It’s spawning a revolution The DIY movement has vaulted from the home to the research lab, and it’s driven by the same motives: saving tons of money and getting precisely what you want. It’s spawning

Educated users that understand, and take an active interest in maintaining their possessions   The Repair It Yourself (RIY) concept by Design Academy Eindhoven graduate Eugenia Morpurgo is a canvas shoe designed to be as

What’s the Big Idea?   Less than one hundred years ago a routine bacterial infection could be a death sentence. The discovery of penicillin changed all of that. We’re now on the verge of a

Stronger than steel or titanium — and just as tough — metallic glass is an ideal material for everything from cell-phone cases to aircraft parts. Now, researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have

After six years of intensive effort, scientists are reporting development of the first commercially viable nanogenerator, a flexible chip that can use body movements — a finger pinch now en route to a pulse beat

  Researchers have demonstrated a penny-sized “nuclear battery” that produces energy from the decay of radioisotopes. As radioactive substances decay, they release charged particles that when properly harvested can create an electrical current. Nuclear batteries

Image by Marco Veringa via Flickr Wine glasses that don’t shatter? Baby bottles that don’t break? Coffee mugs that last generations? All are possible with a new process for strengthening glass and ceramics developed by

A mid-life crisis threatens its future

Uni-Pixel, a company based in Woodlands, Texas, has announced it is about to start mass production of a thin-film to be used in time-multiplexed optical shutter (TMOS) displays, a next-generation display technology that exploits retinal

Wal-Mart and others are going green with “biodegradable” packaging made from corn. But is this really the answer to America’s throwaway culture?