Tasting the Light: Device Lets the Blind "See" with Their Tongues

Neuroscientist Paul Bach-y-Rita hypothesized in the 1960s that "we see with our brains not our eyes." Now, a new device trades on that thinking and aims to partially restore the experience of vision for the blind and visually impaired by relying on the nerves on the tongue's surface to send light signals to the brain.

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Legacy B-52 to launch futuristic WaveRider

The X-51A WaveRider is one step closer to its inaugural test flight later this year, now that airmen at Edwards Air Force Base have successfully "mated" the scramjet-propelled vehicle to a B-52 Stratofortress.

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DARPA 3D reasoning engine to identify urban threats

DARPA is spending millions of dollars to identify trash cans, which may have raised a few eyebrows, except these and other common urban objects could in the course of today's combat missions prove to be tactically significant.

BAE Systems received a $7.1 million contract to work on Phase II of the Urban Reasoning and Geospatial Exploitation Technology (URGENT) program, which is designed to improve the quality and timeliness of geospatial intelligence U.S. troops receive when facing enemy threats in urban environments.

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Gigantic Lightning Jets Shoot from Clouds to Space

Strokes of lightning flashing down towards the ground are a familiar sight during summer thunderstorms, but scientists have capture an image of a rare lightning bolt shooting out upwards from a cloud, almost to the edge of the Earth's atmosphere.

These bolts of upwards lightning, one type among a variety of electrical discharges now known to occur above thunderstaorms, are called gigantic jets, and were only first discovered in 2001.

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Flexible, Stretchable LEDs Promise Better Displays

Bend it, twist it, roll it or stretch it, a new light emitting diode, or LED, created by scientists will still light up.

The new flexible and stretchable LEDs could be used in everything from bumper mounted brake lights to computer and television screens that roll up into a pen.

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Flexible, Stretchable LEDs Promise Better Displays

Bend it, twist it, roll it or stretch it, a new light emitting diode, or LED, created by scientists will still light up.

The new flexible and stretchable LEDs could be used in everything from bumper mounted brake lights to computer and television screens that roll up into a pen.

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$2.5 Billion Order Launches Su-35 Production

The Russian government has finally committed to production of the Sukhoi Su-35 combat aircraft, which features thrust-vectoring and e-scan radar. At the MAKS 2009 airshow at Zhukovsky airbase near Moscow this month, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin signed a contract worth $2.5 billion for 48 Su-35S models.

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EASA Certifies New 'Autopilot/Flight Director' TCAS Mode for A380

Following recent successful development testing, a new Auto-Pilot/Flight-Director (AP/FD) TCAS mode for the Airbus A380 has been approved and certified by the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA).The main benefit of the system is that it could further enhance safety during a traffic avoidance situation because the pilot can now fly the aircraft without switching out of one mode and into another. Thus, by simplifying the actions required by the pilot during a TCAS manoeuvre, this enhanced TCAS mode minimises potential overreactions or inverse reactions while preserving his or her concentration at a critical time.

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Needle-free injection

A needle-free injection system that takes its inspiration from the technology used to activate car airbags has been created by pervormanc.The Pyrofast system uses a fine, high-pressure jet stream to penetrate the skin and deliver liquid or solid drugs to the tissue beneath. According to the German company, the entire process takes 40m/s and creates a puncture that is four times smaller than that caused by conventional needle injections.

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National Ignition Facility Prepares for Fusion Test

Federal researchers are slowly testing 192 lasers that they hope will set off the world's first controlled nuclear fusion reaction.

The lasers are housed at the National Ignition Facility (NIF), a $4 billion complex the size of three football fields that is part of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif.

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NASA's Greatest Mission? Stardust Finds Amino Acids, Keeps on Giving to Science

Some scientific missions are fonts of information that keep on giving and giving, and Stardust has been one of the most fruitful. Launched in 1999, the unmanned craft made a pass through the tail of comet Wild-2 in 2004, and returned to Earth in 2006 with the first cometary material ever retrieved in space and brought back. What scientists found in that sample has changed their understanding of how these "dirty snowballs" formed and provided clues to what the early history of the solar system was like. Now, a new study confirms the finding that the amino acid glycine, a building block of life, was among the samples brought home. And, Stardust shows, comets have a lot more to tell us.

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NASA Successfully Tests Vacuum-Packed Inflatable Heat Shield

Packed into a 15-inch shroud payload, the shield launched this morning aboard a small sounding rocket from the space agency's Wallops Flight Facility off the coast of Virginia. After reaching an altitude of 124 miles, the shield unpacks and inflates itself into a 10-foot diameter mushroom shape of silicone-coated fabric.

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NASA Successfully Tests Nuclear Reactor to Power Future Moon Bases

The fission reactor uses a sodium-potassium liquid metal mixture to transfer heat to a Stirling engine, which then uses gas pressure for electricity conversion. Testing has been successful so far, as researchers have been able to generate a constant 2.3 kilowatts of power from the engine, using a non-nuclear heat source. With the full nuclear reactor running, their goal is to produce 40 kilowatts of power.

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