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Concentrated Solar Startup Sets a New Efficiency Record

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Semprius makes solar modules using tiny cells that need less cooling.

Semprius, a startup that makes miniscule solar cells capable of capturing concentrated sunlight without costly cooling systems, announced this week that it had made the world's most efficient solar panel.

Startup Turns Data Crunching into a High-Stakes Sport

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Kaggle organizes contests for organizations looking to make valuable predictions from mountains of data.

Some things—fog in San Francisco or traffic in New York City—are easy to predict. Others, such as the way a stock market will react to big trades, or the progression of an HIV patient's illness, are far more complicated. That's where a startup called Kaggle comes in. It organizes contests in which participants attempt to make seemingly impossible predictions by analyzing mountains of data.

When Is an Electric Bike Like a Suitcase?

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 18:26:00 GMT

When it's the Boxx.

This isn’t your grandfather’s electric bike. (Assuming he had one?)

How Apple Can Revolutionize Television

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 11:54:00 GMT

An intelligent assistant would be the ideal way to deal with remote-control overload.

Rumor has it Apple is about to start making the the world's favorite gadget.

Too Young to Fail

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 05:00:00 GMT

17-year-old Laura Deming doesn't drive and can't vote. Is now her chance to change the world?

Laura Deming was studying for finals in a crowded MIT reading room last April when her phone rang. That's when she learned she may never again take another exam.

GM Reveals Dismal Volt Sales in January

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 22:07:00 GMT

But is it a bad sign for electric vehicles?

Electric vehicle enthusiasts (and critics) are keeping a close eye on sales of GM’s Volt this year to get a sense of whether electric vehicles will really finally catch on. GM has said that it hopes to sell 30,000 Volts in 2012, which would mean selling, on average 2,500 a month. It’s far short of that pace for January having sold just 603.

iRobot Goes to the Hospital

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 18:13:00 GMT

But it's doing very, very well.

iRobot Corp., makers of the beloved Roomba (and a lot more), announced that it would be investing $6 million in InTouch Health, a telemedicine company operating in 80 hospitals around the world. Though $6 million represents just a minority stake in the company, it’s--needless to say--a substantial investment, and a strong expansion of a joint development and licensing agreement the two companies had announced last summer.

The Secret of Ant Transportation Networks

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 05:10:00 GMT

Just how ants create the highly efficient network of trails around their nests has never been fully understood. Now researchers think they've cracked it

Among the most impressive transportation networks on the planet are the complex trails that ants create around their nests. These networks arise through the ants' exploration of their environment and end up channelling the distribution of food for the colony and the daily movements hundreds of thousands of individuals.

Why Viewers Could Soon Control Super Bowl Ads

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Tweets and other social media comments are about to drive real-time changes in programming.

During this Sunday's Super Bowl, a record five million viewers are expected to tweet or make other social media comments—not just about the game, but also about the many beer, snack, and car ads that are integral to the annual sports and entertainment ritual.

In IPO Filing, Facebook Shares Its Own Secrets

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:41:00 GMT

The world's largest social network is profitable, but fears Google and Apple.

In an announcement that Facebook hopes will be “liked” by many, the world’s largest social network filed to become a publicly listed company late Wednesday. Documents filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission provide investors and Facebook users the first public glimpse of the company’s financial state, technological challenges, and ambitions.

Giants Beat Pats 59 to 41 (in Social Media Super Bowl Buzz)

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:46:00 GMT

New England gets more website hits, but the Giants get more social buzz.

Social media analysis reveals that Giants fans show more online gusto than do their Patriots counterparts.

How Apple Can Win Enterprise

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 17:42:00 GMT

It's not all that different from how it won consumers.

Back in 2010, an audience member at a conference put a question to Steve Wozniak: Could Apple ever become the dominant player in the enterprise, as opposed to the consumer, market? Woz had a measured response. “It can happen, but it’s going to be gradual,” the Apple co-founder said. “What drives a buying decision of a person is a lot different than what drives the buying decision of the enterprise.”

How Neutrino Beams Could Reveal Cavities Inside Earth

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 05:10:00 GMT

Geophysicists want to use neutrinos to 'x-ray' the Earth, a technique that could reveal undiscovered oil fields. But how practical is such a scheme?

Neutrinos are peculiar particles. They have little mass, no charge and come in three flavours. These flavours are not fixed. The strange thing about neutrinos is that once created, they change from one flavour to another as they travel.

Shrunken Servers Aim for a Greener Internet

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Intel teams up with a startup to create a server twice as efficient as those that power websites and apps today.

As the cloud becomes more pervasive—driving everything from social networking to mobile apps—the computers that power it must guzzle more and more energy. Today, startup company SeaMicro, chip maker Intel, and electronics giant Samsung unveiled a new computer design that could make the data centers that power cloud services dramatically more efficient.

Tough Times for U.S. EV Battery Makers

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Companies need more consumer demand for electric vehicles to grow rapidly.

The U.S. government's effort to create an electric-vehicle battery industry suffered a setback last week when one of the companies it funded as part of this effort saw its parent company file for bankruptcy protection. Battery maker Enerdel had been awarded a $118.5 million grant to build a lithium-ion battery factory in Indiana as part of a $2 billion grant program for electric-vehicle component and battery manufacturing; its parent company is Ener1.

Innovation without Age Limits

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Young stars dominate the technology headlines. But outside the Internet, research shows, innovators are actually getting older as complexity rises.

Venture capitalists in Silicon Valley prefer to fund the young, the next Mark Zuckerberg. Why? The common mantra is that if you are over 35, you are too old to innovate. In fact, there is an evolving profile of the "perfect" entrepreneur—smart enough to get into Harvard or Stanford and savvy enough to drop out. Some prominent figures are even urging talented young people to skip college, presumably so they do not waste their "youngness" on studying.

What the Nook Means

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 23:36:00 GMT

A new Nook's on its way. Can it save books?

A Goliath has now become a David. Gigantism, it turns out, is relative.

Kinect Tech Comes to Laptops

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 21:28:00 GMT

Kinect belongs to the world; the world belongs to Kinect.

The Daily’s Matt Hickey continues to mine what seems like a loose-lipped source at Microsoft, reporting that Kinect tech may be coming to laptops. (Hickey had previously reported on efforts to bring the Kinect motion sensor to televisions and to set-top boxes.)

Mobile Phone Data Reveals Human Reproductive Strategies

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 05:10:00 GMT

The pattern of calls and texts between humans reveals how women invest more heavily in their main relationship than men; and how this changes as they age.

Various studies have shown that the frequency of contact between individuals is a reliable indicator of the emotional link between them. So it should come as no surprise that the data from mobile phone calls is a potential treasure trove of information about the social lives of humans.

Surveillance Video Becomes a Tool for Studying Customers

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 05:00:00 GMT

Software mines security footage to help business owners see what people do once they're inside the store.

The huge success of online shopping and advertising—led by giants like Amazon and Google—is in no small part thanks to software that logs when you visit Web pages and what you click on. Startup Prism Skylabs offers brick-and-mortar businesses the equivalent—counting, logging, and tracking people in a store, coffee shop, or gym with software that works with video from security cameras.