Climate change may have contributed to extinction of Neanderthals
Denver CO (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
A researcher at the University of Colorado Denver has found that Neanderthals in Europe showed signs of nutritional stress during periods of extreme cold, suggesting climate change may have contributed to their demise around 40,000 years ago.
Jamie Hodgkins, a zooarchaeologist and assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology at CU Denver, analyzed the remains of prey animals and f ...
more
Carbon capture is substantial in secondary tropical forests
Clemson SC (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
One of the most effective methods for capturing carbon from the atmosphere in the tropics of Latin America requires doing very little. In fact, researchers say, just protecting natural forest regrowth can help reduce climate change. Carbon uptake by secondary tropical forests is substantial.
If left alone to regrow for 40 years, the young secondary forests (YSF) and middle-aged secondary f ...
more
How the spectacular Hawaiian-Emperor seamount chain became so bendy
Sydney, Australia (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
The physical mechanism causing the unique, sharp bend in the Hawaiian-Emperor seamount chain has been uncovered in a collaboration between the University of Sydney and the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
Led by a PhD candidate at the University of Sydney's School of Geosciences, researchers used the Southern Hemisphere's most highly integrated supercomputer to reveal flow pat ...
more
Retreat of the ice followed by millennia of methane release
Oslo, Norway (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
Scientists have calculated that the present day ice sheets keep vast amounts of climate gas methane in check. Ice sheets are heavy and cold, providing pressure and temperatures that contain methane in form of ice-like substance called gas hydrate. If the ice sheets retreat the weight of the ice will be lifted from the ocean floor, the gas hydrates will be destabilised and the methane will be rel ...
more
Saudi Arabia's credit rating lowered
Frankfurt, Germany (UPI) May 16, 2016 -
While strong when compared with other sovereign credit ratings, Saudi Arabia's fiscal health remains under threat from low oil prices, Moody's said.
Moody's Investors Service said the drop in crude oil prices, off more than 50 percent since the middle of 2014, has undermined the economy and finances for Saudi Arabia. As a result, the long-term rating for the country was lowered one notc ...
more
Canadian oil services start to return
Fort Mcmurray, Alberta (UPI) May 16, 2016 -
Employees are on the ground in and around the Fort McMurray area of Alberta to start bringing oil sands operations online, companies said Monday.
Canadian energy company Syncrude said its employees were on the ground surveying operations in advance of the return to normal operations. As of Sunday, the company said it had "several hundred" employees in Fort McMurray working on inspection ...
more
North Dakota rig count at lowest since 2005
Bismarck, N.D. (UPI) May 16, 2016 -
At 27, the number of rigs actively exploring for or producing oil or natural gas in North Dakota is the lowest it's been in more than a decade, state data show.
The government reports 27 rigs in service as of Monday, relatively stable when compared with recent weeks. The rig count ties the all-time low reported in July 2005 and comes at a time when energy companies are spending less on ...
more
BP takes stronger role in North Sea gas
London (UPI) May 16, 2016 -
BP said Monday it was doubling its stake in the Culzean gas field in the North Sea, which is expected to have enough gas to meet 5 percent of British demand.
For an undisclosed sum, BP said it doubled its stake in the field after taking a 16 percent share held by Japanese energy company JX Nippon. The field is operated by Danish energy company Maersk.
"We are pleased to have deep ...
more
Oil prices move closer to $50 per barrel on supply fears
New York (UPI) May 16, 2016 -
Simmering concerns about supply shortages across the global energy market pushed crude oil prices sharply higher in early Monday trading.
Sluggish demand from a lackluster global economy had pushed oil lower since the middle of 2014, though the market sentiment is shifting its focus to supplies. Last week, the International Energy Agency said that, after roughly two years, balance was s ...
more
Statoil to help tap Turkish gas
Stavanger, Norway (UPI) May 16, 2016 -
Norwegian energy company Statoil said Monday it signed an agreement with a Canadian exploration company to help explore the shale gas potential in Turkey.
According to the terms of an agreement, Statoil takes a 50 percent stake in the Barnali license in northwestern part of Turkey, while Toronto-listed Valeura Energy keeps the remaining shares and stays on as the operator in an area kno ...
more
German police arrest 120 in anti-coal demonstrations
Proschim, Deutschland (AFP) May 15, 2016 -
German police said Sunday they arrested 120 people following violent clashes between environmental activists and security personnel at anti-coal demonstrations in the east of the country.
A police spokeswoman said the clashes occurred Saturday in Lausitz when around 300 demonstrators forced their way into the Schwarze Pumpe coal-fired power station belonging to Swedish state-owned energy gia ...
more
European vote against China market status not 'constructive': Beijing
Beijing (AFP) May 16, 2016 -
A European Parliament vote against granting China market economy status in the World Trade Organization was "not at all constructive", Beijing's foreign minister said Monday as he met his French counterpart.
The designation would make it much harder for Brussels to fight Beijing over alleged unfair trading practices.
China joined the WTO in 2001. It argues that accession protocols dictat ...
more
Waze squeezes into Uber's lane with carpool feature
San Francisco (AFP) May 16, 2016 -
Google-owned navigation application Waze on Monday began testing a carpool feature that rolls near the home turf of Uber and Lyft.
Waze Carpool stressed that it intended only to help commuters get to or from their jobs, chipping in to cover trip costs, and was not getting involved with the types of on-demand rides that Uber and Lyft offer.
Still, Waze Carpool would serve as an alternativ ...
more
Buffett takes $1 bn stake in Apple
New York (AFP) May 16, 2016 -
Billionaire investor Warren Buffett has taken a $1 billion stake in Apple, whose stock has been in an extended slump.
The stake was revealed in a regulatory filing by Buffett's holding company Berkshire Hathaway after Apple shares skidded last week to their lowest level in two years.
The filing did not indicate when Buffett purchased the shares or his reasons, but Buffett is renowned as ...
more
Germany eyes free wi-fi in public spaces, finally
Berlin (AFP) May 15, 2016 -
Try looking for a free wi-fi connection in the cafe down the street in Germany and, more likely than not, there isn't one.
Forget about looking for open connections in parks or at key monuments. They just don't exist.
In an age when almost everyone carries a smartphone, the absence of such free hotspots can appear to be an aberration in a country that is known for its technological prowe ...
more
Chinese executive 'confesses' to $800m fraud
Shanghai (AFP) May 16, 2016 -
The alleged mastermind of a scam which cost Chinese investors hundreds of millions of dollars lived in a penthouse flat featuring peacocks and fountains, reports said Monday after he was paraded on television confessing.
Xu Qin, described as the "controller" of Zhongjin Asset Management and its linked companies, was among 35 executives and employees formally arrested last week in connection ...
more
Industry Weighs in on Green Aviation Tech
Hampton VA (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
Aviation's future is bright ... green. That was the environmentally promising message delivered during the Green Aviation Technical Interchange Meeting (TIM), held recently at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va.
More than 100 attendees from government, industry and academia listened as speakers discussed aeronautical research innovations that aim to lessen aircraft noise, reduce e ...
more
Ferrous chemistry in aqueous solution unravelled
Berlin, Germany (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
The team demonstrated how a detailed picture of the electronic states can be ascertained by systematically comparing all of the interactive electronic processes in a simple system of aqueous iron(II). The results have now been published in Scientific Reports, the open access journal from Nature Group publishing.
If a blindman feels the leg of an elephant, he can conclude something about th ...
more
Hybrid hydrostatic transmission enables robots with human-like grace and precision
Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
A new type of hydrostatic transmission that combines hydraulic and pneumatic lines can safely and precisely drive robot arms, giving them the delicacy necessary to pick up an egg without breaking it. This transmission has almost no friction or play, offering extreme precision for tasks such as threading a sewing needle.
The hybrid transmission makes it possible to halve the number of bulky ...
more
Nanocavity may improve ultrathin solar panels
Buffalo NY (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
The future of movies and manufacturing may be in 3-D, but electronics and photonics are going 2-D; specifically, two-dimensional semiconducting materials. One of the latest advancements in these fields centers on molybdenum disulfide (MoS2), a two-dimensional semiconductor that, while commonly used in lubricants and steel alloys, is still being explored in optoelectronics.
Recently, engine ...
more
Researchers unleash graphene 'tiger' for more efficient optoelectronics
Seattle WA (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
In the quest to harvest light for electronics, the focal point is the moment when photons - light particles - encounter electrons, those negatively-charged subatomic particles that form the basis of our modern electronic lives. If conditions are right when electrons and photons meet, an exchange of energy can occur. Maximizing that transfer of energy is the key to making efficient light-captured ...
more
Physicists measure van der Waals forces of individual atoms for the first time
Basel, Switzerland (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
Physicists at the Swiss Nanoscience Institute and the University of Basel have succeeded in measuring the very weak van der Waals forces between individual atoms for the first time. To do this, they fixed individual noble gas atoms within a molecular network and determined the interactions with a single xenon atom that they had positioned at the tip of an atomic force microscope.
As expect ...
more
Digital "clone" testing aims to maximize machine efficiency
Greenbelt MD (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
Just as medical researchers hope to use DNA analysis to help patients live longer and healthier lives, engineers at Sentient Science are looking to better understand what machines are made of to maximize their lifespans. "What we set out to do was really hard," says Ward Thomas, president and CEO of the Buffalo, New York-based company. "We set out to decode the material genome."
The potent ...
more
Using laser pulses to direct protons
Munich, Germany (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
Using ultrashort laser pulses an international team at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich and the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics has managed to manipulate the positions of atoms in hydrocarbon molecules in a targeted fashion.
Researchers in the Departments of Physics and Chemistry at LMU Munich and the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics (MPQ) have used light to rec ...
more
Cryogenic Buyer's Guide - 2016
The global resource for products and services designed for cryogenic applications
The Cryogenic Buyer's Guide, published by the Cryogenic Society of America since 2005, is available in print and online here
Our aim is to provide site visitors and readers with the most complete directory possible of products and services used in cryogenic applications worldwide. The Cryogenic Buyer's Guide includes everything from adhesives, cryocoolers, dewars and electronic controls to greases, liquefiers, magnets, tanks, test chambers, valves and wire used in ultra-low temperature applications. You can find engineering consultants, research and test laboratories, specialty manufacturers, cryogenic treatment services, materials research and cryogenic transport services.
The product and service categories are listed here.
The current list of suppliers is listed here.
If your company is active in providing products and/or services for cryogenic applications, we want to include you. It is FREE to qualified suppliers.
Fill out the application for a listing here.
Hybrid hydrostatic transmission enables robots with human-like grace and precision
Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 17, 2016 -
A new type of hydrostatic transmission that combines hydraulic and pneumatic lines can safely and precisely drive robot arms, giving them the delicacy necessary to pick up an egg without breaking it. This transmission has almost no friction or play, offering extreme precision for tasks such as threading a sewing needle.
The hybrid transmission makes it possible to halve the number of bulky ...
more
