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GLOBAL NEWS NEW TRANSISTORS MADE FROM BLOOD AND MUCUS Rewer are always looking for new materials that can make smaller, more flexible electronics than silicon can. A team from Tel Aviv University, Israel, is exploring making electronics out of the molecules that circulate in the blood and other bodily fluids. The researchers, led by nanotechnology scientist Dr Shachar Richter, are building a transistor from the proteins found in milk, blood and mucus. Transistors amplify electrical signals and they're the basis of all modern electronics. Richter's transistor uses milk proteins to form the fibrous scaffolding, because milk materials stay strong and stable in different environments. Blood proteins, which can absorb oxygen, allow the researchers to add_ different chemicals to adjust the properties of the semiconductor. Mucus proteins give the transistor sophisticated optical properties. Though biological electronics may sound strange, many researchers are interested in using life's molecules in electrical circuits. (Source: InnovationNewsDaily.com, 7 March 2012, http://tinyurl.com/7ybgkde) DARPA UNVEILS DRONE-SLAYING PORTABLE LASER WEAPON he US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is unveiling a portable laser weapon, HELLADS—the High Energy Liquid Laser Area Defense System. The new laser application, created by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, will help change the way that the American military fights future wars. While current military laser systems are the size of a passenger jet, the proposed DARPA weapon can fit onto the back of a flat-bed truck. The 150-kilowatt, solid-state laser weapon is strong enough to take down drones or other aerial targets. A prototype is expected to be available by the end of 2012. (Source: FastCompany.com, 8 March 2012, http://tinyurl.com/86pggw2) TRANSLATES BRAIN ACTIVITY INTO WORDS ew research paves the way for brain implants that would translate the thoughts of people who have lost the power of speech. Scientists ave picked up fragments of people's thoughts by decoding the brain activity caused by words that they hear. The remarkable feat has given researchers fresh insight into how the brain processes language, and raises the tantalising prospect of devices that can return speech to the speechless. Though in its infancy, the work paves the way for brain implants that could monitor a person's thoughts and speak words and sentences as hey imagine them. Such devices could transform the ives of thousands of people who ose the ability to speak as a result of a stroke or other medical conditions. Experiments on 15 patients in the USA showed that a computer could decipher their brain activity and play back words they heard, though at imes the words were difficult to recognise. (Source: Guardian.co.uk, 31 January 2012, http://tinyurl.com/736b476) laser PLANT BLOOMS AFTER 30,000+ YEARS IN PERMAFROST iologists have resurrected a 30,000-year-old plant, cultivating it from fruit tissue recovered from rozen sediment in Siberia. The plant is by far the oldest to be brought back from the dead. The previous record-holder was a sacred otus, dating back about 1,200 years. The late David Gilichinsky, of the Soil Cryology Laboratory in Moscow, Russia, and colleagues recovered the tuits of the ice-age flowering plant (Silene stenophylla, a narrow-leafed campion) from a fossilised squirrel burrow in frozen sediments near the olyma River in northeastern Siberia. Radiocarbon dating of the fruit suggests that the squirrel stashed it around 31,800 years ago. By applying growth hormones to the fruit tissue, Gilichinsky and his colleagues managed to kick-start cell division and ultimately produce a viable flowering plant. Similar fossilised burrows have been identified in Alaska and Canada. (Source: NewScientist.com, 22 February 2012, http://tinyurl.com/77uoupn) a somerv: He eo 8 * NEXUS APRIL - MAY 2012 MIND-READING PROGRAM www.nexusmagazine.com