#Airbus to build giant satellite network European aerospace giant, Airbus, is going to build the world's largest satellite constellation.
The company will produce 900 spacecraft for Oneweb, a British Channel Islands-registered concern that aims to broaden internet access to the underserved.
More than 600 satellites will initially be launched, with the rest held as spares. The deal was announced at the Paris Airshow.
The multi-billion-dollar Oneweb constellation will dwarf any previous commercial network in the sky by a factor of 10.
Airbus will be the"industrial partner"on the project. And the role represents an immense challenge
because Airbus has made its name on some of the world's highest specification and most expensive telecommunications platforms.
and Oneweb was reportedly looking for a price per unit of less than half a million dollars.
Airbus says it will make the first 10 spacecraft at its Toulouse manufacturing facility before shifting work to a dedicated plant in the United states. Many rockets will be required to get the constellation in orbit
Airbus would not give a formal interview at the airshow but issued a statement from its head of space systems. his partnership is a fantastic new chapter in our space story,
and expertise across the entire Airbus Group. neweb is led by Greg Wyler, and the American entrepreneur was pictured meeting French President François Hollande at the Le Bourget showground.
The plan envisages 20 planes of low-orbiting satellites connecting to small user terminals on the ground.
These terminals would act as hubs linking phones and computers. Satellite constellations, it has to be said,
have chequered a rather history. Even some of today big players, like satphone service providers Iridium and Globalstar, got themselves into enormous financial trouble when building their first-generation networks.
Oneweb will have to raise hundreds of millions of dollars to maintain a venture that will not be fully operational for some years o
#Hadron collider discovers new particle Scientists at the Large hadron collider have announced the discovery of a new particle called the pentaquark.
Zweig coined the term"aces"for the three new hypothesised building blocks, but it was Gell-Mann's name"quark"that stuck.
These intermediate states have been named Pc (4450)+ and Pc (4380+."+"We have examined all possibilities for these signals,
"said LHCB physicist Tomasz Skwarnicki of Syracuse University, US. Previous experiments had measured only the so-called mass distribution where a statistical peak may appear against the background noise"-the possible signature of a novel particle.
But the collider enabled researchers to look at the data from additional perspectives, namely the four angles defined by the different directions of travel taken by particles within LHCB."
"The LHC powered up again in April following a two-year shutdown to complete a programme of repairs and upgrades d
#Better method for building with DNA Scientists have come up with an improved method for building tiny 3d structures out of strands of DNA.
Using an approach from computer science, they were able to calculate the best way to fold almost any given shape out of a long, continuous strand.
Importantly, the structures are stable enough to be used to make microscopic biomedical contraptions. The research is published in the journal Nature."
like the ones that you get in computer 3d models, "said senior author Dr Bjorn Hogberg, of the Karolinska Institute, in Sweden."
"With a few clicks of your mouse, you get a complete list of the DNA strands that you need to mix in a test tube,
"Working with collaborators from Aalto University in Finland, Dr Hogberg's team has demonstrated the system with a range of shapes, from rods and balls to a bottle, a bunny and a tiny person.
They might not look like works of art, but they are mind-bogglingly small: less than 100nm (0. 0001mm) across,
from the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, said the work was a step towards"the dream of nanoscale 3d printing"."
"But the current work arguably presents the most versatile and streamlined design method
#Step forward for computing by light Engineers and physicists have discovered a property of silicon which could aid the development of faster computers.
Currently, copper wires transfer information in a computer; the process is slowed down as the wires heat up."
"Photonic"and"spintronic"computing is the principle of transferring information by light or electron spin.
This new property means that silicon-based light detectors identify spin, so more information can be transferred.
Spin is a property of subatomic particles, which influences the ordering of electrons and nuclei in atoms and molecules.
Silicon is a highly symmetrical crystal, but by changing the geometry of it, the team was able to impart"chiral"properties to it.
This chirality means that silicon-based detectors are able to detect the spin of electrons and light,
"The whole computer running with light is a distant dream, but some copper interconnectors can be replaced with light and photodetector devices,"Professor Ritesh Agarwal,
who led this study at the University of Pennsylvania, told BBC News."This is only around five years away from now.
The technology already exists, but this can bring added functionality.""The discovery, which is published in the journal Science,
this study has wider implications for materials science.""It's the same silicon, all we've done is cut it in a particular direction,
"explained Professor Ritesh Agarwal. This is a step towards engineering new, useful properties by changing the geometry of a material l
#L'oreal to start 3d printing skin French cosmetics firm L'oreal is teaming up with bioengineering start-up Organovo to 3d-print human skin.
Experts said the science might be legitimate but questioned why a beauty firm would want to print skin.
L'oreal currently grows skin samples from tissues donated by plastic surgery patients. It produces more than 100
Its statement explaining the advantage of printing skin, offered little detail:""Our partnership will not only bring about new advanced in vitro methods for evaluating product safety and performance,
"Experts were divided about the plans.""I think the science behind it-using 3d printing methods with human cells-sounds plausible,
"said Adam Friedmann, a consultant dermatologist at the Harley Street dermatology clinic.""I can understand why you would do it for severe burns or trauma but
"he added. 3d printed livers The Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative medicine has pioneered the field of laboratory-grown and printed organs.
although some experts were cautious about what it had achieved.""It was unclear how liver-like the liver structures were said
a bioengineering research scientist at Heriot Watt university. Printing skin could be a different proposition,
he thinks.""Skin is quite easy to print because it is layered a structure, "he told the BBC."
"But printed skin has more value in a medical scenario, he thinks.""It would be a great thing to have stores of spare skins for burn victims
where soldiers or police officers may be committing human rights abuses, a mobile phone has become a key weapon.
In the hands of campaigners and victims of abuse, it can provide valuable video evidence of crimes.
when a scratchy video appears on Youtube. The trouble is that often these clips are not
what they seem-witness the video of a heroic Syrian boy apparently saving his sister in the middle of a fire fight.
which is going live on the Google Play store today could make all the difference. It is called Eyewitness to Atrocities
if your phone is examined by a security official they will not see any of the material you have recorded.
The app stamps recordings with GPS coordinates the time and location and other data which will show exactly where it was recorded
and whether it has been edited. Then, when the user is in a safe location, they can upload their material to a secure database owned by the Eyewitness project.
Legal experts can then examine it and decide whether it is suitable for use in courts.
But how likely is it that this idea will take off? When Wendy Betts, who runs the project,
It is designed specifically for war zones and places where human rights abuses are common, but I wondered
In the US, a number of videos have emerged in recent months of police officers shooting suspects,
but will cooperate with requests for information from its database as long as it is clear it has the permission of those who uploaded the material.
The app will only be available for Android phones because that is what just about everyone has in countries where it is designed to be used.
Don't expect Eyewitness to Atrocities to top the download charts but while many developers make inflated claims about their"life-changing"apps,
say UK researchers at the University of Bristol. The team drew inspiration from the way the human body heals from a cut with blood that hardens into a scab.
"said chemistry professor Duncan Wass.""But micro-cracks can lead to catastrophic failures.""The technology could also be applied to other products made of carbon composite materials-including bicycle frames and wind turbines,
he added, "Composite materials are used increasingly in modern airlines, military aircraft and wind turbines. They are very stiff and strong but very light."
"That's perfect for aerospace...but the problem is if they are damaged, they are difficult to protect and repair,
#Baidu to launch self-drive car Chinese web giant Baidu will launch its first driverless car in the second half of 2015,
It had said previously it was working on such a car but did not say when it would be available.
The news, reported by Chinese language website Techweb, will put it head to head with rival Google.
The firm will work with an unnamed car manufacturer, according to Baidu's senior vice president Jin Wang. He made the announcement at the China Cloud computing conference.
The firm has teamed previously up with BMW to develop semi-autonomous car technology. The head of Baidu's deep learning lab Yu Kai has told previously the press that the firm does not agree with Google's view of a completely autonomous car,
looking instead to develop a vehicle that will retain the traditional pedals but give the driver greater freedom.
Artificial intelligence is rapidly becoming a key battleground for tech firms, with self-driving cars seen as one of the first practical applications for the technology.
Baidu's rise in the field of artificial intelligence suffered a setback last week when Stanford university
-which runs an AI test to see whether computers can recognise and sort images-banned Baidu from competing for the next year.
The web giant was stripped of its 2015 title after it emerged that it broke the rules over how many tests it could run.
Google announced last month that its prototype self-driving cars would take to the public roads this summer around its headquarters in Mountain view, California a
#Paris Air Show: Can you print a plane? The new Airbus a350 XWB that is flying daily displays at the Paris Air Show can claim several engineering firsts.
One of these is that it has more 3d printed components than any other aircraft, about 1,
000 on a plane that has gone only just into service. Meanwhile, Raytheon has 3d parts on its missiles,
while makers of drones are increasingly using them. And United Launch Alliance-a joint venture between Lockheed martin and Boeing-has the parts on the rockets it sends into space.
No longer is 3d a novelty manufacturing process. It's going mainstream underlined by the number of 3d-related firms at the Paris show
and conference briefings being held on the sidelines. And it has the potential to transform the aerospace industry's global supply chain
and cost structure, producing parts faster, and which are lighter and mean less waste. It may also mean companies bringing more production back in-house.
The 3d components on the A350 XWB are mostly widgets and brackets, formed by fusing layer upon layer of resins in machines that replicate computer-generated 3d models.
Metals and even glass can also be used. So, we're talking about small routine parts here, rather than large structures-at the moment.
But don't dismiss the significance that 3d printing is playing, says Ian Risk, Airbus Group's head of innovations in the UK,
where the aerospace giant makes aircraft wings.""These components contribute a huge amount to the manufacturing process.
Often, it's the fiddly parts that create delays in production, "he said. The size of the component being made is limited by the size of the printing machine.
churning out components when needed-not stored in a factory somewhere awaiting delivery to factories.
Say, for example, an A380 superjumbo is flying into Singapore and needs a new part. In our digitally connected world, a machine could be programmed to start printing even before the aircraft lands.
In sounds good in theory, and Mr Risk says that"agile manufacturing"will certainly reshape the industry's global supply chain
especially the issue of transmitting secure data across the world, he said. While the holy grail of on-demand supply may be a little way off, John Schmidt,
He says it's too far early to call the end of traditional manufacturing-machining, casting and injection moulding.
"It also reduces waste, as the component is built up rather than cut from a block of material.
He predicts that one of the most significant impacts could be on aircraft design, especially as 3d offers the promise to produce more complex shapes."
and supplies materials and composites used to build components. Director Scott Sevcik predicts that within 10 years,
but that if tests on Stratasys'plastic, called Ultem, go to plan then 3d parts could be used on the exterior of unmanned rockets with a couple of years s
#Hackers steal data using pitta bread Secret encryption keys can be stolen using a cheap gadget so small it could be concealed inside some pitta bread.
Israeli security researchers have demonstrated how to capture radio emissions given off by laptops that inadvertently leak data about the keys.
Before now, grabbing the radio signals was thought to require expensive, bulky equipment. But the four-strong team managed it with cheap components small enough to conceal inside a piece of pocket bread.'
developed by Daniel Genkin and colleagues from Tel aviv University, monitors the radio signals given off by laptops when their central processing unit is crunching data.
The team discovered that many different operations in a computer, such as playing a game or decrypting a file,
had a characteristic pattern of radio activity. The differing power demands a CPU made as it worked gave rise to these telltale signals,
said the group in a paper detailing their work. By monitoring these signals when the computer was decrypting a specific email message sent to it by an attacker,
it became possible to work out the key being used to secure data, they said. After demonstrating that the attack worked in the lab,
the group created a mobile version they dubbed the Portable Instrument for Trace Acquisition (Pita),
which they managed to conceal inside a piece of pocket bread. The attack had been demonstrated to work from a distance of about 50cm (1ft 8in),
and algorithms to protect data. Such attacks were established well, Steve Armstrong managing director of Logically Secure, told tech news site The Register."
"If they can do it at 10m (32ft) in a different room, I would be impressed. If the device needs to be within 20cm,
The team plan to present their work at a technical conference on cryptographic hardware in September r
#Bionic eye implant world first Surgeons in Manchester have performed the first bionic eye implant in a patient with the most common cause of sight loss in the developed world.
which converts video images from a miniature video camera worn on his glasses. He can now make out the direction of white lines on a computer screen using the retinal implant.
Mr Flynn said he was delighted"with the implant and hoped in time it would improve his vision sufficiently to help him with day-to-day tasks like gardening and shopping.
The Argus II implant manufactured by the US firm Second sight, has previously been used to restore some vision to patients who are blind as a result of a rare condition known as retinitis pigmentosa.
The operation, at Manchester Royal Eye Hospital, is the first time it has been implanted in a patient with age-related macular degeneration (AMD)
which affects at least half a million people in the UK to some extent. I met Ray Flynn last month,
on the morning of his surgery and he explained that although his retained his peripheral vision,
his central sight had disappeared. He said:""I'm unable to put the numbers in for my card when paying in a shop or at the bank,
and although I was a keen gardener, I can't tell the weeds from the flowers anymore."
"Mr Flynn said he had to sit very close to the television to see anything. He had given up going to see Manchester united play football as he cannot make out what is happening.
The operation took four hours and was led by Paulo Stanga, consultant ophthalmologist and vitreo-retinal surgeon at Manchester Royal Eye Hospital and professor of ophthalmology and retinal regeneration at the University of Manchester.
He said:""Mr Flynn's progress is truly remarkable, he is seeing the outline of people and objects very effectively."
"I think this could be the beginning of a new era for patients with sight loss."
The images are converted into electrical pulses and transmitted wirelessly to an array of electrodes attached to the retina.
The electrodes stimulate the remaining retina's remaining cells which send the information to the brain.
In a test, two weeks after surgery, Mr Flynn was able to detect the pattern of horizontal,
vertical and diagonal lines on a computer screen using the implant. He kept his eyes closed during the test
so that the medical team could be sure that the visual information was coming via the camera on his glasses and the implant.
"It was wonderful to be able to see the bars on the screen with my eyes closed."
"The implant cannot provide any highly detailed vision -but previous studies have shown it can help patients to detect distinct patterns such as door frames and shapes.
Mr Flynn should learn how to interpret the images from the implant more effectively. Four more patients with dry AMD will receive the implant at Manchester Royal Eye Hospital,
as part of a clinical trial. Prof Stanga said:""We hope these patients will develop some central visual function
Gregoire Cosendai of Second sight Medical Products, described the AMD study as"totally groundbreaking research"."The trial is being held in the Manchester Clinical Research Facility-funded by the National Institute for Health Research and Wellcome Trust,
which aims to bring new drugs and medical devices to patients. Cathy Yelf, of the Macular Society, said:"
000 times faster than the Nand flash storage used in memory cards and computers'solid state drives (SSDS).
and is the invention of Intel and Micron. The two US companies predict a wide range of benefits, from speeding up scientific research to making more elaborate video games.
One expert described it as a"huge step forward"."""There are other companies who have talked about new types of memory technology,
but this is about being able to manufacture the stuff-that's why they are making such a big deal out of it,
Its price has yet to be announced. Intel is marketing it as the first new class of"mainstream memory
"since 1989. 3d XPOINT retains data when the power is switched off-one of its key advantages over RAM (random access memory),
which remains faster. Rather than pitch it as a replacement for either flash storage or RAM,
the company suggests it will be used alongside them to hold certain data"closer"to a processor
so that it can be accessed more quickly than before. Why do need we faster storage? The flash storage in my smartphone and PC seems more than fast enough to view
and record the photos and videos I want. Because there are other situations where using today's storage slows things down
or introduces constraints. So-called"big data"tasks are a particular issue. For example, efforts to sequence and analyse our genes/DNA hold the potential for new and personalised medical treatments.
But copying the huge amounts of information involved backwards and forwards makes this an extremely time-intensive activity at present.
And it would also prove a boon to video game-makers. At present, level designs are limited by how much data can be stored in the RAM-or, strictly, a type of RAM chip called dynamic RAM (DRAM.
That's why players sometimes have to halt their play while they wait for the machine to load a new section.
But if the data can be loaded more quickly from 3d XPOINT, the developers should, in theory, be able to deliver them bigger, open worlds and a more seamless experience.
"which can store a single bit of data. This represents either a one or a zero in binary code a"selector,
"which allows a specific memory cell to be read or rewritten. Access is controlled by varying the amount of voltage it receives via the wires So,
3d XPOINT does away with the need to use the transistors at the heart of Nand chips.
Nand works by moving electrons back and forth to an isolated part of the transistors known as their"floating gates"to represent the ones and zeros of binary code.
An issue with this technique is that it cannot rewrite single bits of data at a time. Instead, larger blocks of information have to be wiped
"It's kind of like a parking lot where you want to move one of the cars, but they are jammed all in,
"Intel executive Rob Crooke says.""So, you have to shuffle them all around to get one new one in there."
"By contrast, 3d XPOINT works by changing the properties of the material that makes up its memory cells to either having a high resistance to electricity to represent a one
Intel suggests not. Solid state drives-and even slower hard disks-will remain significantly cheaper than 3d XPOINT for some time to come,
so it makes sense to continue using them to store most files. The suggestion is the new technology will normally be used instead as an intermediary step.
Rather than copy data directly from the slower types of storage into RAM, programs will anticipate
what data is likely to be needed and then transfer it in advance to the 3d XPOINT.
why not just use it to replace RAM altogether? RAM's speed advantage over traditional storage has made long it the chip of choice to funnel data directly into processors.
However, because it is relatively expensive to produce, computer makers tend to restrict how much they include.
Each megabyte of 3d Xpoint will certainly be significantly cheaper than the equivalent amount of RAM.
And the new technology has added the advantage of being nonvolatile, meaning it does not"forget"information
But, unfortunately it is still not quite as fast as RAM, and some-but not all-applications need the extra speed the older tech provides.
is there ever an advantage to using 3d Xpoint instead of, rather than in addition to, RAM or flash?
Online gaming companies might want to substitute 3d Xpoint for RAM. At present, the amount of players that can be hosted on a single server is limited by the amount of RAM it contains.
Switching to 3d Xpoint would cause only a small-and possibly unnoticeable-difference to the performance of many of the simpler titles.
But it would radically increase the number of people that could be supported for the same price.
One instance when you might want to use the new chips instead of flash would be to store operating system files that are required every time you boot up your machine.
Many users have experienced already faster switch on times on new computers thanks to such files being kept on SSDS rather than disk drives.
"says Intel's marketing director Greg Matson. Whether that proves tempting will depend on exactly what 3d Xpoint costs and just how precious your time is s
a team of Northwestern University scientists is the first to develop an entirely artificial molecular pump, in
The new machine mimics the pumping mechanism of life-sustaining proteins that move small molecules around living cells to metabolize and store energy from food.
For its food, the artificial pump draws power from chemical reactions, driving molecules step-by-step from a low energy state to a high-energy state--far away from equilibrium.
"Our molecular pump is radical chemistry--an ingenious way of transferring energy from molecule to molecule,
Stoddart is the Board of trustees Professor of Chemistry in Northwestern's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences."
"Details of the artificial molecular pump were published May 18 by the journal Nature Nanotechnology. Chuyang Cheng, a fourth-year graduate student in Stoddart's laboratory and first author of the paper, has spent his Ph d. studies researching molecules that mimic nature's biochemical machinery.
He first designed an artificial pump two years ago, but it required more than a year of testing prototypes before he found the ideal chemical structure."
The artificial pump is able to syphon off some of the energy that changes hands during a chemical reaction
"The tiny molecular machine threads the rings around a nanoscopic chain--a sort of axle--and squeezes the rings together,
with only a few nanometers separating them. At present, the artificial molecular pump is able to force only two rings together,
but the researchers believe it won't be long before they can extend its operation to tens of rings and store more energy.
"This is non-equilibrium chemistry, moving molecules far away from their minimum energy state, which is essential to life,
"Ultimately, they intend to use the energy stored in their pump to power artificial muscles and other molecular machines.
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