Tech

Tech

Road Warriors: Robotic vehicles triumph over desert obstacles

In a landmark contest that has spurred advances in robotic-vehicle technology, five driverless racing machines piloted themselves over more than 200 kilometers of rugged desert terrain.

Computing

Untangling a Web: The Internet gets a new look

A new mathematical model of the Internet shows that it may not be as vulnerable to centralized attacks as previous research suggested.

Tech

Humane bloodletting

Medical researchers have designed a new lancet that dramatically reduces the pain experienced by lab mice during blood-sampling procedures.

Tech

Light sensor may improve battlefield tools

A new microscale ultraviolet-light sensor could help shrink the size of some military field systems used for detecting biowarfare agents and clandestine communications to the dimensions of a cell phone.

Tech

Getting a charge out of backpacking

A backpack enhanced with springs, gears, and a generator converts the up-and-down motions of the wearer into enough electricity to power portable electronic gadgets.

Tech

Growing Expectations

Biofuels made from waste agricultural plant matter are gaining prominence as new technologies make them increasingly competitive with petroleum fuels.

Tech

Stepping Lightly: New view of how human gaits conserve energy

Using a simple mathematical model, scientists may have pinpointed the key aspects of human locomotion that make ordinary walking and running the most energy-efficient ways for people to get around on foot.

Tech

Electronics Gets Y’s: Nanotubes branch out as novel transistors

Y-shaped nanotubes might become a common component in ultrasmall electronic circuitry.

Tech

Body-fluid battery

A battery that's activated by body fluids such as saliva or urine may one day power devices ranging from disposable home health-care testing kits to emergency radio transmitters that turn on with a lick.

Tech

Wings warp for birdlike agility

An easily maneuverable, bird-size airplane whose wings can change shape in flight may be able to carry out a variety of assignments in tight spots.

Tech

Roughing up counterfeiters

A new anticounterfeiting scheme generates unique, reproducible identity codes that could be used to authenticate passports, credit cards, and other items on the basis of inherent, microscopic irregularities in the items' surfaces.

Tech

Electronic Leap: Plastic component may lead to ubiquitous radio tags

Tiny radio circuits cheap enough to be embedded into countless products have moved closer to reality with the development of a fast, plastic semiconductor diode.