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Archive for the 'Lasers' Category

Be Your Own Fiber Net

Posted by Sam Churchill on August 1st, 2008

I’mma do the things that I wanna do
I ain’t got a thing to prove to you
I’ll eat my candy with the pork and beans
Excuse my manners if I make a scene
- Weezer: Pork and Beans

Google’s Public Policy Blog says a trial experiment in Ottawa, Canada is trying out the consumer-owned model for fiber on a [...]

The Ultimate Scoop

Posted by Sam Churchill on June 2nd, 2008

There be whales here! - The Voyage Home

There it is. The Phoenix spacecraft has scooped its first sample of Martian soil.

Now for a taste test. Aboard the deck of the Phoenix spacecraft are a suite of science instruments:

The Microscopy, Electrochemistry, and Conductivity Analyzer (MECA), built by JPL, is a miniature wet lab. It [...]

Wireless 10GigE

Posted by Sam Churchill on April 28th, 2008

MRV Communications, a provider of WDM and optical transport, metro Ethernet, and fiber optic components, today announced the TereScope TS-10GE, the industry’s first wireless 10-Gigabit Ethernet system.
The system will make its public debut at Interop, which runs from April 27 – May 2 in Las Vegas. The system has already been named a “Best of [...]

Plasma Antennas

Posted by Sam Churchill on February 18th, 2008

Now that’s what I call a close encounter! — Independence Day

Sprint’s Xohm blog had a graphic (below), inserting the Xohm logo above the Chicago Skyline.

It got me thinking about Plasma Antennas.
Sure, sure, its only a science project in a test tube — but imagine how a “virtual” antenna, floating 1000-2000 feet above a city, [...]

Space Cold War

Posted by Sam Churchill on January 11th, 2008

“Maybe we’re at war with Norway.” — The Thing

Last January 11, a missile launched from China’s Xichang Space Center destroyed a satellite 537 miles above the Earth’s surface. Although the target was a weather satellite belonging to China itself, the act rattled the U.S. space establishment.
Flight controllers at NASA had to maneuver the Terra environmental [...]

Trouble in UTOPIA?

Posted by Sam Churchill on January 4th, 2008

UTOPIA has fallen on hard times, reports the Salt Lake City Tribune.
The fiber-optic telecommunications network in 11 Utah cities is not signing up subscribers as quickly as its backers hoped and, as a result, the tax revenues of those cities could someday be called upon to pay the interest on the system’s debt.
When the [...]

Wireless Bridge Monitoring

Posted by Sam Churchill on August 13th, 2007

New York may be the first state with a 24/7 wireless bridge monitoring system, reports EE Times. The $500,000 project is being funded by the New York State Energy and Research Development Authority. Engineering professor Kerop Janoyan at Clarkson University is working with TransTech Systems (Schenectady, N.Y.) to craft a commercial version of their [...]

Rodney Brooks Interview

Posted by Sam Churchill on May 15th, 2007

That’s the bottom line. If you’re not scared of them, you’re in big trouble.
– Fast, Cheap & Out of Control

RoboBusiness 2007, an international conference showcasing consumer, commercial and military robots, opened in Boston today. To gain insight on what’s in the pipeline, CNET News.com talked with Rodney Brooks, one of the leading experts on robots [...]

Routers in Space

Posted by Sam Churchill on April 16th, 2007

What do you get when you combine a high school library, an intercontinental ballistic missile, and a machine that makes sexy underwear? The answer is scheduled to blast off into space tonight.
– NPR, April 16, 2007

A Chinese navigation satellite was launched early Saturday, the second satellite in less than a week. The Beidou-2 satellite is [...]

Advanced EHF - Wait for It

Posted by Sam Churchill on January 3rd, 2007

Lockheed Martin announced that it has delivered the flight structure for the third space vehicle in the Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) program for integration with its propulsion subsystem.
Each of the three Advanced EHF satellites (wikipedia) employs more than 50 communications channels via multiple, simultaneous downlinks. Launch of the first AEHF satellite is planned for [...]