Make Sinking Ice

Cost: $65
Time: 2
Hours
Safe | | | | |
Risky

Want a surefire bet for your next cocktail party? First, tell your guests
that aquatic life—at least in temperate
climates—depends largely on the fact
that ice floats. If it sank, lakes would freeze solid instead of forming an
insulating layer of ice on top, killing all the fish. Now bet that you can
magically make an ice cube sink. Grab one from a glass of special cubes

In presidential campaign of 2004, Bush and Kerry managed to find one piece of common ground: Both spoke glowingly of a future powered by fuel cells. Hydrogen would free us from our dependence on fossil fuels and would dramatically curb emissions of air pollutants, including carbon dioxide, the gas chiefly blamed for global warming. The entire worldwide energy market would evolve into a “hydrogen economy” based on clean, abundant power. Auto manufacturers and environmentalists alike happily rode the bandwagon, pointing to hydrogen as the next big thing in U.S. energy policy.

Sony's high-capacity blue laser DVD recorder, set to debut in the United States this fall, crams five times more information on a
disc than the standard red laser version does and heralds the arrival of next-generation technology. Enthusiasts eager to get their hands on that much data capacity, however, may think twice after learning that production snags boosted the DVD's price to about $3,500. But researchers at BlackLight Power in Cranbury, New
Jersey, say they have made a discovery that may help overcome technical hurdles and get reliable blue lasers to market.

High-altitude Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) could soon be capable of staying aloft for weeks at a time, providing telecommunications services or gathering military intelligence over a future battlefield.