Today, Nokia announced that it’s going to cut 4,000 more jobs at its factories in Hungary, Mexico and Finland in an effort to improve the production efficiency of said plants. The company plans on moving a larger part of the production of its smartphones to Asia, which it says will help reduce the time it takes for its products to reach the market.

As Nokia continues to suffer the effect of the transition of its smartphone portfolio to Windows Phone, the company is looking for ways to cut costs until the huge investments start paying off. The cheaper labor cost in Asia should help the Finns reduce their production costs and, hopefully, go back in the black.

We are not exactly sure that moving your production thousands of kilometers from the actual markets will really improve the speed, but maybe Nokia is now more focused on reaching the rapidly expanding Chinese market instead of Europe and America.

Still, the company desperately needs to buy some time, until Windows Phone gets competitive enough to allow it to price its smartphones as high as Android and iOS top-dogs and, obviously the guys over at Espoo decided that this is what it takes.

Personnel reductions are planned to be phased through the end of 2012, so we will only see if Nokia made the right decision come the first 2013 financial result.

Source

Related posts:

• Nokia lose huge market share in their homeland
• Why gadget makers wield a ‘kill switch’
• Nokia to cut 4,000 jobs worldwide
• Nokia Windows Phone 7 concept revealed
• Samsung Shows Off Video of Transparent and Flexible 3D Screen

A senior lawmaker says Iran’s Majlis is considering a plan to cut off the country’s economic transactions with South Korea’s Samsung in reaction to the company’s anti-Iran teaser.

Head of Majlis Energy Committee Arsalan Fat’hipour said the double-urgency plan, aimed at imposing a complete ban on buying all Samsung products, would make the company regret making the insulting teaser.

South Korea’s giant manufacturer of electronic devices and home appliances produced a teaser shortly after the assassination of the Iranian scientist Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan by Mossad agents in Tehran, in which Iran had been depicted as a primitive society.

The clip also implies that Israel is powerful enough to easily destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities or assassinate the country’s nuclear scientists.

The Iranian lawmaker added that forgetting the high volume of its trade with Iran, the company has produced the teaser to curry favor with Israel.

Fat’hipour said Samsung’s apology to the Iranian nation, though necessary, would not be enough and that the company must be held accountable for producing the teaser.

Meanwhile, Samsung’s Dubai office has issued a statement condemning the production of the teaser by the company’s Israel office.

Samsung’s public relations official in Tehran, Elaheh Taheri, told reporters on Thursday the clip had nothing to do with the South Korean company and that it had been produced by an Israeli cable TV station, Hot.

Source

Related posts:

• IAEA Leaked Secret Info About Iran
• Iran finalizes bill to ban EU oil exports
• 4th Iranian Nuclear Scientist Dies in Car Bomb Plot
• South Korea disregards US oil sanctions on Iran
• Iran to sue US over airspace violation

Having considered the toughness of the rock-hidden Iranian nuclear facilities, America’s Nutcracker military command has decided to save jaw and develop a new conventional superbomb, since the US still plans to do the job in Iran without nukes.

­Washington has once again reminded Tehran that it has the military capability to crack Iranian hard-target nuclear sites with conventional weapons, leaking to the Wall Street Journal plans to develop an even more effective bunker-buster bomb.

The American military is no longer in love with the most powerful non-nuclear weapon it possesses, the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP), a 13,600-kilogram mammoth capable of penetrating deep underground facilities.

The Pentagon paid around $330 million to Boeing to develop and produce 20 MOP bombs, specially developed to destroy bunkers in countries like Iran and North Korea.

Now, the Defense Department intends to spend another $82 million, to make those bombs even more effective.

An MOP is capable of penetrating 60 meters of reinforced concrete or 38 meters of hard rock, delivering 2,700 kg of explosives deep down, to reliably demolish anything manmade. Yet, in the case of Iran’s Persian mountains, even this doesn’t seem enough.

In hiding its nuclear work, Tehran clearly considered the experience of Saddam Hussein and Bashar Assad, who lost their research nuclear reactors in 1981 and 2007 respectively.

Iranians really had to turn into fairytale dwarves, digging deep into the mountains but with a very un-fairytale intention: not to find something precious, but to safely hide their nuclear program.

In our times, when bombing a sovereign state into Stone Age is an easy walk, as we see from Libya’s example, such a precautionary measure does not appear superfluous.

But this is exactly what makes American generals nervous – they need 100% guarantees that the targets they cannot destroy do not exist, particularly in Iran.

For example, military experts are not sure an MOP can get to Iran’s Fordo enrichment plant facility that has 60 meters of hard rock mountain above it.

At the moment, only a tactical nuclear weapon of several dozen kilotons could guarantee the site’s elimination.

“Once things go into the mountain, then really you have to have something that takes the mountain off,” an unnamed US military official is reported to have said.

But no, using nukes would set a precedent for all the other proud owners of atomic arms worldwide. Countries like China, North Korea and – God forbid – Russia would get a free hand to blindside America with nukes at the breath of suspicion.

The last time the US used nuclear weapons against a civilian population was in Japan in 1945, and that fact is still well-remembered, and not just in Japan.

That is why today, the American military lays its hopes on conventional explosives with expanded capabilities, putting tactical nukes by for a rainy day.

And just in case you were wondering, none of the abovementioned has anything to do with Israel. Though Tel-Aviv has never tried out its almost proven nuclear arsenal on anybody, they rather like saber-rattling, saying they would protect the Jewish state at any cost – and preemptively.

Their fingers are apparently itching on the trigger switch, in forgetfulness that the country starting a war is not necessarily the one that finishes it.

Source

Related posts:

• Iran has uranium for 4 nukes, builds US-reach missiles – Israel
• More US battle ships head to Persian Gulf
• Israel ‘master of puppets’ in US Iran onslaught
• US and Israel revive largest joint anti-missile drills
• Israel ready to strike Iran without Washington’s approval?

A new international project is scheduled to be launched to assess the threat posed by asteroids or comets and look for solutions to protect Earth from an impact.

The new European-led NEOShield project will calculate any threat posed by Near Earth Objects (NEO) and figure the best possible way to shield the Earth.

The project initiated by the German space agency’s (DLR) Institute of Planetary Research is planned to set laboratory experiments by using the latest science.

“We’re going to collate all the scientific information with a view to mitigation,” the state-funded BBC quoted project leader Prof. Alan Harris as saying.

“What do you need to know about an asteroid in order to be able to change its course – to deflect it from a catastrophic course with the Earth?”

Scientists and engineers working on the project expect the study period of the NEOShield to end in three and a half years.

Experts have warned that although the NEO threat may seem distant, the geological and observational records have proved it to be real.

Scientific observations indicate that a small-sized object will enter the Earth’s atmosphere every year that will be seen as a fireball in the sky.

A bigger object will impact the Earth about every 2,000 years or so that will cause major local damage.

Every few million years, a kilometer(s)-sized rock turns up that can have dire global effects.

Source

Related posts:

• Merkel to sway China against Iran
• EU Leaders Warn of Crippling Crisis
• NATO fears resurgent Germany, Russia
• German Debt Exceeds 2 Trillion Euros
• Former German Lawmaker Warns Against Attacking Iran

Samsung unveiled its transparent 46-inch LCD Smart Window panels at CES 2012 show, Vesti.Ru reports.

The lighting, which is an inseparable part of any LCD display is only used during the dark time of the day. During the daytime, the panel uses the light that comes from the sun or from the room illumination.

The South Korean electronic giant promised to establish the production of such transparent panels until the end of January 2012. In the future, the Transparent Smart Windows will change the common way of looking at things. It may act as a fridge door, a sensor shop-window and as the virtual blinds that regulate the flow of light into the room. The panel may work as an electronic sign, an information display or the screen of a medical device.

The panel fully functions like a touch screen. The screen supports the resolution of 1366х768 pixels, has the contrast coefficient of 4500:1. More importantly, the new gadget uses only one-tenth of the power consumed by a common LCD panel of the same size.

The prices for the new transparent 46-inch Smart Windows have not been unveiled yet. According to Display Bank, the market of transparent displays will grow to $900 million by 2015 and to 87 billion – by 2025.

The new Smart Windows will continue the line of 22-inch transparent LCD panels, which Samsung launched in production in March 2011.

Source

Related posts:

• Samsung Shows Off Video of Transparent and Flexible 3D Screen
• Samsung wants to Ban the iPhone 5 in Korea
• Iran’s Majlis mulls banning Samsung products over insulting teaser
• South Korea disregards US oil sanctions on Iran
• Mullen: North Korea ‘Very Real’ Threat

Scientists at Cornell University have created a new invisibility technique that doesn't just cloak an object but also masks an entire event.

Pentagon-sponsored scientists at Cornell University have invented a time cloaking device that makes an entire event invisible for a very short period of time.

According to a study published in Thursday’s edition of the journal Nature, the new device interrupts the flow of light that reaches us from events for a fraction of a second, thus making them invisible for just an instant.

“Our results represent a significant step towards obtaining a complete spatio-temporal cloaking device,” says the study, led by Moti Fridman of Cornell University, which is located in Ithaca, New York.

The scientists have used a method to generate a lens of both light and time, which splits light, creating a gap where an event is masked. The gap, however, is tiny, just 50 picoseconds, or 50 trillionths of a second.

“You kind of create a hole in time where an event takes place,” said study co-author Alexander Gaeta, who is the director of Cornell’s School of Applied and Engineering Physics.

“You just don’t know that anything ever happened,” he added.

Researchers predict that the next step in the experiment is to extend the time gap in magnitude to microseconds and then to milliseconds.

The high-profile experiment aims to enhance next-generation camouflage — a so-called invisibility cloak which prevents the human eye from perceiving specific colors.

The research has been partly sponsored by the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Project Agency, which develops futuristic technology for military purposes.

Source

Related posts:

• Syria: White House preaches peace as Pentagon preps for war
• Pentagon pushes to leave Afghanistan as soon as possible
• US vs Iran, coming this May!
• Pentagon seeks new superbomb for Iran
• Official conclusion of Phobos Ground crash shocks scientists

The ADS (Active Denial System) is an American non lethal weapon.

Non-lethal weapons leave no immediately visible marks on their victims, but can cause startling psychological and physical destruction. And a leak of the latest Pentagon projects shows that fears of such dystopian damage are already coming true.

­In a 1908 New York Times letter to the editor, revolutionary scientist Nikola Telsa wrote, “When I spoke of future warfare I meant that it should be conducted by direct application of electrical waves without the use of aerial engines or other implements of destruction.”

And with last week’s leak of the US military’s Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate’s “Non-Lethal Weapons Reference Book” by PublicIntelligence.org, it appears that Tesla’s vision is coming to life.

While increasingly high-tech tasers remain in vogue, modified guns shooting a cache of 600 rubber pellets filled with pepper spray have found synergy between two increasingly infamous tools used to counter the Occupy Wall Street protests across America.

However, the latest weapons of non-lethal war go beyond attacks on flesh and blood, striking much deeper.

One device, known as the Active Denial System (ADS), is described as a “long range, directed energy, vehicle mounted system that projects an invisible electromagnetic millimeter-wave energy beam beyond small arms range.”

Already having been deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan, the device, which looks like a TV satellite dish mounted on a Humvee, is euphemistically said to create “potential for minor burns if overexposed.”

However, critics have said it can lead to more several thermal injuries – including blindness – while it is believed that the projected invisible electromagnetic energy beam could potentially cause cancer.

What’s more, the ADS may soon go airborne, with modifications to put the device on “a fixed-wing platform” in the works.

While an array of Acoustic Hailing Devices (AHD) providing “scalable, directional warning tones” can cause “auditory damage” to those on solid ground, a device known as an eLOUD© can assault divers with similar auditory impairments and feelings of nausea from up to 457 meters away.

And if one needs to both blind and deafen a target, the Distributed Sound and Light Array (DSLA) “uses a combined laser, non-coherent light, and acoustics to produce a synergistic engagement system.”

Also mentioned are a battery of conceptual systems that can either redirect or stop altogether vehicular movement on the land, sea and air via electromagnetic attack.

All in all, the ability of police and law-enforcement to completely disable unruly populations via all-out sensory assaults is cause for concern in times of deepening economic and social crisis.

And while Americans may believe these tools will be used for crowd control in the far-flung vestiges of the world, they should not be so sure.

In September 2006, Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne said that Americans should be the first to be subjected to the ever-developing array of non-lethal weapons.

“If we’re not willing to use it here against our fellow citizens, then we should not be willing to use it in a wartime situation,” said Wynne. “(Because) if I hit somebody with a non-lethal weapon and they claim that it injured them in a way that was not intended, I think that I would be vilified in the world press,” the Media Freedom Foundation reports.

In fact, with assaults on freedom of speech intensifying across America, it might come as a surprise that voice-to-skull directed acoustic neuro-electromagnetic devices were used as early as 2004 by New York City police against demonstrators at the Republican National Convention.

When Tesla imagined all the ways the electromagnetic spectrum would be used in the waging of future wars, he said “this is not a dream,” and he was right. Now, it sounds more like a nightmare.

Source

Related posts:

• Pentagon pushes to leave Afghanistan as soon as possible
• Pentagon seeks new superbomb for Iran
• US stations 15,000 troops in Kuwait
• More US battle ships head to Persian Gulf
• North Korea making missile able to hit U.S.

The Japanese electronics company, Sony has introduced a paper-powered battery that generates electricity by turning paper into sugar, using it as fuel.

The company has announced that the bio-battery is environmentally friendly, as no harmful chemicals have been used in the product.

The power generating process uses the enzyme cellulose to decompose paper into glucose sugar.

The produced sugar is then combined with oxygen and further enzymes and finally turns into electrons and hydrogen ions. The battery uses the electrons to generate electricity.

Water and acid gluconolactone, which is commonly used in cosmetics, are created as by-products.

Researchers say the bio-battery mechanism is similar to the one used by white ants and termites to digest wood and turn it into energy.

Source

Related posts:

• Sony to buy off Ericsson’s shares in their joint mobile business
• Japan finds 14 water leaks at stricken nuclear plant
• Japanese airline named world’s safest
• Japan will Ignore US Oil Sanctions on Iran
• Japan to deliver arms to communist and sanctioned regimes

An Iranian researcher has invented the world’s tiniest capacitor microphone that can be used in making small and invisible hearing aids.

Bahram Azizollah-Ganji, a faculty member of Noushirvani University of Technology in the northern city of Babol, has built a very small microphone which is only 0.5 x 0.5 mm big.

The device, which is the tiniest microphone in the world, is mainly developed for minute and invisible hearing aids, Ganji said.

The newly invented device can also be used to receive the exact sound of the heart for diagnosing heart problems and examining the health of fetus.

Ganji said his invention could also be used for other purposes such as fishing, underwater surveillance systems and to measure sound waves and ultrasound waves for identifying different marine animals.

Telecommunications systems, information collection devices and defense systems can also benefit from the tiny microphone.

Now preparing for world record, the microphone is not visible with naked eyes. High sensitivity, low cost, low power and voltage consumption are among the advantages of the device.

Source

Related posts:

• Somalia hails Iran’s Humanitarian Aid
• Obama says attack on Iran risky, urges diplomatic fix
• Iran Threatens to Attack any Country that Assists ‘Enemies’
• Iran’s warships arrive in Saudi Arabia
• India to send business delegation to Iran

The billion-dollar defense complex that keeps America safe and sound is yet again under attack, with an antiquated computer virus now apparently attacking the Pentagon’s drone aircraft fleet.

Sykipot, a malicious piece of malware that has been around since at least 2006, was recently waged at the computer systems of US governmental department and defense contractors. Although Symantec, a world-wide leader in anti-virus protection calls the Trojan neither “sophisticated” nor “well-coded,” new reports confirm that the malware was emailed to DoD-affiliated authorities in an attempt to do even more damage to the top-secret drone program.

Drones, unmanned robotic aircraft used by the Pentagon and CIA in surveillance and missile-firing missions, are controlled from remote bases across the world. Despite the advanced technology of the impressive crafts, however, the US recently lost two planes in just as many weeks. First came the interception of a Sentinel RQ-170 craft in Iran on December 4, with a similar craft succumbing to a fiery crash in the Indian Ocean days later.

In the wake of the downing of the Sentinel, Iran engineers made claims that they hacked into the GPS network used by the drone commanders by way of a loophole they say the US government well aware of. In the days since, other reports have suggested the CIA headquarters have also been infiltrated by anti-American forces, with military officials telling Israel-based news outlet Debka that the downing of the drone over Iran could only have been conducted with a high-tech attack on the command center itself.

Now the website Information Week has tried making light of the latest virus, Sykipot, and in identifying it has realized that it has been waged against the Pentagon in hopes of damaging more drones.

According to Information Week’s Mathew J Schwartz, Sykipot was sent in the form of an email attachment to DoD contractors. Often the email will include a malicious Adobe Acrobat .PDF file or a hyperlink that will trigger the virus.

“In targeted attacks,” writes Schwartz, “attackers often include information–in the form of attachments–that they think recipients will find interesting. Conversely, this highlights the type of information that attackers are seeking.” In the case of a slew of emails sent to Pentagon pals, the messages related to drone crafts, specifically the Boeing joint unmanned combat air system X-45 and the Boeing X-37 orbital vehicle.

The Alien Labs Vault blog dives deeper into explaining Sykipot, noting that the Trojan infects Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and Outlook programs, as well as Mozilla’s Firefox browser. From there, the virus connects into internal servers and retrieves encrypted configuration files which can then be executed externally, the results of which are then relayed to a server where the maker of the malware can investigate the results.

The site also notes that most of the servers that manipulate the malicious program are running off a particular webserver named Netbox, which while used across the world, is almost exclusively operated from China.

Symantec adds on their website, “Given the long list of command and control servers being used for controlling the botnet, the attackers are unlikely to be a single person, but rather a group of people. Thus, the Sykipot attackers are likely to be an organized and skilled group of individuals. Given their persistence and their long-running campaigns, the attackers are likely to have consistent funding for their efforts.”

Source

Related posts:

• US vs Iran, coming this May!
• Pentagon seeks new superbomb for Iran
• US stations 15,000 troops in Kuwait
• Israeli agents posed as CIA to recruit terrorists
• More US battle ships head to Persian Gulf

In connection with the plans of the United States to develop the air defense system in Europe, in close vicinity to Russia’s borders, and because of the unwillingness of the US side to provide any guarantees, the Russian Federation continues to take measures to preserve parity in the field. In particular, Russia’s Strategic Missile Forces (SMF) will be renovated with the help of state-of-the-art Topol-M and Yars complexes during the upcoming ten years. In addition, Russia will pass into service a new intercontinental missile of enormous power.

“The decision about the creation of the new silo-based missile system with a liquid-fuel heavy missile has been made. The complex will have increased possibilities in overcoming the prospective missile defense system of the United States,” Sergei Karakaev, the commander of the missile troops said.

The new missile, the mass of which is going to make up 100 tons, is said to replace the world-known “Voevoda” ICBM. In the West, this missile is known as “Satan.” In the meantime, Russia has already started working to create the middle-class newly equipped missile. The new missile is to be passed into service in 2015, RIA Novosti reports.

“Russia does not stand against the US missile defense system. Russia stands against the creation of the missile defense system, which would be directly aimed against Russia to potentially reduce the possibilities of the Russian nuclear containment forces,” the official stated.

According to Karakaev, as long as there is a stable mechanism of nuclear containment in the world, one should not undermine this mechanism to provoke an arms race.

In November, President Dmitry Medvedev announced a complex of measures, which Russia would use to respond to the deployment of the missile defense system in Europe. In particular, Medvedev did not rule out a possibility to refuse from the policy of disarmament. Russia could also revise the previous agreements about arms control, he added.

For the time being, there is no direct threat to Russia, the head of the missile troops stated. However, the Strategic Missile Forces will be prepared to respond fast, if necessary, the general added.

“Technically, there are no restrictions in the opportunity to apply the SMF missiles. It takes little time to pick an object of destruction and put this object into the flight assignment of an ICBM. For the time being, the combat groups of the SMF are on duty with a zero flight assignment, which means that the missiles are not targeted against anything,” Interfax quoted the official as saying.

Russia’s new Yars, Topol-M and Bulava ICBMs are unvulnerable to the US missile defense system. The commander of the Russian SFM said that it was best for the enemy to destroy the missile during the initial part of its flight, when it gathers speed. The missile separates later, which makes it harder for interceptors to detect the missile in a whole cloud of fake targets.

Russia’s state-of-the-art ballistic missiles have the shortest boost phase of the flight – this phase is much shorter than it was with older missiles. “At this short part of the flight the missiles perform active maneuvers, which makes it impossible for interceptors to plan the attack.

“We conducted the tests to evaluate and confirm the nuclear safety of Topol warheads. The results of the tests showed that even in case of most complicated breakdowns, fires or explosions, the nuclear explosion of the warhead is excluded,” Karakaev said.

Russia’s present-day SMF consist of more than 350 missile complexes of six types. Three of them are silo-based and three others are mobile ground-based complexes. It is worthy of note that the Russian system of nuclear containment forces consists of the Strategic Missile Forces, strategic nuclear submarines and strategic bombers.

By the beginning of 2012, there will be 86 launch systems with Topol-M and Yars systems in the structure of the combat group of the SMF. The share of state-of-the-art arms in the SMF will thus grow up to 25 percent.

In 2012, Russia will begin the process to pass Yars missile complexes into service. The range of the system is up to 11,000 kilometers. It has a separating warhead with maneuverable and individually guided blocks. The system is highly maneuverable. In 2012, Russia will also complete the introduction of Topol-M missiles, the operational resource of which makes up not less than 20 years.

The life of operating missile complexes with RS-20B Voevoda, RS-18 Stilet and RS-12M Topol mobile missile complex will be prolonged. These systems still make the base of the Strategic Missile Forces.

However, it is expected that Stilet missiles will be put out of exploitation in 2017, whereas the time of Topol missiles will end in 2019. Voevoda missiles will stay on duty during the entire decade, at the time when the missile forces are being rearmed.

For the time being, as much as 70 percent of missile complexes are beyond their warranties. However, the required parameters of their reliability and technical readiness are still preserved. Not less than 96 percent of all of Russia’s missile complexes are ready for immediate action every day.

“The share of new missile complexes in the SMF will constantly grow. By 2016, the share of new systems is to make up 60 percent. By 2021, this number is expected to grow to 98 percent, Karakaev said.

Source

Related posts:

• Russia unveils plans for “invincible” ICBM
• France ready to sell all to Russia save for NATO codes and ICBMs
• Vladimir Putin calls for more weapons to stop America doing ‘whatever it wants’
• Putin plugs Internet Democracy to pack popular punch
• Russian Foreign Minister in Damascus seeking hope for Syria

Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen has announced plans to build a spaceship that could replace the Space Shuttle, launch rockets, and carry cargo into space.

Allen is planning to launch rockets from a giant aircraft to put satellites and eventually passengers into space.

The developers say six jumbo jet engines would power the aircraft and it would have a wingspan of 117 meters.

“I have long dreamed about taking the next big step in private space flight,” Allen told reporters, “to offer a flexible, orbital space delivery system.”

The first test flight of the aircraft is targeted for 2016.

The project comes after NASA ended its 30-year space shuttle program this year, opening the door to private enterprise to supply space vehicles.

Source

Related posts:

• Why Do Astronauts Wear Space Diapers?
• NASA discovers 11 new Solar Systems
• Planets with Two Suns are Common
• Voyager probe Reaches Outer Limits of the Solar System
• Earth’s sibling located 600 light-years away

Fruitful research: The light is depicted as travelling in waves across the scene

The first stunning images of moving bullets appeared around 50 years ago – now a team of snap happy scientists have trumped that achievement by photographing streaks of light.

Scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) needed some very specialised equipment to pull off the feat, as light travels around a million times faster than a bullet.

The team used a camera that collected the light beams at a rate of roughly one trillion frames per second – that’s fast enough to produce a slow-motion video of a burst of light traveling the length of a one-litre bottle, bouncing off the cap and reflecting back to the bottle’s bottom.

‘We have built a virtual slow motion camera where were can see photons, or light particles, moving through space,’ explained Ramesh Raskar, Associate Professor of the MIT Media Lab.

Professor Raskar’s ‘camera’ was actually a single large lens working alongside an array of 500 sensors.

And instead of a regular flash, the researchers deployed a titanium sapphire laser pulse that lasts less than one trillionth of a second.

Media Lab postdoc Andreas Velten, one of the system’s developers, calls it the ‘ultimate’ in slow motion: ‘There’s nothing in the universe that looks fast to this camera,’ he says.

A bullet can be captured in one shot, but to record the nippier light particles the laser is pulsed millions of times a second through a system of mirrors.

The mirrors are then gradually titled around so that the camera lens scans the entire ‘scene’.

The results are spectacular photographs that show how light travels in waves across space.

What’s more, Raskar explains that the technology he’s refining with his team could have several practical uses.

He adds: ‘Such a camera may be useful in medical imaging, in industrial or scientific use and in the future even for consumer photography.

‘In medical imaging now we can do ultrasounds with light, because we can see how light scatters volumetrically inside the body. And in industrial imaging one can use the scattered light to analyse defects in materials.’

Source

Related posts:

• Official conclusion of Phobos Ground crash shocks scientists
• Cornell University Invents Time Cloak for Pentagon
• Giant gas cloud en route to black hole
• Jumping Cockroach found in South Africa
• Speed of light broken again as scientists test neutrino result

Iran has released video footage of the most advanced US reconnaissance drone which was downed by the Iranian Army in the eastern part of the Islamic Republic earlier this week.

On Sunday December 4, the Iranian Army’s electronic warfare unit downed with minimum damage the US RQ-170 Sentinel stealth aircraft which was flying over the Iranian city of Kashmar, some 140 miles (225km) from the Afghan border.

The aircraft had crossed into Iran’s airspace over the border with neighboring Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, Iran has announced that it intends to carry out reverse engineering on the captured RQ-170 Sentinel stealth aircraft, which is also known as the Beast of Kandahar, and is similar in design to a US Air Force B-2 stealth bomber.

On Tuesday, two US officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that the drone had been part of a CIA reconnaissance mission, involving the United State’s intelligence community stationed in Afghanistan.

They claimed the reconnaissance capability of the RQ-170 Sentinel drone enabled it to gather information from inside Iran by flying along Afghanistan’s border with the Islamic Republic.

The RQ-170 is designed and developed by the American company, Lockheed Martin.

A commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) said on Thursday that the aircraft, equipped with highly advanced surveillance systems, electronic communication, and radar systems, had fallen into the trap of Iran’s armed forces.

Iran has said that the US drone spy mission was a “hostile act”, adding that it will complain to the United Nations over the violation of its air sovereignty by the intelligence gathering aircraft.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry has also summoned the Swiss ambassador to Tehran to protest the recent violation of the Islamic Republic’s airspace by the US spy drone.

The United States has admitted that the unmanned stealth drone was part of a surveillance program for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

Source

Related posts:

• US confirms downed drone spied on Iran
• Obama Asks Iran to Give Back Captured US Spy Drone
• Iran military downs US spy drone
• Israeli agents posed as CIA to recruit terrorists
• Iran sentences CIA operative to death

At technology shows, the Korean company has also demonstrated flexible screens just 0.3mm thick.

But its latest video demo shows off truly out-there technology – a ‘tablet of the future’ that offers instant translation, video, and a level of 3D beyond anything yet available.

Samsung's transparent, flexible AMOLED screen isn't as wacky as it seems - the company has already promised that it will ship flexible AMOLED devices in 2012, starting with mobile phones.

This is where it all starts to get a little far-fetched - the screen seems to be able to 'throw' a holographic 3D image so solid it looks like you could touch it. Glasses-free 3D does exist - but it doesn't look like this

The screen has the functions of a high-end tablet computer - and appears to be able to translate instantly from French into Korean

The Galaxy Skin phone will be so flexible you can roll it up - and may be in shops early next year.

But while Samsung’s video demo might be ‘concept technology’, factories in the Far East are already working on ‘real’ versions – flexible phones that will hit the market in early 2012.

Both Samsung and Nokia are working on the technology.

During a company results conference, investor relations chief Robert Yi said, ‘The flexible display, we are looking to introduce sometime in 2012, hopefully the earlier part.’

Yi said that the first devices to ship with flexible screens would be phones.

Other possible applications include ‘foldable’ iPad-style tablets.

It’s not an out-there prediction, either.

Rival smartphone giant Nokia unveiled a basic prototype of the Nokia Kinetic – a bendable smartphone – at Nokia World

Kinetic allowed users to bend the screen to control functions such as music and video.

Nokia refuses to say when its Kinetic smartphones will be on sale.

Earlier Samsung demonstrations have shown off OLED screens which can be folded over.

The company demonstrated ‘bendable’ AMOLED screens 4.5 inches across and just 0.3mm thick in January this year.

Another paper by Samsung scientists showed off an AMOLED screen with a section that could be folded over completely without cracking.

Earlier this year, reports leaked that Samsung had the capacity to manufacture large amounts of such screens by ‘early 2012′ – but no one knew what they might be for.

Pictures of a concept phone using the technology – the Galaxy Skin (pictured) – also appeared.

Skin was a project carried out by design students using the Samsung logo and Galaxy trademark.

‘Flexible’ screens have been demonstrated in various forms since as early as 2004 – with tech insiders suggesting that laptops or e-Book readers might one day take the form of a ‘pen’ housing a processor with a ‘sheet’ of paper-like screen wrapped around them.

Samsung's Galaxy Skin - unveiled as a concept earlier this year - could be on sale as early as Spring 2012, according to recent reports

Layers of 'Graphene' - atom-thick layers of carbon - will be used to create paper-thin 'foldable' screens in the Samsung Galaxy Skin

Source

Related posts:

• Nokia to axe 4,000 more jobs, improve production efficiency
• Samsung unveils Transparent Smart Windows
• Samsung wants to Ban the iPhone 5 in Korea
• Universal phone charger just months away as mobile firms back micro-USB design
• Iran’s Majlis mulls banning Samsung products over insulting teaser