger HTR plants. One in the USA and one in Germany but both are now shut down. China actually has serious plans to follow up with a lot more plants. Perhaps a thousand of these reactors or more Until 2020-2025, these small mass produced reactors will be secondary to a massive build of larger nuclear reactors (China is order 100 Westinghouse AP1000 reactors, 1.25 GW- 1.7GW by 2020)
Schematic of the HTR-PM (High temperature reactor pebble bed module) Link is to eight page design paper.
A 200 MWe high temperature reactor will be the safest nuclear power plant ever designed and built. High temperature reactors can be adapted to use thorium for fuel and the plan is for factory mass produced reactors. Two year construction times and mass production driving costs down to less than half the cost of the first units. China sees these as supplemental reactors to the big reactors. They will be used in smaller cities and towns and by factories for generating industrial heat. Also, they are looking to use heat for hydrogen generation, desalination and coal liquification (at least that would be cleaner than straight coal burning).
The major safety issue regarding nuclear reactors lies in how to cool them efficiently, as they continue to produce residual heat even after shutdown. Gas-cooled reactors discharge surplus heat and don’t need additional safety systems like water-cooled reactors do. The HTR-10 was subject to a test of its intrinsic safety in September 2004 when, as an experiment, it was shut down with no cooling. Fuel temperature reached less than 1600 C and there was no failure.
“Using the existing operating HTR-10 reactor at the Institute of Nuclear and New Energy Technology of Tsinghua University in Beijing, we have already done what would be unthinkable in a conventional reactor—we switched off the helium coolant and successfully let the reactor cool down by itself,” said Wu.
A Simpler, More Rational Way to Think about Nuclear Safety: FOUR LEVELS OF SAFETY*
[Definition developed by Professor Lawrence Lidsky, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.]
LEVEL 0:
No hazardous materials or confined energy sources.
LEVEL 1:
No need for active systems in event of subsystem failure. Immune to major structural failure and operator error.
LEVEL 2:
No need for active systems in event of subsystem failure. No immunity to major structural failure or operator error.
LEVEL 3:
Positive response required to subsystem malfunction or operator error. Defense in depth. No immunity to major structural failure.
The MHR is the only reactor that meets the criterion of Level 1 safety.
Second, the modular design enables the plant to be assembled much quicker and cost-effectively than traditional nuclear generators. Its streamlined construction timetable is also a first for the nuclear power industry, where designing and building generators usually take decades, rather than years.
The modules are manufactured from standardized components that can be mass-produced, shipped by road or rail and assembled relatively quickly. The new plants are smaller and new modules can be added as needed. Multiple reactors can be linked around one or more turbines, all monitored from a single control room. The site of the Shidaowan project will install 18 additional modules, which will total 3,800 MWe.
A demonstration high-temperature gas-cooled reactor, the HTR-PM of 200 MWe was approved in November 2005, to be built at Shidaowan, near Rongcheng in Weihai city, Shandong province by Huaneng Shidaowan Nuclear Power Company. This consortium is led by the China Huaneng Group Co. - the country's largest generating utility but hitherto without nuclear capacity. The project received environmental clearance in March 2008 for construction start in 2009 and commissioning by 2013. 
The Modular High Temperature Pebble Bed reactor should also use half of the steel and one third of the concrete of Light Water reactors.
A 10 MWt high-temperature gas-cooled demonstration reactor (HTR-10), having fuel particles compacted with graphite moderator into 60mm diameter spherical balls (pebble bed) was commissioned in 2000 by the Institute of Nuclear Energy Technology (INET) at Tsinghua University near Beijing. It reached full power in 2003 and has an outlet temperature of 700-950°C and may be used as a source of process heat for heavy oil recovery or coal gasification. It is similar to the South African PBMR intended for electricity generation. It was subject to a test of its intrinsic safety in September 2004 when as an experiment it was shut down with no cooling. Fuel temperature reached less than 1600°C and there was no failure.
Initially the HTR-10 has been coupled to a steam turbine power generation unit, but second phase plans are for it to operate at 950°C and drive a gas turbine, as well as enabling R&D in heat application technologies. This phase will involve an international partnership with Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute (KAERI), focused particularly on hydrogen production.
A key R&D project is the demonstration Shidaowan HTR-PM of 200 MWe (two reactor modules, each of 250 MWt) which is being built at Shidaowan in Shandong province, driving a single steam turbine at about 40% thermal efficiency.
The 40% efficiency of a MHR driving steam can turbine can be seen. China will switch to higher efficiency gas turbine cycle in later versions.
The size was reduced to 250 MWt from earlier 458 MWt modules in order to retain the same core configuration as the prototype HTR-10 and avoid moving to an annular design like South Africa's PBMR.
China Huaneng Group, one of China's major generators, is the lead organization in the consortium with China Nuclear Engineering & Construction Group (CNEC) and Tsinghua University's INET, which is the R&D leader. Chinergy (a 50-50 joint venture of INET and CNEC) is the main contractor for the nuclear island. Projected cost is US$ 430 million, with the aim for later units being US$ 1500/kWe. The licensing process is under way with NNSA and construction is likely to start early in 2009 with completion expected in 2013.
The HTR-PM will pave the way for 18 (3x6) further 200 MWe units at the same site in Weihai city - total 3800 MWe - also with steam cycle. INET is in charge of R&D, and is aiming to increase the size of the 250 MWt module and also utilise thorium in the fuel. Eventually a series of HTRs, possibly with Brayton cycle directly driving the gas turbines, will be factory-built and widely installed throughout China.
In March 2005 an agreement between PBMR of South Africa and Chinergy of Beijing was announced. PBMR Pty Ltd is has been taking forward the HTR concept (based on earlier German work) since 1993 and is ready to build a 125 MWe demonstration plant. Chinergy Co. is drawing on the small operating HTR-10 research reactor at Tsinghua University which is the basis of their 100 MWe HTR-PM demonstration module which also derives from the earlier German development.
Both PBMR and HTR-PM are planned for operation about 2013. The new agreement is for cooperation on the demonstration projects and subsequent commercialisation, since both parties believe that the inherently safe pebble bed technology built in relatively small units will eventually displace the more complex light water reactors.
General Atomics of the United States with Russian partners have had an advanced modular helium reactor design completed since 2001, but actual construction has been stalled
China will be heading towards the GT-MHR design in stages of actually completed reactors.
The gas turbine part of the reactor design
The chinese steam cycle MHR will achieve much of the benefits of the Gas Turbine MHR and the gas turbine version chinese reactors will have roughly the same benefits in terms of less nuclear waste.
FURTHER READING
High temperature reactor history
Iris reactor license application inactive until 2010.
Documentation on the Iris reactor
High Temperature reactor conference
France also has a high temperature reactor design the Anteres, but they do not have firm construction plans
Cleantechnica followed the coverage provided here and adds some interesting information
June 30, 2008
World's First Commercial High Temperature Nuclear Reactor starts construction in China in 2009
Zinc Finger Proteins Put Personalized HIV Therapy Within Reach
The first steps have been taken towards the goal of using modified T cells from an HIV-infected person for their own treatment. They showed that, using the zinc fingers, they could reduce the viral load of immune-deficient mice transplanted with engineered T cells.
Normally, zinc fingers bind to different bases in the DNA sequence to regulate the activity of genes. The zinc fingers used in this experiment were designed to bind to specific DNA sequences in the CCR5 gene. The CCR5 protein is one of the two cell-surface receptors needed for HIV to gain entry into a T cell in order to replicate.
In this study, the zinc finger protein brings a DNA enzyme to the CCR5 gene to cut a portion of its sequence, but due to the repair process a new mutation arises in the CCR5 protein, rendering it non-functional. Without a functional CCR5 protein on the cell's surface, HIV cannot enter, presumably leading to resistance to HIV infection.
The researchers demonstrated this process in cell culture and in a mouse model. For the animal part of the study, the investigators used healthy human CD4 T cells and added DNA that expresses the zinc fingers, which modifies the CCR5 co-receptor. They grew the engineered cells in tissue culture flasks and transferred them into immune-deficient mice infected with HIV. "We followed them over time and showed that those mice that received the zinc-finger-treated cells showed less viral load than controls and improved CD4 counts," says Perez.
The researchers are planning a clinical trial in humans in which T cells from HIV patients would have their CCR5 gene deliberately knocked out. These modified T cells could then be infused back into the patients to re-establish their immune system and decrease their viral load.
Participated in a podcast on the Speculist about the Future of Fit and Fat
Shawn Phillips is an author, entrepreneur, and expert in the area of performance training and nutrition. He created the Full Strength® Premium Nutrition Shake, clinically proven to swap body fat for lean muscle. He is the author of ABSolution: The Practical Guide to Building Your Best Abs and has just released Strength for Life, published by Ballantine/Random House.
PJ Manney is a writer and futurist and a leading voice in the H+ movement. She has written extensively on transhumanism and related topics, as well as for television (Xena Warrior Princess and Hercules the Legendary Journeys) , and has a novel under development. PJ is the Chairman of the board of directors of the World Transhumanist Association, she's a senior associate at the Foresight Nanotech Institute, and she is on the scientific advisory board for the Lifeboat Foundation.
Brian L. Wang, M.B.A. is the Director of Research for the Lifeboat Foundation. Brian is a long time futurist who has been involved with nanotechnology associations since 1994. He is now a member of the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology (CRN) Task Force where he moderates the technology sub-task force. He is also on the Nanoethics Group Advisory Board. He is also the mastermind behind Next Big Future.
Check out the notes on the podcast and the podcast itself over at the Speculist.
Molecular Genetics of Aging conference september 24-28, 2008
The fourth meeting on the Molecular Genetics of Aging is being organized by Steven Austad, University of Texas Health Science Center; Judith Campisi, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Buck Institute for Age Research and David Sinclair, Harvard Medical School
Judith Campisi is working on one of the major SENS life extension projects to deal with too many old cells. (Apoptosens)
Topics and Co-Chairs:
Genetics I
Heidi Tissenbaum (U Mass Worcester MA USA)
Scott Pletcher (Baylor Houston TX USA)
Genomic Stability
Jan Vijg (Buck Institute Novato CA USA)
Elizabeth Blackburn (UC San Francisco CA USA)
Mitochondria / Metabolism
Peter Rabinovitch (U Washington Seattle WA USA)
Leonard Guarente (MIT Boston USA)
Cellular Senescence / Apoptosis / Stress
John Sedivy (Brown U Providence RI USA
Norman Sharpless (UNC Chapel Hill NC USA)
Stem Cells
Irina Conboy (UC Berkeley CA USA)
Karl Rudolph (Med Sch Hanover Germany)
Proliferative Homeostasis
Paul Hasty (UT Health Science Center, San Antonio, TX USA)
Rolf Bodmer (Burnham Institute San Diego CA USA)
Environment / Interventions
Richard Miller (U. Mich., Ann Arbor MI USA)
Steven Spindler (UC Riverside CA USA)
Genetics II
Anne Brunet (Stanford U CA USA)
Jan Hoeijmakers (Erasmus U Rotterdam Netherlands)
Electrostatic-based DNA Microarray Technique Could Revolutionize Medical Diagnostics
A team of researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has invented a technique in which DNA or RNA assays — the key to genetic profiling and disease detection — can be read and evaluated without the need of elaborate chemical labeling or sophisticated instrumentation.
Based on electrostatic repulsion — in which objects with the same electrical charge repel one another — the technique is relatively simple and inexpensive to implement, and can be carried out in a matter of minutes.
"One of the most amazing things about our electrostatic detection method is that it requires nothing more than the naked eye to read out results that currently require chemical labeling and confocal laser scanners," said Jay Groves, a chemist with joint appointments at Berkeley Lab's Physical Biosciences Division and the Chemistry Department of the University of California (UC) at Berkeley, who led this research. "We believe this technique could revolutionize the use of DNA microarrays for both research and diagnostics."
Groves, who is also a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) investigator, and members of his research group Nathan Clack and Khalid Salaita, have published a paper on their technique in the journal Nature Biotechnology, which is now available online. The paper is entitled "Electrostatic readout of DNA microarrays with charged microspheres."
In their paper, Groves, Clack, and Salaita describe how dispersing a fluid containing thousands of electrically-charged microscopic beads or spheres made of silica (glass) across the surface of a DNA microarray and then observing the Brownian motion of the spheres provides measurements of the electrical charges of the DNA molecules. These measurements can in turn be used to interrogate millions of DNA sequences at a time. What's more, these measurements can be observed and recorded with a simple hand-held imaging device — even a cell phone camera will do.
"The assumption has been that no detection technique could be more sensitive than fluorescent labeling, but this is completely untrue, as our results have plainly demonstrated," said Groves. "We've shown that changes in surface charge density as a result of specific DNA hybridization can be detected and quantified with 50-picometer sensitivity, single base-pair mismatch selectivity, and in the presence of complex backgrounds. Furthermore, our electrostatic detection technique should render DNA and RNA microarrays sufficiently cost effective for broad world-health applications, as well as research."
FURTHER READING
Nature biotechnology paper: Electrostatic readout of DNA microarrays with charged microspheresDNA microarrays are used for gene-expression profiling, single-nucleotide polymorphism detection and disease diagnosis1, 2, 3. A persistent challenge in this area is the lack of microarray screening technology suitable for integration into routine clinical care4, 5. Here, we describe a method for sensitive and label-free electrostatic readout of DNA or RNA hybridization on microarrays. The electrostatic properties of the microarray are measured from the position and motion of charged microspheres randomly dispersed over the surface. We demonstrate nondestructive electrostatic imaging with 10-m lateral resolution over centimeter-length scales, which is four-orders of magnitude larger than that achievable with conventional scanning electrostatic force microscopy. Changes in surface charge density as a result of specific hybridization can be detected and quantified with 50-pM sensitivity, single base-pair mismatch selectivity and in the presence of complex background. Because the naked eye is sufficient to read out hybridization, this approach may facilitate broad application of multiplexed assays
June 29, 2008
LIFT cancer clinical trials
Human trials starting for Zheng Cui's LIFT 'cancer cure' H/T to Alfin
For the upcoming study, the researchers are currently recruiting 500 local potential donors who are 50 years old or younger and in good health to have their blood tested. Of those, 100 volunteers with high cancer-killing activity will be asked to donate white blood cells for the study. Cell recipients will include 22 cancer patients who have solid tumors that either didn't respond originally, or no longer respond, to conventional therapies. The study will cost $100,000 per patient receiving therapy, and for many patients (those living in 22 states, including North Carolina) the costs may be covered by their insurance company. There is no cost to donate blood.
The LIFT method and signing up for the trials The procedure was previously called GIFT.
LIFT is an investigational new cancer treatment that will transfer naturally-occurring cancer-killing activity (CKA) in the granulocytes of a selected donor into the body of a cancer patient.
Here's how the LIFT method works:
* Donor selection: Healthy young volunteers will be screened for the level of CKA, blood types, HLA types, infectious disease status, CMV status etc. by blood tests and physical examinations. The selected volunteers will become part of the Donor Registry. The test results of selected volunteers will be used to match with specific patients.
* Granulocyte collection: When a qualified patient is identified for treatment, granulocytes from several matched donors in the donor registry will be mobilized by two medications and collected by a well-established medical procedure called "apheresis" or "pheresis." A pheresis machine separates donor granulocytes from other blood products that will be immediately returned to donors so that the health impact on granulocyte donation is much smaller than on whole blood donation. Granulocyte mobilization and collection by apheresis have been used in clinical practices for a long time with very good safety record.
* Patient selection and granulocyte infusion: Qualified patients will be selected according to general health condition, disease status and match criteria. Freshly collected granulocytes from matched donors will be given to patients via IV infusion. Granulocytes cannot be stored or shipped for later uses.
Granulocyte infusion therapy has been traditionally used for treating neutropenia-related infections for over 30 years with excellent safety records. Since a significantly higher dose of granulocytes for each patient is proposed in our new cancer treatment, the primary goal of this clinical trial is to test whether the recipients can tolerate the proposed dose of granulocytes.
The main focus of the trial is the possibility of developing Transfusion-Associated Graft vs Host Diseases (TA-GVHD) and other potential side effects in the study subjects at higher doses of donor granulocyte.
Donor granulocytes per se are not known to produce TA-GVHD. However, granulocytes collected via apheresis may contain with some donor T-lymphocytes that in some rare occasions can produce various degrees of TA-GVHD in some individuals, especially the recipients with immune suppression. If possible, we will also make observations on the efficacy of this treatment on the study subjects with measurable diseases of cancer. We will recruit 22 cancer patients as study subjects for this trial.
FURTHER READING
More at redorbit
June 27, 2008
UCLA Sens anti-aging conference abstracts
There will be about thirty speakers at the Understanding aging conference in UCLA this weekend
Here are links to the abstracts of the presentations and some of the highlighted presentations.
Zheng Cui will discuss his Natural Cancer Resistance in Mice and in Humans: basis for a novel cancer therapy (GIFT therapy was covered here) and if successful would be a significant advance in reducing cancer deaths. [possibly a high cure rate and preventing many cancers by helping people fight off early stage cancer]
A new clinical trial is underway at Wake Forest University to test this novel cancer therapy, termed "Leukocyte Infusion Therapy" or LIFT. This clinical trial has met all regulatory requirements including approval by the Wake Forest University School of Medicine's Institutional Review Board (IRB) and been granted an IND (Investigational New Drug) status by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
B.N. Ames talks about delaying the Degenerative Diseases of Aging
I [B.N. Ames] propose that during evolution micronutrient shortages were very common, e.g. the 15 essential minerals, which are not distributed evenly on the earth. The consequences of this homeostatic response are, for example, DNA damage (future cancer), adaptive immune dysfunction (future severe infection), and mitochondrial decay (future cognitive dysfunction and accelerated aging). Much evidence supports this idea that micronutrient shortages accelerate aging.
S.F. Badylak of the McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA will be talking about Regenerative Medicine and Aging
Regenerative medicine is typically based upon the strategic use of undifferentiated stem and progenitor cells, inductive bioscaffolds, and appropriate micro-environmental cues that signal the need for tissue reconstruction. In many respects, the desired result is the recapitulation of developmental biology but limited to a specific tissue or organ. There are many fundamental questions yet to be answered with regard to implementation of such strategies in an aging population. Do aging cells have the same potential for regeneration as young cells? Are biologic scaffolds composed of extracellular matrix from fetal tissues more "instructive" than biologic scaffolds harvested from adult extracellular matrix? How does the micro-environment of aged tissues and organs differ from that or neonatal tissues and organs? These and other questions will be discussed.
L.A. Briggs will discuss the struggle to keep telomeres long
The purpose of this presentation will be to review the current progress [to keep telomeres long], including the recent discovery of several small molecules that induce telomerase activity in normal human cells.
J. Campisi will discuss New tricks for dealing with old cells?
Some senescent cells can escape immune killing by secreting very high levels of matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs). These enzymes likely destroy the ligand-receptor interactions that are needed for killing by natural killer cells. Moreover, the killing of senescent cells can be greatly enhanced by MMP inhibitors, which therefore hold promise for improving the clearance of senescent cells from aged or diseased tissues. We also find that the senescence-associated secretion of inflammatory cytokines is dependent on continuous DNA damage signaling, particularly signaling initiated by the ATM protein kinase. Ablation of ATM kinase activity by RNA interference markedly reduces inflammatory cytokine secretion, suggesting that ATM inhibition might also hold promise for reducing local inflammation caused by senescent cells
C. Gravekamp is working on an improvement of cancer vaccination for older people
K.E. Healy is presenting Synthetic Environments to control Human Embryonic Stem Cell Self-Renewal and Fate Determination
Larocca is presenting Targeted Nanoparticle Probes for Identifying, Tracking and Isolating Embryonic Stem Cell Derived Progenitor Cells
C. Leeuwenburgh will be presenting Mitochondrial iron accumulation with age and functional consequences
D.A. Taylor will be presenting three-fold cell-based approaches to cardiovascular repair and answering the question Is Aging a Treatable Disease in the 21st Century?
FURTHER READING
Over twenty poster abstracts
The agenda of the conference with links to abstracts.
Pre-coverage of the conference
and coverage of Wired article on the conference
The new SENS projects AmyloSENS, ApoptoSENS, Glycosens, Oncosens and Replenisens
Iraqis: 43% say Iraq is going well while 17% of americans say USA on right track
An Ipsos poll indicates that 17% of Americans feel that the United States is on the right track
An opinion poll in February, found that 43% of Iraqis felt that things were going well in Iraq So more than twice the percentage of Iraqis are polling positively about their country versus the percentage of Americans who are polling positively about the USA.
Progress in various areas, such as the economy and security, and actions by the Government of Iraq (GOI) have improved the situation in Iraq. An opinion poll conducted in February found that 43% of Iraqis thought that things were going well in Iraq, up from 22% in September of 2007. The rising price of oil combined with improvements in production has given the GOI more money to spend than before the First Gulf War and the subsequent embargo of Iraqi oil. This increase in revenue has not yet led to noticeable positive change in public services and economic growth remains constrained by the lack of skilled employees in both the public and private sectors; the middle class makes up much of Iraq’s refugees and internally displaced. However, 12 million Iraqis now use cellular phones and 261,000 are Internet subscribers, both of which were negligibly by Iraqis prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom..
Foreign oil companies, with both capital and technical expertise, could feasibly extract an additional 3.5 million barrels of oil, adding 4% to the global supply of crude. While Iraq’s oil infrastructure is aging and in need of a multi-billion dollar investment to contemporize it, Iraq sits atop the world’s fourth largest oil reserve, a fact which appeals to investors
FURTHER READING
The Economist magazine summarizes the mostly improved Iraq situation
Metals are formed into porous nanostructures
Self assembly of the nanostructure of platinum has been performed on a bulk scale. They used the new method to create a platinum structure with uniform hexagonal pores on the order of 10 nm across (a nanometer is the width of three silicon atoms). Platinum is, so far, the best available catalyst for fuel cells, and a porous structure allows fuel to flow through and react over a larger surface area. The researchers have made fairly large chunks of porous platinum this way, up to at least a half-centimeter across. In addition to making porous materials, the researchers said, the technique could be used to create finely structured surfaces, the key to the new field of plasmonics, in which waves of electrons move across the surface of a conductor with the information-carrying capacity of fiber optics, but in spaces small enough to fit on a chip.
Cornell researchers have developed a method to self-assemble metals into complex nanostructures. Applications include making more efficient and cheaper catalysts for fuel cells and industrial processes and creating microstructured surfaces to make new types of conductors that would carry more information across microchips than conventional wires do.
"This is exciting," Wiesner said. "It opens a completely novel playground because no one has been able tostructure metals in bulk ways. In principle, if you can do it with one metal you can do it with mixtures of metals.
The Weiser group has been studying mesostructured silicates.
The method involves coating metal nanoparticles -- about 2 nanometers (nm) in diameter -- with an organic material known as a ligand that allows the particles to be dissolved in a liquid, then mixed with a block co-polymer (a material made up of two different chemicals whose molecules link together to solidify in a predictable pattern). When the polymer and ligand are removed, the metal particles fuse into a solid metal structure.
"The polymer community has tried to do this for 20 years," said Ulrich Wiesner, Cornell professor of materials science and engineering, who, with colleagues, reports on the new method in the June 27 issue of the journal Science. "But metals have a tendency to cluster into uncontrolled structures. The new thing we have added is the ligand, which creates high solubility in an organic solvent and allows the particles to flow even at high density."
Another key factor, he added, is to make the layer of ligand surrounding each particle relatively thin, so that the volume of metal in the final structure is large enough to hold its shape when the organic materials are removed.
FURTHER READING
Highly crystalline mesoporous transition-metal oxides have been synthesized by J. Lee and co-workers at Cornell University (Ithaca, NY). Mesoporous materials with crystalline pore walls are desirable in many technologies and materials, such as photocatalysis, sensors, and fuel cells.
The Weiser group is doing a lot of interesting science.
An earlier step in their research
Cornell researchers have developed a "one-pot" process to create porous films of crystalline metal oxides that could lead to more efficient fuel cells and solar cells
Nanostructure copper interfaces for enhanced boiling
"By themselves, the nanoscale and microscale textures are not able to facilitate good boiling, as the nanoscale pockets are simply too small and the microscale cavities are quickly flooded by water and therefore single-use," Koratkar said. "But working together, the multiscale effect allows for significantly improved boiling. We observed a 30-fold increase in active bubble nucleation site density — a fancy term for the number of bubbles created — on the surface treated with copper nanotubes, over the nontreated surface."
Boiling is ultimately a vehicle for heat transfer, in that it moves energy from a heat source to the bottom of a vessel and into the contained liquid, which then boils, and turns into vapor that eventually releases the heat into the atmosphere. This new discovery allows this process to become significantly more efficient, which could translate into considerable efficiency gains and cost savings if incorporated into a wide range of industrial equipment that relies on boiling to create heat or steam.
Caption: A scanning electron microscope shows copper nanorods deposited on a copper substrate. Air trapped in the forest of nanorods helps to dramatically boost the creation of bubbles and the efficiency of boiling, which in turn could lead to new ways of cooling computer chips as well as cost savings for any number of industrial boiling application. Credit: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute/ Koratkar
The team's discovery could also revolutionize the process of cooling computer chips. As the physical size of chips has shrunk significantly over the past two decades, it has become increasingly critical to develop ways to cool hot spots and transfer lingering heat away from the chip. This challenge has grown more prevalent in recent years, and threatens to bottleneck the semiconductor industry's ability to develop smaller and more powerful chips.
Boiling is a potential heat transfer technique that can be used to cool chips, Koratkar said, so depositing copper nanorods onto the copper interconnects of chips could lead to new innovations in heat transfer and dissipation for semiconductors.
FURTHER READING
Supporting material for the research paper
Advances toward quantum control: better trapped ion quantum gates, hybrid molecules in silicon, quantum coral
The new molecule is a hybrid, with the naturally occurring arsenic at one end in a normal spherical shape and a new, artificial atom at the other end in a flattened, 2-D shape. By controlling the voltage, the researchers found that they could make an electron go to either end of the molecule or exist in an intermediate, quantum, state.
Progress toward gate model Quantum Computer components with new molecule with more easily controlled quantum properties
"Our experiment made us realize that industrial electronic devices have now reached the level where we can study and manipulate the state of a single atom," Rogge says. "This is the ultimate limit, you can not get smaller than that."
Physicist Lloyd Hollenberg and colleagues at the University of Melbourne in Australia were able to construct a theoretical silicon-based quantum computer chip based on the concept of using an individual impurity.
"The team found that the measurements only made sense if the molecule was considered to be made of two parts," Hollenberg says. "One end comprised the arsenic atom embedded in the silicon, while the 'artificial' end of the molecule forms near the silicon surface of the transistor. A single electron was spread across both ends.
"What is strange about the 'surface' end of the molecule is that it occurs as an artifact when we apply electrical current across the transistor and hence can be considered 'manmade.' We have no equivalent form existing naturally in the world around us."
Klimeck, along with graduate student Rajib Rahman, developed an updated version of the nano-electronics modeling program NEMO 3-D to simulate the material at the size of 3 million atoms.
In a Nature Physics journal paper currently online, the researchers describe how they have created a new, hybrid molecule in which its quantum state can be intentionally manipulated - a required step in the building of quantum computers.
"Up to now large-scale quantum computing has been a dream," says Gerhard Klimeck, professor of electrical and computer engineering at Purdue University and associate director for technology for the national Network for Computational Nanotechnology.
"This development may not bring us a quantum computer 10 years faster, but our dreams about these machines are now more realistic."
Fault tolerant Trapped ion quantum gate
Towards fault-tolerant quantum computing with trapped ions
Ion traps are among the most promising physical systems for constructing a quantum device harnessing the computing power inherent in the laws of quantum physics. For the implementation of arbitrary operations, a quantum computer requires a universal set of quantum logic gates. As in classical models of computation, quantum error correction techniques enable rectification of small imperfections in gate operations, thus enabling perfect computation in the presence of noise. For fault-tolerant computation, it is believed that error thresholds ranging between 10**-4 and 10**-2 will be required—depending on the noise model and the computational overhead for realizing the quantum gates—but so far all experimental implementations have fallen short of these requirements. Here, we report on a Mølmer–Sørensen-type gate operation entangling ions with a fidelity of 99.3(1)%. The gate is carried out on a pair of qubits encoded in two trapped calcium ions using an amplitude-modulated laser beam interacting with both ions at the same time. A robust gate operation, mapping separable states onto maximally entangled states is achieved by adiabatically switching the laser–ion coupling on and off. We analyse the performance of a single gate and concatenations of up to 21 gate operations.
Changing the properties of a Quantum Corral by changing one atom
Single-atom gating of quantum-state superpositions
Unprecedented control over the superposition of electronic states of a 'quantum corral', by changing the position of a single atom within it, provides a powerful tool for studying the quantum behaviour of matter. Quantum corral are discussed in creating quantum mirages
Work by Chris Moon and others at Stanford working in the Manipulating the Atom group
The ultimate miniaturization of electronic devices will probably require local and coherent control of single electronic wavefunctions. Wavefunctions exist within both physical real space and an abstract state space with a simple geometric interpretation: this state space—or Hilbert space—is spanned by mutually orthogonal state vectors corresponding to the quantized degrees of freedom of the real-space system. Measurement of superpositions is akin to accessing the direction of a vector in Hilbert space, determining an angle of rotation equivalent to quantum phase. Here, we show that an individual atom inside a designed quantum corral1 can control this angle, producing arbitrary coherent superpositions of spatial quantum states. Using scanning tunnelling microscopy and nanostructures assembled atom-by-atom2, we demonstrate how single spins and quantum mirages3 can be harnessed to image the superposition of two electronic states. We also present a straightforward method to determine the atom path enacting phase rotations between any desired state vectors. A single atom thus becomes a real-space handle for an abstract Hilbert space, providing a simple technique for coherent quantum-state manipulation at the spatial limit of condensed matter.
FURTHER READING
Publications of Jan Benhelm
June 26, 2008
Carnival of Space Week 60
Carnival of Space week 60 is up at slacker astronomy
This site submitted an article with a preview of the space elevator and lunar lander games. The article heavily focused on the space elevator.
Centauri Dreams talks about really big and slow space colonization ships (multi-generational Arks with 10 thousand year travel times).
There is Phoenix Mars lander coverage and a lot more. Check out the Carnival of Space week 60.
Wired Magazine has positive SENS coverage
Wired magazine has a positive article on Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence (SENS) and Aubrey deGrey
Digg that article here
Other researchers have also found some success pursuing similarly structured research programs. For example, late last year, the Buck Institute for Age Research received $25 million from the National Institutes of Health to establish a home for the "new scientific discipline of geroscience." The new field, and its research institute, are dedicated to proactively fighting aging with researchers from a dizzying array of fields.
In research that will first be presented on Friday at the conference, Methuselah-funded scientists will demonstrate a proof-of-concept experiment for using bacterial enzymes to fight atherosclerosis, or the hardening of the arteries. That's an idea that de Grey has been pushing for years.
Gandhi describing his critics,
1. they ignore you
2. then they laugh at you
3. then they fight you
4. then you win
The Fourth Stage of SENS and Aubrey deGrey"In perhaps seven or eight years, we'll be able to take mice already in middle age and treble their lifespan just by giving them a whole bunch of therapies that rejuvenate them," de Grey said. "Gerontologists all over, even my most strident critics, will say yes, Aubrey de Grey is right."
Even as he imagines completing Gandhi's fourth step, de Grey always keeps his eye on the ultimate prize -- the day when the aging-as-disease meme reaches the tipping point necessary to funnel really big money into the field.
"The following day, Oprah Winfrey will be saying, aging is a disease and let's fix it right now," de Grey said.
New Oil production for the United States: Thunder Horse
The British Petroleum offshore oil rig Thunder Horse started production on June 14, 2008 This is US domestic oil in the gulf of Mexico. It will be producing 250,000 barrels of oil per day in 2009.
Thunder Horse page at BP.com
The new production is still not enough as the CIBC is predicting $200 per barrel of oil and $7 per gallon in the USA by 2010.
While Americans are already driving 11 billion fewer miles than they did last year, a decline of 4.3%, they still drive today about 30% more than they did before the OPEC oil shocks. The elasticity of driving to gasoline prices is estimated to be around the 0.06. That means a 10% rise in gasoline prices will eventually lead to a 0.6% reduction in miles driven. Using that rule of thumb, the 280% cumulative rise in gasoline prices between 2004 and our target $7 per gallon target price should induce more than 15% reduction in miles driven on American roads.
This would be predicted to apply a hit to the US economy.
At a minimum, once the worst of the housing shock passes, the Fed will be forced to raise real interest rates back to zero in order to prevent an improving economy from allowing wages and other prices to catch up to oil. With CPI trending at an energy- and food-driven 4%, that will entail 200 basis points in tightening to get to a 4% funds rate by the end of next year. As a result of our upward revised call for both oil and interest rates, we’ve chopped our US growth forecast for 2009 from just over 2% as of two months ago, to little over 1%, no better than this year’s housing-blunted performance. The US economy has managed to avoid feeling the full brunt of oil prices over the last few years, but 2009 will be the year that its luck runs out
Thunder Horse’s actual “production profile” hinges on “well performance” and “how fast we are able to drill and connect new wells,” BP spokesman Ronnie Chappell cautioned.
The Thunder Horse field is located in Mississippi Canyon Blocks 776, 777 and 778, in the Boarshead Basin, 125 miles south-east of New Orleans. It is the largest field in the Gulf of Mexico and lies at a water depth of 6,000ft. The field was discovered in 1999. BP operates the development (75% interest), with co-venturer ExxonMobil owning the balance. The reservoir consists of Upper Miocene turbidite sandstones 6,000m beneath the seabed in 1,900m of water. Pressures exceed 1,200bar and temperatures reach 135°C
Norway Alvheim; Volund; Vilje had first oil June 9, 2008 as well.
Marathon Oil believes the Alvheim; Volund; Vilje output will be at 75,000 bpd in early 2009
FURTHER READING
Other oil megaprojects for 2008
Russia's Yuzhno-Khylchuyuskoye "YK" for July 2008 start to get 150,000 bpd in 2009
Russia's Vankorskoye for October 2008 to get 420,000 bpd peaking in 2017
Brazil Marlim Sul Mod 2 P-51 for August 2008 to get 180,000 bpd
Brazil Marlim Leste P-53 for August 2008 to get 180,000 bpd
Brazil Marlim Leste (FPSO Cidade de Niteroi) Dec 2008 for 100,000 bpd
Canada's Horizon Oil Sands Project (Phase I) for Sept 2008 start to get 110,000 bpd
China moving to World Bank Upper middle income classification in 2010
Although China's economic size on an exchange rated basis has passed Germany this year and will pass Japan in 2009 and will probably pass the United Statesin 2016, China is still classifed as a lower middle income country by the World Bank. This means that using a 3 year average of exchange rates and looking at the GDP according to the Atlas method on July 1st of a year, that China has per capita GDP between $906 - $3,595.
At the end of 2009, China's currency could have appreciated and the size of its economy grown so that it has $4153 per capita of GDP. But the level at the middle of the year not including Hong Kong and Macau would be about $3500. So it would take until 2010 to get to $3890 per capita using the 3 year average of currency appreciation if this sites forecast for growth and currency were correct. When China passes the United States it will probably not be what the World bank considers a high income country with per capita income at $11,116 or more.
UPDATE: The Economist magazine reports that China has a lot of hot money flowing into the country ($500 billion in 2008)
This causes inflation pressure and requires that China mass sterilization. Excess liquidity is mopped up by by issuing bills (as “sterilisation”) or by lifting banks’ reserve requirements. But all this complicates monetary policy.
To curb future inflation, China therefore needs to stem the flood of capital.
One solution would be a large one-off appreciation of the yuan so that investors no longer see it as a one-way bet. This, in turn, would give the PBOC room to raise interest rates. The snag is that the yuan would probably have to be wrenched perhaps 20% higher to alter investors’ expectations, and this is unacceptable to Chinese leaders, especially when global demand has slowed and some exporters are already being squeezed.
This implies that monetary policy will remain too loose. The longer that the torrent of hot money continues and interest rates remain too low, the bigger the risk that underlying inflation will creep up.
Thus the constant appreciation at a rate as fast or slightly faster than the 7% of the first half of 2008 seems likely. Perhaps 20-25% over the next 18 months. This would put the exchange rate with the US dollar of 5.15 to 5.5 at the end of 2009.
Achieving World Bank Upper middle income per capita income levels would be getting up to the level of Jamaica and a little better than Thailand in 2006. High income is getting up to the level of Hungary in 2006 or better.
When people say that China cannot catch up the overall size of the US economy then they are saying that China cannot raise per capita income to the level of Hungary.
China is a massive country with a population several times Europe. So the move to different income levels is and will be uneven. Shanghai is passing into High income levels. Hong Kong and Macau area already high income. The coastal cities and provinces are already upper middle income and will move to high income levels first. The rural and interior areas will lag at low income and lower middle income levels.
FURTHER READING
The 2006 list of upper middle income countries
American Samoa, Argentina, Belize, Botswana, Brazil, Bulgaria, Chile,
Costa Rica, Croatia, Dominica, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Grenada,
Hungary, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lebanon, Libya, Lithuania, Malaysia,
Mauritius, Mayotte, Mexico, Montenegro, Northern Mariana Islands, Oman,
Palau , Panama, Poland, Romania, Russian Federation, Serbia,
Seychelles, Slovak Republic, South Africa, St. Kitts and Nevis,
St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Turkey, Uruguay,
Venezuela, RB
China will have an installed nuclear power capacity of 40 million kilowatts on the mainland by 2020, or four percent of the total installed power generation capacity. New official projects with a combined capacity of 23 million kilowatts are being launched, involving a total investment of 450 billion yuan (about $60 billion).
New permanent near terabit per square inch computer memory
Capacitors in the mask: Thanks to a 100 nm thin mask made of aluminum oxide (above), the German and Korean research team were able to trickle the ceramic (PZT) onto the platinum layer (Pt). The scientists then cut off some platinum to create electrical contact to the ceramic. Image: Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics
Individually addressable epitaxial ferroelectric nanocapacitor arrays with near Tb inch- 2 density that could displace current computer memory Permanent high density memory.
Woo Lee1, Hee Han Andriy Lotnyk, Markus Andreas Schubert, Stephan Senz, Marin Alexe, Dietrich Hesse, Sunggi Baik & Ulrich Gösele1
of
- Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics, Weinberg 2, D-06120 Halle, Germany
- Department of Materials Science & Engineering, Pohang University of Science and Technology, San 31, Hyoja-dong, 790-784 Pohang, Korea
- Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science (KRISS), Yuseong, 305-340 Daejon, Korea
Ferroelectric materials have emerged in recent years as an alternative to magnetic and dielectric materials for nonvolatile data-storage applications. Lithography is widely used to reduce the size of data-storage elements in ultrahigh-density memory devices. However, ferroelectric materials tend to be oxides with complex structures that are easily damaged by existing lithographic techniques, so an alternative approach is needed to fabricate ultrahigh-density ferroelectric memories. Here we report a high-temperature deposition process that can fabricate arrays of individually addressable metal/ferroelectric/metal nanocapacitors with a density of 176 Gb inch- 2. The use of an ultrathin anodic alumina membrane as a lift-off mask makes it possible to deposit the memory elements at temperatures as high as 650 °C, which results in excellent ferroelectric properties.
The permanent memory produced through the German-Korean cooperation can save 176 billion bits per square inch, which is 27 billion bits per square centimeter - more than any comparable memory made of this type of material. "We are approaching memory density of several terabits or billions of bits per square inch, and we hope to be able to increase the memory density even further," relates Dietrich Hesse. Such high memory density is necessary for more widespread use of permanent memory. They could, for example, make the hard-drive and tedious booting up of computers a thing of the past.
three-dimensional nanoscale structures of magnetic metals could make new classes of MEMS devices
Click on the picture for a larger image. Working in the trenches: Transmission electron microscopy image of a thin cross section of 160 nanometer trenches shows deposited nickel completely filling the features without voids. (Color added for clarity.)
Materials scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a process to build complex, three-dimensional nanoscale structures of magnetic materials such as nickel or nickel-iron alloys using techniques compatible with standard semiconductor manufacturing. The process, described in a recent paper, could enable whole new classes of sensors and microelectromechanical (MEMS) devices.
The NIST team also demonstrated that key process variables are linked to relatively quick and inexpensive electrochemical measurements, pointing the way to a fast and efficient way to optimize the process for new materials.
The NIST process is a variation of a technique called “Damascene metallization” that often is used to create complicated three-dimensional copper interconnections, the “wiring” that links circuit elements across multiple layers in advanced, large-scale integrated circuits. Named after the ancient art of creating designs with metal-in-metal inlays, the process involves etching complex patterns of horizontal trenches and vertical “vias” in the surface of the wafer and then uses an electroplating process to fill them with copper. The high aspect ratio features may range from tens of nanometers to hundreds of microns in width. Once filled, the surface of the disk is ground and polished down to remove the excess copper, leaving behind the trench and via pattern.
The big trick in Damascene metallization is ensuring that the deposited metal completely fills in the deep, narrow trenches without leaving voids. This can be done by adding a chemical to the electrodeposition solution to prevent the metal from building up too quickly on the sides of the trenches and by careful control of the deposition process, but both the chemistry and the process variables turn out to be significantly different for active ferromagnetic materials than for passive materials like copper. In addition to devising a working combination of electrolytes and additives to do Damascene metallization with nickel and a nickel-iron alloy, the NIST team demonstrated straightforward measurements for identifying and optimizing the feature-filling process thereby providing an efficient path for the creation of quality nanoscale ferromagnet structures.
C.H. Lee, J.E. Bonevich, J.E. Davies and T.P. Moffat. Magnetic materials for three-dimensional Damascene metallization: void-free electrodeposition of Ni and Ni70Fe30 using 2-mercapto-5-benzimidazolesulfonic acid. Journal of The Electrochemical Society, 155 (7) D499-D507 (2008).
The new process makes it feasible to create complex three-dimensional MEMS devices such as inductors and actuators that combine magnetic alloys with non-magnetic metallizations such as copper interconnects using existing production systems.
June 25, 2008
Amory Lovins distorts nuclear energy and promotes air pollution
Amory Lovins wrote the nuclear illusion which looks at the data from 2000 forward or 1990 forward but he claims a decades long (plural so at least two decades and Lovins has been claiming nuclear collapse since the 1970s) collapse of nuclear energy.
Since 1980, nuclear power TWH has increased by over 400%. So Amory Lovins is wrong about nuclear energy being a collapsing industry.
The charts that Lovins uses are only looking at 2000 forward or look at "new additions" when the bulk of nuclear power generation increases was from operating improvement and uprates to existing reactors.
The "micropower" is mostly diesel, biomass and natural gas of small and big sizes. Natural gas has 4 deaths per TWH (Externe source). So 2500 Twh (to displace nuclear power) would be 10,000 deaths per year. The diesel (oil) portion is 35 deaths per TWH. The biomass about 10 deaths per TWH (35,000 deaths per year if diesel was the main source). The blended rate of deaths per TWH from micropower is over 12 deaths per TWH. Far higher than the 0.65 deaths per TWH calculated by Externe for nuclear power. Even if the micropower deaths per TWH was cut in half for lower distribution losses the number is still far higher. Diesel and natural gas are not renewable. Over 75% of the power that Lovins is talking about is diesel, natural gas and biomass.
Deaths per TWH for all energy sources
Natural gas is not renewable. So is Lovins advocating an increase of more than double the US military deaths of the 5+ years of the Iraq war every year from more natural gas air pollution and other causes ?
All energy build costs went up with the increase in commodity prices (steel, concrete, oil)
There are wind turbine shortages and backorders for several years for the large efficient turbines.
Nuclear operating costs and efficiency are on continuing to the improvements that they have made for decades.
Laser uranium enrichment 3-10 times cheaper and more efficient.
Existing nuclear power plants are getting 20 year extensions and power uprates.
MIT/Westinghouse commercializing new 50% power uprates for annular fuel.
FURTHER READING
Further analysis of deaths per TWH
Nuclear power build in China and the rest of the world
Feed in tariffs subsidies for renewables
Energy costs with externalities
Staffing an expanding nuclear industry
constructing a lot of nuclear power is not supply constrained
Nuclear forging bottleneck is being addressed
Idaho national lab plan to extend nuclear plants to 80 years of operation and increase build in the USA to over 10 reactors per year
New smaller and mass produced reactors will address the larger finance issues
Mass producable uranium hydride reactors
The Fuji molten salt reactor
THE DEBATES ON NUCLEAR ILLUSION
David Bradish critique part 1 vs Nuclear illusion
David Bradish critique part 2 vs Nuclear illusion
David Bradish critique part 3 vs Nuclear illusion
David Bradish critique part 4 vs Nuclear illusion
Gristmill rebuttal part one
Gristmill/Lovins rebuttal part 2
Amory Lovins supports "clean coal"
Amory Lovins fossil fuel apologist
Approximate visible light cloak simulated and practical device within reach
Silicon photonic crystal has holes of the right sizes and waveguides
In computer simulations, the researchers have demonstrated an approximate cloaking effect created by concentric rings of silicon photonic crystals. The mathematical proof brings scientists a step closer to a practical solution for optical cloaking.
"This is much more than a theoretical exercise," said Harley Johnson, a Cannon Faculty Scholar and professor of mechanical science and engineering at Illinois. "An optical cloaking device is almost within reach."
Axisymmetric photonic crystal structures may be designed to possess interesting optical properties, particularly when the photonic band structure of the material is highly anisotropic. We use finite element calculations to demonstrate an approximate electromagnetic cloaking effect imparted by a structure consisting of concentric silicon photonic crystal layers. The results show that it is possible to bend light around an object by simply using anisotropy. The calculations show that the cloaking mechanism is fundamentally different from Pendry's approach. This design may work as a practical solution for optical cloaking.
D. Xiao and H. T. Johnson, “Approximate cloaking effect in an axisymmetric silicon photonic crystal structure,” Optics Letters, 33, 860-862 (2008).
In October 2006, an invisibility cloak operating in the microwave region of the electromagnetic spectrum was reported by researchers at Duke University, Imperial College in London, and Sensor Metrix in San Diego. In their experimental demonstration, microwave cloaking was achieved through a thin coating containing an array of tiny metallic structures called ring resonators.
To perform the same feat at much smaller wavelengths in the visible portion of the spectrum, however, would require ring resonators smaller than can be made with current technology, Johnson said. In addition, because metallic particles would absorb some of the incident light, the cloaking effect would be incomplete. Faintly outlined in the shape of the container, some of the background objects would appear dimmer than the rest.
To avoid these problems, postdoctoral research associate Dong Xiao came up with the idea of using a coating of concentric rings of silicon photonic crystals. The width and spacing of the rings can be tailored for specific wavelengths of light.
"When light of the correct wavelength strikes the coating, the light bends around the container and continues on its way, like water flowing around a rock," Xiao said. "An observer sees what is behind the container, as though it isn't there. Both the container and its contents are invisible."
Currently simulated in two dimensions, the cloaking concept could be extended to three dimensions, Xiao said, by replacing the concentric rings with spherical shells of silicon, separated by air or some other dielectric.
The researchers' optical cloaking technique is not perfect, however. "The wave fronts are slightly perturbed as they pass around the container," said Johnson, who also is affiliated with the university's Beckman Institute and the Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory. "Because the wave fronts don't match exactly, we refer to the technique as 'approximate' cloaking."
FURTHER READING
Invisibility to sound for acoustic shields (hide nuclear deterrent submarines from sonar detection) and shaping sound and other waves (like earthquakes) is also coming soon
Researchers at the University of Illinois are the first to achieve optical waveguiding of near-infrared light through features embedded in self-assembled, three-dimensional photonic crystals. Applications for the optically active crystals include low-loss waveguides, low-threshold lasers and on-chip optical circuitry.
Harley Johnson site
Photonic crystal tutorial
Silicon photonic crystal
Scanning electron micrograph of a porous silicon photonic crystal
June 24, 2008
Space elevator games and Lunar lander contest 2008 preview
The Space elevator power beaming (climber) competition is on Sept 27, 2008
Vertical Distance: 1 kilometer (ten times the 2007 distance)
Speed for prizes: 2 m/s for $900,000 and 5 m/s for $2 million
11 teams have entered the 2008 power beaming / climbing contest
The University of Saskatchewan space design team
The University of Saskatchwan team almost won in 2007
University of Alberta racing team
Queen's space elevator team
McGill Space elevator team
Kansas City Space Pirates
MClimber from Michigan
NSS Space elevator team
Laser Motive
TXL group
Team Nippon
Earth track controllers
Proving Space Elevator components by 2010
The Space Elevator requires two major achievements: a tether which is at least 30 GPa-cc/g strong (see below), and a long-range power beaming system in the Mega-Watt range.
The Spaceward foundation plan to demonstrate by the year 2010, a 10 GPa-cc/g CNT tether, and a multi-kWatt km-scale power beaming demonstration.With these benchmarks demonstrated, the Spaceward Foundation plans to pursue a 5-year development phase (phase 1) of full-performance components, followed by a 5-year system development effort (phase 2). This puts the beginning of construction (phase 3) around the year 2020.
Tether strength to weight ratio seems to be on track to reach the necessary levels by 2013.
In 2007, 9 GPa g/cc strenth material for millimeter lengths
"High-Performance Carbon Nanotube Fiber", Krzysztof Koziolet al, Science Magazine, 2007 - Measurement of the strongest of a sample of mm-long pure aggregated carbon nanotube fibers.
In 2008, 40 GPa g/cc
from Sparse (Carbon nanotubes) CNT Composite
"The extraordinary reinforcing efficiency of single-walled carbon nanotubes in oriented poly(vinyl alcohol) tapes", Wang et al. IOP Nanotechnology vol. 18 –
inferred strength of SWNTs from a 1% CNT reinforced plastic tape.Abstract. This paper reports on oriented poly(vinyl alcohol)/single-walled carbon nanotube (PVA/SWNT) tapes that were prepared by a mild processing route, involving the use of dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) as a solvent. Composite films with homogeneously dispersed SWNTs were cast from solution and drawn into oriented tapes using solid-state drawing. The obtained tapes showed the extraordinary reinforcing effects of the SWNTs, as the addition of 1.0 wt% SWNTs tripled the tensile strength of the PVA tapes. Micromechanical analysis showed that the nanotube contribution to the composite strength was as high as 88 GPa, which is very high when compared to other data reported in the literature, and for the first time begins to exploit the theoretical strength of nanotubes.
Goal 2010, 35 GPa g/cc for 1000 km x mm
Minimal value for Space Elevator ribbon, Taper Ratio=6.3 with 33% safety factor.
Comparative Ribbon Mass = 4.6 - May require more efficient power system.
Goal 2011, 50 GPa g/cc for 1000 km x mm
Basic value for Space Elevator ribbon, Taper Ratio=3.5 with 33% safety factor.
Comparative Ribbon Mass = 2.0
Goal 2012, 80 GPa g/cc for 1000 km x mm
Desirable value for Space Elevator ribbon, Taper Ratio=2.5 with 50% safety factor.
Comparative Ribbon Mass = 1.0
The 2008 work by Z Wang is getting a follow up navy study for increased percentages of carbon nanotubes in plasticThis STTR requests proposals that develop a clear scientific understanding of the main obstacles to ultrahigh CNT loading in nanocomposites and that proposes new methods or approaches to increasing the loading of well dispersed CNTs in structural resins beyond 10% weight fraction.
The Lunar Lander contest is October 24-25, 2008
There was almost a winner in 2007 and 2006. There should be a winner in 2008.
FURTHER READING
Space Elevator conference Friday, July 18 thru Sunday, July 20 in Redmond Washington
2nd European climber workshop - Luxembourg - October 18 thru October 19. 2008
1st Japanese space elevator conference Nov 2008
Wikipedia on the space elevator
Fuzzwich and Techshop at Demo party
Went to a Demo networking event last week
In 1991, Stewart Alsop changed the technology conference circuit by instituting a new event with new rules: DEMO would be about the products; would require timed, live demonstrations; and would not allow PowerPoint presentations. These rules still stand. Startups communicate the power and value of emerging technologies on stage in a short 360 second.
Two of companies at that event:
Fuzzwich.com who make animation simpler. An example that I created in a few mintues is below.
TECHSHOP
Techshop is an open access public workshop with rapid prototyping machines and many other tools Techshop membership costs $100-125/month. They have classes where you can learn how to use the equipment to start making inventions.
TechShop Menlo Park / HQ is located at 120 Independence Dr, Menlo Park, California, just to the east of 101 near Marsh Road on the San Francisco peninsula.
FURTHER READING
Every demo 2007 startup ranked by thedeal.com
Gas centrifuge versus laser uranium enrichment
General Electric has licenced and is commercializing a laser uranium enrichment process. The Silex laser uranium enrichment process has been indicated to be an order of magnitude more efficient than existing production techniques but again, the exact figure is classified.
Australian scientists Michael Goldsworth and Horst Struve developed the process, and from 1996 to 2002 received support from the United States Enrichment Corp. (Bethesda, MD); the two scientists have since formed a public corporation, Silex Systems (Lucas Heights, NSW, Australia). Last year they licensed the Silex process to General Electric. The process is based on selective excitation of uranium hexafluoride (UF6) molecules that contain U-235 by laser light at a narrow spectral line near 16 µm, but few details have been released (see figure). The Los Alamos National Laboratory (Los Alamos, NM) initially explored the concept three decades ago, but the U.S. Department of Energy later abandoned it in favor of atomic-vapor laser isotope enrichment.
The CO2 lasers can generate 1 J pulses, but only at a limited repetition rate, and only a fraction of the pulse is in the pump band. Unspecified “additional nonlinear optical tricks” are needed to convert the CO2 pump light to the correct wavelength to pump the Raman cell. The lasers are 1% efficient and the Raman conversion 25% efficient, so the overall efficiency is 0.25%.
With many details classified or proprietary, it is hard to quantify the processing. Lyman wrote that if a laser could illuminate a one-liter volume at an ideal repetition rate, it would take about 100 hours to produce one kilogram of U-235-assuming complete separation of the U-235 and U-238 isotopes. However, most processes require multiple stages of separation, and according to Lyman’s comments, a 5000 Hz laser would be needed to process all the feed stream (a mixture of UF6 and an unidentified diluting gas).
Solid state lasers able to be continuously tuned from the 0.2 to 10 micron range
Free electron lasers can operate 3 to 100 microns and in the 6-35 micron ranges
The US Navy has funded development of megawatt solid state free electron lasers for delivery in 2012
The new solid state lasers could be more efficient for the desired frequency and wavelengths.
The specific energy consumption is 2300-3000 kWh/SWU for Gaseous Diffusion, versus 100-300 kWh/SWU for gas centrifuge. The number of stages required to produce LEU is about 30 times larger in the diffusion plant than in the centrifuge plant.
A kilogram of LEU requires roughly 11 kilograms U as feedstock for the enrichment process and about 7 separative work units (SWUs) of enrichment services. To produce one kilogram of uranium enriched to 3.5% U-235 requires 4.3 SWU if the plant is operated at a tails assay 0.30%, or 4.8 SWU if the tails assay is 0.25% (thereby requiring only 7.0 kg instead of 7.8 kg of natural U feed).
Areva's recently announced Idaho enrichment plant, estimated to cost $2 billion, is expected to supply 3 million SWU or half the capacity of the GE plant at full production. The full-scale GE plant, expected to supply 3.5-6.0 million SWU, will require additional investor commitments. The GE laser enrichment plant would start at 1 million SWU/year and then get expanded Close to one million kilograms/year of enriched uranium using 7 SWU per kg.
25 page powerpoint presentation made April 2008 on Silex
Silex is also examining Oxygen-18 (PET medical imaging) and Carbon-13 (medical diagnostic) laser separation.
FURTHER READING
Laser enrichment at Idaho Samizdat
Silex company site
Worldwide Uranium demand and Nuclear Reactor fuel requirements translate into a requirement for uranium enrichment separative work services in the range 35–38 million SWU/year over the next 10 years.
About 120,000 kg SWU are required to enrich the annual fuel loading for a typical large (1,000 MWe) nuclear reactor.
The Silex process is inefficient for highly enriched uranium at this time
The up to ten times greater enrichment efficiency improves the energy efficiency of nuclear power and the cost efficiency of nuclear fuel and operations.
Uranium: 8.9 kg U3O8 x $53 472
Conversion: 7.5 kg U x $12 90
Enrichment: 7.3 SWU x $135 985 [Silex could reduce this by 3-10 times]
Fuel fabrication: per kg 240
Total, approx: US$ 1787
The Rich still got richer and more numerous
The Merryl Lynch/Cap Gemini Wealth report for 2008 is out looking back at 2007 statistics As of 2007 there are 10.1 millionaires in the world, which is an increase of 600,000 over 2006.
HNWI wealth grew by 9.4%, to US$40.7 trillion—a slight deceleration from the 11.4% growth witnessed in 2006. The largest regional gains in wealth were in Latin America and the Middle East, up by 20.4% and 17.5%, respectively. For their part, Ultra-HNWIs (those with over 30 million in assets not including their primary house) posted the highest gains of any “wealth band,” both in population, up 8.8%, and total assets, up 14.5%.
FURTHER READING
Prior wealth chart update2007 2006 2005 2004 Wealth Amount 8 5 3 2 US$30B+ Forbes list (which mainly catches owners 77 67 49 32 US$10B+ of public assets, can underestimate some 203 167 124 102 US$5B+ like CTO of Cisco, who may be billionaire 1125 946 793 691 US$1B+ from cisco stock + large startup positions) 10,000 9400 8200 7500 US$160M+ (my own estimate) 103,300 95,000 85400 77500 US$30M+ (UHNW, ultra high net worth class) 990,000 (e)930,000 820000 745000 US$5 to 30M 9.3M 8.6M 7.8M 7.4M US$1-5M Global number, US number 33% (2.6 million) 10.1M 9.5M 8.7M 8.2M US$1M+ Global number, US number 33% ( 2.6 million) 28M ~26M ~24M ~22M US$500K-1M doesn't include primary residence, (estimate)
The 2007 world wealth report
Future wealth projection
What countries should do to win for their people
Researchers develop neural implant that learns with the brain
University of Florida researchers have taken the concept of brain machine interfaces a step further, devising a way for computerized devices not only to translate brain signals into movement but also to evolve with the brain as it learns. This is a huge step forward to transhuman and technological singularity goals. The computer and the user co-evolve to learn to work together more effectively.
Until now, brain-machine interfaces have been designed as one-way conversations between the brain and a computer, with the brain doing all the talking and the computer following commands. The system UF engineers created actually allows the computer to have a say in that conversation, too, according to findings published this month online in the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers journal IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering.
"In the grand scheme of brain-machine interfaces, this is a complete paradigm change," said Justin C. Sanchez, Ph.D., a UF assistant professor of pediatric neurology and the study's lead author. "This idea opens up all kinds of possibilities for how we interact with devices. It's not just about giving instructions but about those devices assisting us in a common goal. You know the goal, the computer knows the goal and you work together to solve the task."
Sanchez and his colleagues developed a system based on setting goals and giving rewards. Fitted with tiny electrodes in their brains to capture signals for the computer to unravel, three rats were taught to move a robotic arm toward a target with just their thoughts. Each time they succeeded, the rats were rewarded with a drop of water.
The computer's goal, on the other hand, was to earn as many points as possible, Sanchez said. The closer a rat moved the arm to the target, the more points the computer received, giving it incentive to determine which brain signals lead to the most rewards, making the process more efficient for the rat. The researchers conducted several tests with the rats, requiring them to hit targets that were farther and farther away. Despite this increasing difficulty, the rats completed the tasks more efficiently over time and did so at a significantly higher rate than if they had just aimed correctly by chance, Sanchez said.
"We think this dialogue with a goal is how we can make these systems evolve over time," Sanchez said. "We want these devices to grow with the user. (Also) we want users to be able to experience new scenarios and be able to control the device."
FURTHER READING
Photo gallery for the article
Al fin comments on this development and refers to another brain implant advance
ANOTHER DIFFERENT BRAIN IMPLANT
The other brain implant advance is described in an IEEE Spectrum June 2008 article. Michigan engineers are developing a closed-loop deep-brain stimulation device for Parkinson's disease that would listen to the brain while stimulating it.
The group is also trying to make the system more energy efficient. They claim to have already reduced the power consumption and size compared with other stimulators, characteristics that would translate into huge benefits for a clinical model.
Pictures related to the Michigan Parkinsons disease related brain stimulation [not the learning feedback system from Florida]:
June 23, 2008
Effective Gene Silencing and targeted Gene therapy advance
A fluorescent image of the cell taken four hours into the same experiment. At this time the quantum dot-siRNA complex is distributed throughout the cellular fluid. The dark region in the middle of the cell is the nucleus. Credit: University of Washington
New work helps to overcome a long standing barrier in the siRNA (silence/turn off genes using RNA) field: How to achieve high silencing efficiency with low toxicity. The new quantum dot approach is 5-10 times less toxic and 7 to 25 times more effective. (98% of gene activity was stopped).
Quantum dots, fluorescent balls of semiconductor material just six nanometers across, was surrounded by a proton sponge that carried a positive charge. Without any quantum dots attached, the siRNA's negative charge would prevent it from penetrating a cell's wall. With the quantum-dot chaperone, the more weakly charged siRNA complex crosses the cellular wall, escapes from the endosome (a fatty bubble that surrounds incoming material) and accumulates in the cellular fluid, where it can do its work disrupting protein manufacture.
Key to the newly published approach is that researchers can adjust the chemical makeup of the quantum dot's proton-sponge coating, allowing the scientists to precisely control how tightly the dots attach to the siRNA.
Quantum dots were dramatically better than existing techniques at stopping gene activity. In experiments, a cell's production of a test protein dropped to 2 percent when siRNA was delivered with quantum dots. By contrast, the test protein was produced at 13 percent to 51 percent of normal levels when the siRNA was delivered with one of three commercial reagents, or reaction-causing substances, now commonly used in laboratories.
Central to the finding is that fluorescent quantum dots allow scientists to watch the siRNA's movements. Previous siRNA trackers gave off light for less than a minute, while quantum dots, developed for imaging, emit light for hours at a time. In the experiments the authors were able to watch the process for many hours to track the gene-silencer's path.
The new approach is also five to 10 times less toxic to the cell than existing chemicals, meaning the quantum dot chaperones are less likely to harm cells.
Researchers from Northwestern University and Texas A & M University have discovered a new way to limit gene transfer and expression to specific tissues in animals.
They were able to target a particular type of cell of gene therapy treatment. They are working to generalize and identify DNA sequences for targeting other types of cells.
Exciton communication and transistors could be the basis of new faster computers
An circuit that uses excitons for computing flashes light as the particles decay to release photons. Credit: Leonid Butov/UCSD
Particles called excitons that emit a flash of light as they decay could be used for a new form of computing better suited to fast communication, physicists at UC San Diego have demonstrated. Switching times on the order of 200 picoseconds have been demonstrated so far. (A picosecond is one trillionth of a second). While exciton computation itself may not be faster than electron-based circuits, the speed will come when sending signals to another machine, or between different parts of a chip that are connected by an optical link. The gallium arsenide excitonic circuits will only work at frigid temperatures - below 40 degrees Kelvin (or -390 degrees Fahrenheit), a limit determined by the binding energy of the excitons. The operating temperature can be increased by choosing different semiconductor materials.
Integrated circuits, assemblies of transistors that are the building blocks for all electronic devices, currently use electrons to ferry the signals needed for computation. But almost all communications devices use light, or photons, to send signals. The need to convert the signalling language from electrons to photons limits the speed of electronic devices.
Leonid Butov, a professor of physics at UCSD, and his colleagues at UCSD and UC Santa Barbara have built several exciton-based transistors that could be the basis of a new type of computer, they report this week in an advance online version of the journal Science. The circuits they have assembled are the first computing devices to use excitons.
"Our transistors process signals using exitons, which like electrons can be controlled with electrical voltages but unlike electrons transform into photons at the output of the circuit,” Butov said. “This direct coupling of excitons to photons bridges a gap between computing and communications."
Excitons are pairs of negatively charged electrons and positively charged “holes” that are created by light in a semiconductor such as gallium arsenide. When the electron and hole recombine, the exciton decays and releases its energy as a flash of light.
Breakthrough could be significant step to faster Spintronic computers
click on the image for a larger version of the picture
Physicists at UC Riverside have made an accidental discovery in the lab that has potential to change how information in computers can be transported or stored. The thickness of MgO (Magnesium Oxide) can control the flow of electrons with different spin.
When the MgO interface is very thin, spin up electrons, represented in this image with an arrow to the right, are reflected back to the semiconductor. At an intermediate thickness of the interface, spin down electrons are reflected back to the semiconductor, resulting in a “spin reversal” that can be used to control current flow.
Inversion of Ferromagnetic Proximity Polarization by MgO Interlayers at Physics Review Letters by
Yan Li,1 Y. Chye,1 Y. F. Chiang,1 K. Pi,1 W. H. Wang,1 J. M. Stephens,2 S. Mack,2 D. D. Awschalom,2 and R. K. Kawakami1
1Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Riverside, California 92521, USA 2Center for Spintronics and Quantum Computation, University of California, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USAWe investigate the spin-dependent reflection properties in Fe/MgO/GaAs heterostructures by optical pump-probe measurement of the ferromagnetic proximity polarization (FPP). As a function of MgO thickness, the FPP is initially enhanced (<2.0 Ã…) and then exhibits an unexpected sign reversal at ~5.0 Ã…. The identification of two competing thresholds in the intensity dependence of FPP and the observation of FPP sign reversal in Fe/Mg/GaAs suggest that the inversion of FPP is related to an interfacial bonding effect.
Impossible control of number electrons on the surface of a superconductor made real
A team of University of British Columbia researchers has developed a technique that controls the number of electrons on the surface of high-temperature superconductors, a procedure considered impossible for the past two decades.
Led by Physics Assoc. Prof. Andrea Damascelli, the team deposited potassium atoms onto the surface of a piece of superconducting copper oxide. The approach allows the scientists to continuously manipulate the number of electrons on ultra-thin layers of material. This level of control of electrons on surfaces will have applications beyond superconductors to other materials.
From the Nature Physics paper:In situ doping control of the surface of high-temperature superconductors
Central to the understanding of high-temperature superconductivity is the evolution of the electronic structure as doping alters the density of charge carriers in the CuO2 planes. Superconductivity emerges along the path from a normal metal on the overdoped side to an antiferromagnetic insulator on the underdoped side. This path also exhibits a severe disruption of the overdoped normal metal's Fermi surface. Angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) on the surfaces of easily cleaved materials such as Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+ shows that in zero magnetic field the Fermi surface breaks up into disconnected arcs. However, in high magnetic field, quantum oscillations at low temperatures in YBa2Cu3O6.5 indicate the existence of small Fermi surface pockets. Reconciling these two phenomena through ARPES studies of YBa2Cu3O7- (YBCO) has been hampered by the surface sensitivity of the technique. Here, we show that this difficulty stems from the polarity and resulting self-doping of the YBCO surface. Through in situ deposition of potassium atoms on cleaved YBCO, we can continuously control the surface doping and follow the evolution of the Fermi surface from the overdoped to the underdoped regime. The present approach opens the door to systematic studies of high-temperature superconductors, such as creating new electron-doped superconductors from insulating parent compounds.
UPDATE: The Vancouver Sun reports on the steps used
First, the copper oxide is put in a stainless-steel chamber kept in "outer space vacuum conditions" to avoid contaminating the sample, Damascelli explained. Atoms of potassium are then deposited onto the sample's surface, leaving behind electrons.
The second trick involves a technique that goes back to Albert Einstein's Nobel Prize-winning research into the photoelectric effect. Researchers shine light on the sample, which is absorbed by the electrons and ejected from the sample in a way that can be measured.
"This study that we do is the only way to really understand what is happening inside the superconductor," Damascelli said.
The experiment is groundbreaking for two reasons: Scientists are now able to control the number of electrons on the surface of a superconductor, and can also observe them.
"Extremely thin layers and surfaces of superconducting materials take on very different properties from the rest of the material. Electrons have been observed to re-arrange, making it impossible for scientists to study," says Damascelli. "It's become clear in recent years that this phenomenon is both the challenge and key to making great strides in superconductor research.
"The new technique opens the door to systematic studies not just of high-temperature superconductors, but many other materials where surfaces and interfaces control the physical properties," says Damascelli. "The control of surfaces and interfaces plays a vital role in the development of applications such as fuel cells and lossless power lines, and may lead to new materials altogether."
The superconductors Damascelli's team experimented on are the purest samples currently available and were produced at UBC by physicists Doug Bonn, Ruixing Liang and Walter Hardy.
Part of the study was carried out at the Advanced Light Source synchrotron in California. In the future, the design and study of novel complex materials for next-generation technologies will be carried out at the Quantum Materials Spectroscopy Center currently under construction at the Canadian Light Source in Saskatoon under Damascelli's leadership.
FURTHER READING
Profile of Andrea Damascelli
Arata Cold Fusion follow up : how much excess heat
This is a follow up on the Arata cold fusion experiment which was showing excess heat
Physics world has a review of the Arata cold fusion research This information is a review of the Arata cold fusion work at the LENR-CANR site. [Low Energy Nuclear Reactions, also known as Cold Fusion. (CANR, Chemically Assisted Nuclear Reaction)]
Based on 0.5 to 1 degree celsius of excess heat for one liter of water for 5000 minutes then it appears to be about 200-400 kwh of excess heat.
A deuterium (cold fusion) versus hydrogen (ordinary chemical) experiment is performed by Arata. There is always a significant temperature difference between T (inside, Tin) and T(surface of the energy cell, Ts), indicating that the sample and cell are not reaching equilibrium. After 300 minutes the Tin of the deuterium experiment is about 28 °C (4 °C warmer than ambient), while Tin/Ts of the hydrogen experiment is at about 25 °C (1 °C warmer than ambient).
Arata claims that, given the large amount of power involved, this must be some form of fusion — what he prefers to call "solid fusion". This can be described, he says, by the following equation:
D + D = 4He + heat
The deuterium experiments remain 1 °C or more than ambient for at least 3000 minutes while still exhibiting the temperature difference between the sample and the cell, Tin and Ts.
20 °C calorie: the amount of energy required to warm 1 g of air-free water from 19.5 °C to 20.5 °C at a constant pressure of 101.325 kPa (1 atm). This is about 4.182 J. The experiment appears to have been dealing with one liter of water. So one extra degree for 5000 minutes would be 300,000 seconds times 4172 joules which is 1251.6 megajoules. This is 347.6 kwh. Being able to convert that thermal energy into electricity would not be efficient without boosting the temperature.
June 22, 2008
Saudi Arabia oil: Background on Zuluf, Safaniyah, Berri, Khurais and Shaybah the sources of increased production
The increased production fields have rectangles around the name. Information from the EIA Saudi Arabia Country report Click on the picture for a larger version.
Saudi Arabia will increase production capacity to 12.5 million barrels a day of oil by the end of next year [2009] and could add a further 2.5 million barrels a day if needed, from some new giant fields, Naimi said.
The further daily capacity includes 900,000 barrels from the Zuluf field, 700,000 barrels from Safaniyah, 300,000 barrels from Berri, 300,000 barrels from Khurais and 250,000 barrels from Shaybah, Naimi said.
``Saudi Arabia is prepared and willing to produce additional barrels of crude above and beyond the 9.7 million barrels per day, which we plan to produce during the month of July, if demand for such quantities materializes and our customers tell us they are needed,'' Naimi said.
Saudi Arabia's capacity will be 12.5 million barrels a day by the end of 2009 and may rise to 15 million after that if necessary, he said
The market needs between 3 million and 4 million barrels a day of spare oil production capacity, compared with the 2 million barrels a day currently available, Bodman said. OPEC says the world's spare capacity is about 3 million barrels a day, with two- thirds of that in Saudi Arabia.
Safaniyah, by far the largest offshore oilfield in the world, was found in 1951 by Texaco (which in 1937 was the first to join SoCal - now Chevron - in Saudi Arabia as a 50% partner in Aramco. But now Taxaco is part of Chevron).
Safaniyah has over 15 bn barrels of proven oil reserves recoverable at relatively low cost. The oil is heavy, 27[degrees] API with 2.93-2.96% sulphur, and much of Safaniyah's 1.5m b/d capacity has been mothballed. Like most other offshore fields in the north-east, the oil is reservoired in Cretaceous sandstones and carbonates mainly at a depth of 5,100 ft.
Berri, found in 1964 by Mobil, is an onshore and offshore giant. It has over 10 bn barrels of 32-34-39 deg. API oil recoverable at relatively low cost. The field produces from several formations of Upper and Mid-Jurassic age, lying mostly at a depth of 8,300 feet. Its capacity has been raised from less than 700,000 b/d in 1990 to 1.15m b/d.
Berri crude oils are blended with lighter grades mostly produced from Abqaiq and the field's system can take crude oils from Qatif. The export blend is Arabian Extra Light, 38 deg. API with about 1% sulphur.
From the EIA country report: Shaybah contains an estimated 14.3 billion barrels of premium grade 41.6o API sweet (nearly sulfur-free) Arab Extra Light crude oil, with production as of November 2006, at around 550,000 bbl/d from 141 wells. It is the largest oil field in the world that has been developed in the past two decades. According to Oil Minister Naimi (October 1999), the development of Shaybah showed that "the cost of adding...capacity - that is, all the infrastructure, producing and transportation facilities - necessary to produce one additional barrel of oil per day in Saudi Arabia is, at most, $5,000 compared to between $10,000 and $20,000 in most areas of the world."
-The Shaybah complex includes three gas/oil separation plants (GOSPs) and a 395-mile pipeline to connect the field to Abqaiq, Saudi Arabia's closest gathering center, for blending with Arab Light crude (Berri and Abqaiq streams). In addition to oil, Shaybah has a large natural gas "cap" (associated gas), with estimated reserves of 25 trillion cubic feet (Tcf). Gas production of 880 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) is re-injected. It is reported that possible gas recovery project could be implemented within 5 or 6 years, potentially for use in petrochemical production.
-The Khurais fields (including Abu Jifan and Mazalij) west of Ghawar, will increase Saudi production capacity (of Arab Light) by 1.2 million bbl/d at a cost of $3 billion. Once online, Saudi Arabia will be the only oil producer to have two “super giant” fields, that which produce more than 1 million bbl/d of crude oil. This is to involve installation of four GOSPs, with a capacity of 200,000 bbl/d each, at Khurais, which first came online in the 1963, but was mothballed by Aramco some three-decades later. Aramco plans to drill at least 300 exploration wells with 23 rigs.
Click on the picture for a larger version.
Recent Saudi Oil Production was as low as 8.6 million bpd in 2007
FURTHER READING
Oil megaprojects from around the world
June 20, 2008
Updated China economic projection
China's GDP in 2007 was 24.66 trillion yuan ($3.38 trillion) and per capita GDP was $2,556, official figures suggest.
UPDATE of this May article:
China's currency is now 6.88 yuan to 1 USD. China's GDP is now $3.78 trillion.
Hong Kong's GDP is $409 billion in 2008
Including Hong Kong and Macau China has $4.2 trillion GDP.
China reports its own military spending at about 417.8 billion yuan. [US$60.7 billion] which would put China as the fourth largest spender after the USA, France and the UK
Rand has estimated China's spending to be 33% higher than reported amounts and DoD doubles the military spending. Either adjustment would put China as the second largest military spender but well behind the USA's military spending.
The Economist magazine noted that China's national economic figures have been inaccurate but that the provincial numbers which show 10% higher growth have historically been shown to be more correct.
Stephen Green, an economist at Standard Chartered, calculates that in 2007 the combined output of the provinces was 10% more than that reported by Beijing. Their average growth rate of 13.1% was also still 1.2 percentage points higher than the revised national growth rate, although the gap has narrowed from almost three points in 2005.
Updated projection for currency, US recession and China but not with the 10% higher provincial growth numbers and the new 2007 GDP number. If growth did average 1.2% faster and US growth was weaker then China could pass the USA on an exchange rated basis in 2014. My updated likely estimate is for 2015-2018 for China's economy to pass the USA economy. The most likely years are 2016-2017. The latest exchange rate is 6.94 [6.88 June 20, 2008] yuan to 1 USD. Key factors are the pace of change in the exchange rate, the degree to which China can maintain high growth and how fast the US economy grows. As previously noted at this site: China should maintain high growth until 2020 because of the migration of 1-2% of the population each year from rural areas to urban areas. Those people over a few years provide 4 times as much gdp per capita. This provides a boost of 3-6% to the annual growth rate.
Year GDP(yuan) GDP growth Yuan per USD China GDP China+HK/Ma US GDP
2007 24.66 11.9% 7.3 3.38 3.7 13.8
Jun08 26.0 6.88 3.78 4.2 Past Germany
Oct08 26.7 6.65 4.0 4.45
2008 27.3 10.2% 6.35 4.3 4.8 14.0
2009 30.1 9.8% 5.62 5.4 5.9 14.2 Pass Japan
2010 33.7 9.5% 5.11 6.6 7.1 14.6
2011 37.0 9.5% 4.64 8.0 8.5 15.0
2012 40.6 9.5% 4.26 9.5 10.0 15.4
2013 44.2 9.0% 3.91 11.3 11.8 15.9
2014 48.2 9.0% 3.72 13.0 13.5 16.4
2015 52.0 8.0% 3.54 14.7 15.2 16.9
2016 56.2 8.0% 3.53 16.7 17.2 17.4 Passing USA
2017 60.4 7.5% 3.38 18.8 19.4 17.9 Past USA
2018 64.2 7.0% 3.20 20.9 21.5 18.4
2019 69.2 7.0% 3.09 23.0 23.6 19.0
2020 74.0 7.0% 3.0 25.2 25.8 19.6
2021 78.4 6.0% 2.9 27.2 27.8 20.2
2022 83.1 6.0% 2.9 29.4 30.0 20.8
2023 87.3 5.0% 2.8 31.5 32.2 21.4
2024 91.7 5.0% 2.8 33.7 34.4 22.0
2025 96.3 5.0% 2.7 36.1 36.8 22.7
2026 101.1 5.0% 2.6 38.7 39.4 23.4
2027 106.1 5.0% 2.6 41.4 42.1 24.1
2028 111.4 5.0% 2.5 44.4 45.1 24.8
2029 117.0 5.0% 2.5 47.5 48.2 25.5
2030 122.8 5.0% 2.4 50.9 51.6 26.3 Close to double USA
FURTHER READING
China's economy now third largest passing Germany.
Part of the reason for China's GDP growth, lower cost of infrastructure
China is planning to complete rebuilding from the recent earthquake within 3 years. This compares to longer timeframes for US rebuilding after the San Francisco earthquake (still working on the Bay bridge) and from Katrina. The replacement of the eastern span of the Bay Bridge appears like it will cost $6.3 billion and be completed in 2013. 24 years after the 1989 quake.
The rebuilding of damage from China's quake will cost a lot less than repairs in the USA. $10 billion has been set aside for repairs in China.
The new Olympic stadium (the bird nest) only cost $500 million and was completed in 52 months
China has already started demolition of unsafe structures and towns.
Beijing's new airport (the world’s largest and most advanced airport building)is larger than all five London terminals and cost an estimated $3.75 billion to construct, occupies 14 million square feet and was finished in four years. London Heathrow's Terminal 5 took nearly 20 years to build and cost at least twice as much as the one in the Chinese capital.
Chinese and Russian officials signed a $1 billion deal Friday to have Moscow build a nuclear fuel enrichment plant in China and supply uranium.
The deal calls for Russia to build a $500 million nuclear fuel enrichment plant and supply semi-enriched uranium worth at least $500 million. Earlier this year, a Russian company completed work on two 1,000-megawatt light-water reactors for China's Tianwan nuclear power plant south of Shanghai. China plans to build 40 plants by 2020, tripling the nuclear share of its power generation to 6 percent.
Westinghouse secured a $5.3 billion order from China National Nuclear in July to provide four AP1000 nuclear power reactors in Haiyang, Shandong Province and Sanmen, Zhejiang Province, both in eastern China. Four AP1000 in the USA for Florida Power and Light are contracted in 2008 for $13.7 billion, $2927/kw.
Phoenix Mars Lander Finds Water Ice
Dice-size crumbs of bright material have vanished from inside a trench where they were photographed by NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander four days ago, convincing scientists that the material was frozen water that vaporized after digging exposed it.
A link to a NASA video of the ice find
Many images at the Phoenix NASA blog
June 19, 2008
Carnival of Space Week 59
The 59th carnival of space is up at Green Gabbro on the Science blogs
Centauri Dreams talks about the improved technology for the burst of new exoplanet discoveries.
Nasa is blogging about the GLAST (Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope) mission.
25 reasons to go the moon are discussed
Check out the Carnival for much more.
Achieving a Mundane Technological Transhuman Singularity
Some people have criticized the technological Singularity and Transhumanism because of the upside being things that they do not believe can be achieved.Also, the primary technologies that are often described as enabling the Singularity and Transhumanism are Molecular Nanotechnology and greater than human intelligence general AI. There has been virtually no effort or money spent to develop diamondoid molecular nanotechnology and greater than human AGI is something that will be a rapid shift. For AGI, one can imagine the situation before Deep Blue beat Gary Kasparov in chess. A couple of years before it happened many people thought it would be long time before a computer won at chess and many were surprised when it did happen.
This site does not agree that Molecular Nanotechnology (MNT) is not achievable or that greater than human intelligence AI is not achievable. However, let us examine how some of the primary Singularity and Transhuman goals can be achieved even without Molecular Nanotechnology or greater than human intelligence AGI.
The goals, with the first blurb the term used by a critic (Richard Jones for the first three and then goals many have derided for the later goals) and goals from Eric Drexler's website related to MNT, and what follows as a more detailed description of a precise and measurable goal.
1. End scarcity : Relative economic abundance with every living person having an personal resources at the affluent level of a current US citizen. $250,000 per person per year in purchasing power parity income. [The income level that Obama would want to tax more heavily if he become President]. No shortages of any basic need water, food, medical care [equal to that which is achieving the medical results currently affordable to an affluent person now] and energy [currently a US citizen uses an average of 13,000 kwh per year for electricity and three times that for transportation and a share of industrial energy usage. So abundance is 100,000 kwh for every person and assuming a future population of 10 billion is 1000 trillion kwh.
A manufacturing and construction revolution can be achieved with printable buildings, inflatable electric cars, printable electronics and advanced automated rapid manufacturing.
Computer simulation and detailed modeling and other enabling technology will enable the revolution.
Paper stronger than cast iron made from plant cellulose is here and will make manufacturing far cheaper.
Stem cell meat factories, advanced aquaculture and vertical farming and more advanced genetically engineered food will enable an abundance of food. The vertical farming would be further enabled by the printing building technology.
Aquaculture (fish farming) already provide over half of the world's fish.
For water desalination is already very advanced and it is becoming more energy efficient and cheaper. More abundant and affordable energy helps to create more water from desalinization.
The mass produced uranium hydride nuclear reactor would be part of a relatively mundane energy abundance solution. These reactors would have far less waste since 50 times more fuel would be burned generating energy. Molten salt reactors are even more efficient and could burn 99% of the uranium and plutonium in the reactor.
Increasing the current level of nuclear power in the world by 450 times would achieve the 1000 trillion kwh level. Increasing the efficiency of so that fuel usage is reduced by 30 to 98 times and being able to use thorium as well as uranium would ensure that there is sufficient nuclear fuel for the 5-15 times more per year that would be needed. There is uranium in seawater and Japanese researchers have been able to extract kilograms of it. It would cost more but fuel costs are only a small percentage of a nuclear plants operation.
2. Eradicate death [A Jones term]: Achieving actuarial escape velocity [which is not eradicating death but radical life extension] whereby life expectancy increases at greater than one year for each year that passes. No age related disease caused deaths. An increased level of increased physical regeneration and restoration. Really bad accidents or destructive weapons would still be able to kill. Advanced technology could create a precise copy of a person, but whether this will be done for ethical and societal reasons or whether the copy is the person is not discussed. A copy of "the mind" could be created in another substrate (ie. not a flesh and blood person but a computer than simulates "the mind").
Calorie restriction mimicking drugs could be available within five years according to a leading researcher and should provide 3-13 years of increased life span
Treatments to boost the human immune system against cancer and effective and cheap early detection of cancer cells will enable a massive decrease in cancer deaths.
The SENS project has raised over ten million dollars and is launching projects for each of the seven parts of the initial program to substantial extend human lives. This would be a major first step on the actuarial escape velocity path.
Regenerative medicine is making substantial advances with stem cells, tissue generation, and increasing the regenerative capability in humans to be more like salamanders (able to regrow limbs.) This research is well funded by the US defence department with the AFIRM (Armed Forces Institute of Regenerative Medicine funded for $250 million for five years) project.
3. Eliminate the bungled mechanisms that introduce imperfections into the human body: Enhance various performance aspects of the human body. Various medical and mechanical enhancements will be discussed which will be significant advances to existing performance enhancement.
Effective and safe myostatin inhibition will likely be developed which will enable most people to become several times stronger and closer to the best levels achievable now (one in one million people already have myostatin inhibited and it is four times as effective as high doses of steroids).
Cognitive enhancement is already here and will become more effective.
Craig Venter, billionaire and enabler of new gene therapy and synthetic biology technology, has indicated that very strong cognitive enhancement is possible, desirable and a goal that he wants to achieve.
From the Eric Drexler website - things that MNT would enable.
- desktop computers with a billion processors
- inexpensive, efficient solar energy systems
- medical devices able to destroy pathogens and repair tissues
- materials 100 times stronger than steel
4. Blood stream robots or achieving the goals (cellular surgery and repair) for which blood stream robots were proposed using other means. [medical devices able to destroy pathogens and repair tissues]
Nanoparticles, existing blood stream robots and guideable containers and cellular repair are being proven and people are working to improve and deploy them.
5. Materials 100 times stronger than steel [cheap and commonly used] : Production or access to diamond and carbon nanotubes increased by 1000 times and using diamond as a primary material for house sized objects and for electronics.
Carbon nanotube production will be ramped up which will become very cheap and will be deployed widely
Very large (multi-carat) diamonds can be produced very fast since 2005 Current methods can produce, three-dimensional growth of colorless single-crystal diamond in the inch-range (~300 carat) is achievable. Large scale production and scaling up diamond creation is an active and well funded area.
6. Open access to space [within the solar system for human and robotic travel and small probes up to a significant fraction of light speed for interstellar access]
Ten near term developments for greatly improved space access were covered here
Mirrored laser arrays are achievable with refinement of current technology as is nuclear propulsion.
7. Pollution "elimination" : Reduction of pollution into the environment and nearly complete elimination of deaths caused by pollution.
The use of the uranium hydride and molten salt reactor would greatly reduce the use of fossil fuels.
This sites proposed energy plan is a fast, affordable, and low technology development risk path to eliminating fossil fuels and enabling abundant clean energy.
8. Desktop computers with one billion processors (or performance greater than one billion of todays processors)
500 cores in new teraflop chips for less than $200 for the processor.
Berkeley and Tensilica already working towards energy efficient and affordable exaflop computers for the 2015-2017 timeframe
Design conferences have been held to work out details on zettaflop computers
9. Shape changing functional devices like utility fog
Claytronics has been funded by Intel.
Precise 3 dimensional manufacturing is progressing
Conclusion
So how much of some of the key goals of a transhuman singularity can be achieved without fullblown molecular nanotechnology, AGI or fusion ? Quite a bit. which is why the real deal with molecular nanotechnology, AGI and fusion will be really impressive. The mundane technological singularity shows the kinds of societal shifts that will be needed in order to fully take advantage of the upside. A lot of systems and processes have to be redesigned. The mundane singularity is 100 to 1000 times faster in terms of production and various capabilities.
Miniture scanning electron microscopes on a chip
The UK's NFAB has a new sub-miniature scanning electron microscope which is a completely new concept in electron microscopy. The microscope is 5 μm long and has atomic resolution (2 Å) at 500 eV energy and 10 nA of current. The low energy means it can identify single atoms on a surface as well as being able to make holograms of large molecules.
It has patented an enabling technology* which will allow a generation of miniature scanning electron microscopes, multiple-beam lithography machines and focussed ion beam millers to be manufactured. These are currently under development and testing at Salford University and various other European Universities and nanotechnology companies under an EU-funded collaborative research grant (CRAFT).
This is not useful for actually manipulating the molecules just for looking, but cheaper and better resolution would still be nice.
They claim the microscope will have 0.01 nm resolution. Instead of firing electrons from a tungsten filament, it will shoot them from a single atom at the peak of a tiny gold pyramid with a height of around 100 nanometres. The beam will be focused as it passes through a 2 micrometer hole in a silicon chip before it hits the target below.
The electron beam itself is just 10 micrometers long in Eastham's new microscope – the beam of a standard SEM is around 60 centimetres long. The electrostatic lens used in the new SEM still contains imperfections that will limit the microscope's resolution, says Eastham, but the effect should be much smaller. Eastham's approach
produces a beam with around 100 times less energy than usual in an SEM. Cutting power consumption addresses one of the greatest costs of SEM technology, he claims.
The new design will lack the large depth of field that lets SEMs produce images with a 3D appearance, due to the design of its aperture. Eastham's team should have a prototype of the nano-SEM completed within 3 to 6 months, he says. The microscope is expected to be available for sale within two years for a cost of approximatively $195,000. Current SEMs with a resolution of 0.05 nanometers can cost around $8 million. The price would be 40 times less and the resolution would be improved by four to five times.
"It is now possible to 'aberration correct' electron optical lenses," he says, which allows the best, current, multi-million dollar SEMs to reach about 0.04 nm resolution.
FURTHER READING
Roland Piquipaille has coverage as well
Sky news coverage of the NFAB
June 18, 2008
What if Blacklight Power works in 2009 ?
Top view of the apparatus [Blacklight power is using] for scattering an electron beam from a crossed atomic or molecular beam and measuring the fifth-force deflected beam. NOTE: this is not the generator but a device for testing some of the science behind it.
Dec 11, 2008 UPDATE: Blacklight Power has signed its first commercial deal.
UPDATES: Rowan University has recently published independent validation of the Blacklight Power claims. Rowan university generated a megajoule of power beyond normal chemical reactions. Prof Jansson of Rowan University who did the work has a B.S. from MIT and Ph.D. from Cambridge.
Venture Beat has investigated the Rowan University validation.
A Phd chemist blogger is investigating as well.
MORE UPDATE: Further Rowan University confirmation has been published
END UPDATE
Blacklight Power, a company with $60 million in funding from respected funding sources, claims to have built a 50 kw prototype power generation device.[this link is to a prior article with a picture of the generator] They claim that the device will generate power at ten times less cost than the cheapest coal, wind and nuclear power now. They are expecting to have built a factory for mass producing power generation devices in 2009 and to scale the system up to 3MW or more and down to smaller power levels. However, even more important than solving all energy problems would be that Blacklight power could then be right about Hydrinos and a fifth physical force and a possible grand theory including gravity. Their power system can be 137 times more powerful than traditional chemistry. A better power system would help many space applications and they also discuss a better ion propulsion drive. The claims are fantastic but they are looking to put out purchasable and useful systems next year.
The fifth-force acceleration based on this estimate is over twelve orders of magnitude greater. As one application, even a micro fifth-force device has great promise as a replacement for micro-ion-thrusters for maintaining the orbits of satellites.
Hydrinos are hydrogen atoms with the electrons in a theoretical lower energy state which allows 100 times more power to be generated than typical hydrogen chemistry.
They are claiming that quantum levels are not integers but that fractional subquantum levels are possible from (1/2, 1/3, 1/4, ... 1/137)
They claim that Li and NaH are catalysts for achieving these subquantum level states for hydrogen. H2 (1/p) is claimed to be stable and lighter than air and cannot accumulate in the earth's atmosphere.
Power generation with Blacklight power system
When the hydrino is created through a reaction between hydrogen and a catalyst, according to Mills, it lets go of more than enough energy to fuel electrolysis in common water, thus producing more hydrogen. The excess energy — the majority — would go to producing electricity. The only outside ingredients needed are a catalyst, to turn the hydrogen to hydrinos, and heat (which would also be generated once the reaction had started). And the hydrinos created by the process? They’re non-reactive and can be released to float up into space, as they’re lighter than helium. Or, even better, they can be processed into unique chemicals with a range of useful applications.
Schematic of the fifth force test system
UPDATE:
For clarification, the ideas and new physics/chemistry proposed by the Blacklight people goes against current science. The highly regarded living and dead scientists (including nobel prize winners) would have to be wrong in regards to the areas of physics and chemistry effected by the Blacklight/Hydrinos/Nwe physics theories and experiments (IF Blacklight Power is right which is a series of huge IFs).
It would take a series of improbable events for Blacklight to be totally right. The device could partially work but for reasons other than the new physics and chemistry that they propose.
Chemistry that is one hundred times more powerful would have a massive effect.
New physics (especially if what was a correct Grand Unified theory) would also be huge.
New power sources.
All of the claimants in these areas have always been wrong except for Einstein, Newton and a few other instances where fundamental science changed.
Acoustic shield design for sonar invisibility
Sound shield: An acoustic cloak comprising alternating layers of sound-scattering materials should make objects invisible to sonar--and insulated from sound. In this computer-generated image, a cylinder (green circle) is coated with 200 layers of such a material, which was found to be the optimal design. Sound waves moving from left to right (their peaks and troughs are represented by red and blue lines) flow past the object and reform on the other side with no distortion.
Credit: New Journal of Physics
From Technology Review: Engineers have designed a material that redirects sounds and could be used in buildings to shield them from noises. The sound-shielding material, which, if actually made, would be the first acoustic cloaking device, could also be useful in hiding military ships and other vessels from sonar. Engineers led by José Sánchez-Dehesa at the Polytechnic University of Valencia, in Spain, have created a plan for making an acoustic shield, using alternating layers of two different materials. These materials would comprise arrays of sonic crystals--patterns of small rods made of aluminum or other materials that allow some sound waves to pass while blocking the passage of others. This is follow up work related to metamaterials that are being developed for superlenses and optical invisibility.
Sánchez-Dehesa has modeled a two-dimensional acoustic cloak but says that extrapolating his work to three dimensions should be straightforward. "We're proposing a cloak for any shape," he says. Hiding warships from sonar is one possible application. But Sánchez-Dehesa is interested in the problem of noise generally. "In principle," he says, "it's possible to make this cloak very thin," on the order of centimeters. "If we're able to design a wall to put in a house to screen external noise, it would be very nice." Cummer imagines columns for concert halls that do structural work but, acoustically, are effectively not there.
Unlike light cloaks, which can shield objects from light of only one frequency, acoustic cloaks should be able to shield an object to a broad range of frequencies. The speed of sound, however, is not a universal constant, so it should be possible to craft broadband acoustic cloaks. [Speculation: Similar principles could work for shielding against earthquake waves through the ground]
Acoustic cloaking in two dimensions: a feasible approach
This work proposes an acoustic structure feasible to engineer that accomplishes the requirements of acoustic cloaking design recently introduced by Cummer and Schurig (2007 New J. Phys. 9 45). The structure, which consists of a multilayered composite made of two types of isotropic acoustic metamaterials, exactly matches the conditions for the acoustic cloaking. It is also shown that the isotropic metamaterials needed can be made of sonic crystals containing two types of material cylinders, whose elastic parameters should be properly chosen in order to satisfy (in the homogenization limit) the acoustic properties under request. In contrast to
electromagnetic cloaking, the structure here proposed verifies the acoustic cloaking in a wide range of wavelengths; its performance is guaranteed for any wavelength above a certain cutoff defined by the homogenization limit of the sonic crystal employed in its fabrication.
They present an acoustic cloak that could be physically realizable. In brief, the proposed cloak is based on a multilayered structure consisting of two layers with the same thickness and made up of two different acoustic isotropic metamaterials. These metamaterials are built with sonic crystals (i.e. periodic arrays of sonic scatterers) based on two types of elastic cylinders that have to accomplish certain requirements on their mass density and effective sound speed. Numerical experiments based on multiple scattering method are presented to support the exact performance of the proposed cloak.
The paper is organized as follows. First, in section 2, we review the solution in the previous paper and report our approach to get the acoustic cloaking. Numerical experiments demonstrating the performance and properties of the proposed cloak are also presented and discussed. Section 3 describes the recipe to build the metamaterials needed to fabricate the multilayered cloak making it physically feasible. Finally, the work is summarized in section 4.
FURTHER READING
Jose Sanchez-Dehesa is one of the researchers that developed the new acoustic cloak design
June 17, 2008
Carbon nanotube producing companies
Surveying the carbon nanotube market, the leaders in large scale production are Baytubes, Hyperion Catalysis International and Nanocyl. Along with Bayer and Hyperion, other leading producers include France's Arkema, Belgium's Nanocyl, Iljin Nanotech in South Korea, and Shenzhen Nanotech Port in China. Japan's Mitsui has a joint venture with Hodogaya Chemical for nanotube R&D, production, and distribution. This will look at these and other competitors, some future expansion plans and the main process that is used to get to larger scale production. Expanded production will bring down the price significantly for carbon nanotubes and lower price will make more applications economical.
Baytubes are in the process of constructing a new production line of 200 metric tons that we expect to be on-stream by 2009," Schmid says. Depending on the success of that operation, the Bayertubes vision is to have 3,000 metric tons of capacity in place by 2011. 
Bayertubes uses a catalytic chemical vaper deposition on a fluidized bed process to produce large scale carbon nanotubes.
Hyperion Catalysis International of Cambridge, Mass, has partnered with Nanoledge in Germany to add Baytubes to epoxy resins used in sporting equipment. Bayer also has a supply agreement with FutureCarbon, which makes solvent-based nanodispersions and concentrates for processing into other materials.
Some markets for carbon nanotubes for Bayer Material Science (baytubes)
"We have done the dispersion step and sell concentrates or plastics containing the nanotubes, typically in concentrations of 15–20% by weight," Collins says. Because nanotubes are strong, but extremely lightweight, and can be highly electrically conductive, the final loading in a plastic part may be just 2–5%, or even less.
In its more than 20 years, Hyperion has seen small- and large-scale competitors emerge; about 35 MWNT suppliers can be found on supplier lists. Along with Bayer and Hyperion, other leading producers include France's Arkema, Belgium's Nanocyl, Iljin Nanotech in South Korea, and Shenzhen Nanotech Port in China. Japan's Mitsui has a joint venture with Hodogaya Chemical for nanotube R&D, production, and distribution.
"Nanotubes are not yet a commodity, and it's not enough just to 'buy nanotubes,'" Collins remarks in reference to the emergence of importers that sell inexpensive tubes from other sources. "We manufacture and sell at an attractive price based on the volume that is purchased. It's not our intent—and we hope it's not our
competitors'—to sell product based on price. It should be based on performance."
Cnano Technology, Menlo Park, Calif., company was founded in 2006 with a plan to change the economics of nanotube production and advance applications using extremely pure nanotubes. Cnano has what it calls a "novel hybrid technology" for low-cost MWNT production and a manufacturing site in China. In July, CMEA Ventures, Pangaea Ventures, and WI Harper invested a combined $6 million in the company.
Catalytic Materials of Pittsboro, N.C., has a patented process for making high-purity MWNTs. And San Jose, Calif.-based Ahwahnee Technology claims it can supply large-scale quantities of raw, treated, or premixed MWNTs. It offers MWNT kits to enable end users to test materials.
Among the leading large-scale producers is Nanocyl, formed five years ago as a spin-off of Belgium's University of Namur. In mid-2005, it started up a 15-kg-per-day reactor, and today it has an annual capacity of 40 metric tons for industrial, specialty, and research nanotubes.
China's usage of cement
World cement usage in 2008 is 2.8 billion tons and is forecast to be 3.5 billion tons in 2012 China is using 1.3 billion tons in 2008 about 45% of the world total.
The cement usage is mainly driven by the fact that China is adding a one to one and half Los Angeles worth of city every year.
1.5%- 2% population migration from rural areas to small and large cities.
20 million to 30 million people into cities.
Building apartments, houses, roads, rail, airports, offices and factories.
China aims to increase its operational railway lines from 75,438 km in
2005 to more than 90,000 km by 2010. So adding about 3000 km of rail per year.
Cement used for NYC subway was about 8000 cubic yards per mile. 11,260 tons per mile. (1.42 tons per cubic yard)
China has about 34,000 km of highways (2006), a number that's expected to more than double by 2020.
China now has 3.57 million km of roads, linking 88 percent villages and 98.5 percent rural towns.
About 13 million tons of cement is needed per 100,000 km of rural road. [33 pounds of cement per square yard of road, 7 yards wide, 1760 yards per mile = 203 tons per mile or 127 tons per km]
Some 270,000 km of rural highways will be built and upgraded in 2008. By comparison, 423,000 km of countryside highways were built or upgraded in 2007, a record high. So about 35 million tons of cement in 2008 and 60 million tons of cement in 2007.
The interstate highway in the US was responsible for 31% of the productivity increase in the USA after it was build and still boosts productivity
Construction non-residential buildings was two fifths of building construction in China
New construction will advance at a nine percent annual rate in real terms through 2011, continuing to outpace improvements and repairs. This trend will sustain through the next decade as China continues a high pace of economic development and industrialization. New construction also dwarfs improvements and repairs in size, accounting for over three-quarters of all construction expenditures in 2011.
China is building the equivalent of a 3 gorges dam every 2 years. They are putting dams on many other rivers. But the dam only used 10.8 million tons of cement. Less than 1% of one year's demand.
Construction expenditures in China are forecast to increase 8.8 percent annually through 2011 to ¥6.4 trillion in real (inflation-adjusted) terms. An ever expanding domestic economy, continuing endeavors to upgrade infrastructure, sustained strength in foreign investment funding, healthy demand for Chinese manufactured goods, and
further population and household growth will all work to drive construction market gains in China.
Nonbuilding construction expenditures will climb ten percent annually in real terms through 2011, fueled primarily by the government's efforts to modernize and expand China's physical infrastructure. These efforts include plans to upgrade the nation's rail system, to expand the national highway network -- known as the "7918 Network", and to enhance energy supplies through construction of new power plants such
as the Xiluodu Hydropower Plant and the Yangjiang Nuclear Power Station
Nonbuilding construction fastest growing end use
Cement consumption in nonbuilding construction will continue to post the best gains of any end-use segment, rising 6.8 percent yearly through 2010. Gains will be stimulated mainly by strong growth in China's nonbuilding construction activity. The government's continued efforts to modernize the country's infrastructure is exemplified by such massive projects as the South-North Water Diversion -- designed to redirect water to the northern plains from central and south China. This project, scheduled for completion in 2050, will result in annual cement consumption of over one million metric tons.
Nonresidential building will remain the largest end use for cement in China, growing at a 4.6 percent annual rate through 2010. Continued strength in foreign and private direct investment in commercial real estate development will help spur market gains.
Ready-mix concrete manufacturers in China will be the strongest market for cement, climbing at an annual pace of 12.9% to reach 194 million metric tons in 2008. Growth will be driven by the government's 2004 ban on onsite concrete production, enacted to help reduce environmental damage from onsite cement operations and improve the overall quality of concrete used in construction
FURTHER READING
McKinsey on China's urbanizationChina's urban population will expand from 572 million in 2005 to 926 million in 2025 and hit the one billion mark by 2030. In 20 years, China's cities will have added 350 million people—more than the entire population of the United States today [17.5 million per year]. By 2025, China will have 219 cities with more than one million inhabitants—compared with 35 in Europe today—and 24 cities with more than five million people.
This site believes that China's urbanization is happening faster than official Chinese figures have indicated.
China is expecting 24 million new job seekers in cities and towns
Official figure was 577 million (44%) urban population in 2006
China was 37.7% urban in 2002 6.3% increase in 4 years. 1.6% per year increase. 21 million per year.
The Economist magazine talks about China's infrastructure splurge
Worldwide construction report
Construction machinery China is a booming business as is all construction related activity in China
China cement is more expensive than Thailand's cement
China's cement demand
China's CO2 emissions
Cement at wikipedia
Defense Science Board examining Synthetic Biology
The Defense Science Board will examine how the Defense Department could benefit from scientific breakthroughs in the field of synthetic biology.
John Young, the under secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics, wants DSB members to “survey” developments in biotechnology and “attempt to project transition paths from research into current and future defense applications,” according to a June 11 memo Young sent to the panel’s chairman.
The United Kingdom's Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council's released a report 'Synthetic Biology: social and ethical challenges' on June 9 2008
There is no agreed definition of synthetic biology, but it is best understood as the deliberate design of biological systems and living organisms using engineering principles.
The technological manipulation of life was first advocated at the turn of the last century and was instrumental in shaping the rise of molecular biology. However, the widespread use of the term has only occurred since the mid-2000s, as the field has emerged owing to the falling cost of gene sequencing and synthesis. The aims of synthetic biology include: 1) the production of minimal living genomes; 2) the design of interchangeable parts that can be assembled into pathways for the fabrication of novel components; 3) the construction of entirely artificial cells; and 4) the creation of synthetic biomolecules.
RELATED READING
John Young was a witness on the 21 March 2007 hearing to receive testimony on Department of Defense counterproliferation, counterterrorism, and science and technology priorities
John Young receiving Presidential Citation at Georgia Tech on May 24, 2008
June 16, 2008
If Tiger Woods has a Cartilage Tear in his Knee
From Yahoo Sports: The surgery on meniscus in Tiger Wood's left knee in April didn’t work as well as hope. One knee expert, while obviously not privy to the medical records, watched Woods this weekend and saw trouble.
This is not a story related to a "big future", but it is science and medicine related and could have big cultural impact if Tiger Woods has lasting health problems effecting his career.
UPDATE: Tiger Woods will have season ending ACL surgery on his knee Tiger Woods apparently has a double stress fracture in his tibia and a knee that will require reconstructive ACL surgery.
Step by Step ACL reconstruction
Key steps
4. To reconstruct the ACL, it is necessary to remove all of the existing damaged ACL. This is done with a motorized device which is called a shaver. 
The graft harvest.
7. After making the skin incisions, the patella tendon is identified, and the central third is harvested with a bone block at each end of the tendon. Initially, the tendon is removed from the tibial tubercle area. The graft is then passed beneath the skin and retrieved from the superior incision. Harvesting is completed.
16. The graft is then placed through the tibia, through the knee joint, and into the femoral drill hole.
17/18. Screws are placed into the bones to hold the graft in place.
Although a number of different types of tissue have been utilized to reconstruct the ACL, the most common type of ACL reconstruction involves harvesting the central third of the patellar tendon with a bone block at each end of the tendon graft. After performing a diagnostic arthroscopic examination of the knee, the central third of the patellar tendon is harvested. The remaining tendon is then repaired. After harvesting the tissue, drill guides are used to place holes into the tibia (bone below the knee) and femur (bone above the knee). By placing the drill holes at the attachment sites of the original ligament, when the graft is pulled through the drill hole and into the knee, it will be placed in the same position as the original ACL. Typically, it takes the reconstructed ligament approximately 9 months to heal.
Future Technology
Researchers have used carbon nanotubes and electricity to coax the growth of stronger, bone-cushioning cartilage.
Researchers report in the Journal of Biomedical Materials Research Part A that they successfully grew cartilage around carbon nanotubes in their lab—and are optimistic that one day they will be able to duplicate the feat inside the human body. They may get a step closer in September, when they plan to implant carbon nanotubes in sheep joints to test—for the first time—their technique outside the lab. Researchers say they hastened new cell production by sending electrical surges through the nanotubes, which are also excellent conductors of electricity.
Webster has come a long way since his original experiments with in vitro bone tissue growth. Over the past decade, he added bladder, cartilage, central nervous system, and vascular tissue growth to his repertoire. The principle is the same in each: Growing cells are more likely to adhere to and thrive on a rough nanotube surface than on smooth bone or fraying cartilage.
"The use of nanotechnology in scaffolds to assist with regenerating cartilage is novel," says Constance Chu, director of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center's Cartilage Restoration Program and an orthopedic surgeon specializing in cartilage regeneration and osteoarthritis, "and would be of high interest if it can eventually improve the functional properties of the regenerated cartilage."
CARBON NANOTUBE REINFORCED CARTILAGE: A cartilage-forming cell (known as a chondrocyte) interacts with carbon nanotube fibers in this image. The researchers' goal is to grow carbon nanotube-reinforced cartilage in the body that is stronger than the torn or worn cartilage it is replacing.
Courtesy of Brown University
Back to Tiger's Potential Problem
“Just so we’re clear, I have not seen Tiger’s operative reports, and I am not saying he’s done,” said Dr. Howard Luks, an orthopedic surgeon in Westchester, N.Y. who specializes in athletes. “But one has to imagine, with the amount of discomfort he’s experiencing this long after the surgery, that there are some degenerative symptoms or arthritic symptoms, or something that doesn’t respond well to pivoting, turning, and twisting.
Woods is having problems, which suggests the more serious and more difficult to treat hyaline cartilage problem, according to Luks.
There are two kinds of treatment for a cartilage tear
The most common procedure with pro athletes is called a menisectomy, which means we take out that portion of the meniscus that's torn. When you read in the newspaper that a player's meniscus has been repaired, most of the time that's not correct. It usually means that a portion of the meniscus was removed so that the knee would be functionally normal, but not anatomically normal.
Some of these tears can be repaired. The good part of the repair is that it extends the longevity of the knee's healthy function. The bad part is that it will take the player out of action for six months minimum. The blood supply to the meniscus is present throughout the outer 25 percent of it. Any tear that is in the substance of the meniscus and isn't located near the connection to the soft tissue won't heal because there's no blood supply to it.
The ongoing symtpoms include pain along the side of the knee where the meniscus is torn when he twists or flexes his knee or when there's a combination of flexing and twisting. He might have instability as well in which a piece of cartilage actually moves in the joint and gives him the feeling that his knee is going to give.
Long Term: You put the articular cartilage at risk when there's a deficit of meniscus cartilage. When the articular cartilage wears out, that's what we commonly call arthritis. When you take out meniscus, you put more load on the articular cartilage, which is more likely to wear out. But there are a lot of variables that make it hard to predict when the knee will become arthritic.
Petavision on petaflop supercomputer models human visual cortex
Just days after the announcement of the first sustained petaflop supercomputer (based on the Linpack computer standard, Japan has had a petaflop computer but not using the Linpack standard) Los Alamos researchers used PetaVision software on the Roadrunner supercomputer to model more than a billion visual neurons surpassing the scale of 1 quadrillion computations a second (a petaflop/s).
On June 9, 2008 scientists used PetaVision to reach a new computing performance record of 1.144 petaflop/s. The achievement throws open the door to eventually achieving human-like cognitive performance in electronic computers. PetaVision only requires single precision arithmetic, whereas the official LINPACK code used to officially verify Roadrunner's speed uses double precision arithmetic.
"Roadrunner ushers in a new era for science at Los Alamos National Laboratory," said Terry Wallace, associate director for Science, Technology and Engineering at Los Alamos. "Just a week after formal introduction of the machine to the world, we are already doing computational tasks that existed only in the realm of imagination a
year ago."
Based on the results of PetaVision's inaugural trials, Los Alamos researchers believe they can study in real time the entire human visual cortex--arguably a human being's most important sensory apparatus.
The ability to achieve human levels of cognitive performance on a digital computer could lead to important insights and revolutionary technological applications.
Such applications include "smart" cameras that can recognize danger or an autopilot system for automobiles that could take over for incapacitated drivers in complex situations such as navigating dense urban traffic.
Los Alamos National Laboratory's computation science team working with Roadrunner includes: Craig Rasmussen, Charles Ferenbaugh, Sriram Swaminarayan, Pallab Datta, all of Los Alamos; and Cornell Wright of IBM.
The PetaVision Synthetic Cognition team responsible for the theory and codes run on Roadrunner includes: Luis Bettencourt, Garrett Kenyon, Ilya Nemenman, John George, Steven Brumby, Kevin Sanbonmatsu, and John Galbraith, all of Los Alamos; Steven Zuker of Yale University; and James DiCarlo from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
RELATED NEWS
Teraflop chips for less than $2000 from AMD and Nvidia and 4 teraflop workstations for less than $8000 from Nvidia
North Dakota Bakken oil increasing 5000-7000 barrels per day each month, Saskatchewan's Bakken oil increasing too
The state (North Dakota's) Industrial Commission reports that North Dakota oil wells pumped an average of 150,578 barrels a day in April. The previous high of 147,774 barrels a day was set in August 1984. North Dakota reported 5700 more barrels of oil per day in March, 2008 March production was 143738 bopd versus February 138013 bopd.
Crescent Point Energy Trust (TSX:CPG.UN) is increasing its Bakken oil in Saskatchewan, Canada spending by $200-425 million. Crescent Point is raising its production guidance by five per cent and its distributions to investors by 15 per cent.
The Calgary-based trust said Monday the increases were due to "significant growth" in its southeast Saskatchewan Bakken resource play, better-than-expected drilling and production results in its core areas, and higher than anticipated commodity prices.
The capital budget is being increased by 89 per cent to advance development at Bakken and add production at a rate of about $25,000 per barrel of oil equivalent.
Crescent Point now expects to exit 2008 with production greater than 37,500 boe per day, and is upwardly revising its 2008 average production forecast by five per cent to 36,250 boe daily.
From the Business Week article:
North Dakota surpassed Kansas in 2006 to become the eighth-largest oil-producing state in the nation, and soon will surpass Wyoming to become seventh among oil-producing states, said Ron Ness, president of the North Dakota Petroleum Council.
North Dakota produced 45 million barrels of oil last year, up about 5 million barrels from 2006, Ness said.
Production this year likely will exceed the record of 52.6 million barrels set in 1984, said Lynn Helms, the director of the state Department of Mineral Resources.
FURTHER READING
More North Dakota oil statistics
Teraflop chips, AMD Firestream 500 cores versus Nvidia Tesla 10P with 30,000 threads
More teraflop chips are being introduced by AMD and Nvidia. AMD FireStream 9250 will be available at the end of Sept 2008 for $1999. The FireStream chips can perform "double precision" floating-point calculations at 1 teraflop of performance.
A 4x Crossfire X configuration is good for almost 5 TFlops, which means 1.2 TFlops per RV770 GPU. The R700 - the dual-GPU 4870 X2 card – is good for almost twice that performance: According to AMD, the R700 will deliver 2 TFlops per board. The AMD chips use less power than the Nvidia chips.
Nvidia is also introducing updated chips for 2008
UPDATE: The Nvidia Tesla 10P is the company's second generation, general purpose graphic processing unit for high-performance computing (GPGPU). The latest product has twice the performance of the previous generation Tesla 8 product, or 1 teraflop of computational power versus 500 gigaflops. The T10P also has more than double the memory at 4GB versus 1.5GB in the older model. Nvidia's Tesla C1060 card slips into a PCIe slot for delivering high-performance computing to workstations. The card delivers 1 teraflop of power for $1,699. The Nvidia 10P also supports double precision processing which is needed for many scientific supercomputing applications
The Nvidia chips include 1.4 billion transistors running at speeds up to 1.6 GHz. "It's one of the largest chips in mass production and unlike some processors it is not 60 percent cache," said Keane.
Nvidia is continuing to push GPGPU (Nvidia Tesla) systems for technical computing using graphics chips. The company is launching two board level products for such high-end apps, including a four GPU system in a 1U-sized rack-mounted device that delivers up to 4 TFlops at 700W. It sells for $7,995.
Nvidia is updating its year-old Cuda development environment that helps programmers modify C programs to exploit parallelism. Cuda now supports all major 32- and 64-bit operating systems and includes a number of parallel algorithms and tools. On the road map for Cuda is support for Fortran and multiple GPU systems and clusters. Nvidia is also working on support for C++ and a hardware debugger.
Nvidia describes their new Tesla 10 offerings
The Nvidia Tesla C1060 GPGPU card for $1699
The Nvidia Tesla S1070 1U server for $8000
Evolved machines uses the Tesla processors to speed up by 130-fold against simulations with current generation x86 microprocessors. They are now engaged in the design of a rack of GPUs, which will rival the world’s top systems, at 1/100 their cost.
Simulation of a single neuron involves 200,000,000 differential equation evaluations per second, requiring approximately 4 gigaflops. A neural array engaged in sensory processing requires thousands of neurons, thus, the detailed simulation of neural systems in real time requires more than 10 teraflops of computing power.
Intel's plans
"http://community.zdnet.co.uk/blog/0,1000000567,10005497o-2000331777b,00.htm" target=blank>Intel Larrabee chip was delayed
According to Hiroshige's Goto Weekly from Japan, there'll be 24 and 32 core variants out in 2009 and a 48 core chip in 2010.
Intel also has the 80 core Polaris chip in the roadmap pipeline.
Intel's chip roadmap
AMD new high end graphics chips will be a cheaper two chip set
AMD says its 4850 device at about 110 W and $199 will deliver about 75 percent of the performance of Nvidia's high-end GTX280 which costs $649 and dissipates 236W. AMD will claim technology leadership in two areas. Its chips will use more than 500 cores, more than double the 240 cores on the new Nvidia parts. They will also use GDDR5 memory interfaces running at about 3.2 Gbits/s or more. Nvidia will use the existing GDDR3 protocol running at up to 1.1 GHz on a 512-bit interface to deliver memory bandwidth up to about 102 Gbytes/s on some versions.
Because memory bandwidth is not increasing as fast as processing resources on the latest Nvidia architecture, some applications may find they are memory bound, said Andy Keane, general manager of GPU computing at Nvidia.
Bergman said the AMD focus on a more mainstream design will enable it to roll out this fall a version for notebook computers that consumes less than 70W. "There's no way this new Nvidia core will be in notebooks this fall," Bergman said.
June 14, 2008
High Superconducting temperature predicted for boron-doped diamond and spinhole theory for all superconductors
T A Study calculates that boron-doped diamond (BC5) should be superconducting on up to temperatures of 45 K, which, if borne out in experiments, would make this class of material with the highest with the highest transition temperature into a superconducting state mediated by the passing of phonons.
A paperby Peter Wachter proposes that spin holes in anti -ferromagnetic clusters combine to make nonmagnetic bipolarons, which can condense and lead to superconductivity. (Cu, Pu and Fe high Tc superconductors: all the same mechanism.)
In conclusion, it has been shown that the parent materials of high Tc superconductors are antiferromagnets, where long - range magnetic order has been interrupted by 5 – 20% substitution of the magnetic ions by nonmagnetic ions. These nonmagnetic ions have been provoked by chemical doping, but are of the same kind as the magnetic ions, only in another valence state or another spin configuration. The remaining short – range antiferromagnetic clusters or fluctuations will surround such a spin hole with charge as a magnetic polaron. Two such polarons have an attractive interaction and form a boson nonmagnetic bipolaron. This can make a Bose condensation and lead to superconductivity, which has been shown in many papers by Alexandrov and Mott. We could show, that the same mechanism works for all three (Cu, Pu and Fe) high Tc superconducting systems.
A superconducting paper examines the issue of how the pairing of electrons works and which physical model might be a better explaination. A “pairing glue” in the Hubbard and t-J models is basically a question about the dynamics of the pairing interaction.
Synthesis and Microstructural Studies of Iron Based LaO1−xFxFeAs
Superconducting Materials
Materialise a current leader in Rapid Manufacturing
Rapid manufacturing was used to make important components of a concept car. The Sintesi is a sports car with four doors and four seats, developed by a highly innovative approach: it does not consider the car as a shape that covers the mechanicals, but one that gives a shape to the mechanicals around the passengers, starting from the latter. (H/T to Pantopicon.be)
Materialise, a rapid manufacturing company, used additive technology stereolithography (SLA): the radiator, control panels, roof antenna, remote controller, roof light cover and most importantly, the instrument panel which is the centrepiece of the car’s interior. During the file preparation phase, a complex webbing structure was integrated in the dashboard to give it functional strength.
Pininfarina Sintesi stereolithography dashboard, Materialise uses about twelve different kinds of rapid manufacturing and rapid prototyping systems. Those systems can use a variety of materials.
The eventual panel was “printed” in its full width on a Materialise Mammoth SLA machine, with a build volume up to 2150 x 700 x 800 mm, in a translucent PP-like epoxy (Poly 1500). 
Due to its complexity, also the radiator had to be manufactured by means of additive technologies. The production of the smaller components like the roof antenna and remote controller show the endless personalisation possibilities of additive manufacturing. Nowadays, the state of the art of additive technologies allows that this type of products can be manufactured in small series of production cars or one-offs. This is a big step forward towards real personalised manufacturing.
Mammoth Stereolithography has a build area of more than 2 meters
In order to build single-piece SLA models with dimensions of more than 2 meters, Materialise has developed a unique technology: mammoth stereolithography.
Mammoth systems offer not only the ability to print very large parts, but are also extremely fast and productive, thanks to a patented curtain recoating technology which minimises the dead time between layers. The mammoth parts are constructed layer by layer in a liquid polymer that hardens when struck by a laser beam. The laser printed layers are each time lowered together with the vessel's resin level. Afterwards, a small reservoir moves over the vessel and disposes a film of liquid polymer onto the whole vessel. This curtain recoating technology needs less time between layers than the traditional SLA technology which uses a scraper.
As a result of their unique combination of build size and speed, mammoth systems are especially suited to high volume prototyping operations requiring both large numbers of parts, and large parts.
FURTHER READING
Improved rapid manufacturing is one of the seeds of a manufacturing and construction revolution.
This revolution will require rethinking designs and modelling and other systems to fully realize its potential. Totally rethinking cars is using inflatable bodies for cars and then using new paper that is stronger than cast iron and epoxy to bring material costs down.
The mammoth prototyping system could be used to make larger ecomodifications to existing cars. Aeromodding a car can increase full economy on the highway by 50%. Less extreme modifications can achieve 25% increases in fuel efficiency.
Aerodynamic modifications for cars
- Lower the car - Lowering the car reduces the effective frontal area, increasing efficiency. 2.7" ground clearance is a good minimum height. According to Mercedes, "Lowering the ride height at speed results in a 3-percent improvement in drag."
- Remove that wing - Many "sports" cars have a non-functional wing on the back. Removing it will improve the fuel economy. The exceptions are the small rear fairings that are designed to detach the airflow from a rounded trunk.
- Clean up the underside of the car. - Installation of a "body pan", while a labor intensive operation, will provide a significant improvement in mileage. More...
- If a body pan is not practical, an air dam will redirect air that would normally pile up under the car causing drag. Not as good as a body pan, but better than nothing. Should be combined with side fairings.
- fair the wheel wells, racing disk wheel covers, and many other modifications
An extreme custom modification gets about 70mpg on highway from an old Honda civic
A discussion group for improving fuel efficiency.
June 13, 2008
US Navy may get more nuclear powered
Congress in 2007 passed the National Defense Authorization Act for 2008, an annual piece of legislation that tells the Pentagon how it should spend its budget. Under the act all future aircraft carriers, submarines and battle cruisers have to be built with a nuclear power system at their heart.
The National Defense Authorization Bill for 2009, which the Senate has still to pass, aims to shift the process up a gear by adding various types of amphibious assault ships to the list of those that must be powered by nuclear reactors in the future. Amphibious ships come in various forms, from those that incorporate a dock for landing craft, to undersized aircraft carriers for helicopters and vertical take-off aircraft - or a mixture of both. The vessels' position in combat can also vary - from a "stand-off" over-the-horizon location to being moored to a pier in a combat zone.
Equipping such ships with nuclear reactors would have another advantage in military operations, says Wright. "Assault ships are carrier escort vehicles and will no longer be holding up a carrier task force's progress by having to be refuelled every three to five days," she says.
There was a 2007 study on the use of more nuclear power in the United States Navy
A potential advantage of nuclear power postulated by some observers is
that a nuclear-powered ship can use its reactor to provide electrical power for use
ashore for extended periods of time, particularly to help localities that are
experiencing brownouts during peak use periods or whose access to electrical power
from the grid has been disrupted by a significant natural disaster or terrorist attack. The Navy has stated that the CG(X) is to have a total power-generating capacity of about 80 megawatts (MW). Some portion of that would be needed to operate the reactor plant itself and other essential equipment aboard the ship. Much of the rest might be available for transfer off the ship. For purposes of comparison, a typical U.S. commercial power plant might have a capacity of 300 MW to 1000 MW. A
single megawatt can be enough to meet the needs of several hundred U.S. homes,
depending on the region of the country and other factors.
The Navy is looking to install radar requiring 30 or 31 megawatts of power onto its new Cruiser.
A nuclear-powered CG(X) could cost roughly 32% to 37% more than a conventionally powered CG(X). The Navy estimates that building the CG(X) or other future Navy surface ships with nuclear power could reduce the production cost of nuclear-propulsion components for submarines and aircraft carriers by 5% to 9%, depending on the number of nuclear-powered surface ships that are built.20 Building one nuclear-powered cruiser every two years, the Navy has testified, might reduce nuclear-propulsion component costs by about 7%.
At a crude oil cost of $74.15 per barrel (which was a market price at certain points in 2006), the life-cycle cost premium of nuclear power is:
— 17% to 37% for a small surface combatant;
— 0% to 10% for a medium sized surface combatant; and
— 7% to 8% for an amphibious ship.
Newly calculated life-cycle cost break-even cost-ranges, which supercede the break-even cost figures from the 2005 NR quick look analysis, are as follows:
— $210 per barrel to $670 per barrel for a small surface combatant;
— $70 per barrel to $225 per barrel for a medium-size surface combatant; and
— $210 per barrel to $290 per barrel for an amphibious ship. In each case, the lower dollar figure is for a high ship operating tempo, and the higher dollar figure is
for a low ship operating tempo.
A 2006 Navy study states that for a medium-size surface combatant that is larger than the DDG-1000, an additional cost of about $600 million to $700 million would equate to a procurement cost increase of about 22%. If building a Navy surface combatant or amphibious ship with nuclear power rather than conventional power would add roughly $600 million to $700 million to its procurement cost., then procuring one or two nuclear-powered CG(X)s per year, as called for in the Navy’s 30-year shipbuilding plan, would cost roughly $600 million to $1,400 million more per year than procuring one or two conventionally powered CG(X)s per year, and procuring a force of 19 nuclear-powered CG(X)s would cost roughly $11.4 billion to $13.3 billion more than procuring a force of 19 conventionally powered CG(X)s. For purposes of comparison,the Navy has requested a total of $13.7 billion for the SCN account for FY2008.
UPDATE: The United States navy has 280 active ships The Aircraft carriers (12 current, 2 under construction, 2 planned) and submarines (70 now, 5 under construction or ordered, at least 9 more planned) in the US navy are nuclear powered already.
The US has 10 amphibious assault ships (helicopter carriers) and 11-18 amphibious transport docks.
Amphibious assault ships (small aircraft carriers for marines)
* Tarawa class (3 in commission, 2 decommissioned)
* Wasp class (7 in commission, 1 under construction)
Amphibious transport docks (200 meters long versus 173 meters for a cruiser)
* Austin class (9 in commission, 2 decommissioned, 1 converted to an auxiliary command ship)
* San Antonio class (2 in commission, 3 under construction, 4 more planned)
The US Navy has 22 cruisers and 52 destroyers with 3 under construction, 7 more planned.
Dock Landing ships
* Whidbey Island class (8 in commission)
* Harpers Ferry class (4 in commission)
So 32-50 ships in the amphibious and cruiser categories could become nuclear powered at about 2 at a time over 16-25 years from 2015-2040.
NXP Semiconductor 150 mbps LTE modem and Clearwires 6Mbps Wimax network
NXP Launches The World’s Fastest Cellular Modem, the PNX6910, which is capable of achieving data transfer rates of 150 Mbits downlink and 50 Mbits uplink, and supports multi-mode LTE/HSPA/UMTS/EDGE/GPRS/GSM capability.
The world's fastest cellular modem from NXP - Nexperia Cellular System Solution PNX6910 will be available to early access customers in the second quarter of 2009.
Advanced cellular modem
- LTE class 4 up to 150-Mbps down link, 50-Mbps uplink
- TDD and FDD support
- MiMo, Rx diversity with 2Rx/1Tx path
- HSPA+, HSPA, UMTS, TD-SCDMA
- Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE
- HSPA/LTE bands I-XIV, TDSCDMA bands 33-37 & 39
Interfaces to cellular-connect smart phones and PC’s
- USB 2.0 high-speed device and high-speed MIPI HSI, SDIO
- Drivers for Linux, Windows, Apple OS
Sprint Nextel and Clearwire are promising that their new 6Mbps WiMAX network will support both open access and wholesale access and that it will reach 140 million people by the end of 2010 and executives announced that they hope to cover 220 million people by 2017. A lengthy document filed this week with the FCC asks for permission to merge the 2.5GHz spectrum assets of Sprint and Clearwire into "New Clearwire," the company backed by Sprint, Clearwire, Intel, Time Warner, Google, and Bright House. In the filing, Clearwire makes the case that it will provide true "third pipe" Internet access to home and mobile users at speeds of 6Mbps (and 3Mbps uplink).
Clearwire claim that "each of these systems has consistently demonstrated the ability to deliver up to 6Mbps downlink and up to 3Mbps uplink while the end user is moving at speeds of up to 60 miles per hour."
Carnival of Space Week 58
Carnival of Space 58 is up at UniverseToday
This site contributed an article on the top ten near term developments for vastly increased capabilities in space
Centauri Dreams talks about a light tower for propelling solar sails
Bad Astronomy talks about a quantum mechanics test at the space station
Colony Worlds indicates that future colonists should grow bamboo
Hobbyspace reports that the 2008 Lunar Lander Challenge will take place at Holloman Air Force Base in Alamogordo, New Mexico, October 24-25, 2008. This year's competition will be webcast online; the public can follow the action at the X PRIZE Foundation website www.xprize.org.
Check out the carnival of Space 58 at UniverseToday for a lot more
June 12, 2008
Iraq Oil production could increase by 400,000 bpd by the end of 2008
Following up on Iraq Oil status Oil production and output holding steady at higher levels that started in May. Iraq will produce up to 2.9 million bpd by the end of 2008, Hussein al-Shahristani Iraqi Oil Minister 2.9 million bpd would be an increase of about 400,000 bpd from levels at the end of May, 2008 2.53 million bpd.
Starved of access to oil and gas prospects by governments who increasingly favour development by their state oil companies, Western oil companies are eager to invest in Iraq, home to the world's third biggest oil reserves. However, the security situation and an uncertain legal framework have deterred the majors from making significant investment.
Major oil companies have all turned in their proposals for oil service deals and some will be signed this month. Shahristani had warned that Baghdad might drop the oil service contracts, worth about $500 million a piece, if the majors failed to sign deals by June. Five of the deals under discussion are with Royal Dutch Shell (nyse: RDSA), Shell in partnership with BHP Billiton (nyse: BBL), BP (nyse: BP), Exxon Mobil (nyse: XOM) and Chevron (nyse: CVX) in partnership with Total. Iraq is also in talks with a consortium of Anadarko (APC.N), Vitol and Dome for a sixth contract on the Luhais field.
Dow Jones news reports the Iraqi oil ministry is planning to announce the first round of tenders to develop its vast oil fields, which are among the world's largest, at the end of June or the beginning of July, an Iraqi oil official said Monday.
"Iraq is going to announce the first round of tenders to develop super giant oil fields in southern and northern Iraq either at the end of June or the beginning of July," the official told Dow Jones Newswires by telephone from Baghdad.
The official named seven oil fields and two gas fields that would be included in the first tender announcement. They are North Rumaila, South Rumaila, Zubair, West Qurna, and Buzurgan in southern Iraq and Kirkuk and Bai Hassan in northern Iraq. The two gas fields are Akkaz in western part of the country and Mansouriya in the east.
Over the last few months, the ministry has been working to prepare contract models for these fields, the official said. The ministry has signaled that more restrictive service contracts may be used to develop these fields, rather than controversial production-sharing contracts.
The official said the ministry would hold a news conference to announce these new tenders.
Iraq is currently in the final stages of striking what are called Technical Services Contracts, or TSCs, with oil majors to help boost crude oil production in the country's largest producing fields.
Iraqi oil sources said these TSCs could be signed as early as June. Each would last two years and could be extended for another year.
Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani has threatened to cancel these TSCs if they aren't signed in June. The TSCs are designed to boost Iraq's crude oil production from producing oil fields.
Iraq wants to boost production by 600,000 barrels a day in six producing oil fields in northern and southern Iraq. They are Kirkuk in the north, West Qurna 1, Zubair, Missan, Rumaila and Luhais in the south.
FURTHER READING
State Department Iraq Weekly Report for June 11, 2008
United States might finally build a new oil refinery in 2013
The first new oil refinery in the United States in thirty years is one step closer.
Union County residents voted 58 percent to 42 percent Tuesday to endorse the rezoning of almost 3,300 acres of pristine farm land north of Elk Point for the oil refinery. Texas-based Hyperion Resources requested the rezoning for the $10 billion refinery, billed as a potential step toward national energy independence.
It will process 400,000 barrels of oil per day (mostly from Canada's oilsands) and will likely be in operation in 2013.
North Dakota reported 5700 more barrels of oil per day in March, 2008 MArch production was 143738 bopd versus February 138013 bopd.
Reece Energy Exploration Corp. rose to a third-straight record in Toronto after saying it found oil in the first well it drilled in the Bakken area in Saskatchewan
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&tab=in&ned=us&ie=UTF-8&ncl=1219754152
FURTHER READING
Previous coverage of North Dakota's Bakken Oil
Daily North Dakota drilling and production reports (after 6 months on confidential list)
North Dakota oil statistics
Latest update on Bussard Fusion Prototype WB7
"We're fully operational and we're getting data," Nebel said. "The machine runs like a top. You can just sit there and take data all afternoon.
Nebel may be low-key about the experiment, but he has high hopes for Bussard's Polywell fusion concept. If it works the way Nebel hopes, the system could open the way for larger-scale, commercially viable fusion reactors and even new types of space propulsion systems.
"We're looking at power generation with this machine," Nebel said. "This machine is so inexpensive going into the 100-megawatt range that there's no compelling reason for not just doing it. We're trying to take bigger steps than you would with a conventional fusion machine."
EMC2 built the laboratory and an experiment in nine months. If a working scaled up production system could be built in comparable time then the main part (not the site preparation and power lines) of any new reactor could be produced in 9 months or less.
this site had an article about the space propulsion breakthrough that this fusion system would enable if it is successful
Stronger paper and rapid manufacturing
Despite its great strength, Berglund's "nanopaper" is produced from a biological material found in conventional paper: cellulose. This long sugar molecule is a principal component of plant cell walls and is the most common organic compound on Earth. Wood is typically about half cellulose, mixed with other structural compounds.
Cellulose is extracted from wood to make paper, is the basis of cellophane, and has also recently been used by materials scientists developing novel plastic materials. But they have used it only as a cheap filler material, ignoring its mechanical properties.
However, the mechanical processes used to pulp wood and process it into paper damage the individual cellulose fibres, greatly reducing their strength. So Berglund and colleagues have developed a gentler process that preserves the fibres' strength.
The new method involves breaking down wood pulp with enzymes and then fragmenting it using a mechanical beater. The shear forces produced cause the cellulose to gently disintegrate into its component fibres. The end result is undamaged cellulose fibres suspended in water.
It also means that the 214 megapascal strength paper (versus 1 megapascal for regular paper).
There is already a person who used 3D modelling and computerized cutting to create a cardboard based surfboard covered with epoxy.
The new paper made only from plant cellulose would be cheaper and strong enough for many applications.
Here is a link to video showing the assembly of the cardboard surfboard
Previous discussion on new ideas for a manufacturing and construction revolution. The new nanopaper will enable more rapid manufacturing with cheaper materials.
FURTHER READING
Feature on cardboard surfboard in surfer magazine
He looked to aerospace blogs for insight into the strength-to-weight ratio as it relates to design and how to graphically manipulate lines and rib interactions for his cardboard cores. "I'd look for the math that explained how to apply curves using programming language. Sheldrake cut the cardboard-core surfboard pieces using the stone company's laser cutter.
June 11, 2008
Death and Taxes
U.S. life expectancy has been steadily rising, usually by about two to three months from year to year. This year's jump of fourth months to 78.1 years is
"an unusually rapid improvement," Preston said.
The preliminary number of deaths in the United States in 2006 was 2,425,900, a 22,117 decrease from the 2005 total. With a rapidly growing older population, declines in the number of deaths (as opposed to death rates) are unusual, and the 2006 decline is likely the result of more mild influenza mortality in 2006 compared with 2005.
37 page preliminary analysis of the proposed McCain and proposed Obama tax plans The plans would reduce tax revenues by $3.7 trillion (McCain) and $2.7 trillion (Obama) over the next 10 years, or approximately 10 and 7 percent of the revenues scheduled for collection under current law, respectively.
This is confirming this site's previous analysis that Obama's plan to tax the rich will not result in more tax revenue More of what people in the higher income brackets report will be taxed but there will be less revenue because of changes in tax strategies to avoid taxation.
So the CDC report on 2006 US life expectancy and the Urban Institute and Brooking Instition tax policy center analysis are indicating less death and less tax revenue.
Tax plan summariesSenator McCain would permanently extend the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, increase deductions for taxpayers supporting dependents, reduce the corporate income tax rate, and allow immediate deductions for the cost of certain short-lived capital equipment. Senator Obama would permanently extend certain provisions of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts primarily affecting taxpayers with incomes under $250,000; increase the maximum rate on capital gains and qualified dividends; and enact new and expanded targeted tax breaks for workers, retirees, homeowners, savers, students, and new farmers. Senator McCain proposes to extend permanently the AMT "patch" that has prevented most individuals and families with incomes below $200,000 from being affected by the tax, and in our interpretation of his proposal, Senator Obama would do the same. Each candidate would also increase the estate tax exemption and reduce the estate tax rate compared with current law in 2011 and beyond, although Senator McCain would cut the tax much more than Senator Obama. Finally, each candidate promises to broaden the tax base and reduce corporate loopholes. McCain lists eight breaks for oil companies as targets but, other than that, is short on details for his pledge to eliminate "corporate welfare." Obama identifies a variety of steps, including basis reporting for capital gains, taxing carried interest as ordinary income, and enacting sanctions on international tax havens that don't cooperate with enforcement efforts, but he would also need additional as-yet-unspecified policies to achieve his revenue target for base broadening.
How there were fewer deaths in 2006The 2006 increase is due mainly to falling mortality rates for nine of the 15 leading causes of death, including heart disease, cancer, accidents and diabetes.
"I think the most surprising thing is that we had declines in just about every major cause of death," said Robert Anderson, who oversaw work on the report for the health statistics center.
The overall death rate fell from 799 per 100,000 in 2005 to about 776 the following year.
Perhaps the most influential factor in the 2006 success story, however, was the flu. Flu and pneumonia deaths dropped by 13 percent from 2005, reflecting a mild flu season in 2006, Anderson said. That also meant a diminished threat to people with heart disease and other conditions. Taken together, it's a primary explanation for the 22,000 fewer deaths in 2006 from 2005, experts said.
FURTHER READING
History of tax in the USA
2007 tax brackets at wikipedia
Top incomes and composition (salary, business income, capital gains)
Year top rate and income level of top rate
Tax policy center site
tax brackets by year
Individual tax rates
How many in the higher tax brackets
Sources of historical tax information
Historical networth 1989 to now
Effective tax rates
Updates on World Oil Production and Demand
IEA (International Energy Agency) weekly oil report was issued June 10. Global oil product demand is expected to average 86.8 mb/d in 2008, 80 kb/d below last month’s estimate, following the reduction of price subsidies in several non-OECD countries. Global growth is cut even more steeply by 230 kb/d to +0.9% or +800 kb/d when historical upward revisions to 2006 and 2007 data are factored in.
Global oil supply rebounded by 490 kb/d in May to average 86.6 mb/d, lifted by higher OPEC crude supply. The rise however comes after extensive downward revisions to 1Q08 non-OPEC production and lower biofuels and NGLs for the rest of this year. Despite this, a recovery in non-OPEC output is forecast for the second half of 2008.
World Oil Demand is still larger than supply by 1 million b/d.
The US EIA (Energy Information Administration) posted their May, 2008 International Petroleum Monthly on June 9, 2008.
In thousands of barrels per day. Oil Production.
Time Period USA P. Gulf OAPEC OPEC World
2008 January..E 8,624 23,979 25,121 36,594 85,530
February E 8,625........24,208 36,885 85,827
March...PE 8,664 24,219 25,361 36,784 85,730
2008 3Mth AvgPE 8,638........24,134 36,751 85,693
The Persian Gulf countries are Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Production from the Kuwait-Saudi Arabia Neutral Zone is included in Persian Gulf production.
OAPEC: Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries: Algeria, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.
OPEC: Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries: Algeria, Angola, Ecuador, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela.
FURTHER READING
The Full IEA Oil Market Report. 60 page PDF.
June 10, 2008
Blog Economics
Chitika, an ad network, had a study of the revenues of the top 50,000 blogs for 2006 Chitika made the assumption that an estimate of total advertising revenues for a blog would be 3 times as much as the Chitika revenue for the blog. Using revenue trends and statistics from a representative
sample for the 12000+ Chitika publisher network. Ad revenue in a blog is more sensitive to the rank of the blog than what one would expect in a typical Zipf Law 80/20 curve situation. [More money for the top blogs and less for the the bottom]. Blog ranking was determined by Technorati ranking.
Top 50,000 made $500 million in advertising in 2006.
Top 10 blogs in Technorati, $40 million in ad revenue.
The top 1% accounted for approximately 20% of the total revenue.
Top 500 blogs made $100 million. Avg $200,000
11-500 blogs made $60 million. Avg $120,000
The top 5% accounted for approximately 50% of the total revenue.
Top 2500 blogs made $250 million
$150 million for 501-2500 Avg $75,000
The top 10% accounted for approximately 80% of the total revenue.
Top 5000 blogs made $400 million
2501 through 5000 made $150 million Avg $60,000
The top 15% accounted for approximately 90% of the total revenue.
Top 7500 blogs made $450 million
5001 through 7500 made $50 million Avg $20,000
7501 through 50,000 made $50 million Avg $1176.
Converting Alexa ranking to daily pageviews
Rank
242 www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk 0.5% reach 68 million page views/day
500 www.huffingtonpost.com 40 million page views/day
5000 www.space.com (4600) 6 million pv/day
35000 800,000 pv/day
70000 20-100,000pv/day
CPMs of $1 are low and $4 are average but it depends upon topic and being able to sell the inventory of CPM. It also matters how hard the site is trying to monetize.
Some Technorati to Alexa Ranks
http://makezine.com/blog
Technorati Rank: 10,810 Alexa: 6400 4 million pv/day
http://pajamasmedia.com/instapundit
Technorati Rank: 280 Alexa: 35000 250,000 pv/day
http://theoildrum.com
Technorati Rank: 2780 Alexa: 32000 70,000 pv/day
http://liewcf.com
Technorati Rank: 5752 Alexa: 18621 300,000+ pv/month
http://www/hackszine.com
Technorati Rank: 9073 Alexa: 50530 10k-30k per day
top 25 blog properties (5-15 times annual profit for valuation) for 2008
1.The Gawker Properties: $150 million. Gawker (#228), ValleyWag (#34 technorati), Gizmodo (#3 technorati), Wonkette (#678 technorati), and a number of smaller websites. The company claims 30 million monthly unique visitors. $11 million in revenue.
2. MacRumors: $85 million.Blog. It ranks No. 2,700 in Alexa. Page views at 33 million, which seems a bit high. Advertising at least $30 per page CPM. est $12 million and with 60% margin.
3.Huffington Post: $70 million. In late 2007 management claimed that the website had 4 million unique visitors per month and would bring in $7.5 million for the year.
#1 ranking on Technorati.
4.PerezHilton: $48 million. Is No 400-755 in Alexa. Compete show 1.3 million visitors a month. Quantcast puts month page views at 191 million. That seems high. It would put revenue at $900,000 million a month with a $5 CPM.
5.TechCrunch: $36 million. The TechCrunch network claims almost 3.2 million unique visitors and 14.6 million page views. Alexa 951-1795. CPM yield estimate $30. Revenue from advertising at $438,000 a month or $5.3 million a year. #2 ranking on Technorati.
6 (tied): Ars Technica $15 million. Sites ranks 2,500 in Alexa. #7 technorati. Audience is growing very rapidly. Quancast has reach at 1.1 million. Ads are all premium clients. Est $40 per page CPM. Page views are probably six million a month. Revenue of almost $3 million.
FURTHER READING
Craigslist revenue for 2008 is about $80 million
TV station web revenue $1.2 billion
Myspace revenue $800 million
Guy Kawasaki blog revenue was not very good in 2007
Adsense case study of Weblogs inc. $90K/month, 1 million/year, 60 million pageviews
10 steps to seven figure income from your site
Modelling and Enabling a Manufacturing and Construction Revolution
This site recently discussed the seeds of Manufacturing and construction revolution.
The seeds of the revolution are:
- Contour crafting (scaling up inkjet/rapid prototyping up to making buildings, cement jet) Use cement as the ink. Layer by layer additive construction. 200 times
faster than conventional methods. 5 times lower cost for construction.
- Inflatable electric cars. Flatship cars from a factory like Ikea furniture and could be as cheap as $2500 for an environmentally friendly car.
- Reel to reel production of electronics can be hundreds to thousands of times faster than current lithography factories for making computers and factories for making electronics, televisions, video monitors.
Other seeds are
- wafer scale self assembly of nanoscale components
- Nanotubes and more new materials (nanosteel able to withstand higher temperatures and retain strength)
- wood based fibers able to make paper and cardboard stronger than cast iron. Cheap and plentiful material that could be strong enough for many applications.
Making things 100 times faster than we do now would require a lot more planning to prevent many unintended problems. We need to take the best methods of today like Building Information Modelling and city planning and take those to the next level as well.
Modelling and Planning the Manufacturing and Construction Revolution
Once a computer model of a building has been created, it is possible to extract detailed plans of particular subsystems, such as cooling, water and electrical wiring
The Economist magazine talks about the shift for architects from 2-d blueprints to 3d databases. The amount of data and the variables that are modeled need to be increased. A denser data version of Second Life [virtual world modeling] needs to be made. Various proposed construction can be planned out to end of life.
Elaborate digital models for cities. Currently architecture and city planning are mostly 2-Dimensional professions.
Modeling to get better estimates, schedules and then simulate.
Building Information Management detail or greater fed into Second life virtual reality with many scenarios and at faster than real-time simulation modes.
There should also be various inexpensive real-time sensors tracking various aspects of safety and feeding models with updates on the current situation.
- Time and infrastructure health of surrounding systems and buildings relative to next maintenance task
- Actual emissions at and around the building site
- Traffic and people flow and usage patterns
More rapid and cheap construction could help address things like the California Dike problem.
Advanced City Planning
More detailed data, with more frequent updates at the city and larger scales. Various links on the subject are below.
Urban info modeling
Virtual reality in city planning process.
More frequently updated and detailed views of the real world from Everyscape and google Earth and other sources.
Virtual reality cityscapes
Plan NYC
New true 3 dimensional displays will help with the visualization process
Open geospatial BIM
Accelerating the Economy
Accelerating the economy while maintaining or improving safety will require coordination and effort. Just like being able to have trains move faster and with fewer delays requires planning, coordination and effort.
Looking at the "mundane possible speedups" [not using nanofactory level molecular nanotechnology or Artificial general intelligence] will also flesh out the requirements for MNT speeds.
Each of the levels of faster speed would require consideration.
10 times faster construction would mean - less time for various checks from weeks to days.
100 times faster means minutes for turnarounds or everything pre-checked and approved.
1000 times means all interested parties must have their issues pre-thought out for work in the pipeline up to one year in advance. A pre-planned city wide wiki of intersection projects. New software and new project planning may be required to enable each level.
Plans would be going into a queue for simulation, software-agent first pass comments and validations.
How modularized and disconnected can things safely be? The more compartimentalized things can be then the more simplicity and speed can be retained. There is value to higher safe development speeds.
20% growth - 1997-98 Internet time across the whole economy
If Robin Hanson is correct about the economics of the singularity, this would be the real long economic boom.
FURTHER READING
building-information modelling (BIM).
BIMStorm, open source BIM
BIM and Beyond
Beyond BIM article
BIM article
BIM at wikipedia
Virtual design and construction at wikipedia
Google search on beyond BIM
Five fallacies of BIM from Autodesk (CAD software maker]
CityGML
Chuck Eastman, a professor of architecture and computing at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta is one of the champions of BIM.
June 09, 2008
Top Ten Near Term Developments for Vastly Improved Capabilities in Space
1. Fuel depots. 2-17 times more stuff to the moon or other space missions. Lowering costs for GTO closer to LEO orbit costs
Boeing Propellant fuel depot
2. Lunar concrete would reduce the amount of material needed to build things on the moon by ten times.
A 50 meter telescope could be built from lunar concrete, with the mirror covered with a thin layer of aluminum. It could directly image any potential continents on planets around nearby stars with no atmosphere on the moon to distort the massive light gathering area.
3. Successful Big and cheap rockets by Spacex or others
Spacex is trying to bring costs down to $500-3200/kg to get into space
Spacex Falcon 9 Heavy
Spacex Dragon space capsule
4. Bigelow - inflatable space stations
Bigelows planned habitable private space station
Bigelow Aerospace Lagrange point and lunar plans
5. Vasimr
The Vasimr 200kw unit is almost flight ready
A 12 MW Vasimr system could send a ship to Mars in less than 120 days one way. A 200 MW Vasimr could go to Mars in 39 days.
1-2MW Vasimr lunar cargo vehicle could transfer up to 39% of the mass from low earth orbit to the moon.
6. Solar electric sail
A simplified picture of the electric sail. An actual system would have 50 to 100 or more 20 kilometer wires. 100 kg spaceships could be accelerated to final speeds of 40-100 km/second. The electric sail is an extremely promising new propulsion technique which is nearly ready to be tested. If electron heating turns out to be successful performance may be increased even more. Costs for solar system missions will go down and new capabilities and performance will be possible.
7. Virgin galactic getting LEO orbit capabilities with SpaceshipThree
Spaceshiptwo at apogee
Virgin Galactic could expand the number of people (passengers) who get to fly by 10 to 1000 times versus the NASA plans. Seats on spaceshiptwo cost $200,000. Virgin Galactic says more than 200 individuals have booked, and another 85,000 have registered an interest to fly. Tens of millions of dollars in deposits have already been taken. If set prices drop to $100,000 each then 85,000 people would generate $8.5 billion in revenue. This could make Spaceshipthree (an orbital system) fully fundable from Virgin Galactic operational profits. Virgin Galactic appears to be offering a path forward to safer (100 times or more safer) and cheaper travel into space for a lot more people.
8. LEO solar power
Low earth orbit (LEO) systems offer the advantage of reducing the scale of the solar power systems. An interesting concept for solar power appears to be on track for testing in Palau by 2012. The Space Island Group is also proposing low earth orbit solar power beamed to multiple locations. Space Island Group hopes to have its first system up by 2010. Space Island group is targeting 10 cents per kilowatt hour (kWh). The Space Island Group has almost completed financing for a prototype system that it claims will be in orbit within 18 months, at a total cost of $200 million. "The satellite will deliver between 10 to 25 megawatts of power," says Meyers. "It will 'site-hop' across base stations in Europe, beaming 90 minutes of power to each one by microwave."
9. Lorentz force propulsion
Successful simulated space conditions test of lorentz force propulsion
Refueling nuclear rockets using lorentz force propulsion
10.Power source breakthroughs: IEC fusion, focus fusion, uranium hydride reactors, Blacklight power
Tri-alpha energy
Farther out:
Laser arrays. Technology is possible but not funded.
Space elevators and space piers. Technology will take two decades or more to mature or to be funded.
Tethers. Minor development and projects funded.
Obama's plan to tax the rich won't work
Businessweek discusses Obama's plan to increase the marginal tax rate back to the level under Bill Clinton and before the Bush tax cuts
Of the 149 million households filing federal income taxes for 2006, some 3% reported income between $200,000 and $500,000; fewer than 1% claimed income above half a million dollars.
The Bush administration instituted a federal tax cut for all taxpayers. Among other changes, the lowest income tax rate was lowered from 15% to 10%, the 27% rate went to 25%, the 30% rate went to 28%, the 35% rate went to 33%, and the top marginal tax rate went from 39.6% to 35%
Many people believe that increasing the marginal rate will collect more revenue from the the rich or for the government in general. Historically it does not matter if the top marginal rate is 90% or 25% the government collects 19.5% of GDP. The only way to get more tax revenue is to increase GDP. Such as a concerted effort to accelerate a manufacturing and construction revolution using new systems and technology.
Economists of all persuasions accept that a tax rate hike will reduce GDP, in which case Hauser's Law says it will also lower tax revenue. That's a highly inconvenient truth for redistributive tax policy, and it flies in the face of deeply felt beliefs about social justice. It would surely be unpopular today with those presidential candidates who plan to raise tax rates on the rich – if they knew about it.
Although Hauser's Law sounds like a restatement of the Laffer Curve (and Mr. Hauser did cite Arthur Laffer in his original article), it has independent validity. Because Mr. Laffer's curve is a theoretical insight, theoreticians find it easy to quibble with. Test cases, where the economy responds to a tax change, always lend themselves to many alternative explanations. Conventional economists, despite immense publicity, have yet to swallow the Laffer Curve. When it is mentioned at all by critics, it is often as an object of scorn.
Because Mr. Hauser's horizontal straight line is a simple fact, it is ultimately far more compelling. It also presents a major opportunity. It seems likely that the tax system could maintain a 19.5% yield with a top bracket even lower than 35%.
The fact that no matter what the rates and brackets all that can be obtained is 19.5% that argues for as simple a tax code as possible for getting that 19.5%.
The fair tax
or a
Relatively flat tax
The wealthier someone is then the more control they can have over their financial profile. Money can be shifted between income, corporate profits, dividends and capital gains and new income can be shifted between jurisdictions.
FURTHER READING
Tax brackets 1971-1978
1975 Median income 11,800 Mean income 13,779
Someone making 5 times the median income. Would be in the 60k-70k range.
(equal to someone now making 200,000).
Tax rate would be 53-55%.
1965 Median income was $6900 Five times that was 35,000 for 50-53% tax rate.
CBO analysis of long term taxes
Heritage examination of taxes
Comparing some tax burdens between countries
Comparing top marginal individual and corporate tax rates
Historical lessons of lower tax rates
New Apple iPhone 2.0 Available July 11, 2008 starting at $199
The New Apple iPhone 2.0 able to use faster 3G communication was announced today. It will be available for $199 for the 8GB model and $299 for the 16GB model. iPhone 2.0 will be availabe July 11, 2008.
Competing Smartphones
The Economist magazine notes that while the Apple iPhone has 20% of the smartphone market in the United States it only has 5% worldwide.
There are competing phones from Samsung with superior digital cameras (5 megapixel) instead of 2 megapixel for the iPhone. The iPhone sets the standard for
the quality of its interface, The new iPhone will also have improved enterprise software and integration with Microsoft Outlook email.
The Samsung Instinct will be on the Sprint network at 3G speeds
Samsung Omnia i900 will become available in Southeast Asia first and then be launched to other markets over the second half of 2008, according to Samsung.
More info on the Samsung Omnia i900
Blackberry Bold 9000 is a 3G smartphone.
The Blackberry Thunder touchscreen phone is featured at Blackberry cool They have a picture which shows the Thunder as having a large screen like the iPhone.
Nokia is still the world smartphone leader with the N95 and the Nokia S60
FURTHER READING
The Times Online discusses the competing smartphones
CEO Steve Jobs said the new iPhone, which is based on 3G technology, is 36% faster than top rival Nokia's N95 smartphone.
Jobs says the new iPhone will be available worldwide starting July 11. It will allow up to six hours of Web browsing and five hours of talk time.
Jobs announced the 3G iPhone, which had been rumored for months, at the company's annual World Wide Developers conference in San Francisco.
During the show, Jobs also introduced a slew of new applications for the iPhone, including a wireless system that automatically forwards e-mail to other devices, a friend-finding service called Loopt and mobile blogging software from TypePad.
Other new applications for the iPhone include a service from MLB.com that provides a live scoreboard of major league games, and music-making software, called Cow Terry, for creating songs on the phone.
The new iPhone applications are aimed at boosting revenue from data services. Wireless companies increasingly are looking to these services to offset slowing growth in mobile phone sales. Apple, for instance, will charge $99 a year for its new MobileMe service, which sends e-mail, contact and calendar updates to a user's devices.
The official Apple iPhone site
iPhone 2.0 features listed at Apple.com