"Accordion" Solar Towers Give 20 Times the Power

Harnessing the power of sunlight can mean more than just laying solar panels on rooftops or putting them on motorized swivels to track the sun across the sky. MIT researchers have built solar panel towers and cubes capable of generating as much as 20 times more power compared with fixed, flat panels with the same base area. 





Although these solar panels cost more compared to the ordinary flat panels, they can create higher energy output for a given size physical footprint. The solar towers also collect much more sunlight during the mornings, evenings and winters - regardless of clouds or shadows, making it more reliable source for the power grid. 

"I think this concept could become an important part of the future of photovoltaics," said Jeffrey Grossman, a professor of power engineering at MIT. 


Their efforts led to power boosts ranging from double the usual energy output to 20 times the energy output of fixed, flat solar panels. The biggest power boosts came in scenarios such as locations far from the equator, in winter months and on cloudier days. 

News, the good and the bad...

The Pew Research Center’s latest accounting of the news industry:
The good news - big audiences hungry for more news and information.
The bad news - less revenue to pay for news production.


In the group's ninth annual State of the news media report on Monday morning, they find that most sectors of the news media experienced a decline in total revenue in 2011, with newspapers and their Web sites affected most acutely. The network television, magazine and local TV sectors also had drops in revenue.


“In sum, the news industry is not much closer to a new revenue model than a year earlier and has lost more ground to rivals in the technology industry,” the report states. “But growing evidence also suggests that news is becoming a more important and pervasive part of people’s lives. That, in the end, could prove a saving factor for the future of journalism.”


The report says that mobile devices, in particular, may be “leading to a deeper experience with news than on the desktop/laptop computer.”


Digital platforms not surprisingly grew in popularity in 2011, but so did network television news, “whose audiences grew for the first time in a decade,” according to Pew. The morning and late evening newscasts on local TV also enjoyed an overall uptick in popularity for the first time in five years.


The gains can be attributed in part to an unusually active news cycle. News magazine circulation was basically flat while newspaper circulation was down about 4 percent on weekdays and 1 percent on Sundays versus the previous year.


Pew predicts that more news organizations will introduce flexible digital subscriptions in 2012, following the lead of The New York Times and others.


It is a matter of survival, the report states: “Over the last five years, an average of 15 papers, or just about 1 percent of the industry, has vanished each year. A growing number of executives predict that in five years many newspapers will offer a print home-delivered newspaper only on Sunday, and perhaps one or two other days a week that account for most print ad revenue.”

Bypassing the Password?

Can you imagine going on your personal computer without having to enter in your password?


This is a vision that the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), part of the Defense Departnment wants to turn into a reality. This company will distribute research funds to develop a softweare that allows you to access your computer without having to type your password; just by the way you type, it will identify that you are indeed the person that you say you are.


According to the Defense Department, a strong password that meets their requirements is something like, "6tFcVbNh^TfCvBn". However, this type of password does not meet human requirements and we are not built to understand and memorize random combinations of numbers and letters.

“What I’d like to do,” Mr. Guidorizzi said, “is move to a world where you sit down at a console, you identify yourself, and you just start working, and the authentication happens in the background, invisible to you, while you continue to do your work without interruptions.”

No biometric sensors, like thumbprint or iris scanners, would be used. Instead, he is seeking technology that relies solely on an individual’s distinct behavioral characteristics, which he calls the cognitive fingerprint.

Academic experts are trying several approaches to determine users’ identities solely through their computer behavior.

Pharmacy on a Chip

Researchers at MIT have developed what they're hoping will be something of a pharmacy on a chip. These are wirelessly controlled and programmable microchips that can be implanted into the human body to deliver medicine, potentially replacing daily drug injections, according to MIT.


"You could literally have a pharmacy on a chip," said MIT professor Robert Langer, who worked on the project with fellow MIT professor Michael Cima. "You can do remote control delivery, you can do pulsatile drug delivery, and you can deliver multiple drugs."


The university reported that the wireless chips were tested delivering on an osteoporosis drug called Teriparatide to seven women between the ages of 65 and 70. The test reportedly showed that the chips delivered dosages comparable to injections with no adverse side effects. The chips were reportedly implanted in the patients in a doctor's office using a local anesthetic and left in the patients for four months.
The university researchers worked with scientists at MicroCHIPS Inc., a medical product company based in Waltham, Mass.