Templates made from polymer nanofibers enable the formation of long-lived silicon nanostructures that store ten times as much charge as do graphite battery terminals.

Electron tunneling drives a conformational change in each wheel of a four-wheel drive, single molecule nanocar, driving it across a copper surface.

In light of our continuing interest in the ways in which nanotechnology will interact with robotics and other emerging technologies, here is an update from IEEE Spectrum on the Boston Dynamics robot project. The earlier version called BigDog was cited here a few years ago, and was impressive enough. The update is a substantially improved [...]

Zyvex Technologies announced that its 54-foot boat named Piranha completed a rough-weather sea test near Puget Sound in the Pacific Ocean, demonstrating record fuel efficiency.

The 4th International Conference on carbon nanotechnology and space elevator systems, Dec. 4-5, 2010, is available for remote participation or listening-in.

The brothers Montgolfier invented the hot air balloon upon the observation that smoke rises, and thus they figured that if they could catch it in a bag, the bag would be pulled upward. Hot air ballooning is quite popular today; people think of balloons as being quaint and pretty and natural, or at least more [...]

Just for fun, imagine you could build a tower up to geosynchronous orbital height. If you stepped off the top floor, you’d just hang there, in orbit. If the tower you build is shorter, you’d fall, since (a) you aren’t going quite as fast, and (b) orbital speed is faster as you get lower. However, [...]

Roboplane tech can deal with air-traffic control directly • The Register. Flying cars – or personal aircraft anyway – have moved a step nearer, as ongoing trials using robot aeroplanes and next-gen air traffic equipment in America are said to offer the option of “reduced crews” on commercial cargo flights. US aerospace firm GE Aviation [...]

Previous in series: VTOL So, how close are we to flying cars? For specificity, let’s pick a technological bar to hurdle that answers most of the objections to the concept we’ve seen as comments on the previous posts: It should be relatively high-powered compared to current light craft. It should be STOVL for safety and [...]

Previous in series: Why would I not want a flying car? How close to a true VTOL does a flying car have to be to retain the advantages we would like?  If you have to keep it at an airport, you have to drive there and back in a separate vehicle, obviating many of the [...]

Previous in series: Why would I want a flying car? There have been many reasons urged against the concept of flying cars; let’s take stock of them here: They are impractical (and thus time spent on the concept is wasted) They would be noisy or unsightly They would be dangerous, to the occupants or to [...]

Previous in series: Where is my flying car? Let’s consider:  I live in Laporte, PA, and have an office in the Foresight suite in Menlo Park, CA. That’s a distance of about 2800 miles, and I could drive it in about 40 hours, a full working week.  That’s a substantial commute. Of course, I don’t [...]