South Korea is a leader in Nuclear power and Japan considers restarting and Germany temporarily restarts some reactors

1. South Korea's reactors are capable of giving technology powerhouses like the US and Japan a run for their money.

As of today, a total of 21 nuclear power plants have been built around the country, the sum of which provide South Korea with 18,716MW of power, accounting for nearly 23.9 per cent of its total energy capacity and 31 per cent of total electricity consumption.

The South Korean government expects this number to increase to 60 per cent by 2035, with the additional nuclear reactors currently under construction and 10 more in the pipeline.

A model of the nuclear power plant to be built in the UAE.

Construction of the first two of South Korea's home-grown Generation III APR1400 reactors — Shin Kori 3 and 4 — was authorised in 2006, with the first concrete on Unit 3 being poured in October 2008. It is the APR1400 which was selected by the UAE to serve as the basis of the Emirates' budding nuclear energy programme. When completed in 2013 and 2014, respectively, Shin Kori Units 3 and 4 will serve as the reference plant for the reactors under construction in the UAE. The Shin Ulchin 1 & 2 reactors, authorized by the government for construction in April 2009, are expected to be completed by 2016.

XM25 smart gun removes the benefit of seeking cover

Economist Magazine provides a report on the successful use of the XM25 in Afghanistan. US soldiers are giving the XM25 rave reviews. Besides being a smart gun able to hit enemy who are behind cover, the XM25 has twice the range of an AK47. The successful technology is being adapted for larger guns like artillery. Prices will drop to $25 per XM25 bullet and it is already far cheaper than an airstrike and more accurate with less collaterol damage than mortars and other alternatives.

A handful of XM25s are now being tested in Afghanistan by the Americans. So far, they have been used on more than 200 occasions. Most of these fights ended quickly, and in America’s favour, according to Lieutenant-Colonel Shawn Lucas, who is in charge of the weapon’s field-testing programme. Indeed, the programme has been so successful that the army has ordered 36 more of the new rifles.

in December 2010, Nextbigfuture reported that the XM25 smart gun would be deployed one per squad in Afghanistan.

Each rifle bullet is programmed, before it is fired, by a second computer in the rifle itself. To determine the distance to the target, the gunman shines a laser rangefinder attached to the rifle at whatever is shielding the enemy. If that enemy is in a ditch, a nearby object—a tree trunk behind or to the side of the ditch, perhaps—will do

Korea aims to dramatically boost overseas nuclear business

State-run electricity provider Korea Electric Power Corp. Chief Executive Kim Joong-kyum said Monday in a statement that the company plans to boost the proportion of its overseas business to at least 50% from 3% currently as a way of increasing its profitability.

Kim didn't give a specific timeframe for the company's plans or mention what is meant by 'business' in this context.

Japan will be unable to meet 2020 emission targets because of reduced nuclear power

1. The Japanese government and the ruling Democratic Party of Japan plan to reconsider Japan's pledge to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent by 2020 from 1990 levels. "Achieving the target has become impossible in any way," a government source said, because the nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant has made it impossible for Japan to significantly expand its nuclear power capacity.

Japan has premised its emission target on greater reliance on nuclear power because in generating electricity, nuclear power emits substantially fewer amounts of carbon dioxide, a substance that causes global warming, than thermal power.

But the 25 percent reduction target, which was first pledged in 2009 by then prime minister and DPJ leader Yukio Hatoyama, has become Japan's international commitment under the U.N. climate change treaty.

Overview and Status of SMRs Being Developed in the United States, China, Russia, and Korea

Overview and Status of SMRs Being Developed in the United States (17 pages)

U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is preparing for SMR applications
•Has identified several generic issues in four primary categories:
–Licensing process
–Design requirements
–Operational requirements
–Financial implications

•Is aggressively working many of these issues with focus on LWR-based designs

•Expect non-LWR designs to require more review time, although some licensing experience exists

Lightbridge will work with Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute on Advanced Nuclear fuel

Lightbridge Corporation has entered into a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute (KAERI) to explore nuclear fuel collaboration opportunities.

Lightbridge and KAERI will explore collaborative opportunities in pre-irradiation examination of the Lightbridge-designed metallic fuel samples and other areas. As part of the planned loop irradiation experiments in the Advanced Test Reactor in the United States and MIR research reactor in Russia, Lightbridge plans to conduct pre-irradiation examination of metallic fuel samples prior to their insertion for irradiation testing.

KAERI is interested in Lightbridge-designed metallic fuel technology and its potential application to Korean OPR-1000 and APR-1400 reactors.

Nextbigfuture has covered Lightbridge technology. They are developing larger surface area fuel and all metal nuclear fuels for uprating Pressure Water Reactors by 17 to 30%. Lightbridge is developing two fuel product families for power uprates in existing and new build reactors.

Memristor memory could be used in wearable electronics

Physics World - Researchers in South Korea are the first to make a bendable digital memory that can store data without constant power. Such memories could find applications in electronic paper for more comfortable reading and in wearable computers, which could be used in medical monitoring and treatment.

Several research groups have explored the development of flexible memories by placing memristors in cross-point configurations. Two arrays of parallel metal lines are placed one on top of the other in a grid; where the lines cross, they are connected with a memristor. By running current along the two wires that cross a particular memristor, the researchers can – in theory – read, write or erase information encoded in its resistive state.

Memory bends easily round a pencil-sized rod

Nanoletters - Flexible Memristive Memory Array on Plastic Substrates

Mobile subscriptions near 6 billion and broadband usage by country

ITU (International Telecommunications Union) World Telecommunication facts and figures for 2011 (8 pages)

With 5.9 billion mobile-cellular subscriptions, global penetration reaches 87%, and 79% in the developing world.

Mobile-broadband subscriptions have grown 45% annually over the last four years and today there are twice as many mobile-broadband as fixed broadband subscriptions.

* Of 1.8 billion households worldwide, one third have Internet access, compared to only one fifth five years ago.
* In developing countries, 25% of homes have a computer and 20% have Internet access, comparedto 20% and 13%, respectively, 3 years ago.

Global Nuclear Power Development: Major Expansion Continues

Global Nuclear Power Development: Major Expansion Continues (13 pages)

The Nuclear Energy Institute has a white paper that reviews the current status and the plans for nuclear power

China’s government has plans to increase nuclear incrementally—80 GW by 2020, 200 GW by 2030 and 400 GW by 2050.

India is working to extend electrification to 400 million citizens without access to power. Currently coal provides almost 60 percent of India’s electricity. India is developing fast breeder reactors and is at the forefront of developing a thorium-based reactor fuel cycle (thorium is abundant in India). Today India has 20 operating commercial reactors supplying 3 per-cent of its electricity and six reactors under construction, including one prototype 500 MW fast breeder reactor. India’s ambitious plans to expand nuclear energy use include 17 reactors planned and possibly 40 plants proposed for longer term development; these numbers are eclipsed only by China’s nuclear construction plans.

Google Android Will Remain Free

Wall Street Journal Google Inc. Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt said Tuesday that the Internet search giant remains committed to offering its Android mobile operating system for free to its handset manufacturing partners.

In August, Google unveiled plans to buy the Motorola Mobility and set-top devices for $12.5 billion, a development that has raised anxiety among cellphone makers about whether Google would accord them equal treatment regarding the Android platform.

PC Mag - T-Mobile confirmed Tuesday that the Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus will arrive on Nov. 16 for $249.99 after a $50 mail-in rebate. Customers will be required to sign up for a two-year deal with the carrier.

Inexpensive way to obtain graphene in large quantities using edge-functionalized graphite

ACS Nano - Large-Area Graphene Films by Simple Solution Casting of Edge-Selectively Functionalized Graphite Researchers have demonstrated an inexpensive way to obtain graphene in large quantities using edge-functionalized graphite.

Besides being a very convenient way to produce graphene from pristine graphite, the technique could be tailored to specific applications. For example, Baek and his co-workers have already created nitrogen-doped graphene films that display excellent electrocatalytic activity for the oxygen reduction reaction in hydrogen fuel cells. "The EFG approach could be extended to application-specific purposes such as energy conversion and storage as well as nanoscale reinforcing materials," says Baek.

We report edge-selective functionalization of graphite (EFG) for the production of large-area uniform graphene films by simply solution-casting EFG dispersions in dichloromethane on silicon oxide substrates, followed by annealing. The resultant graphene films show ambipolar transport properties with sheet resistances of 0.52–3.11 kΩ/sq at 63–90% optical transmittance. EFG allows solution processing methods for the scalable production of electrically conductive, optically transparent, and mechanically robust flexible graphene films for use in practice.

J B Baek publications web page

South Korea APR1400 Nuclear Reactor Construction and Indian Uranium

1. The reactor pressure vessel for unit 4 of South Korea's Shin-Kori nuclear power plant has been put in place. The unit is the second APR-1400 to be built and its schedule follows the first, Shin-Kori 3, by one year.

First concrete for Shin-Kori 4 was poured in August 2009 and the APR-1400 unit is scheduled to begin commercial operation in September 2014. Its schedule is running about one year behind that of Shin-Kori 3, the first APR-1400 to be built. Two more of the 1350 MWe pressurized water reactors are planned for construction at Shin-Ulchin and scheduled to start up in 2016 and 2017. Four have been ordered by Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation for the Braka plant in the United Arab Emirates to start between 2017 and 2020. The construction and power generation costs of the APR-1400 are reported to be 10% lower than those of OPR-1000 units.

Korean Candu restarts after refurbishment

Unit 1 at the Wolsong nuclear power plant in South Korea has been restarted following the completion of a refurbishment of the pressurized heavy water reactor (PHWR). It marks the first time that a Candu-6 reactor has been successfully dismantled, retubed and restarted. The 679 MWe reactor to operate for a further 25 years. It took 839 days to refurbish (started in 2009).

South Korea SK Teleconm and LG Uplus are rolling out faster LTE wireless networks tomorrow

1. Korea Times - SK Telecom (No. 1 mobile carrier in South Korea) is launching LTE service in South Korea. SK Telecom LTE will provide a maximum downlink speed of 75 Mbps, which is five times faster than that of the 3G WCDMA network, and 1.9 times faster than WiBro. SK Telecom plans to launch a high-quality video call service on LTE smartphones that offers images eight times clearer and twice clear voice clarity, as its LTE network enhances the speed of a video call from 64 Kbps to over 500 Kbps. SK Telecom promised to offer a high-quality LTE-based voice service and widen coverage as it has 1,720 base stations in Seoul, which is far higher than around 500 of Uplus in Seoul and three other major cities. SK Telecom also plans to release two LTE tablets in October. The company expects the number of its LTE subscribers to soar to 10 million by 2015 from an estimated 300,000 this year.

``The migration toward LTE doesn’t mean that SK would drop WiBro networks. We are using WiBro as back-up networks. LG Electronics will introduce LTE-WiBro handsets and models supporting both WCDMA and WiBro will also be released,’’ said Bae.

2. SK Telecom will expand for coverage nationwide by 2013. SK plans to invest more than 2 trillion won ($1.9 billion) on LTE by 2014.

Korea will benefit the most from a China, Korea, Japan free trade agreement

Rationale for a China-Japan-Korea FTA and Its Impact on the Korean Economy (124 pages)

The Korean economy will benefit the most from a CJK (china-japan-korea) FTA (free trade agreement) in terms of GDP growth and welfare. For instance, the macroeconomic effects of a CJK FTA in terms of GDP growth will be 5.14 percent for Korea, 1.54 percent for China and 1.21 percent for Japan. Furthermore, the simulation shows that the macroeconomic benefits from a CJK FTA for the Korean economy are greater than the sum of the benefits from a Korea-Japan FTA and a Korea-China FTA.

After concluding their third round of trilateral summit at the end of May, 2011 in Jeju island, South Korea, leaders from China, South Korea and Japan have agreed to complete a joint research task by 2012 on the feasibility of grouping the three nations into a free trade zone.

HP discovers memristor mechanism and hasten the replacement of flash memory

Synchrotron x-rays probed the memristor in a 100 nanometer region with concentrated oxygen vacancies (right, shown in blue) where the memristive switching occurs. Surrounding this region a newly developed structural phase (red) was also found to act like a thermometer revealing how hot the device becomes when read or written.

EETimes - senior HP Fellow Stanley Williams says they have discovered that an electric field and a current act together to enable a memristor memory device that can both be switched very rapidly and hold its state indefinitely.

* In testing, they have switched these devices over 30 billion times and counting, with no degradaton in their ability to retain information

Not only does an applied voltage drive the migration of oxygen vacancies in the device, but at the same time there is a current that heats it up to about 300 degrees Celsius—just enough to turn the amorphous film into a crystalline film

LTE competition in South Korea prompts plans for LTE Advanced to begin in 2013

LTE Advanced has been demoed at speeds of 1.2 gbps LTE has theoretical speeds of 300mbps and has been demoed at about 150 mbps.

SK Telecom (South Korea) intends to upgrade to LTE's successor, LTE-Advanced, starting in 2013.

SK Telecom also said it would apply Coordinated Multi-Point technology to the network when up and running in a bid to prevent base station interference, and “pursue early development” of LTE femtocell.

SK Telecom is South Korea's largest mobile operator. The company will be going head to head against LG U+ - which also plans to launch LTE in July - and KT, which has its own LTE ambitions.

South Korea also has advanced Wimax with download speeds of 40 mbps

Gendercide in China, India and other countries

India gender imbalance is heading to 110 boys to 100 girls

The news from India’s 2011 census is almost all heartening. Literacy is up; life expectancy is up; family size is stabilising. But there is one grim exception. In 2011 India counted only 914 girls aged six and under for every 1,000 boys.

Samsung is mass producing transparent LCD displays panels that are 90% more power efficient than backlit LCD

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. announced today that it began mass production of the 22-inch transparent LCD panel in March this year. The panels come in two colors, the black-and-white type and the color type, and they have a contrast ratio of 500:1 with WSXGA+(1680*1050) resolution.

Compared with the conventional LCD panels that use back light unit (BLU) and have 5% transparency, Samsung’s transparent LCD panel boasts the world’s best transparency rate of over 20% for the black-and-white type and over 15% for the color type.

South Korea, China, India, Russia are undeterred in their push for nuclear power

Bloomberg -South Korea announced that they will continue building nuclear plants".

In China, the People's Congress voted to continue without interruption progress for more nuclear power. "Japan quake no threat to China's environment, nuclear power plants"

As of June 2010, official installed nuclear capacity projections were 70-80 GWe by 2020, 200 GWe by 2030 and 400-500 GWe by 2050.