Week of Sun, 2006-12-31 00:00 to Sat, 2007-01-06 23:59

A new kind of screening system, called "the Backscatter", is somewhat controversial, but may soon be used in several airports.

Some U.S. airports will soon begin using what's known as "backscatter x-ray technology" to screen passengers. The technology can see through materials such as clothing -- and that raises concerns.

Google has joined a group of 19 universities, national labs and private foundations that are building the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST).

Scheduled to begin operations in 2013, the 8.4-meter LSST will be able to survey the entire visible sky deeply in multiple colors every week with its three-billion pixel digital camera. The telescope will probe the mysteries of dark matter and dark energy, and it will open a movie-like window on objects that change or move rapidly: exploding supernovae, potentially hazardous near-Earth asteroids as small as 100 meters, and distant Kuiper Belt Objects.

Lockheed Martin has been awarded a $619 million contract from the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) to begin production of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) Weapon System. The contract for the first two THAAD fire units includes 48 interceptors, six launchers and two fire control and communications units. The system is scheduled for fielding in Fiscal Year 2009.

Final assembly, integration and testing of production equipment will take place at Lockheed Martin’s award-winning manufacturing facilities in Troy, AL, and Camden, AR.

A new competition launched this year will see students design a space settlement located in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. The Regional Space Settlement Competition, sponsored by Imperial College London, will guarantee the winning team a place in the 14th International Space Settlement Design Competition. This will be held in July 2007 at NASA’s Johnson Space Centre, Houston, USA.

Samsung Electronics Co. created the first LCD panel that can produce independent images on each side of a mobile LCD display. The new double-sided LCD can show two entirely different pictures or sets of visual data simultaneously on the front and back of the same screen. Other conventional double-sided LCDs can only show a reverse image of the same video data.

General Motors Corp. awarded advanced battery development contracts to two suppliers to design and test lithium-ion batteries for use in the Saturn Vue Green Line plug-in hybrid SUV.

One contract has been awarded to Johnson Controls – Saft Advanced Power Solutions, LLC, a joint venture between Tier 1 automotive supplier Johnson Controls and Saft. Another agreement was signed with Cobasys, in partnership with A123Systems. Cobasys, based in Orion, Mich., is a joint venture between Chevron Technology Ventures LLC, a subsidiary of Chevron Corp., and Energy Conversion Devices, Inc. A123Systems, based in Watertown, Mass., is a leading manufacturer of high power lithium-ion batteries.

Space assets typically provided strategic surveillance behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War. A little more than a decade later, theater space operators use space assets to support a range of tactical missions including communications, navigation, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance: keys to victory for today's war fighter.

"Today, space is a critical integrator and enabler on the modern battlefield and the operators are not just Airmen," Major Endicott said.

Telesat plans to build and launch Nimiq 5, the latest in the line of satellites carrying digital television to Canadian viewers.

Bell ExpressVu will have exclusive use of the satellite to provide a wide range of high-definition and specialty television services to
its subscribers.

The satellite's manufacturing plan also includes contracts with the Canadian satellite industry, including multiplexers and switches from Com Dev International Ltd. and antennas from MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates, Ltd.

Northrop Grumman Corporation will develop system definition requirements for the U.S. Air Force's Alternate Infrared Satellite System (AIRSS) that would provide uninterrupted space-based early missile detection.

Under a contract valued at $24.8 million from the Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center, the company's Space Technology sector will define system-level performance requirements for the space, ground and launch segments and key subsystems.

NASA has completed the Ares I crew launch vehicle system requirements review. The review brings the agency one step closer to developing a new mode of space transportation for astronauts on missions to explore the moon, Mars and other destinations.

The system requirements review confirmed that the Ares I system requirements were complete, validated and responsive to mission requirements.

Newly published research by Rice University chemists and North Carolina State University toxicologists finds that repetitive movement can speed the uptake of nanoparticles through the skin.

The research is based on in vitro experiments involving animal skin that was exposed to buckyball-containing amino acids. It appears in the Jan. 10 issue of the American Chemical Society's journal Nano Letters.

A pair of University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers have developed a method of making flexible, thin-film transistors (TFTs) that are not only inexpensive to produce, but also capable of high speeds — even microwave frequency, impossible before now.

Assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering Zhenqiang (Jack) Ma and graduate student Hao-Chih Yuan recently demonstrated flexible TFTs capable of operating at a world-record speed of 7.8 GHz.

Cisco to acquire the privately held company, IronPort Systems, Inc. of San Bruno, Calif.

“We feel there is enormous potential for enhanced email and message protection solutions to be integrated into the existing Cisco Self-Defending Network framework,” said Richard Palmer, senior vice president of Cisco’s Security Technology Group. “Using the network as a flexible platform to integrate IronPort’s technologies, Cisco will be able to build new security applications as customers’ demands evolve.”

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has allowed California's Zero Emissions Vehicle (ZEV) regulations to take effect by approving a waiver in late December. Under the Clean Air Act, California is the only state allowed to set regulations for automobile emissions that are more restrictive than federal law, but other states are allowed to adopt the California regulations.

Novell today announced its SUSE® Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 has earned a 2007 InfoWorld Technology of the Year Award, being named “Best Linux Desktop.”

The InfoWorld award is the latest significant honor for SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10. It was named “Best of Show” and “Best Desktop Solution” at August's LinuxWorld in San Francisco, and Novell's Nat Friedman received the first-ever VARBusiness “Technologist of the Year” award in October for his role in developing the innovative Linux desktop. InfoWorld's annual awards recognize the top technology sectors that matter most to enterprise IT, as well as identify the best and most innovative enterprise products that have fundamentally altered the IT landscape. Winners are selected by InfoWorld test center analysts based on innovation and effectiveness.

With wireless technology, consumers can easily network their computers within their household and access the Internet through any of their computers.

Consumers can sit in a lawn chair on their back porch and catch up on their e-mail and news, even do some online banking. But with this newfound convenience lies a new danger.

AM General and General Dynamics Land Systems today will form a joint venture to compete for the U.S. Army and Marine Corps Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV) program.

General Tactical Vehicles, the joint venture company, will design, develop and produce a highly mobile, highly survivable and innovative wheeled utility vehicle for the armed services to meet all the requirements of the JLTV program. The joint venture is the first-ever collaborative project for the two American defense companies, both of whom were awarded JLTV “Best Technical Approach” trade studies by the Office of Naval Research in 2006.

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. is now sampling its 16-gigabit (Gb) NAND flash memory – the first NAND flash using 50 nanometer (nm) process technology.

The first samples of this high density NAND flash memory have a multi-level cell (MLC) design with a 4Kbyte (KB) page size to enhance both its read and write features. The new 4KB page function improves the conventional 2KB paging system for MLC NAND flash to double the read speed, while increasing write performance 150%.

Satellite imagery meshed with video-game technology is allowing University of Colorado at Boulder and NASA researchers to virtually "fly" along footpaths used by Central Americans 2,000 years ago on spiritual pilgrimages to ancestral cemeteries.

The effort has allowed researchers to trace the movements of ancient people in the Arenal region of present-day Costa Rica, who used single-file paths to navigate rugged terrain between small villages and cemeteries over the centuries, said CU-Boulder Professor Payson Sheets. The repeated use of the footpaths caused erosion resulting in narrow trenches in the landscape up to 10 feet deep.

Along with the increasing number of hybrid vehicles sharing the roadways with traditional fossil-fueled autos, there has also been an increase of hydrogen-powered fuel cell vehicles on Air Force bases.

Hydrogen station officials here say the concept of hydrogen isn't new. NASA has been using the substance for both propulsion and power generation in the form of fuel cells aboard the space shuttles for years. Now the Air Force is bringing that technology down to earth.

Engineers at UC San Diego have synthesized a long-sought semiconducting material that may pave the way for an inexpensive new kind of light emitting diode (LED) that could compete with today's widely used gallium nitride LEDs, according to a new paper in the journal Nano Letters.

To build an LED, you need both positively and negatively charged semiconducting materials; and the engineers synthesized zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoscale cylinders that transport positive charges or "holes" – so-called "p-type ZnO nanowires." They are endowed with a supply of positive charge carrying holes that, for years, have been the missing ingredients that prevented engineers from building LEDs from ZnO nanowires. In contrast, making "n-type" ZnO nanowires that carrier negative charges (electrons) has not been a problem. In an LED, when an electron meets a hole, it falls into a lower energy level and releases energy in the form of a photon of light.

Boeing has successfully completed a critical U.S. Air Force review of its Global Positioning System (GPS) Space Segment III program and has been awarded a $50 million contract for additional system design activities.

The Delta System Requirements Review, completed in November, featured an incremental capability insertion approach designed to ensure low development and delivery risks. The review is part of a $10 million follow-on order to the Phase A Concept Development Contract awarded in 2004. The U.S. Air Force is expected to award the multi-billion dollar GPS III contract in 2007.

The conversion from analog radio to digital radio is well under way around the world and gaining momentum rapidly, reports In-Stat (http://www.in-stat.com). Worldwide, the market for digital radio receivers will grow from 5 million units in 2005, to almost 25 million unit shipments in 2010, the high-tech market research firm says.

Recent research by In-Stat found the following:

* XM will hit 8 million subscribers, and Sirius will hit 6.3 million subscribers, by the end of 2006.