Monthly Archives: May 2013

Nanotechnology and Easter Island

There’s going to be an international nanotechnology conference on Easter Island, June 4 – 8, 2013,

[Downloaded from http://cedenna.cl/en/]

[Downloaded from http://cedenna.cl/en/]

A May 29, 2013 article by Kate Manning for The Santiago Times, describes Chile’s interest in nanoscience and nanotechnology,

The director of CEDENNA (Universidad de Santiago de Chile’s Center for Development of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology), Dora Altbir, said the conference will link Chilean students and young researchers with the most cutting-edge nanotechnology today and allow them to connect with leading scientists.

The director said she wants the conference to “broaden the study of nanoscience and nanotechnology in Chile, since all developed countries and many developing already conduct studies and have advanced in these disciplines.”

But broadening the study demands heftier investment. Chile allots US$4 million annually to develop nanotechnology. Comparatively, the United States and the European Union spend about US$3.7 trillion and US$1.2 billion respectively. Brazil spends US$1 billion.

Chilean politicians, the gatekeepers of public funds, often mention their goal for Chile to become a developed nation by 2016. Dangling a carrot, Altbir champions nanoscience as a field where Chile could distinguish itself in the scientific community and as a developed nation.

The conference, being organized by CEDENNA. has attracted some accomplished scientists. From the May 27, 2013 CEDENNA news release,

The conference led by the Center for the Development of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (CEDENNA) of the Universidad de Santiago de Chile will bring together leading academic scientists, researchers and students from Europe, Asia and the Americas to exchange and share their experiences and results on diverse themes related to this groundbreaking field of science.

The first week of June, the eyes of the scientific world will be focused on “the navel of the world” (Te Pito or Te Henua) given that for the first time an International Conference on Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, EINC 2013, will take place on Easter Island.

That a Conference will be held in Easter Island is no small thing. At present nanoscience and nanotechnology are at the center of groundbreaking research around the world owing to the fascinating advances that basic science is achieving in this area and the technological benefits they bring.

The Easter Island Conference on Nanoscience (EINC2013) will bring together in Chile world-class scientists from the fields of physics, chemistry and the material sciences to share their knowledge and discuss their research in nanoscience and nanotechnology.
The conference, which will take place June 4 – 8, 2013, will include the participation of two Nobel Prize winners and around 100 academic scientists, researchers and students from three continents.

Among the scientists invited to the conference are Claude Cohen-Tannoudji, Nobel Prize winner, 1997, from the École Normal Supérieure de Paris, France, Dan Shechtman, Nobel Prize winner, 2011, from Technion, Israel, Kornelius Nielsch from the University of Hamburg, Germany and Myriam Sarachick from City College of New York, USA. [emphasis mine]

(I briefly mentioned Shechtman in a May 8, 2013 posting where I noted that he’d been a pariah within his scientific community for several years. Scroll down to the last paragraph for the mention.)

I am delighted to be able to publish something about Chile and nanoscience. I have this is the first of many future mentions. You can find out more about EINC2013 here.

Stranger Visions at Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars June 3, 2013 in Washington, DC

I got a notice from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars Science and Technology Innovation Program about an art/science presentation taking place on June 3, 2013 in Washington, DC. From their May 30, 2013 announcement,

Stranger Visions: The DNA You Leave Behind

Heather Dewey-Hagborg is an information artist who is interested in exploring art as research and public inquiry. In her recent project Stranger Visions she creates literal figurative portrait sculptures from analyses of genetic material collected in public places. Working with the traces strangers unwittingly leave behind, Dewey-Hagborg calls attention to the impulse toward genetic determinism and the potential for a culture of genetic surveillance. The project raises questions about the DNA we leave behind, privacy, and numerous legal and bioethical issues.

Designed as a provocation, Stranger Visions has been featured in the international news media, including Smithsonian, CNN, the New York Times, and National Public Radio.

In this exhibit and policy discussion, Dewey-Hagborg will discuss her process and progress on Stranger Visions. She will join Professor Sonia Suter of the George Washington University Law School and Dr. Todd Kuiken and Eleonore Pauwels of the Synthetic Biology Project  in a discussion and public Q&A about the bioethical, legal, and policy dimensions of the work.

You must register to attend the event. No RSVP is required to view the webcast.

Click here to RSVP. [If you are attending in person; viewing the webcast does not require an RSVP]

*** Webcast LIVE at [http://www.wilsoncenter.org/event/stranger-visions-the-dna-you-leave-behind]***

 

What: Stranger Visions: The DNA You Leave Behind

When: June 3, 2013 from 3:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.

Who:Heather Dewey-Hagborg, Information Artist and Ph.D. Candidate at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; Professor Sonia M. Suter, George Washington University Law SchoolNancy J. Kelley, JD, MPP; Founding Executive Director of the New York Genome Center; a representative from the FBI is tentatively scheduled to discuss their methods and protocols surrounding DNA collectionand analysis.

Dr. Todd Kuiken and Eleonore Pauwels of the Synthetic Biology Project will moderate the session.

Where: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars

6th Floor Board Room

Ronald Reagan Building

1300 Pennsylvania Ave NW

Washington, D.C.

For directions, visit: http://www.wilsoncenter.org/directions

To learn more about the Synthetic Biology Project, visit: http://www.synbioproject.org/about/

It was not immediately apparent to me that this event is being held as part of the Center’s Synthetic Biology Project event series. Interesting approach to bioethical and other issues.

ETA June 3, 2013: Eleanore Pauwels, one of the Wilson Center researchers on the panel, wrote a May 31, 2013 commentary on some of the issues raised by Dewey-Hagborg’s work on Slate.com (Note: Links have been removed),

… Heather Dewey-Hagborg, a 30-year-old Ph.D. student studying electronic arts at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., has the weird habit of gathering the DNA people leave behind, from cigarette butts and fingernails to used coffee cups and chewing gum. She comes to Genspace to extract DNA from the detritus she collects and sequence specific genomic regions from her samples. The data are then fed into a computer program, which churns out a facial model of the person who left the hair, fingernail, cigarette, or gum behind. Using a 3-D printer, she creates life-sized masks that offer a depiction of what the anonymous DNA donor might look like. And they may be coming to a gallery wall near you, with a show at the New York Public Library slated for early 2014.

Such a process might seem artistically cutting edge to some. But, for most of us, the “Yuck!” factor kicks in quickly. Whether you find it cool or creepy, though, this DNA-profiling experiment raises a number of legal and ethical questions that no one knows how to handle. To what degree does the DNA we leave behind in public spaces belong to us? Does a facial mask without a name raise the same issues as a photo? In either case, what exactly is our expectation of privacy?

Just because an individual sheds DNA in a public space does not mean that he or she does not care about preserving the privacy of the genetic material. There was no informed consent given to access that data. On the other hand, some might say the major problem is not unauthorized access to data but misuse of data. It is easy to imagine a scenario in which someone sequences the genome of an acquaintance (or rival) who left a cigarette behind. If the person who tested the cigarette found a risk gene for a mental disorder and posted the results on Facebook with the smoker’s name, the information could affect his social and professional life.

…  To what extent do genetic traits (such as ancestry) tell you about how a person looks? Based on the analysis of these genetic traits, how accurate is the 3-D facial model produced by the computer? At the request of a Delaware forensic practice, Dewey-Hagborg has been working on a sculpture from a DNA sample to identify the remains of an unidentified woman. This opens another black box at the connection between law enforcement and what we might call “DIY forensic science”: Here, what is the role of the state versus that of the individual?

I recommend reading the commentary in its entirety. As for the questions Pauwels raises, I’m wondering how I’d feel if I saw a mask that l00ked like me at the New York Public Library in 2014. Of course, that begs the next question, would I recognize myself?

Canadian filmmaker Chris Landreth’s Subconscious Password explores the uncanny valley

I gather Chris Landreth’s short animation, Subconscious Password, hasn’t been officially released yet by the National Film Board (NFB) of Canada but there are clips and trailers which hint at some of the filmmaker’s themes. Landreth in a May 23, 2013 guest post for the NFB.ca blog spells out one of them,

Subconscious Password, my latest short film, travels to the inner mind of a fellow named Charles Langford, as he struggles to remember the name of his friend at a party. In his subconscious, he encounters a game show, populated with special guest stars:  archetypes, icons, distant memories, who try to help him find the connection he needs: His friend’s name.

The film is a psychological romp into a person’s inner mind where (I hope) you will see something of your own mind working, thinking, feeling. Even during a mundane act like remembering the name of an acquaintance at a party, someone you only vaguely remember. To me, mundane accomplishments like these are miracles we all experience many times each day.

Landreth also discusses the ‘uncanny valley’ and how he deliberately cast his film into that valley. For anyone who’s unfamiliar with the ‘uncanny valley’ I wrote about it in a Mar. 10, 2011 posting concerning Geminoid robots,

It seems that researchers believe that the ‘uncanny valley’ doesn’t necessarily have to exist forever and at some point, people will accept humanoid robots without hesitation. In the meantime, here’s a diagram of the ‘uncanny valley’,

From the article on Android Science by Masahiro Mori (translated by Karl F. MacDorman and Takashi Minato)

Here’s what Mori (the person who coined the term) had to say about the ‘uncanny valley’ (from Android Science),

Recently there are many industrial robots, and as we know the robots do not have a face or legs, and just rotate or extend or contract their arms, and they bear no resemblance to human beings. Certainly the policy for designing these kinds of robots is based on functionality. From this standpoint, the robots must perform functions similar to those of human factory workers, but their appearance is not evaluated. If we plot these industrial robots on a graph of familiarity versus appearance, they lie near the origin (see Figure 1 [above]). So they bear little resemblance to a human being, and in general people do not find them to be familiar. But if the designer of a toy robot puts importance on a robot’s appearance rather than its function, the robot will have a somewhat humanlike appearance with a face, two arms, two legs, and a torso. This design lets children enjoy a sense of familiarity with the humanoid toy. So the toy robot is approaching the top of the first peak.

Of course, human beings themselves lie at the final goal of robotics, which is why we make an effort to build humanlike robots. For example, a robot’s arms may be composed of a metal cylinder with many bolts, but to achieve a more humanlike appearance, we paint over the metal in skin tones. These cosmetic efforts cause a resultant increase in our sense of the robot’s familiarity. Some readers may have felt sympathy for handicapped people they have seen who attach a prosthetic arm or leg to replace a missing limb. But recently prosthetic hands have improved greatly, and we cannot distinguish them from real hands at a glance. Some prosthetic hands attempt to simulate veins, muscles, tendons, finger nails, and finger prints, and their color resembles human pigmentation. So maybe the prosthetic arm has achieved a degree of human verisimilitude on par with false teeth. But this kind of prosthetic hand is too real and when we notice it is prosthetic, we have a sense of strangeness. So if we shake the hand, we are surprised by the lack of soft tissue and cold temperature. In this case, there is no longer a sense of familiarity. It is uncanny. In mathematical terms, strangeness can be represented by negative familiarity, so the prosthetic hand is at the bottom of the valley. So in this case, the appearance is quite human like, but the familiarity is negative. This is the uncanny valley.

Landreth discusses the ‘uncanny valley’ in relation to animated characters,

Many of you know what this is. The Uncanny Valley describes a common problem that audiences have with CG-animated characters. Here’s a graph that shows this:

Follow the curvy line from the lower left. If a character is simple (like a stick figure) we have little or no empathy with it. A more complex character, like Snow White orPixar’s Mr. Incredible, gives us more human-like mannerisms for us to identify with.

But then the Uncanny Valley kicks in. That curvy line changes direction, plunging downwards. This is the pit into which many characters from The Polar Express, Final Fantasy and Mars Needs Moms fall. We stop empathizing with these characters. They are unintentionally disturbing, like moving corpses. This is a big problem with realistic CGI characters: that unshakable perception that they are animated zombies. [zombie emphasis mine]

You’ll notice that the diagram from my posting features a zombie at the very bottom of the curve.

Landreth goes on to compare the ‘land’ in the uncanny valley to real estate,

… The value of land in the Uncanny Valley has plunged to zero. There are no buyers.

Well, except perhaps me.

Some of you know that my films have a certain obsession with visual realism with their human characters. I like doing this. I find value in this realism that goes beyond simply copying what humans look and act like. If used intelligently and with imagination, realism can capture something deeper, something weird and emotional and psychological about our collective experience on this planet. But it has to be honest. That’s hard.

He also explains what he’s hoping to accomplish by inhabiting the uncanny valley,

When making this film, we knew we were going into the Uncanny Valley. We did it because your subconscious processes, and mine, are like this valley. We project our waking world into our subconscious minds. The ‘characters’ in this inner world are realistic approximations of actual people, without actually being real. This is the miracle of how we get by. My protagonist, Charles, has a mixture of both realistic approximations and crazy warped versions of the people and icons in his life. He is indeed a bit off-kilter. But he gets by, like most of us do. As you probably have guessed, both Charles and the Host are self-portraits. I want to be honest in showing you this world. My own Uncanny Valley. You have one too. It’s something to celebrate.

On the that note, here’s a clip from Subconscious Password,

Subconscious Password (Clip) by Chris Landreth, National Film Board of Canada

 I last wrote about Landreth and his work in an April 14, 2010 posting (scroll down about 1/4 of the way) regarding mathematics and the arts. This post features excerpts from an interview with the University of Toronto (Ontario, Canada) mathematician, Karan Singh who worked with Landreth on their award-winning, Ryan.

EuroNanoForum 2013’s Best Research Project Award finalists announced

Mentioned at length in my Mar. 14, 2013 posting, EuroNanoForum 2013, being held in Dublin, Ireland from June 13 – 20, has announced a list of 11 finalists for its Best Research Project Award. From the May 30, 2013 news item on Nanowerk,

Eleven EU-funded nanotechnology projects have been shortlisted for the “Best Research Project Award” to be announced at the next EuroNanoForum (ENF2013), Europe’s largest Nanotechnology and Materials Conference, in Dublin.

More information at: http://www.euronanoforum2013.eu/calls/call-for-projects/

The aim of the award is to highlight the innovative outcomes of EU research projects and to present how nanotechnologies enable progress in every aspect of daily life: from health to environment, energy, transport, food and communication. The 11 candidates will be voted on and a winner announced at the ENF2013 on 20 June 2013.

EuroNanoForum’s 2013 Call for Projects webpage lists the finalists,

The finalists are:

BioElectricSurface; Electrically Modified Biomaterials’ surfaces: From Atoms to Applications.

EUMET; Design, Development, Utilization and Commercialisation Of Olefin Metathesis Catalysts.

FEMTOPRINT; Develop a printer for microsystems with nano-scale features fabricated out of glass.

FLEXONICS; Ultra-high barrier films for r2r encapsulation of flexible electronics.

IP NANOKER; Structural ceramic nanocomposites for top-end functional applications.

LIGHT-ROLLS; The development of a roll-to-roll production platform for the manufacturing of micro-structured flexible LED displays – “Light where you want it” The future of retail lighting.

MUST; Multi-Level Protection of Materials for Vehicles by Smart Nanocontainers.

NanoInteract; The aim of NanoInteract was to ensure that nanotechnologies do not cause inadvertent harm to human or environmental health at any stage of their lifecycle.

NANOTHER; Integration of novel NANOparticle based technology for THERapeutics and diagnosis of different types of cancer.

Sonodrugs; Image-Controlled Ultrasound Induced Drug Delivery.

STONECORE; The use of nanotechnology materials for the refurbishment of buildings as well as the conservation of natural and artificial stone, plaster and mortar.

The Call for Projects webpage also notes,

Over 50 projects have been submitted for the Best Research Project 2013 covering the areas of Industrial Technologies, Life Sciences, Environment, Energy and Transport. At the Award Gala, the spotlight will be on the 11 finalists who will have the opportunity to present their achievements on stage and to the gala attendees. There will then be a live ballot at the Gala Dinner to identify the winner of the prestigious Best Research Project Award 2013.

That live ballot at the Gala Dinner is going to make this a very exciting evening for all the finalists. I wonder what kind of politicking the attendees will be subject to.

We use the same reading strategies as did educated people in the 14th Century

There’s a fascinating May 23, 2013 news item on phys.org about reading habits in the 14th century,

Today we constantly switch from one text to another: news, blogs, email, workplace documents and more. But a new book by an MIT [Massachusetts Institute of Technology] professor reveals that this is not a new practice: In the 14th century, for instance, many people maintained eclectic reading habits, consuming diverse texts in daily life.

Consider Andrew Horn, the chamberlain for the city of London in the 1320s—meaning he was essentially the lawyer representing London’s interests in court against the king, who was Edward II for most of that time. The bound manuscripts in Horn’s possession, handed down to the city and preserved today, reveal a rich mixture of shorter texts: legal treatises, French-language poetry, descriptions of London and more.

Perusing such diverse texts, within bound volumes, was all in a day’s reading for a well-educated person, asserts Arthur Bahr, a professor of literature at MIT. Now in his book “Fragments and Assemblages,” published by the University of Chicago Press, Bahr says we must reconstruct how medieval people compiled these bound volumes in order to best grasp how they thought and wrote.

The May 23, 2013 MIT news release by Peter Dizikes, which originated the news item, explores the impact these reading habits may have had on a classic text of the period,

When we realize that individuals read this way, Bahr notes, we can see that the practice of throwing together all kinds of texts in a single bound manuscript may have influenced the composition of the most famous piece of literature of the period, Geoffrey Chaucer’s late-14th-century work “The Canterbury Tales,” a rich collection of linked stories.

“The ability to see the potential of textual juxtapositions is the cultural ground out of which the Canterbury Tales springs in the late 14th century,” Bahr says. “Chaucer’s invitation to readers is a kind of interactive process of composition. He has an idea about what ordering of the tales makes sense, because he creates links between them, but he’s encouraging us to participate. We don’t think of older writing as being that radical, but it is.”

Dizikes’ news release also provides some historical context for medieval reading practices,

To see why readers 700 years ago jumped between texts so much, recall that this was prior to the invention of the printing press, which was introduced in Europe in the middle of the 15th century. Before single books could be mass-produced more easily, manuscripts were copied out by hand, then bound together. This process led people to have many different types of texts bound together, rather than a single text being the entirety of a bound volume.

The book’s (Fragments and Assemblages) author, Bahr, interprets the relationship between the texts found in Andrew Horn’s bound volume and extends the interpretation to Chaucer’s work (from the news release),

In the case of Horn’s manuscripts, Bahr says, London’s chamberlain collected “detailed records of all the rules and legal precedents that give the city power and autonomy. But he included poetry, and bylaws for a poetic society, and a little Latin poem that doesn’t seem to go with anything else. Thinking about the literary, and being able to read in literary ways, as well as practical ways, was a skill he thought was important.”

But Horn was not just throwing a bunch of texts together and expecting readers to bounce around wildly from one to another, Bahr observes. He had a deliberate method to his assemblages of texts.

“Horn actually uses the construction of his books to create literary puzzles for his reader,” Bahr says. “One poem just doesn’t make sense, but if you read the poem in juxtaposition with the legal treatise that comes after, then the two pieces make sense. He’s suggesting that the law and literature are sort of the yin and the yang, you need both. And that is kind of amazing, really.”

In the book, Bahr looks at additional 14th-century manuscripts that compiled works of many authors, but also reinterprets Chaucer through the lens of these reading practices.

“Chaucer is able to conceive of the literary project that he undertakes in large part because those early figures created a literary culture that was attuned to these sorts of textual juxtapositions within literary manuscripts,” Bahr says.

Consider, Bahr adds, the Miller’s Tale, in the prologue of Chaucer’s great work. “It’s a very funny tale about a miller, his adulterous wife, and her lover,” Bahr says. “As Chaucer is getting ready to tell it, he says, [in effect], ‘If you don’t like dirty stories, just turn the page and look at something else.’ This has been taken as a joke, but it’s a serious joke, because we can turn the page, and we’re being invited to think about the effect of different textual juxtapositions. If we put these pieces in a different order, what would that do to the work as a whole?”

Among other things, Bahr points out, it would lead readers to skip about more freely within “The Canterbury Tales” and, in effect, create their own distinctive versions of it. [emphases mine]

That last bit sounds remarkably like some descriptions of digital novels and other ‘experimental’ work being done in what is sometimes called ‘new media’.

The whole thing brings to mind, Baroness Susan Greenfield, a British neuroscientist, who regularly forecasts ruin in the wake of new, mind-altering technologies such as Facebook and Twitter. I imagine that if the book were a new technology today, she would find it just as disturbing.

I’m not sure how amusing Dean Burnett’s satirical April 9, 2013 posting is for anyone who’s not familiar with Greenfield’s pronouncements but here’s an excerpt from Burnett’s post (Note: Links have been removed),

Following her recent article about the potential neurological dangers of the newly announced “Facebook phone”, it’s becoming increasingly likely that any new technological development will eventually have an article about it in which Susan Greenfield predicts the serious damage it could do to people’s brains.

Overlooking the fact that the recent article reads as though it was written by someone whose understanding of Facebook and smartphones is based exclusively on an overheard conversation between two drunken advertising executives in a pub, Greenfield tends to stick to a reliable and predictable formula.

Technological advances usually focus on making things faster, slicker and more efficient. So, should you need a Greenfield-esque article about the latest technological announcement to make your needless paranoia-inducing agenda seem more scientific/credible, there’s no need to wait until the Baroness herself can fit you into her schedule. Now you can write your own by following this simple step-by-step guide.

I highly recommend reading both Dizikes’ news release and Burnett’s posting in their entirety.

ETA May 31, 2013 1:10 pm  (PDT): There is another article about Arthur Bahr and his latest book, Fragments and Assemblages, which describes the work in more depth.  Medieval reading lessons by Kathryn O’Neill for MIT.

Cambridge University wants to take its flexible opals to market

Structural colour due to nanoscale structures such as those found on Morpho butterfly wings, jewel beetles, opals, and elsewhere is fascinating to me (Feb. 7, 2013 posting). It would seem many scientists share my fascination  including these groups at the UK’s University of Cambridge and Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute, from the May 30, 2013 University of Cambridge news release (also on EurekAlert),

Instead of through pigments, these ‘polymer opals’ get their colour from their internal structure alone, resulting in pure colour which does not run or fade. The materials could be used to replace the toxic dyes used in the textile industry, or as a security application, making banknotes harder to forge. Additionally, the thin, flexible material changes colour when force is exerted on it, which could have potential use in sensing applications by indicating the amount of strain placed on the material.

The most intense colours in nature – such as those in butterfly wings, peacock feathers and opals – result from structural colour. While most of nature gets its colour through pigments, items displaying structural colour reflect light very strongly at certain wavelengths, resulting in colours which do not fade over time.

In collaboration with the DKI (now Fraunhofer Institute for Structural Durability and System Reliability) in Germany, researchers from the University of Cambridge have developed a synthetic material which has the same intensity of colour as a hard opal, but in a thin, flexible film.

Here’s what the researchers’ synthetic opal looks like,

Polymer Opals Credit: Nick Saffel [downloaded from http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/flexible-opals]

Polymer Opals Credit: Nick Saffel [downloaded from http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/flexible-opals]

The news release provides a brief description of naturally occurring opals and contrasts them with the researchers’ polymer opals,

Naturally-occurring opals are formed of silica spheres suspended in water. As the water evaporates, the spheres settle into layers, resulting in a hard, shiny stone. The polymer opals are formed using a similar principle, but instead of silica, they are constructed of spherical nanoparticles bonded to a rubber-like outer shell. When the nanoparticles are bent around a curve, they are pushed into the correct position to make structural colour possible. The shell material forms an elastic matrix and the hard spheres become ordered into a durable, impact-resistant photonic crystal.

“Unlike natural opals, which appear multi-coloured as a result of silica spheres not settling in identical layers, the polymer opals consist of one preferred layer structure and so have a uniform colour,” said Professor Jeremy Baumberg of the Nanophotonics Group at the University’s Cavendish Laboratory, who is leading the development of the material.

Like natural opals, the internal structure of polymer opals causes diffraction of light, resulting in strong structural colour. The exact colour of the material is determined by the size of the spheres. And since the material has a rubbery consistency, when it is twisted and stretched, the spacing between spheres changes, changing the colour of the material. When stretched, the material shifts into the blue range of the spectrum, and when compressed, the colour shifts towards red. When released, the material will return to its original colour.

I find the potential for use in the textile industry a little more interesting than the anti-counterfeiting application. (There’s a Canadian company, Nanotech Security Corp., a spinoff from Simon Fraser University, which capitalizes on the Blue Morpho butterfly wing’s nanoscale structures for an anti-counterfeiting application as per my first posting about the company on Jan. 17, 2011.) There has been at least one other attempt to create a textile that exploits structural colour. Unfortunately Teijin Fibres has stopped production of its morphotex, as per my April 12, 2012 posting.

Here’s what the news release has to say about textiles and the potential importance of structural colour,

The technology could also have important uses in the textile industry. “The World Bank estimates that between 17 and 20 per cent of industrial waste water comes from the textile industry, which uses highly toxic chemicals to produce colour,” said Professor Baumberg. “So other avenues to make colour is something worth exploring.” The polymer opals can be bonded to a polyurethane layer and then onto any fabric. The material can be cut, laminated, welded, stitched, etched, embossed and perforated.

The researchers have recently developed a new method of constructing the material, which offers localised control and potentially different colours in the same material by creating the structure only over defined areas. In the new work, electric fields in a print head are used to line the nanoparticles up forming the opal, and are fixed in position with UV light. The researchers have shown that different colours can be printed from a single ink by changing this electric field strength to change the lattice spacing.

As for wanting to take this research to market, from the news release,

Cambridge Enterprise, the University’s commercialisation arm, is currently looking for a manufacturing partner to further develop the technology and take polymer opal films to market.

For more information, please contact sarah.collins@admin.cam.ac.uk.

The reference to opals reminded me of yet another Canadian company exploring the uses of structural colour, Opalux, as per my Jan. 31, 2011 posting.

Lomiko Metals, batteries, graphite/graphene, and a strategic alliance with the Research Foundation of Stony Brook University and Graphene Laboratories, Inc.

Lomiko Metals, a Vancouver-based (Canada)  company, has been mentioned here with respect to a property in Québec (Quatre Milles) containing graphite flakes in an April 17, 2013 posting, which also mentioned the company’s strategic alliance with Graphene Laboratories Inc.

Building on that previous announcement Lomiko Metals has announced a new member to the strategic alliance in a May 30, 2013 news item on Azonano,

LOMIKO METALS INC. (the “Company”) announces that the Research Foundation of Stony Brook University (RF), Graphene Laboratories, Inc. (Graphene Labs) and Lomiko Metals, Inc. have agreed to investigate novel, energy-focused applications for graphene.

“This new agreement with Stony Brook University’s researchers means Lomiko is participating in the development of the technology graphene makes possible,” commented Paul Gill, CEO of Lomiko. “Using graphene to achieve very high energy densities in super capacitors and batteries is a transfomative technology. Strategically, Lomiko needs to be participating in this vital research to achieve the goal of creating a vertically integrated graphite and graphene business.”

The May 29, 2013 Lomiko Metals news release, which originated the news item, has more details,

Under its Strategic Alliance Agreement with Lomiko, Graphene Labs — a leading graphene manufacturer — will process graphite samples from Lomiko’s Quatre Milles property into graphene. The Research Foundation, through Stony Brook University’s Advanced Energy Research and Technology Center (AERTC) and the Center for Advanced Sensor Technology (Sensor CAT), will then examine the most efficient methods of using this graphene for energy storage applications. There is no certainty the roposed [sic]  operaton [sic] will be economically viable.

For all parties involved, the goal of this collaboration is to map commercially viable routes for the fabrication of graphene-based energy storage devices. By participating in these projects, the partners will address the cost of graphene production, as well as how best to integrate the material into commercial energy storage devices.

As I find the various business/academic partnerships interesting, I’m including the About section of the news release,

About Graphene Laboratories Inc.

Graphene Laboratories, Inc. primary focus is to apply fundamental science and technology to bring functional advanced materials and devices to market.
Graphene Laboratories Inc. operates the Graphene Supermarket® (www.graphene-supermarket.com), and is a leading supplier of advanced 2D materials to customers around the globe. In addition to the retail offering of advanced 2D materials, it offers analytical services, prototype development and consulting.

Located in Calverton NY, Graphene Labs benefits from the unique high tech community on Long Island. Efforts by Graphene Laboratories are supported by Brookhaven National Laboratory, Stony Brook Business Incubator, and the Clean Energy Business Incubator Program (CEBIP), hosted by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).

For more information on Graphene Laboratories, Inc, visit www.graphenelabs.com or contact them at (516)-382-8649 or via email at info@graphenelabs.com

About AERTC

Located in the Research and Development Park on the campus of Stony Brook University, the Advanced Energy Incubator is space that is home to companies within the Advanced Energy Center. The Advanced Energy Center (www.aertc.org) is a true partnership of academic institutions, research institutions, energy providers and companies. Its mission is innovative energy research, education and technology deployment with a focus on efficiency, conservation,renewable energy and nanotechnology applications for new and novel sources of energy.

About Sensor CAT

The New York State Center for Advanced Technology at Stony Brook University provides intellectual, logistical, and material resources for the development of new product technologies – by facilitating R&D partnerships between New York companies with an in-state footprint and university researchers. The important outcomes are new jobs, new patents, training of students in company product matters, and improved competitiveness for New York State businesses.

About Lomiko Metals Inc.

Lomiko Metals Inc. is a Canadian based exploration-stage company. Its mineral properties include the Quatre Milles Graphite Property and the Vines Lake property which both have had recent major discoveries. On October 22 and November, 13 2012, Lomiko Metals Inc. announced 11 drill holes had intercepted high grade graphite at the 3,780 Ha Quatre Milles Property. On March 15, 2013 Lomiko reported 75.3% of graphite tested was >200 mesh and classified as graphite flake with 38.36% in the >80 mesh, large flake category. 85.3% of test results higher than the 94% carbon purity considered high carbon content, with the median test result being 98.35%.

The highlight of Lomiko’s testing was nine (9) sieve samples which captured flakes of varying sizes which tested 100.00% carbon. Both fine and flake material may be amenable to graphene conversion by Lomiko Metals Inc. partner Graphene Laboratories.

The project is located 175 km north of the Port of Montreal and 26 km from a major highway on a well-maintained gravel road.

For more information on Lomiko Metals Inc., review the website at www.lomiko.com or contact A. Paul Gill at 604-729-5312 or email: info@lomiko.com

On Behalf of the Board

“A. Paul Gill” Chief Executive Officer

We seek safe harbor. Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

I couldn’t resist that last bit either. As I understand it, this means ‘caveat emptor’ or buyer beware. In short do your research.

Baba Brinkman’s hip-hop theatre cycle features Chaucer & a live onstage science peer-review in New York City

I’m happy to see that Baba Brinkman’s IndieGogo crowdfunding campaign was successful (my Jan. 25, 2013 posting), so he can introduce the first hip-hop theatre cycle (Evolutionary Tales) to the world. He will be performing three of his shows, Ingenious Nature, Rap Guide to Evolution, and Canterbury Tales Remixed in repertory off Broadway in New York City on weekends (Fri. – Sun.) starting Friday, May 31, 2013 and then, throughout most of the month of June. Here’s more from Baba’s May 29, 2013 announcement,

Greetings from the Player’s Theatre! We’ve spent the past two days setting up not one but three shows here, preparing for the world’s first-ever hip-hop theatre cycle: Evolutionary Tales.

We launch on Friday with a performance of Ingenious Nature, which was recently nominated for an Off-Broadway Alliance Award in the category of “Best Unique Theatrical Experience” (which we didn’t win, but it was a nice acknowledgement). Use the code “Genious” to get $29 advance tickets.

Then on Saturday we’re taking the “peer-reviewed rap” theme to the next level, with a World Science Festival presentation of the Rap Guide to Evolution featuring Dr. Helen Fisher, Dr. Stuart Firestein, and Dr. Heather Berlin providing a live post-show peer-review talkback. Use the code “Darwin” for discount tickets.

Finally, on Sunday the Canterbury Tales Remixed will have its first off-Broadway performance since early 2012, tracing the evolution of storytelling from Gilgamesh to Slick Rick via Chaucer’s masterpiece. Use the code “Tales” for discount tickets.

We run until June 23rd, Fri/Sat/Sun. …

The Evolutionary Tales website offers a bit more information about each show,

 INGENIOUS NATURE
Evolutionary psychology, sex differences in behavior, and the modern dating scene. Can science serve as a road map to romance? It turns out, ovulation studies make for awkward first-date conversation.
Fridays 8pm, May 31 – June 21
RAP GUIDE TO EVOLUTION
Rap Guide to Evolution interprets Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution for the hip-hop age, exploring the links between bling and peacocks’ tails, gangster rap music and elephant seals, and the species-wide appeal of Afro-centricity.
Saturdays 8pm, June 1 – 22
CANTERBURY TALES REMIXED
Canterbury Tales Remixed brings you a collection of the world’s best-loved stories, supplementing Chaucer’s masterful character-driven Tales with artful re-tellings of the epics of Beowulf and Gilgamesh. The evolution of storytelling!
Sundays 5pm, June 2 – 23
115 Macdougal Street, NYC
Ticket Info (866) 811-4111

This link will take you to the calendar where you select the show(s) you’d like to attend and click through to purchase one or more tickets.

I’m fascinated by the idea of live science peer-review onstage. I imagine that too is a world first, along with the hip-hop theatre cycle. I wish Baba and all his collaborators the best of luck.

Graphene euphoria, heat sinks, diamonds, and Rice University’s Ajayan Group

Pulickel Ajayan, at Rice University (Texas), must have one of the most active laboratories in the US where nanotechnology-based research and announcements about it are concerned and I imagine it’s an exciting place to work. Whoever wrote the May 28, 2013 Rice University news release on EurekAlert seems to have caught some of the Ajayan Group’s excitement,

What may be the ultimate heat sink is only possible because of yet another astounding capability of graphene. The one-atom-thick form of carbon can act as a go-between that allows vertically aligned carbon nanotubes to grow on nearly anything.

That includes diamonds. A diamond film/graphene/nanotube structure was one result of new research carried out by scientists at Rice University and the Honda Research Institute USA, reported today in Nature’s online journal Scientific Reports.

The heart of the research is the revelation that when graphene is used as a middleman, surfaces considered unusable as substrates for carbon nanotube growth now have the potential to do so. Diamond happens to be a good example, according to Rice materials scientist Pulickel Ajayan and Honda chief scientist Avetik Harutyunyan.

Here’s an image the team has provided,

Rice University and the Honda Research Institute use single-layer graphene to grow forests of nanotubes on virtually anything. The image shows freestanding carbon nanotubes on graphene that has been lifted off of a quartz substrate. One hybrid material created by the labs combines three allotropes of carbon – graphene, nanotubes and diamond – into a superior material for thermal management. (Credit: Honda Research Institute)

Rice University and the Honda Research Institute use single-layer graphene to grow forests of nanotubes on virtually anything. The image shows freestanding carbon nanotubes on graphene that has been lifted off of a quartz substrate. One hybrid material created by the labs combines three allotropes of carbon – graphene, nanotubes and diamond – into a superior material for thermal management. (Credit: Honda Research Institute)

The news release provides more information about the diamond-carbon nanotube-graphene hybrid material,

Diamond conducts heat very well, five times better than copper. But its available surface area is very low. By its very nature, one-atom-thick graphene is all surface area. The same could be said of carbon nanotubes, which are basically rolled-up tubes of graphene. A vertically aligned forest of carbon nanotubes grown on diamond would disperse heat like a traditional heat sink, but with millions of fins. Such an ultrathin array could save space in small microprocessor-based devices.

“Further work along these lines could produce such structures as patterned nanotube arrays on diamond that could be utilized in electronic devices,” Ajayan said. Graphene and metallic nanotubes are also highly conductive; in combination with metallic substrates, they may also have uses in advanced electronics, he said.

To test their ideas, the Honda team grew various types of graphene on copper foil by standard chemical vapor deposition. They then transferred the tiny graphene sheets to diamond, quartz and other metals for further study by the Rice team.

They found that only single-layer graphene worked well, and sheets with ripples or wrinkles worked best. The defects appeared to capture and hold the airborne iron-based catalyst particles from which the nanotubes grow. The researchers think graphene facilitates nanotube growth by keeping the catalyst particles from clumping.

Ajayan thinks the extreme thinness of graphene does the trick. In a previous study, the Rice lab found graphene shows materials coated with graphene can get wet, but the graphene provides protection against oxidation. “That might be one of the big things about graphene, that you can have a noninvasive coating that keeps the property of the substrate but adds value,” he said. “Here it allows the catalytic activity but stops the catalyst from aggregating.”

Testing found that the graphene layer remains intact between the nanotube forest and the diamond or other substrate. On a metallic substrate like copper, the entire hybrid is highly conductive.

Such seamless integration through the graphene interface would provide low-contact resistance between current collectors and the active materials of electrochemical cells, a remarkable step toward building high-power energy devices, said Rice research scientist and co-author Leela Mohana Reddy Arava.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Graphene as an atomically thin interface for growth of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes by Rahul Rao, Gugang Chen, Leela Mohana Reddy Arava, Kaushik Kalaga, Masahiro Ishigami, Tony F. Heinz, Pulickel M. Ajayan, & Avetik R. Harutyunyan. Scientific Reports 3, Article number: 1891 doi:10.1038/srep01891 Published 28 May 2013

Scientific Reports, a Nature publication, provides open access to its papers.

Life-cycle assessment for electric vehicle lithium-ion batteries and nanotechnology is a risk analysis

A May 29, 2013 news item on Azonano features a new study for the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on nanoscale technology and lithium-ion (li-ion) batteries for electric vehicles,

Lithium (Li-ion) batteries used to power plug-in hybrid and electric vehicles show overall promise to “fuel” these vehicles and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but there are areas for improvement to reduce possible environmental and public health impacts, according to a “cradle to grave” study of advanced Li-ion batteries recently completed by Abt Associates for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

“While Li-ion batteries for electric vehicles are definitely a step in the right direction from traditional gasoline-fueled vehicles and nickel metal-hydride automotive batteries, some of the materials and methods used to manufacture them could be improved,” said Jay Smith, an Abt senior analyst and co-lead of the life-cycle assessment.

Smith said, for example, the study showed that the batteries that use cathodes with nickel and cobalt, as well as solvent-based electrode processing, show the highest potential for certain environmental and human health impacts. The environmental impacts, Smith explained, include resource depletion, global warming, and ecological toxicity—primarily resulting from the production, processing and use of cobalt and nickel metal compounds, which can cause adverse respiratory, pulmonary and neurological effects in those exposed.

There are viable ways to reduce these impacts, he said, including cathode material substitution, solvent-less electrode processing and recycling of metals from the batteries.

The May 28, 2013 Abt Associates news release, which originated the news item, describes some of the findings,

Among other findings, Shanika Amarakoon, an Abt associate who co-led the life-cycle assessment with Smith, said global warming and other environmental and health impacts were shown to be influenced by the electricity grids used to charge the batteries when driving the vehicles.
“These impacts are sensitive to local and regional grid mixes,” Amarakoon said.  “If the batteries in use are drawing power from the grids in the Midwest or South, much of the electricity will be coming from coal-fired plants.  If it’s in New England or California, the grids rely more on renewables and natural gas, which emit less greenhouse gases and other toxic pollutants.” However,” she added, “impacts from the processing and manufacture of these batteries should not be overlooked.”
In terms of battery performance, Smith said that “the nanotechnology applications that Abt assessed were single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs), which are currently being researched for use as anodes as they show promise for improving the energy density and ultimate performance of the Li-ion batteries in vehicles.  What we found, however, is that the energy needed to produce the SWCNT anodes in these early stages of development is prohibitive. Over time, if researchers focus on reducing the energy intensity of the manufacturing process before commercialization, the environmental profile of the technology has the potential to improve dramatically.”

Abt’s Application of Life-Cycle Assessment to Nanoscale Technology: Lithium-ion Batteries for Electric Vehicles can be found here, all 126 pp.

This assessment was performed under the auspices of an interesting assortment of agencies (from the news release),

The research for the life-cycle assessment was undertaken through the Lithium-ion Batteries and Nanotechnology for Electric Vehicles Partnership, which was led by EPA’s Design for the Environment Program in the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention and Toxics, and EPA’s National Risk Management Research Laboratory in the Office of Research and Development.  [emphasis mine] The Partnership also included industry partners (i.e., battery manufacturers, recyclers, and suppliers, and other industry groups), the Department of Energy’s Argonne National Lab, Arizona State University, and the Rochester Institute of Technology

I highlighted the National Risk Management Research Laboratory as it reminded me of the lithium-ion battery fires in airplanes reported in January 2013. I realize that cars and planes are not the same thing but lithium-ion batteries have some well defined problems especially since the summer of 2006 when there was a series of li-ion battery laptop fires. From Tracy V. Wilson’s What causes laptop batteries to overheat? article for How stuff works.com (Note: A link has been removed),

In conjunction with the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), Dell and Apple Computer announced large recalls of laptop batteries in the summer of 2006, followed by Toshiba and Lenovo. Sony manufactured all of the recalled batteries, and in October 2006, the company announced its own large-scale recall. Under the right circumstances, these batteries could overheat, potentially causing burns, an explosion or a fire.

Larry Greenemeier in a Jan. 17, 2013 article for Scientific American offers some details about the lithium-ion battery fires in airplanes and elsewhere,

Boeing’s Dreamliner has likely become a nightmare for the company, its airline customers and regulators worldwide. An inflight lithium-ion battery fire broke out Wednesday [Jan. 16, 2013] on an All Nippon Airways 787 over Japan, forcing an emergency landing. And another battery fire occurred last week aboard a Japan Airlines 787 at Boston’s Logan International Airport. Both battery failures resulted in release of flammable electrolytes, heat damage and smoke on the aircraft, according to the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

Lithium-ion batteries—used to power mobile phones, laptops and electric vehicles—have summoned plenty of controversy during their relatively brief existence. Introduced commercially in 1991, by the mid 2000s they had become infamous for causing fires in laptop computers.

More recently, the plug-in hybrid electric Chevy Volt’s lithium-ion battery packs burst into flames following several National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) tests to measure the vehicle’s ability to protect occupants from injury in a side collision. The NHTSA investigated and concluded in January 2012 that Chevy Volts and other electric vehicles do not pose a greater risk of fire than gasoline-powered vehicles.

Philip E. Ross in his Jan. 18, 2013 article about the airplane fires for IEEE’s (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) Spectrum provides some insight into the fires,

It seems that the batteries heated up in a self-accelerating pattern called thermal runaway. Heat from the production of electricity speeds up the production of electricity, and… you’re off. This sort of things happens in a variety of reactions, not just in batteries, let alone the Li-ion kind. But thermal runaway is particularly grave in Li-ion batteries because they pack a lot more power than the tried-and-true metal-hydride ones, not to speak of Ye Olde lead-acid.

It’s because of this very quality that Li-ion batteries found their first application in small mobile devices, where power is critical and fires won’t cost anyone his life. It’s also why it took so long for the new tech to find its way into electric and hybrid-electric cars.

Perhaps it would have been wiser of Boeing to go for the safest possible Li-ion design, even if it didn’t have quite as much oomph as possible. That’s what today’s main-line electric-drive cars do, as our colleague, John Voelcker, points out.

“The cells in the 787 [Dreamliner], from Japanese company GS Yuasa, use a cobalt oxide (CoO2) chemistry, just as mobile-phone and laptop batteries do,” he writes in greencarreports.com. “That chemistry has the highest energy content, but it is also the most susceptible to overheating that can produce “thermal events” (which is to say, fires). Only one electric car has been built in volume using CoO2 cells, and that’s the Tesla Roadster. Only 2,500 of those cars will ever exist.” Most of today’s electric cars, Voelcker adds, use chemistries that trade some energy density for safety.

The Dreamliner (Boeing 787) is designed to be the lightest of airplanes and using a more energy dense but safer lithium-ion battery seems not to have been an acceptable trade-off.  Interestingly, Boeing according to Ross still had a backlog of orders after the fires.

I find that some of the discussion about risk and nanotechnology-enabled products oddly disconnected. There are the concerns about what happens at the nanoscale (environmental implications, etc.) but that discussion is divorced from some macroscale issues such as battery fires. Taken to absurd lengths, technology at the nanoscale could be considered safe while macroscale issues are completely ignored. It’s as if our institutions are not yet capable of managing multiple scales at once.

For more about an emphasis on scale and other minutiae (pun intended), there’s my May 28, 2013 posting about Steffen Foss Hansen’s plea to revise current European Union legislation to create more categories for nanotechnology regulation, amongst other things.

For more about airplanes and their efforts to get more energy efficient, there’s my May 27, 2013 posting about a biofuel study in Australia.