Also, battery life is up to 20 hours for audio playback.

The 80 GB iPod is here.

Since 1999, the editors of Technology Review have honored the young innovators whose inventions and research we find most exciting; today that collection is the TR35, a list of technologists and scientists, all under the age of 35. Their work--spanning medicine, computing, communications, electronics, nanotechnology, and more--is changing our world.

2006 Innovator of the Year: Joshua Schachter

Apparently del.icio.us is one of the most innovative things to happen this year.

Other candidates in infotech: Tor, Tapestry, Asbestos, Google Maps mashups like housingmaps.com, and Ruby on Rails.

The biotechies might be more interested in the story of Alice Ting, an assistant professor in chemistry at MIT who pioneered a successor to GFP.

Young Innovators Under 35 | Technology Review | 2006

Advanced Micro Devices Inc. struck another blow at Intel Corp., its bigger rival in the market for personal-computer microprocessors, as it disclosed plans Monday to buy one of the dominant makers of graphics chips in a $5.4 billion deal that analysts said could fundamentally alter competition in the semiconductor industry.

The acquisition of ATI Technologies Inc. will allow AMD to shed its role as a boutique player that sells only microprocessors, which act as the core calculating engines in PCs. Almost immediately, AMD will become a seller of chips in four new categories, eroding a key advantage of Intel, which has long benefited from its broader product portfolio.

AMD buys ATI

If you liked the video of Fedex arrivals during thunderstorms, you might be interested in some of the following.

RAPT Automation Tool

The New York Port Authority, through a cooperative research and development agreement, has sponsored the development of a decision support tool to assist air traffic controllers with the management of traffic in the busy New York terminal airspace during convective weather events. The Route Availability Planning Tool (RAPT) uses the convective weather forecast of the Corridor Integrated Weather System and modeled aircraft trajectories to determine when specific departure routes will be blocked by severe weather. During its first year of operation, the prototype RAPT has permitted substantial delay reduction in the New York area.

Weather Forecasting Accuracy for FAA Traffic Flow Management: A Workshop Report

The characteristics of these tools suggest how operational users might utilize highly accurate 2- to 6-hour convective forecasts when they are developed. A departure route availability planning tool (RAPT) that uses the 0- to 60-minute Terminal Convective Weather Forecasts commenced operational evaluation at the New York terminal area and surrounding en-route facilities in August 2002. RAPT examines four-dimensional intersections of planes with forecasted storm locations to determine appropriate departure times from a runway. The RAPT software will utilize the 0- to 2-hour Regional Convective Weather Forecasts at a number of air traffic control facilities in 2003. Direct use of convective forecasts to assist air traffic users in making decisions about traffic routing, such as illustrated by RAPT, has significant implications for the presentation of convective weather forecasts and validation. First, the uncertainty of convective forecasts needs to be expressed in a way that allows tools such as RAPT to provide guidance to operational users as to the likelihood of a route being available for use as a function of time. And second, convective forecast accuracy needs to be verified in the context of operational value to the user, particularly by explicitly addressing the accuracy for route usage decisions. Key Points Identified by Presenters on Ways to Present Forecasts Two- to 6-hour convective weather forecast products should be designed to facilitate air traffic control and airline decisions such as predicted capacity, route availability, and the fuel to be loaded on aircraft. Because accurate deterministic 2- to 6-hour forecasts are not available, it is necessary to develop probabilistic forecasts that can readily be used by both humans and automated air traffic management decision support tools. The FAA will need to also have a robust “tactical” convective we... [ Read More (0.4k in body) ]

Those interested in the GE Puffer may also find this device of interest.

Cellular Analysis and Notification of Antigen Risks and Yields (CANARY) – Information taken from Todd H. Rider, et al., "A B Cell-Based Sensor for Rapid Identification of Pathogens," Science 2003, 301: 213-215.

Researchers at MIT Lincoln Laboratory began work in 1997 on the CANARY (Cellular Analysis and Notification of Antigen Risks and Yields) project. It involves the use of B-lymphocytes, a type of white blood cell that our bodies use against bacterial and viral invaders. These cells are already designed by nature to search for any bacteria and viruses very rapidly. In the laboratory, they are given the ability to glow in the presence of certain contaminants by adding a luminescence gene from jellyfish. The actual detectors are pathogen specific antibodies within the B cells that trigger a burst of calcium when an agent is detected. Within seconds, the calcium activates a bioluminescent protein that causes the whole cell to glow. A device termed a luminometer is used to analyze the light-emitting cell. Within the luminometer the cells are kept alive in test tubes and their response is displayed on a computer readout. The system has already been tested successfully against a list of biological agents, including anthrax, smallpox, plague, tularemia and encephalitis.

The CANARY bio-agent forensic analysis of body fluids would be useful for monitoring air, water, and contaminated surfaces as well as body fluids. It is expected to detect more rapidly and with greater sensitivity than conventional sensors that are based on chemical reactions. These chemical reactions can take several hours to complete and the sensors can require several thousands of particles for detection. By comparison, CANARY has been able detect as few as 50 colony-forming units of the plague bacterium in less than three minutes. Furthermore, unlike many existing sensors, CANARY would not require advanced training for operation. Consequently, MIT researchers foresee a variety of applications for the system. ...

In the event of an emergency, suspicious substances on the street, subways, or airports could be tested quickly.

Here's a press release and a demonstration video. The article from Science may also be of interest for the technically inclined.

We report the use of genetically engineered cells in a pathogen identification sensor. This sensor uses B lymphocytes that have been engineered to emit light within seconds of exposure to specific bacteria and viruses. We demonstrated rapid screening of relevant samples and identification of a variety of pathogens at very low levels. Because of its speed, sensitivity, and specificity, this pathogen identification technology could prove useful for medical diagnostics, biowarfare defense, food- and water-quality monitoring, and other applications.

Looking For Trouble - Finding the Bugs

The implications for network discrimination should now be pretty clear. If the network discriminates by sending misleading signals about congestion, and sending them preferentially to certain machines or certain applications, the incentive for those machines and applications to stick to the social contract and do their share to control congestion, will weaken.

Will this lead to a wave of defections that destroys the Net? Probably not, but I can't be sure. I do think this is something we should think about.

Discrimination, Congestion, and Cooperation

For my own reference.

The Internet engineering community is making progress on the thorny issue of how best to route emergency communications such as 911 calls over the Internet.

This year-long effort is important for companies and government agencies that are migrating to VoIP and must ensure that police and firefighters can locate and respond to 911 calls placed from IP phones in their office buildings.

IETF taking on 911 problem within VoIP

Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology announce energy savings by a factor of more than 500 in simulations with their ultra energy efficient embedded architecture based on Probabilistic CMOS (PCMOS).

GA Tech Develops Ultra-Efficient Embedded Architectures Based On Probabilistic Technology

"PetaCache may help scientists change the way they think about exploring new ideas. It will allow a physicist with a sudden new idea, an 'I wonder if...' moment, to quickly begin exploring that new idea."

PetaCache: Accelerating Data-Intensive Applications

Forensic scientists could use DNA retrieved from a crime scene to predict the surname of the suspect, according to a new British study.

It is not perfect, but could be an important investigative tool when combined with other intelligence.

Subscribers to Current Biology can read the full paper; anyone can review the technical summary. From the summary:

A large surname-based forensic database might contribute to the intelligence-led investigation of up to ∼70 rapes and murders per year in the UK.

DNA 'could predict your surname'