A Moment in History: Creating Antimatter [Video]

A Brief Video History of Antimatter:

Creating Antimatter and the Future Implications:

Scientists at the Geneva particle-based research lababory, CERN, have created anitmatter. By trapping 38 antihydrogen atoms in a magnetic bottle, scientists can begin to measure and compare matter and antimatter. This is the first step in three fields, first understanding The Great Bang that created our Universe, second, it is the start the engineering of antimatter weapons, and possibly antimatter power stations.

Here is a photo of the machine used to make antihydrogen atoms:

When matter and antimatter meet, they destroying "... each other instantly on contact in a violent flash of energy." [CNN] Here's how the explosion works:

"In an antiatom, the antimatter equivalent of an ordinary atom, the electrical charges of all the component particles are reversed; while an ordinary atom has a positively charged nucleus with one or more negatively charged electrons orbiting it, the antimatter atom has a negatively charged nucleus with positively charged orbiting electrons. An ordinary atomic nucleus contains positively charged protons, while its antimatter counterpart contains negatively charged antiprotons." [New York Times]

DISCOVERY CHANNEL VIDEO - "MATTER vs. ANTIMATTER"

When the matter and antimatter meet, as two opposite electrical charges meet, they create a flash of energy. There has been prior research where scientists have created antiprotons and antielectrons, but this was the first time antimatter atoms have ever been created.

The Antimatter Bomb?

The dream here is to eventually be able to harness this energy for possible use as well as understand the makings of our Universe.

Sources: [CERN] [Huliq] [New York Times] [CNN World] [Boing Boing]

California Mystery Missile [Video]

CBS affiliate KCBS captured a mysterious rocket being launched into the sky Monday night, while so far there is no explanation for the siting.






Sources: [CBS News] [SPACE.com] [Live Science]

Exoskelton News - Avatar Suits Will Soon Be A Reality

In 2006, Masaaki Nagumo created a land walking robot, similar that that seen in The Matrix Reloaded, Avatar, and even Star Wars. The robot lacks arms [covered in guns], but it still takes mankind a few steps closer in to making the robotic weapon. Check out the video below. This same company also made robotic walkers for kids.

Sources: [Engadget]

Lockhead Martin HULC Exoskeleton PROMO Video

Source: [Youtube]

Mars 2025: The Quest to make Halo Suits

The Sarcos XOS 2 Exoskeleton 

Mars, here we come!

This suit is the closets we have come so far to designing the Iron Man suit, but within the next few years a exoskeleton spacesuit will be developed.

Sources: [CrunchGear]

Digital Tour: The WikiLeaks Nuclear Bunker Facility

Name: Pionen White Mountains
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
Depth: 98 feet below the ground [under a mountain]

  

  

VIDEO TOUR:

Source: [Gizmodo]

China: Military, Space, and Economy Technology

Does Defensive Modernization Work in the 21st Century?

Defensive Modernization = Poor Domestic Infrastructure

China's heavy investment in military and space technology has a direct result of poor rural internal infrastructure.

Chinese Battleships now out number the US navy:

The Economist reports that the rising cost of military weapons has caused a steady decline in defense technology within the United States, Russia, and Britain with steady rises by India and heavy military investment by China.

"In a book published in 1983, Norman Augustine, a luminary of the aerospace industry, drafted a series of lighthearted “laws”. In one aphorism, he plotted the exponential growth of unit cost for fighter aircraft since 1910 (see chart 2), and extrapolated it to its absurd conclusion:

“In the year 2054, the entire defence budget will purchase just one aircraft. This aircraft will have to be shared by the Air Force and Navy 3½ days each per week except for leap year, when it will be made available to the Marines for the extra day.”

Nearly three decades on, Mr Augustine says, “we are right on target. Unfortunately nothing has changed.” These days Raptors go for $160m apiece ($350m including the cost of developing the jet), compared with $50m-60m for the venerable F-16. In the long run, high unit costs must limit numbers." [The Economist] [Defense Tech]


Secret Chinese Satellite Rendezvous in Space:

"Earlier this month, two Chinese satellites met up in orbit. Depending on who you believe, it’s either a sign of China’s increasingly-sophisticated space program — or a sign of its increasingly-sophisticated space warfare program... [as these] performed maneuvers [indicate] a cutting edge procedure called non-cooperative robotic rendezvous... This kind of rendezvous can have extremely useful, and benign, applications: removing space debris, refueling satellites or repairing craft in orbit. But the military apps are massive, and include up-close inspection of foreign satellites, espionage — and the infliction of some serious damage to adversarial space infrastructure..." [Danger Room]

The True Backbone of Chinese Technology: Lixin Fan [Last Train Home]

"... The wave is made up of millions of migrant factory workers. The homes they seek are the rural villages and families they left behind to seek work in the booming coastal cities. It is an epic spectacle that tells us much about China, a country discarding traditional ways as it hurtles towards modernity and global economic dominance...." [Business Insider]


Does defensive modernization work in the 21st century? What do you think.... ? What are the internal and domestic costs...?

Military Technology [Fighter Jets]

The Joint Strike Fighter F-35B

As promised, Lockheed Martin pulled off the first vertical landing of the F35B today. LockMart’s test pilot hovered for a minute at 150 feet and then “rode 41,000 pounds of thrust” provided by the Pratt & Whitney F135 turbofan and dropped like a feather to the tarmac. The company said the F-35B featured in today’s video is one of three F-35B STOVL aircraft undergoing flight trials at Patuxent River. The press release claims that the F135 is the most powerful engine ever flown in a fighter aircraft.

Dr. Paul Bevilaqua is the aerodynamicist who designed the F-35B shaft-driven lift fan years ago at Skunk Works, Lockheed Martin's advanced technology program. His invention changed short-take off and vertical-landing (STVOL) planes forever, making the Lightning II the first supersonic aircraft with this capability. To honor him, Lockheed Martin has released this new video, in which Dr. Bevilaqua explains how the project went from "napkin to production."


Watching him explain it, the genius of Dr. Bevilaqua's F-35B Shaft Driven Lift Fan is obvious. After all, the invention is quite simple. According to Bevilaqua, the best way to create power from the engine is by using a turbine. That power then gets moved forward using a shaft that connects to a fan, providing the vertical lift on the front of the plane—and all while the turbine exhaust is redirected to the ground to lift the back of the plane.


Britain is not only getting a whole lotta lot of F-35B STOVL fighters, but two new 60,000-ton state-of-the-art aircraft carriers.The carriers—which will cost $5.9 billion, a lot less than the $14 billion that the US spends on their super-carriers—will host 36 F-35s and two EH-101 Merlin multi-purpose helicopters each.
Constructed in modules all across Britain, which will be later assembled in a very complicated process in a central shipyard—will be almost fully automated, requiring only a 1,500 crew. Here is the fact sheet:

• The surface of the16,000sqm flight deck is covered in a grainy,heat-resistant paint,similar to very coarse sandpaper. The entire painted surface amounts to 370 acres - slightly bigger than Hyde Park.
• Two huge lifts, each with a 70-ton capacity, are capable of transporting two aircraft from the hangar to the flight deck in 60 seconds.
• The ground-breaking twin-island layout allows more deck space for aircraft and better visibility of the flight deck. The forward island is for navigating the ship; flight control is based in the aft island.
• The ship's 29,000 sq m hangar is 150 metres in length and has 20 slots for aircraft maintenance.
• There are 11 full-time medical staff on board managing an eight-bed medical suite, operating theatre and dental surgery.
• Onboard water treatment plant produces over 500 tons of fresh water daily.
• Two Rolls-Royce MT30 gas turbines and four diesel generator sets produce 109MW.
• Cabins are spacious and cruise-liner style, with en-suite toilets and shower facilities. Officers and senior ratings have single or two-berth cabins. The maximum number of crew in a cabin is six.
• The carrier will carry more than 8,600 tons of fuel, enough for the average family car to travel to the Moon and back 12 times. This gives a range of up to 10,000 nautical miles.
• Top speed will be in excess of 25 knots, sufficient to cross from Dover to Calais in an hour.
• The two five-blade propellers are each 30ft in diameter - that's one-and-a-half times the height of a double-decker bus.

Sources: [Gizmodo - History] [Gizmodo - Air Craft Carriers] [Defense Tech]

Military, Police, and Earth Technology

A Greener Police - The Ford Police Interceptor

From Ford:

A highly efficient 3.5-liter V-6 engine delivering at least 263 horsepower and E85 compatibility is 25 percent more efficient than the 4.6-liter Single Overhead Cam (SOHC) V-8 offered in the current Crown Victoria Police Interceptor.

Plus, an all-new 3.5-liter EcoBoost V-6 twin-turbocharged, direct-injection engine will deliver at least 365 horsepower and 350 ft.-lb. of torque across a broad rpm range.

A high-capacity six-speed SelectShift Automatic transmission delivers the power of EcoBoost to the road via the sophisticated torque-sensing all-wheel-drive system.

Again, Ford and other American automobile makers are on a very strong rebound, especially due to the current Toyota Recall. The computers in these cars should also have the technology to control and launch mobile UAV's.


The Bunker Busting Robot

This Robotic Underground Munition [RUM] is being developed by the US Defense Threat Reduction Agency to drill deep underground into enemy bunkers then explode, creating a very expensive one time use.

Our Last Defense Against Earthquakes

The Stanford University "Quake-Catcher" has been available since 2008, but due to current frequency and intensity of the earthquakes in Haiti and Chile, they have experienced many new users that will allow the earthquake predictor to work with more efficiency. Using accelerometers built into many new laptops, the software takes note if many laptops are all shaking in the same area and uses this information to track the earthquake.

My only problem with technology like this is that it uses expensive laptop sensors that are expensive and not available in the areas that will be most affected by "increased frequency and intensity" of storms and geothermal activity [Taken from my notes in Prof. Gary Yohe's class and the IPCC Report], most notably the "third-world."


Sources: [Smart Planet] [Gizmodo] [Engadget]

Military Technology: The F-35 Lightning II

It can land in your backyard, so Air Force pilots can use them on dates

Source: [Crunch Gear]

Protonex Fuel-Cell will Power HULC Exoskeleton for 3 Days

The Human Universal Load Carrier [HULC] exoskeleton designed by Berkeley Bionics in 2008 to allow a man to easily carry an extra 200 pounds effortlessly now has a new power source thanks to Lockheed Martin's new fuel-cell power pack.

Sources: [Engadget]

DARPA: Falcon HTV-3X

Using regular propulsion, then ramjets, then scramjets to push the jet upwards of 1700-2000 meter per second [4000 mph]. The jet, in seeming competition with the latest Russian T-50 Stealth jet, is built to carry 12,000 pounds of cargo over large distance at incredible speeds.

Sources: [Crunch Gear]

Military Technology: The Python

The Python was created and is in use by the British Royal Engineers to clear half a kilometer of possible IED territory. It is the latest British weapon against the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan.


"The Python rocket is a trailer-mounted, rocket-propelled mine-clearing system pulled behind the Trojan armoured engineer tank. The Python system fires a snake of high explosives. The detonation, across a suspected IED field in a dry river bed – wadi – north of Patrol Base Wahid, shook the ground either side of the detonation, and created a huge cloud several hundred metres high."

Sources: [Gizmodo] [Ministry of Defense]

A Flashlight/Machine Gun

Did he say the Magpul FMG-9 is for "checking your mailbox?"



Sources: [Boing Boing]

Turn Your Car Into A Tank

Source: [Crunch Gear]

Military Technology Review

This week in the OE MILITARY TECHNOLOGY REVIEW we explored modern military advancement in weaponry, comparing the enemies of the Cold War's new T-50 stealth mig to the US mounted lazer rocket bomb destruction system, as well as exposing a company's false bomb sensing equipment that has cost many men their lives in Iraq.

Russian T-50 Stealth Mig

The Russian 5th Generation PAK FA T-50 "Sukhhoi" Stealth Fighter was developed by the Russian Air Force to compete with the US F-22 Raptor. After years of secrecy the mig was finally released for public view, as Russia flex's its military technology muscle.


Humvee-Mounter Laser-Avenger
This lazer-guided IED finder spots and destroys roadside bombs.

 

Fraud Bomb Detectors Kill Hundreds
AED-651 Bomb Detector are fakes, yet the Iraqi government spent $85 million on them. Each Bomb-Magic-Wand cost $40,000 and do not even work.

This BBC exclusive shows that the company, that promotes its device can find a bomb "up to a kilometer away," shipped empty useless bomb detectors into Iraq.

Sources:
[Gizmodo] [Russia Today]
[Gizmodo] [Wired.com]
[Gizmodo] [BBC] [CrunchGear]

Nano Tech: Spray On Liquid Glass

It makes your clothing invincible to the elements. SiO2 Ultra-Thin layering spray coats clothing with a thin protective layer that repels dirt, heat, UV radiation, and infections.

The image shows the SiO2 coating on a filament of a microfibre, illustrating the 100 nanometer thick protective layer.

"... the nano-scale glass coating bonds to the surface because of the quantum forces involved. According to the manufacturers, liquid glass has a long-lasting antibacterial effect because microbes landing on the surface cannot divide or replicate easily."


"A year-long trial of the spray in a Lancashire hospital also produced "very promising" results for a range of applications including coatings for equipment, medical implants, catheters, sutures and bandages. The war graves association in the UK is investigating using the spray to treat stone monuments and grave stones, since trials have shown the coating protects against weathering and graffiti. Trials in Turkey are testing the product on monuments such as the Ataturk Mausoleum in Ankara."

Sources: [Gizmodo] [Physorg] [Boing Boing]

Want to Stream your UAV Video to your Cellphone?

"The system allows anyone to route video signals from UAVs—or any aerial surveillance craft or satellite—to any cellphone around the world, using an encrypted data signal. The signal gets transmitted in real time to a command center. Then, HT4Sight compresses and encrypts the video, sending the stream to any phone in a cellular, Wi-Fi, or satellite network."




[Gizmodo] [Helinet Technologies]

Security Technology: Human Scanners

Remember in Total Recall when the train stations and airports all had body scanners for security measures? This technology now exists and has been implemented in US airports around the country.

Some believe that these scanners are an invasion of privacy.

The American Association for Nude Recreation announced:

"A trained security professional in a remote monitoring station takes a few seconds discreetly screening passengers to be sure they're only bringing what nature gave them aboard. In exchange for safer skies, AANR believes it's completely worth it. But you don't have to be a nudist to agree these measures are based on common sense."


Source: Gizmodo

Mars 2025: The First Crew

The Possible First Men and Woman to Land on Mars

Here at OE Technology we strongly believe the technology to land human life on mars already exists, it just needs to be adapted for suitable application. When imagining humans living on Mars or the Moon, it seems pretty logical that robots would be used to build shelters for human visitors. This technology is already under major development:

Honda Asimo

VS.

Toyota Robot Violinist