Chronos is one of the many Smalltalk-related blogs syndicated on Planet Smalltalk
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Discussion of the Essence# programming language, and related issues and technologies.

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2010-03-30

A Grand Unified Theory of Artificial Intelligence

From PhysOrg.com:

As a research tool, Goodman has developed a computer programming language called Church — after the great American logician Alonzo Church — that, like the early AI languages, includes rules of inference. But those rules are probabilistic. Told that the cassowary is a bird, a program written in Church might conclude that cassowaries can probably fly. But if the program was then told that cassowaries can weigh almost 200 pounds, it might revise its initial probability estimate, concluding that, actually, cassowaries probably can’t fly.
Full article


New Path To Solar Energy Via Solid-State Photovoltaics

From PhysOrg.com:

Berkeley Lab researchers have found a new mechanism by which the photovoltaic effect can take place in semiconductor thin-films. This new path to energy production brightens the future for photovoltaic technology by overcoming voltage limitations that plague conventional solid-state solar cells.
Full article


2010-03-28

Is gravity a phenomenon that emerges from the laws of thermodynamics and information theory?

From Technology Review:

A few month's ago, Erik Verlinde at the the University of Amsterdam put forward one such idea which has taken the world of physics by storm. Verlinde suggested that gravity is merely a manifestation of entropy in the Universe. His idea is based on the second law of thermodynamics, that entropy always increases over time. It suggests that differences in entropy between parts of the Universe generates a force that redistributes matter in a way that maximises entropy. This is the force we call gravity.
Full article


2010-03-23

The world's smallest microlaser

From PhysOrg.com:

ETH-Zurich physicists (Switzerland) have developed a new kind of laser that shatters the boundaries of possibility: it is by far the smallest electrically pumped laser in the world and one day could revolutionize chip technology.
Full article


2010-03-22

Quivering Gizmo Ushers in Quantum Machines

From Science Now:

The weird rules of quantum mechanics state that a tiny object can absorb energy only in discrete amounts, or quanta, and can literally be in two places simultaneously. Those mind-bending tenets have been amply demonstrated in experiments with electrons, photons, atoms, and molecules. Ironically, though, physicists have never observed such bizarre quantum-mechanical effects in the motion of a human-made mechanical device. Now, Andrew Cleland, John Martinis, and colleagues at the University of California, Santa Barbara, have taken a key first step in that direction by fashioning a vibrating, diving board-like gizmo a few dozen micrometers long and less than a nanometer thick that makes literally the slightest movement allowed by quantum theory.
Full article


2010-03-20

Designer Nanomaterials On-Demand: Scientists Report Universal Method for Creating Nanoscale Composites

From PhysOrg.com:

Composites are combinations of materials that produce properties inaccessible in any one material. A classic example of a composite is fiberglass - plastic fibers woven with glass to add strength to hockey sticks or the hull of a boat. Unlike the well-established techniques for producing fiberglass and other macroscale composites, however, there aren't general schemes available for making nanoscale composites.
Full article


2010-03-17

Researchers develop molecular 'LEGO kit' to create nano-cubes

From PhysOrg.com:

Scientists at the University of Glasgow have devised a molecular 'LEGO toolkit' which can be used to assemble a vast number of new and functional chemical compounds.

Using molecules as building blocks they have been able to construct a molecular scaffold based on tiny (nano-scale) storage cubes. This new ‘designer route’ opens the door to many new compounds that, potentially, are able to act as the ion sensors, storage devices, and catalysts of the future.
Full article


Brain-Like Computer Closer to Realization

From PhysOrg.com:

Almost since computing began, scientists and technologists have been fascinated with the idea of a computer that works similarly to the human brain. In 2008, the first "memristor" was built, a device that is designed to behave in a manner that mimics the junctions betweens the neurons in the brain. However, until recently, the memristor was just a device. Now a group at the University of Michigan, led by Wei Lu, has demonstrated that the memristor can actually be used in computing. Their findings were published in Nano Letters: "Nanoscale Memristor Device as Synapse in Neuromorphic Systems."
Full article


2010-03-15

1 gene lost = 1 limb regained? Scientists demonstrate mammalian regeneration through single gene deletion

From PhysOrg.com:

A quest that began over a decade ago with a chance observation has reached a milestone: the identification of a gene that may regulate regeneration in mammals. The absence of this single gene, called p21, confers a healing potential in mice long thought to have been lost through evolution and reserved for creatures like flatworms, sponges, and some species of salamander. In a report published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from The Wistar Institute demonstrate that mice that lack the p21 gene gain the ability to regenerate lost or damaged tissue.
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Computational feat speeds finding of genes to milliseconds instead of years

From PhysOrg.com:

Like a magician who says, "Pick a card, any card," Stanford University computer scientist Debashis Sahoo, PhD, seemed to be offering some kind of trick when he asked researchers at the Stanford Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine to pick any two genes already known to be involved in stem cell development. Finding such genes can take years and hundreds of thousands of dollars, but Sahoo was promising the skeptical stem cell scientists that, in a fraction of a second and for practically zero cost, he could find new genes involved in the same developmental pathway as the two genes provided.
Full article


New Answer to 80-Year-Old Question Makes Computer Modeling 100,000 Times Faster

From Popular Science:

A new formula allows computers to simulate how new materials behave up to 100,000 times faster than previously possible, and could drastically speed up innovation relating to electronic devices and energy-efficient cars. Princeton engineers came up with the model based on an 80-year-old quantum physics puzzle.
Full article


2010-03-10

Research streamlines data processing to solve problems more efficiently

From PhysOrg.com:

Researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a new analytical method that opens the door to faster processing of large amounts of information, with applications in fields as diverse as the military, medical diagnostics and homeland security.
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A huge step toward mass production of graphene

From PhysOrg.com:

Scientists have leaped over a major hurdle in efforts to begin commercial production of a form of carbon that could rival silicon in its potential for revolutionizing electronics devices ranging from supercomputers to cell phones. Called graphene, the material consists of a layer of graphite 50,000 times thinner than a human hair with unique electronic properties. Their study appears in ACS' Nano Letters.
Full article


2010-03-09

Novel material paves the way for next-generation information technology

From PhysOrg.com:

University of Queensland researchers have successfully demonstrated a futuristic semiconductor technology that will pave the way for the next generation of electrical and information technology systems.
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2010-03-08

MIT researchers discover new way of producing electricity

From PhysOrg.com:

A team of scientists at MIT have discovered a previously unknown phenomenon that can cause powerful waves of energy to shoot through minuscule wires known as carbon nanotubes. The discovery could lead to a new way of producing electricity, the researchers say.
Full article


2010-03-04

Breakthrough reveals blood vessel cells are key to growing unlimited amounts of adult stem cells

From PhysOrg.com:

In a leap toward making stem cell therapy widely available, researchers at the Ansary Stem Cell Institute at Weill Cornell Medical College have discovered that endothelial cells, the most basic building blocks of the vascular system, produce growth factors that can grow copious amounts of adult stem cells and their progeny over the course of weeks. Until now, adult stem cell cultures would die within four or five days despite best efforts to grow them.
Full article


'Microrings' could nix wires for communications in homes, offices

From PhysOrg.com:

Purdue University researchers have developed a miniature device capable of converting ultrafast laser pulses into bursts of radio-frequency signals, a step toward making wires obsolete for communications in the homes and offices of the future.
Full article


IBM Scientists Create Ultra-Fast Device Which Uses Light for Communication between Computer Chips

From PhysOrg.com:

IBM scientists today unveiled a significant step towards replacing electrical signals that communicate via copper wires between computer chips with tiny silicon circuits that communicate using pulses of light. As reported in the recent issue of the scientific journal Nature, this is an important advancement in changing the way computer chips talk to each other.
Full article


2010-03-02

Nanotube Thermocells Hold Promise For Converting Heat Waste To Energy

From PhysOrg.com:

A study published in the American Chemical Society's journal Nano Letters reveals that thermocells based on carbon nanotube electrodes might eventually be used for generating electrical energy from heat discarded by chemical plants, automobiles and solar cell farms.
Full article


Biochemists take a bead on gene-controlling code

From PhysOrg.com:

University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers have developed a new technique for observing the proteins that operate by that controlling code — called the epigenome — and assembled a library of interactions between the proteins and key positions on packets of DNA.
Full article


2010-03-01

New device for ultrafast optical communications

From PhysOrg.com:

A new device invented by engineers at UC Davis could make it much faster to convert pulses of light into electronic signals and back again. The technology could be applied to ultrafast, high-capacity communications, imaging of the Earth's surface and for encrypting secure messages.
Full article


Researchers make graphene hybrid

From PhysOrg.com:

Layers of h-BN a single atom thick have the same lattice structure as graphene, but electrically the materials are at opposite ends of the spectrum: h-BN is an insulator, whereas graphene, the single-atom-layer form of carbon, is highly conductive. The ability to assemble them into a single lattice could lead to a rich variety of 2-D structures with electric properties ranging from metallic conductor to semiconductor to insulator.
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