PlayStation To Help Fight Disease
Thanks to a creative usage of cutting-edge technology, anyone with a broadband-connected Sony PlayStation 3 can soon enlist in the fight against diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, Huntington's and a variety of cancers. By allowing users to download optional software designed to distribute computations across many idle gaming systems, Stanford University's Folding@home project harnesses the... posted on Mar 18 2007, 2,312 reads

Pharmaceutical For The People
The pharmaceutical industry spends billions of dollars fighting Western ailments, but very little on diseases that kill millions in the developing world. Victoria Hale, recently awarded a MacArthur Fellowship for her efforts, is changing that. Hale's San Francisco-based nonprofit, Institute for OneWorld Health, is innovatively partnering around the world to bring these neglected drugs to market. S... posted on Mar 09 2007, 1,562 reads

Teens Build Soybean-Fueled Car
A car that can go from zero to 60 in four seconds and get more than 50 miles to the gallon would be enough to pique any driver's interest. So who do we have to thank for it. Ford? GM? Toyota? No -- just Victor, David, Cheeseborough, Bruce, and Kosi, five kids from the auto shop program at West Philadelphia High School. The kids, along with a handful of schoolmates, built the soybean-fueled car as ... posted on Mar 02 2007, 3,026 reads

South Africa's Free Science Texts
Five years ago, South African physicist Mark Horner had just finished giving a talk on wave phenomena at a South African science fair when a group of young students from a poor rural high school came up to him, asking him to proofread the notes they'd taken by hand in a notebook. The scientist was stunned by the comprehensive diligence reflected in the notes, and asked why the students were so att... posted on Feb 24 2007, 3,375 reads

What Are You Optimistic About?
Each year the Edge Foundation poses one thought-provoking question to over one hundred of the world's leading minds. This year's question: "What are you optimistic about?" Edge publisher John Brockman points out that while conventional wisdom warns us that things are sliding from bad to worse, many of our top scientists have a brighter outlook on our future. This stimulating compilation of answers... posted on Jan 12 2007, 3,046 reads

Top Scientists Forecast Future
What will be the biggest breakthrough of the next 50 years? As part of their 50th anniversary celebrations, the New Scientist magazine asked over 70 of the world's most brilliant scientists for their ideas. In coming decades will we: discover that we are not alone in the universe? Unravel the physiological basis for consciousness? Routinely have false memories implanted in our minds? Begin to ev... posted on Nov 22 2006, 2,344 reads

A Video Game That Teaches Economics
Students taking Economics 201 at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro don't come to class -- they just log in to the Internet. The entire microeconomics course is a video game that students play online to earn three college credits. Such sophisticated tools for learning could transform the face of education as we know it. "This is a game in which the students are literally immersed in a ... posted on Oct 23 2006, 2,214 reads

Altruism: a Neural Kick from Within
What motivates people to act anonymously kind? Researchers at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke in Bethesda, Maryland, wanted to find exactly that -- the neural basis for unselfish acts. So they decided to peek into the brains of 19 volunteers who were choosing whether to give money to charity, or keep it for themselves. They found that the part of the brain that was acti... posted on Oct 18 2006, 2,587 reads

World's Greatest Green Inventions
What if there was an electric car that went from 0-60 mph in less time than a Ferrari, all while getting 100 mpg? What if we could use advanced monorail technology to create frictionless wind turbines? From Solar powered LEDs to Cellphones to greener aircraft, there's a new breed of inventors coming up with cutting-edge creations while also keeping the long-term health of the Earth in mind. Check ... posted on Oct 11 2006, 4,094 reads

Lighting Up the World with LED
While trekking in Nepal in 1997, Dave Irvine-Halliday was struck by the plight of rural villagers having to rely on smelly, dim and dangerous kerosene lanterns to light their homes. Hoping to make a difference, Dr. Irvine-Halliday, a professor of electrical engineering at the University of Calgary in Canada, founded the Light Up The World Foundation. The non-profit organization has since helped to... posted on Oct 04 2006, 2,128 reads