The cool science thread

[Iangould]

Science is such a cocktease:

New research may open the way to dirt-cheap solar cells that can be made anywhere with simple equipment.

Assuming they can increase the power output by about a factor of 10. Then again in the past decade they've increased the energy output using this technique by a factor of ten thousand.

That’s the vision of MIT researcher Andreas Mershin, whose work appears this week in the open-access journal Scientific Reports. The work is an extension of a project begun eight years ago by Shuguang Zhang, a principal research scientist and associate director at MIT’s Center for Biomedical Engineering. Zhang was senior author of the new paper along with Michael Graetzel of Switzerland’s École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
In his original work, Zhang was able to enlist a complex of molecules known as photosystem-I (PS-I), the tiny structures within plant cells that carry out photosynthesis. Zhang and colleagues derived the PS-I from plants, stabilized it chemically and formed a layer on a glass substrate that could — like a conventional photovoltaic cell — produce an electric current when exposed to light.

Graetzel BTW is the leading researcher in the related field of dye-sensitized solar cells where he has raised energy output significantly. If anyone can do this it's probably Graetzel.

Now Mershin says the process has been simplified to the point that virtually any lab could replicate it — including college or even high school science labs — allowing researchers around the world to start exploring the process and making further improvements. The new system’s efficiency is 10,000 times greater than in the previous version — although in converting just 0.1 percent of sunlight’s energy to electricity, it still needs to improve another tenfold or so to become useful, he says.

[Iangould]

A drug already approved for treating cancer in humans appears to reverse the effects of Alzheimer's Disease in mice.

So not only does it stop the progress of the disease, it reverses the effects.

In particular, the researchers were struck by the speed with which bexarotene improved memory deficits and behavior even as it also acted to reverse the pathology of Alzheimer's disease. The present view of the scientific community is that small soluble forms of amyloid beta cause the memory impairments seen in animal models and humans with the disease. Within six hours of administering bexarotene, however, soluble amyloid levels fell by 25 percent; even more impressive, the effect lasted as long as three days. Finally, this shift was correlated with rapid improvement in a broad range of behaviors in three different mouse models of Alzheimer's.

One example of the improved behaviors involved the typical nesting instinct of the mice. When Alzheimer's-diseased mice encountered material suited for nesting – in this case, tissue paper – they did nothing to create a space to nest. This reaction demonstrated that they had lost the ability to associate the tissue paper with the opportunity to nest. Just 72 hours after the bexarotene treatment, however, the mice began to use the paper to make nests. Administration of the drug also improved the ability of the mice to sense and respond to odors.

Human clinical tests should follow quickly since the drug has lready passed basic safety tests.

You're probably also going to see some doctors start prescribing this drug "off-label" to their alzheimer's patients almsot immediately.

[the4thpip]

The Swiss developed a satellite called "CleanSpace One" designed to clean up orbit from Debris.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science...ite/53103008/1

[Spike-X]

The Swiss developed a satellite called "CleanSpace One" designed to clean up orbit from Debris.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science...ite/53103008/1

"Stereotype? What stereotype?"

[dupersuper]

The Swiss developed a satellite called "CleanSpace One" designed to clean up orbit from Debris.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science...ite/53103008/1

Thank you, Swiss people.

[Iangould]

A new version of cement requires 97% less energy to produce and should also be cheaper since it's made from extremely common materials (limestone and slag from iron production).

[Iangould]

It looks like the reports of faster thsn light neutrinoes were wrong.

They found a fault in the wiring of a detector that explains the anomaly.

link

[Jorriss]

It looks like the reports of faster thsn light neutrinoes were wrong.

They found a fault in the wiring of a detector that explains the anomaly.

link

Plot Twist.


I'm kidding. Everyone saw this coming.

[Iangould]

Envia Systems, a California start-up, claims to have developed a Lithium-ion battery for electric cars which stores 2-3 times as much power per kilogram and costs half as much as current batteries.

If these claims are correct, within a few years, electric cars should be pretty close to matching gas-powered cars on both cost and range.

[Vibranium]

http://io9.com/5889828/were-on-the-v...er-discoveries

some interesting possible discoveries with the Large Hadron Collider

[Iangould]

Two big stories:

So for a cost of $50 billion, it should be possible to build a superconducting Madlev launch system that could deliver cargo to low Earth orbit for $50 a kilogram.

It'd be a huge project - a thousand mile track with a 5 kilometre high tower at the end - but all the technology required exists already.

link


And

A new metamaterial could lead to 95% efficent solar cells for around the same cost as current cells.

[the4thpip]

Engineered stem cells seek out, kill HIV in living organisms

[Iangould]

Researchers have used an implanted electrode array in the brain of monkeys to restore movement in paralyzed limbs.

[Iangould]

Two big solar energy-related stories:

1. The principal cost invovled in making crystalline Silicon soalr celsl (the most common kind) is the cost involved in smeltign and refining the crystline Silicon. The process is also extremely energy intensive and uses highly toxic chemicals.

Now there's an alternative manufacturing process that using lower temperatures, no toxic chemicals and far less energy that could cut the cost of crystalline Silicon by 90%.

2. A new substrate for solar cells absorbs red photons that have to little energy to be useable and re-emits higher energy yellow photons. (The trick is it absorbs to red for every one yllow it re-emits.)

This technique should work with virtually any sort of soalr cell and should increase the conversion of solar energy by aroudn 2%. So commerical cells currently converted 13% of the sun's energy would emit 15% with this substrate.

link

[Vibranium]

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/20...ebookclickthru

I wanna be a space miner!!!!