OnInnovation: Visionaries thinking out loud. A video oral history project advancing a culture of innovation powered by The Henry Ford.

http://bit.ly/aCOAe8There may be a new type of solar cell that mimics the way plants repel sunlight. When sunlight hits a leaf it provides it with vital nutrients. However, when the leaf receives enough sunlight it risks being burnt. The natural response, coming from thousands of years of evolution, is that a thin watery membrane covers the leaf and all of its vital proteins. The water cools down and wets the proteins, rejuvenating them, and allowing them to once again receive sunlight. Photovoltaic cells contain a variety of molecules that receive photons from sunlight, shake the photons around a bit to release electrons, and channel the electricity towards an external power source. With the new cells, the molecules soak in a liquid that rejuvenates them, and then they pass through a porous membrane that dries them off. This rapid repair mechanism based on chloroplasts is the future of solar cells.

http://bit.ly/ddhOfB
When searching for a solution to a business or other problem, we may look to books, the Internet or other people for assistance, but rarely do we seek the answers in nature. As the author, Mitch Ditkoff explains, nature has a way for dealing with any problem. Activities that humans have developed often have origins in the animal kingdom.
 
Observing nature and studying its perfect systems and processes is a very practical way of coming up with realistic ideas to solve problems. The creators of Kung Fu observed the fighting styles of various animals. The first sketch of an airplane was created by Leonardo da Vinci after studying the mechanics of birds in flight. Many medicines are based on the natural healing properties of herbs and plants. The answer to your problem may be found by observing an ant colony, a squirrel gathering nuts, or perhaps even a dog burying something in the backyard. Inspiration can be found in any number of places in nature; More...

http://bit.ly/ddhOfB
When searching for a solution to a business or other problem, we may look to books, the Internet or other people for assistance, but rarely do we seek the answers in nature. As the author, Mitch Ditkoff explains, nature has a way for dealing with any problem. Activities that humans have developed often have origins in the animal kingdom.
 
Observing nature and studying its perfect systems and processes is a very practical way of coming up with realistic ideas to solve problems. The creators of Kung Fu observed the fighting styles of various animals. The first sketch of an airplane was created by Leonardo da Vinci after studying the mechanics of birds in flight. Many medicines are based on the natural healing properties of herbs and plants. The answer to your problem may be found by observing an ant colony, a squirrel gathering nuts, or perhaps even a dog burying something in the backyard. Inspiration can be found in any number of places in nature; More...

http://bit.ly/csd0AP
The 33 miners trapped in an underground mine in Chile are getting all the help they can get from engineers and doctors to stay healthy. The connection between the underground mine and the outside world is a very narrow tunnel, the diameter of a lemon. All sorts of helpful devices have passed back and forth through that tunnel. Doctors have carefully lowered test tubes down hole for the trapped miners to take urine samples. Engineers have packaged food and water into narrow containers and lowered them down as well. The miners have received board games to help pass the time. They have received tube-shaped lights, which will be lit for 12 hours a day, giving the miners a sense of day and night, and routine. If you are trapped in an enclosure, how important is a routine to add order to your life?

http://zd.net/c5N82kInnovation in the tech industry used to be much more collaborative than . With the introduction of the transistor, companies interested in using the transistor for developing computers or other technology products could easily receive licenses. Collaboration between competitors was the norm, because it was all new, and the future was sure to hold so much progress in technology that everyone was sure to get their fill of the action. We may now be nearing the end of that period of open collaboration. The manufacturing process is being outsourced much more now and the big technology companies like Apple, are not revolutionizing technology anymore. The innovation now occurs in the garages of individual innovators. Should the US seek to re-establish its high-tech manufacturing center?

http://bit.ly/dBVKNw
The problem with alternative energy is that it is dependent upon the natural element that drives it. With wind power, especially, a windmill/ wind turbine, will produce power only when the wind is blowing, which in prime conditions is only 30% at best. Underwater turbines are slightly more reliable since they can be placed in rivers where there is constant flow.
A new product hopes to combine alternative energy with mainstream energy to keep those wind turbines working full time. They have created a hybrid wind turbine, which generates power from both the wind tower and a turbo-compressor that is run on natural gas, situated at the base of the tower. A small clutch in the hybrid turbine switches its input from tower to turbo-compressor when it senses that the blades have stopped spinning due to a lack of wind.  

http://bit.ly/cA7ZPgMIT is unveiling a swarm of a thousand robots that will swim around in the oily mess of the gulf absorbing oil and bagging it for future pick up. The robots work by spinning a conveyor belt that moves the robot forward. The belt is “a paper towel for oil spills” according to MIT and can absorb 20 times its weight in oil.
 
This is an especially promising solution for the gulf, which seems to focus both on removing the oil, and recouping some for later use. Other solutions for the gulf have included ships sucking in oil, attempts to burn the oil, and dispersing chemicals to breakdown the oil. These attempts have all been relatively successful, but clearly the majority of oil remains. Mother Nature has also contributed to the cleanup effort. Scientists have found new microbes near the oil that are naturally breaking it down and reducing its impact on sea life. Clearly, nature has a way of dealing with even the most horrible of human disasters. More...

http://nyti.ms/al5k2aNew software may be the incentive that teachers are looking for to switch from textbooks in the classroom to the iPad. Known as Inkling, it allows students viewing online textbooks to mark up the text and share their notes with students and teachers. What’s great is that students reading the text remotely on their iPad can add additional notes to the notes left by other students, and students end up building off each other’s ideas. Teachers can place themselves in the mix as well. Can this interactive and collaborative tool find its way into our nation’s schools?

http://bit.ly/a8bmGRThe arctic tundra is a difficult region to explore. The landscape includes jagged icebergs, unavoidable bodies of water, and crevasses. No known vehicle or vessel could traverse all conditions, making exploration of the area impossible –until now. An inflatable research lab called the Arctic Drifter, 45-feet in diameter, is a rolling laboratory that can handle the arctic’s hazardous conditions. The outside of the drifter is comprised of inflatable Hypalon air bags which will cushion the drifter while crossing rough regions and also keep it afloat. Inside the drifter, the two-story research facility is kept upright by an inner roll-cage which keeps the room from shaking while the drifter rolls forward.

http://bit.ly/aJIfkxScientists are one step closer to finding an anecdote for HIV. The protein they discovered, TRIM5a, works for destroying the virus in monkeys. In order to study how TRIM5a interacts with the virus, scientists injected a fluorescent dye into the protein and studied the interaction under a heavy-duty microscope. They observed that the protein first latches onto the virus and then other TRIM5a proteins gang up and destroy the virus. The TRIM5a can contain a variety of amino acids, which scientists will experiment with to find the right ones for humans.