radio waves

Two Oslo-based design researchers have created a visual model of RFID fields in an effort to show curious designers how RFID looks and works, and help shed light on its functionality.

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Researchers from Tel Aviv University believe they've found a way to detect the severity of an oncoming flood in any given location using date from the area's network of cell towers. But it doesn't make use of human to human communications; instead, it revolves around measuring humidity in the air.

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If the paranoid blogosphere is to be believed, every morning a group of plasma-physics grad students wakes up at a research facility in Gakona, Alaska, 200 miles north of Anchorage, and prepares for another day of playing God. It’s cold, dark as a mineshaft in winter, and the day’s work does little to cheer the mood. Depending on the unpredictable agendas of military scientists, this group of technicians must shoot radio waves into the upper reaches of our atmosphere to create missile shields, eviscerate enemy satellites, set off the occasional earthquake, or control the minds of millions of people.

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Scientists conducting pre-clinical trials have shown that tiny nanotubes, heated up with radio waves, can destroy cancer cells while leaving healthy cells relatively unharmed. The tests, performed in rabbits, showed that the radio-nanotube technique fries the cancer completely, and without side effects.

The next trick, according to the group, is figuring out how to deliver those nanotubes to the right spot. They need to ensure that they attach to tumor cells, and not the healthy kind. The scientists suggest that clinical trials of the technique, a continuation of work begun by nanotech pioneer Richard Smalley before his 2005 death, are at least three years away.—Gregory Mone

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Ever wonder what a blackhole sounds like? The sun? Remnants of the Big Bang? Yeah, neither had we but it turns out the answer is wind crossed with radio waves, an electronic heartbeat and the ocean. How? SpaceSounds has collected a handful of radio telescope recordings of pulsars, planets and machines (check out the oddly-addictive beeps of Sputnik). There are  also human voices in the mix: Kennedy gives his "Man on the Moon" speech, ground control and the Apollo spacecraft communicate, a ground operator highlights technical issues Skylab 1 experiences during liftoff.

If written description isn't hacking it, listen for yourself at spacesounds.com

Via manhattansersguide.com

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Vacation snapshots are nice, but wouldn´t they be nicer if you could swipe your cellphone over them to retrieve video, sound files and captions? That´s the idea behind the Memory Spot, an adhesive chip in development at Hewlett-Packard´s Bristol, England, facility. The stamp-like memory device comes in two sizes, 1.4 or 2 millimeters square. Affixed to a photo or document, it can store and transfer up to four megabytes of data, enough for a short video or a couple songs.

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Forgot your wallet? You´ll need a better excuse than that for passing on the check. By next year, you´ll be able to pay simply by swiping your cellphone a few inches from a cash register, with a new wireless standard called Near Field Communication. An NFC chip in your phone will send your credit-card number-stored on your phone or on the chip-by way of short-distance radio waves. An electronic reader at the checkout will decode the number and ring up your purchase.

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You bet. But first, a primer: Smart Personal Objects Technology (SPOT) is a service from Microsoft that uses FM radio waves to send personalized text feeds-including news, stock quotes, weather, movie listings, appointments and instant messages-to SPOT-enabled wristwatches. A number of models are available from Suunto, Swatch, Tissot and others (see spotstop.com for a full list).
I've had a SPOT watch (two, actually, plus one for my wife) since their debut in 2004, and I love it.

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