Clearing away backlog tech stuff

[dracodraconis]

Source: News @ Nature According to a Nature article, the debris from China's test of an anti-sattelite missile could remain in orbit for more than 10 years, wreaking havoc on nearby weather satellites owned by other countries. The US had abandoned their own anti-satellite experiments for fear of seriously debris damaging their own satellites.

Source: Daily Tech Phillips recently demonstrated it's Lumalive fabric LED technology at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). The fabric consists of 20-cm square arrays of 14 by 14 pixels that can operate for about 3 hours. The LEDs are embedded in a fabric matrix that is machine-washable. A Windows interface is also available to allow the user to customize the display. No word yet on cost.

Source: Technology Review A new radar-imaging system analyzes the walking gate of people to determine the likelihood that they are carrying an explosive. The system also detects objects carried by the person that could be a weapon or explosive. More work is needed to "perfect" the gate analysis system before it can be deployed in places like airports.

Source: Technology Review Apple may have been one of the first to announce a product using a multi-touch screen, but a host of applications are expected to follow it into the marketplace. Researchers at New York University are designing large display systems that will track more than 20 simultaneous "touches", allowing for a more complex and intuitive interface than possible with mouse and keyboard alone. Tracking multiple touches on a large screen could open the door to more interactive systems. A cool video of the multi-touch system can be found at YouTube.

Source: Engadget More on the single-photon storage system: The technique involves firing a single photon through a grating, the structure of the grating is stored in the diffraction pattern. The light is then slowing down using cesium gas. They are hoping to almost completely stop the light, allowing the image to be stored "permanently" (or long enough to be considered permanent). Don't expect to see this outside the lab for quite a while.

Comments

[ironphoenix.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, the Chinese experiment. It brings back memories of doing ionizing radiation analysis and shielding design for a satellite spectrometer. There was this experiment by the US military way back when, called Starfish Prime (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starfish_Prime), in which they popped a nuke in near-Earth space. LEO satellite designers have had to contend with the trapped particles (in Earth's magnetic field) in from this explosion ever since.

On another note, I think you mean "gait," not "gate."

[dracodraconis.livejournal.com]

Yes, evaluating the gates would be of no use since they don't tend to walk around much, nor do they tend to hold extremist viewpoints... at least not that we know of.

I wonder if Starfish Prime was the experiment that lead to the space weapons testing moratorium in the US. Even without testing anti-satellite systems, we have an incredible amount of junk floating around causing problems.