Cyborg Eye - A Light of Hope for the Blind

Not too long ago the idea of artificial vision was little more than science fiction. The concept has been portrayed time and time again in movies and on T.V. From the cyclopean eye of the HAL 9000 in Stanley Kubrick's epic 2001: A Space Odyssey to the visor of Geordi La Forge in Star Trek, the idea of being able to enhance machines and return sight to the blind has captured our imagination for decades.

However, mimicking human vision, a sense that took nature millions of years to perfect, is no easy task. In the year 2000 a man was fitted with the first functional electronic eye. A camera sent images to a brain implant, via a computer, allowing the man, identified only as Jerry, to perceive black objects against white backgrounds. Composed of a mere hundred sensors, this limited vision allowed Jerry to discern a two inch tall letter E and navigate the New York subway. A useful visual aid perhaps, but not yet approaching the sophistication of human vision.



One of the major stumbling blocks in the quest for artificial vision is the shape of the retina, the light sensitive inner layer of the eye. The retina contains millions of photoreceptors which capture light and transmit it as electrical signals along the optic nerve to the brain. In animals the retina is curved in order to better sense the 3D world in which we live. Until recently however, scientists were unable to place such a large number of artificial photoreceptors on a curved surface. Now, new research may point the way to true artificial sight.

Scientists at the University of Illinois and Northwestern University have constructed a device which weaves a network of photoreceptors into a flexible mesh. The mesh is laid across a curved rubber membrane to produce a device roughly the size and shape of a human eye. "This approach allows us to put electronics in places where we couldn't before," said Professor John Rogers, who led the research group. Up until now artificial vision systems have been limited by flat silicon based image sensors. Silicon is brittle and shatters when bent, restricting cameras and other imaging equipment to flat receptors, which distort images.



Professor Rogers and Professor Yonggang Huang overcame these limitations by linking tiny silicon light sensors together with minute flexible wires that are capable of bending by up to 40 percent. A curved array of detectors is "much better suited for use as retinal implants," Rogers said.

It's hoped that the breakthrough research, which was published in the science journal Nature, will herald the advent of new classes of imaging devices and work is already underway to examine other potential applications for the technology.

Could MARS Power Your Home

Not the planet Mars, but the lighter-than-air wind turbine developed by a Canadian company called Magenn Power. The Magenn Power Air Rotor System (MARS) rotates about a horizontal axis in response to wind. The company claim that the system can generate electricity more cost effectively than any competing system.

Helium (a totally inert gas) raises MARS to an altitude of 1000 feet. Once deployed to this altitude the wind causes the system to rotate producing additional lift due to the Magnus Effect. This effect also helps to stabilize MARS, restricting it to a small area and preventing it from drifting downwind of it's tether.

The system can generate power for immediate use or transmission to the power grid. Unlike traditional wind turbines MARS can be deployed almost anywhere because it utilizes the 600-1000 feet lower level jet streams that are available almost everywhere. This fact combined with it's comparatively low manufacturing and deployment cost means that the usual placement restrictions don't apply to MARS. In the future, using this technology, wind farms could be placed closer to, or possibly within, large urban centers where energy needs are greatest. This would lead to less energy being lost due to transmission over long distances.

The MARS wind turbine can operate in winds from 4 mph to 60 mph, unlike traditional wind turbines which must shutdown in high winds to avoid damage. The system can be deployed, deflated and redeployed without the need for heavy machinery or large towers. This, coupled with it's other benefits, make it ideal for disaster situations, and the Third World where infrastructure is limited.

So how soon will it be before we see fields of these wind turbines above us? Well the company plan to begin shipping their MARS 10 product in 2009. So watch the skies!

Tide and Time Wait for No One

Ireland's Strangford Lough is to be the site of the worlds first commercial tidal turbine.The lough has one of the fastest tidal flows on earth and is reasonably sheltered from inclement weather, making it an attractive location for the tidal power project. The technology was developed by Marine Current Turbines at a cost of £10 million and works on a similar principle to a terrestrial windmill. Two rotors, 15 to 20 meters in diameter, are fixed to the sea bed on a 300 ton rig. The turbines can pitch at up to 180 degrees allowing them to capture energy from the tide as it flows in and out of the Irish lough at 4 to 8 knots (roughly 7 to 15 kilometers per hour). When in operation the 600kW turbines generate enough energy to power 1000 U.K. homes. Up until mid July 2008 the turbines were supplying electricity to the national grid on a test basis. Then on July 17 the two turbines were damaged. The company states that the damage was caused by a "control system fault." Work began immediately to replace the turbine blades.

Despite the fact that this technology produces zero emissions British government support for this, and other similar projects, has been tepid at best. Most of the funding for this project was raised privately. Bernie Bulkin of Britain's Sustainable Development Commission says that Britain has " a number of highly competitive devices... some of which are ready to go into the water... government should be backing innovation and technology on this." However, as reported previously on this blog, the British government has decided to throw it's tax payer's money behind the construction of a new generation of nuclear power plants.

Strangford Lough is a protected habitat with a host of diverse marine life making their home there. Dr David Erwin, a former Chief Executive of the Ulster Wildlife Trust, and Chair of the independent group overseeing the project, noted that "small animals will pass right through the turbines..." However, he also stated that he is "a bit concerned" about larger animals, such as seals and basking sharks. They "just might get caught up in the turbines." He says.

The marine laboratory of Queen's University Belfast are in the process of carrying out a two year study to monitor seals, porpoises (whales, dolphins) and seabird activity in the Strangford Narrows near the £10 million tidal turbine. The influence of changes in the water flow pattern caused by the presence of the turbines will also be studied. In an unrelated topic Queen's University recently received an £850,000 grant for marine energy research. If their study shows any serious impact on the wildlife of Strangford Lough caused by the presence of the turbines the project will be stopped.

In our haste to solve the urgent problem of global warming let's hope we don't sacrifice the more vulnerable in our environment.

Do Geothermal Revolutions Power Your Home?

Italy is a country with an enormous cultural heritage, but did you know that the worlds first geothermal energy plant was invented in Italy? Would it surprise you to know that the technology was invented in 1904? Astonishingly, in the more than one hundred years since the invention of geothermal technology humanity seems to have ignored this gift from the earth in favor of fossil fuels.



In fact, despite the lack of support from government, a small number of forward thinking, progressive, U.S. companies have invested in geothermal technology and are actually providing clean renewable power to the U.S. power grid. In California's Salton Sea CalEnergy operate 10 geothermal energy plants with a combined output of 327 MW of power. A tiny proportion of America's power needs, yet a source which could be cultivated with the proper support.



So what's stopping us from using this clean renewable energy to power all of our homes? Well until recently the political will wasn't there. However, with the price of oil continuing to go up and up people, governments and industry are starting to look down for alternatives.

Germany, a country not known for it's hot springs or it's volcanic activity, has recently seen a massive jump in interest in geothermal. In Unterhaching near Munich a community driven geothermal project went online in June 2008. The plant is capable of producing up to 3.4 MW of electricity. This is the most modern geothermal plant in Germany and was delayed for almost a year due to competition from the oil industry for drilling resources.

With this abundant clean energy at our fingertips (under our feet would be more apt) why are governments still investing in fossil fueled power stations? What's extremely worrying is that not only are our governments not putting enough resources into renewable energy technologies, they are are about to compound their mistake and go nuclear. In January 2008 the British government announced that it was authorizing the construction of a new generation of nuclear power plants. Despite protests from the Irish government and others, they seem hell bent on following through with their plans.

It seems regardless of the danger to human life that nuclear plants pose, the radioactive pollution caused by their operation and the enormous hazard caused by the huge amounts of radioactive waste they generate, governments seem set to branch off in the wrong direction yet again.

In a speech given in Washington D.C. in July 2008 Al Gore challenged the American people to produce 100% of their energy from renewable sources within ten years. Are they up to that challenge? Are we?

The Quantum of Computing

Modern digital computers are smaller, faster and cheaper than their ancestors. However, although computers have become vastly more efficient at accomplishing their work, the work remains essentially the same. The work in question involves the manipulation of bits of information. The term "Bit" stands for "Binary Digit". Binary is a numbering system that represents values as sequences of zero's and one's. For example the number 13 can be represented by the sequence 1101.

Quantum Computing is an emerging field in computer science that differs fundamentally from digital computing in that it's basic unit of computation is not the Bit, but the Qubit. Unlike a Bit, which exists in a state of 0 or 1, a Qubit can exist as 0, 1, or simultaneously as both 0 and 1. This unusual property is possible due to an effect known as single-particle interference.



Single-particle interference can be visualized by imagining a laser firing a stream of photons into a light splitter. The splitter sends half the photons left and allows the rest to continue straight through. Given this information you might expect that each photon has an equal probability of traveling left or straight. However, quantum mechanics predicts that each photon travels both paths simultaneously.



Getting computers to do two things at once, or "Multitask" has long been the goal of computer scientists. Most household computers today appear to do several things at once, but generally this is an illusion created by making the computer switch between lots of different small tasks very quickly. Quantum Computers however, are capable of true multitasking, performing enormous parallel computations.

Theoretically the computers we have today can simulate the function of quantum computers. So why do we need quantum computers? Well although modern computers can theoretically simulate the function of quantum computers, it would be computationally too expensive to do so. Simulating a quantum computer with even a few dozen qubits is well beyond the capability of any computer made today.

The power of quantum computing should not be underestimated. In the future it may allow computer models to be advanced enough to predict tsunamis, with the potential to save thousands of lives. They may also be able to model our entire climate and ecosystem, helping us to reverse the damage of climate change and perhaps save the planet.

The Right Biofuel

Filled up your tank lately? Whatever you call it, petrol or gas, it's getting more expensive. Hard pressed consumers are demanding cheaper fuel and in our economic system, the free market, it's the suppliers job to meet that demand. So what do suppliers do? Well they do what any forward thinking industry would do. They look for alternative sources of fuel. Unfortunately, in their haste to meet consumer demand they stopped at the most expedient solution. Biofuel.

What made Biofuel an expedient solution was the fact that there was already an available source for the raw materials needed to manufacture it. Theoretically Biofuel can be made from any organic (carbon based) source. This includes plant and animal matter, and the most readily available supply of plant and animal matter is our food supply.

Faced with the ever increasing cost of fossil fuels and their contribution to Global Warming Environmentalists and Industry seemed to agree that Biofuels were the way of the future.



Today the worlds food supply is being siphoned into our fuel tanks at an alarming rate. In early July 2008 a confidential World Bank report published in a British newspaper claimed that Biofuels have forced global food prices up by 75 percent.

As always though the human cost is not the only cost. As the hype around Biofuels grew and governments started setting Biofuel targets, palm plantations sprouted out of the virgin forests of South-east Asia. These forests form the habitat for numerous species, including the orang-utan, the only great apes found outside Africa. Evidence suggests that fewer than 30,000 orang-utans exist in the world today. According to The World Wildlife Fund "The most serious threat to orang-utans is the destruction of their rainforest habitat... The main causes of this habitat loss are commercial logging, clearance for agriculture, and conversion to plantations."



Efforts are being made however, to move away from palm oil, and other destructive sources of Biofuel to more sustainable sources. Biofuel from algae has been recently touted as an eco-friendly way to produce Biofuel from non-food sources, such as switchgrass, corn stovers, wood chips and sugar cane. Algae are photosynthetic and consume carbon to grow. Nearly 50% of algae is vegetable oil. However, many of the carbon sources used to grow algae, such as sugars, still rely on agricultural land and/or destruction of forests.

The Solution?

A New Zealand company Aquaflow Bionomic Corporation are pioneering the production of Biofuel from wild algae harvested from open-air environments, such as the settling ponds of standard Effluent Management (EM) Systems. According to the company the "process can be used in many industries that produce a waste stream, including the transport, dairy, meat and paper industries." Amongst the benefits of using this approach is the fact that there is no competition with other carbon sources, such as our food supply. The process involves cleaning nutrient rich waste water from urban and industrial sources using existing infrastructures, and discharging clean water.

Companies around the world are attempting to harness the power of algae for the production of energy. While some approaches involve the consumption of sugars and other food sources, the more imaginative ones utilize algae to clean waste from our homes and factories while producing a sustainable form of energy.

Australia's Solar Power Tower

Amongst Australia's wealth of natural resources is sunlight. In fact Australians have so much sunlight they sometimes overlook it as a natural resource. In an area of Australia nicknamed "Sunraysia" for it's abundance of sunshine, an Australian company EnviroMission aims to build a solar energy plant on a scale never before seen.


The "Solar Power Tower" will be the worlds biggest solar power plant and one of the tallest structures ever built by man. Standing a kilometer high and with a base six times the size of New York's Central Park the tower is based on a well known principle. Hot air rises.

The base of the tower is an enormous greenhouse known as the expansive collector zone. As the Sun's rays beat down on the greenhouse the air inside becomes heated. With nowhere else to go the hot air rushes towards the tower and as it does it drives 32 x 6.25MW pressure staged turbines located at it's base.

The 200 Mega Watt tower will produce enough energy to power 200,000 homes without any harmful greenhouse gas emissions. That's the equivalent of taking 90,000 cars off the road.

Unlike a number of projects that have popped up over the last few years this technology is tried and tested. The prototype for the tower operated for seven years in Manzanares Spain and consistently generated 50kW output of green energy.



As well as being clean green and the way of the future it's set to join Ayres Rock and The Great Barrier Reef as one of the worlds most popular tourist attractions.