Technology

(Photo: Speak Dolphin)

The fact that there is a dolphin using an iPad is perhaps less amazing than the surprise that Apple's marketing department had nothing to do with it. Yes, Merlin the dolphin has an iPad, and he and his trainer are using it to better understand each other's communication patterns. If successful, the Apple gadget may help break the dolphin-human language barrier.

Ever since the debut of the iPad, there have a plethora of cats, dogs, birds, and mice playing with the Apple gadget. Though some, like the amazing cat Iggy, seem to demonstrate a level of self-awareness about the iPad, Merlin is the first mammal to use it as a learning tool.

The innovative program was the brainchild of dolphin researcher Jack Kassewitz of Speak Dolphin, an organization dedicated to unlocking the secrets of cetacean communication. Kassewitz explains:

The use of the iPad is part of our continuing search to find a suitable touchscreen technology which the dolphins can activate with the tip of their rostrums or beaks ... We think that once the dolphins get the hang of the touchscreen, we can let them choose from a wide assortment of symbols to represent objects, actions, and even emotions.

The researchers have found a way to waterproof the iPad and are now using it to help Merlin — an animal that lives in Puerto Aventuras, Mexico — to make associations between physical objects and digital representations of those objects. The next step will be to layer in verbs and prepositions, making the dream of interactive communication with the brainiest animals on the planet a true possibility.

via: Boing Boing

Karl Burkart writes a regular column for the Mother Nature Network, where this post originally appeared.

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One of the most frequent objections to renewable energy systems is that their production is too variable. But technologies continue to be developed that will allow storage of power generated from wind, solar, and other intermittent renewable sources. The latest development comes from researchers at Isentropic in Cambridge, England who propose giant batteries filled with gravel and argon gas. These batteries would provide a number advantages over pumped hydro, which is presently used for almost all electricity storage today, as well as over underground compressed air storage.

The gravel battery system would use excess capacity generated by a renewable source to heat and pressurize the argon gas and then pump it through a gravel filled silo to store energy. Then, when demand calls for electricity, the system is simply operated in reverse to generate electricity. According to the company, the system's "round trip efficiency is over 72% - 80%." This is comparable to the efficiency of pumped storage hydro, which has an efficiency of 70% - 85%. But gravel batteries are much more compact, and can be more readily installed in relatively flat areas characteristic of many areas with good windpower potential, such as the American Great Plains. A gravel battery can use far less land (1/300th) than that required for a pumped hydro lake, as well.

Underground compressed air storage is another technology that has been suggested, but that requires the presence of underground caverns, which are not always present where you might want to put a power storage facility. In addition to being able to be located anywhere, gravel batteries could be relatively inexpensive because they do not need costly materials. Costs could be as low as $55/kWh, and $10/kWh at scale for large installations.

via: Worldchanging

It seems like pee, or more specifically urea, is becoming quite the sustainable ingredient.  Beyond being tapped as a good source of hydrogen, it's powering batteries and is now being used to make sustainable bricks.

Architect Ginger Krieg Dosier has designed a way of "growing" bricks by combining sand, bacteria, calcium chloride and urea, all easy-to-come-by materials.  Traditional brick-making is very energy-intensive, producing more pollution than global air travel each year.  It's also consumes a lot of resources:  400 trees are burned to make 25,000 bricks.

These Better Bricks are created through a chain of chemical reactions known as microbial-induced calcite precipitation.  Once all the ingredients are combined, the bacteria serves as a glue that binds the sand together, creating a brick that is as tough as a fired-clay brick or even marble and requires no baking to achieve that strength.

If Better Bricks replaced all traditionally-fired bricks, 800 million tons of CO2 emissions would be eliminated each year.

via Inhabitat

Aerogel, the amazing material that is 37 times better than fiberglass as insulation, could also be the perfect tool for cleaning up oil spills.  The downside is that Aerogel isn't ready for the large-scale production necessary to help with the current oil disaster.

The material is incredibly low density - it's mostly air - so it has the capacity to absorb a lot of oil.  The maker of Aerogel, AeroClay, is beginning testing on an Aerogel sponge that could be made to soak up either water or oil.  By modifying the polymers that keep the material from collapsing, scientists can program the sponge to absorb different liquids or particles.  Aerogel has been used by NASA in the past to capture comet dust.

In the case of an oil spill, the sponge could be used like a dish sponge to clean oil off birds or rocks, or, even better, be deployed to keep oil from ever reaching the shore.

Although we hope that a major oil spill like the one in the Gulf of Mexico never happens again, it's good to know that technology is being developed to make us better prepared if it does.

via Treehugger

 

 

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Solar panel materials are getting thinner and thinner. Now, MIT researchers have announced a method for printing solar cell material on paper.

The efficiency of this method is far lower than other kinds of solar cells. The paper solar cells have an efficiency of around 1.5-2%, while commercial silicon wafer solar panels are generally around the 15-20% efficiency range. However, the scientists point out that this is still a research technology and is years from commercialization.

Even if the efficiency does not improve dramatically, it may be possible that cheap and abundant solar collecting materials provide a better and more cost-effective way of getting power, especially for portable electronic devices.

The relative effect of the chemicals and processes used in system may also be an issue. If there are less harmful materials used in a printed solar cell technology, the benefits that offers may also outweigh the relative efficiency gap as compared with the more toxic option.

Japan's population is getting older.  Their birth rate has declined, and with that, a drop in production of baby diapers.  But conversely, the production of adult diapers has risen seven percent in just two years, hitting 5 billion units last year.  Leave it to Japan to turn an increase in adult diaper waste into a great fuel making opportunity.

Enter Japanese company Super Faiths who has created their SFD Recycle System machine that automatically shreds, dries and sterilizes dirty diapers from hospitals and nursing homes, and turns them into fuel pellets. These bacteria-free pellets can then be used in biomass boilers and stoves for home or water heating.

Unlike the diaper-recycling plants that exist in Europe, these machines can be installed directly at the source.  A hospital in Tokyo has two machines that process a total of 1,400 pounds of disposable diapers a day.  It takes a day for the diapers to become fuel material.

Super Faiths has three different sized models that can process from 330 to 1,102 pounds of diapers a day.

via CNET

NASA's newest robot can dive and swim for indefinite periods of time because it's powered by an unlimited resource: the ocean's temperatures.  The robotic buoy utilizes thermal energy each time it moves from cold deep waters to warm surface waters.

The SOLO-TREC diver has been taking 500-meter dives off the coast of Hawaii collecting information on ocean salinity and currents since last November. The robot makes three trips a day, constantly recharging itself.

The robot is outfitted with tubes of oil. Those tubes are surrounded by a compartment filled with wax that liquifies once the robot hits warm waters. The liquified wax expands, which squeezes the oil from the tubes into the interior of the buoy it's stored at high pressure.  The oil is then released, which drives the generator and charges the batteries.

This process produces about 1.6 Wh, which fuels the buoy's functions like water intake and expulsion, a GPS receiver, and its sensors and transmitters.

NASA plans to create a whole fleet of these robot buoys that will monitor various ocean conditions. The next step will be to develop similar devices that would never require a battery change.

via New Scientist

Imagine being able to pitch solar tents in situations where you need both some protective cover and access to clean energy - perhaps as a car port for a plug-in EV or a disaster relief shelter.  A new tensile solar fabric from FTL Solar could be used in variety of ways and, as a bonus, it isn't an eyesore either.

A great example of highly functional design, the PowerMods as they're called bring together super-strong fabric and thin-film PV.  The possible uses for this solar fabric are almost endless:  battery charging stations, medical units, military bases, temporary housing, energy pods for remote villages, solar arrays in city parks, etc.

FTL has four different models of the PowerMod, including smaller-scale lean-tos and large car-park arrays.  You can check out the specs for each model here.  Each of the models' outputs are calculated on five hours of sunlight ranging from 1,068 Wh a day for the smallest model to to 2,040 kWh a day for the largest.

via Michelle Kaufman

Japan's solar sail-powered "space yacht" is all set to launch on May 18.  Ikaros (Interplanetary Kite-Craft Accelerated by Radiation of the Sun) will be the first spacecraft of its kind to attempt to reach deep space.

The craft's 46-foot sails, outfitted with ultra-thin solar cells, will be steered by mission control from the ground, tweaking the angles to ensure enough of the sun's rays are hitting the craft to keep it powering on into space.  Other solar-sailed crafts have gone into space, but none have made it beyond orbit.  One reason could be that it's not a cheap mission.  The JAXA space program has already spent $16 million on this project.

Ikaros will be launched into space by a rocket along with Japan's first Venus-bound satellite before they separate and Ikaros goes fuel-free for the rest of its journey.

The Planetary Society also has a solar-powered space flight planned for sometime this year.  It will interesting to see how the two fair.

via Popular Science