University of Melbourne (UniMelb)

If only computers themselves were smart enough to fight off malevolent hackers. That is the premise of an ambitious two-year contest with a $2 million first prize, posed to the world’s computer programmers by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, better known by its acronym, Darpa. It is the blue-sky, big-think organization within the Defense Department that created a

Image via Wikipedia Hardly a day seems to pass without a new report of a soldier or civilian being killed or maimed by an improvised explosive device(IED) in Afghanistan or Iraq. Just such a weapon killed two coalition members on Monday in Iraq’s volatile southern region, according to NATO. Meanwhile, data published October 22 by Wikileaks indicates

Researchers use engineered viruses to provide quantum-based enhancement of energy transport Nature has had billions of years to perfect photosynthesis, which directly or indirectly supports virtually all life on Earth. In that time, the process has achieved almost 100 percent efficiency in transporting the energy of sunlight from receptors to reaction centers where it can

The sun is the most abundant power source on Earth, but new designs soon hitting the market could keep its energy flowing even after sunset Researchers are exploring various strategies to put sunshine on tap, converting the sun’s energy into fuels that can be stored, transported and used as needed. Setting excess power aside can

These new tools distill the essential features of printers, scanners and modems into handheld packages   After analysis of hundreds of data points collected around the evolution of work and collaboration, the PSFK Consulting Team noticed that designers and engineers are re-imagining the bulky and stationary design of traditional desktop computers and office equipment by creating smaller,

New thought in any global arena doesn’t take long to propagate these days. Given an idea, there are now many small, highly skilled commando-like development teams that can employ the latest materials and technologies and rapid manufacturing and prototyping techniques to build and test a series of prototypes within a short time and develop a

A robotic gripping arm that uses engineered bacteria to “taste” for a specific chemical has been developed by engineers at the University of California, Davis, and Carnegie Mellon University. The gripper is a proof-of-concept for biologically-based soft robotics. “Our long-term vision is about building a synthetic microbiota for soft robots that can help with repair,

People who suffer from chronic pain often feel like the experience dominates their lives, and changes them profoundly. Now, a group of pain researchers and geneticists have discovered that this feeling isn’t far from scientific truth. Being in chronic pain changes the way your brain functions on a physical level. The good news is that you

A new type of electronic sensor that might be used to quickly detect and classify bacteria for medical diagnostics and food safety has passed a key hurdle by distinguishing between dead and living bacteria cells. Conventional laboratory technologies require that samples be cultured for hours or longer to grow enough of the bacteria for identification

New technology could speed hospital work, enhance health care Rutgers researchers have created an automated blood drawing and testing device that provides rapid results, potentially improving the workflow in hospitals and other health-related institutions to allow health care practitioners to spend more time treating patients. A study describing the fully automated device is published online in