Richard Hogg, professor emeritus of mineral processing and geo-environmental engineering, was elected to membership in the National Academy of Engineering. Election to the NAE is among the highest professional distinctions accorded to an engineer. Academy membership honors those who have made outstanding contributions to "engineering research, practice or education, including, where appropriate, significant contributions to the engineering literature." (more)
Some people quit smoking on the first try while others have to try to quit repeatedly. Using such mobile technology as hand-held computers and smartphones, a team of researchers from Penn State and the University of Pittsburgh is trying to find out why.
"One thing that really stood out among the relapsers is how their urge to smoke just never dropped, in contrast to those who were successful in quitting for a month -- their urge dropped quickly and systematically -- almost immediately upon quitting," said Stephanie Lanza. (more)
The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-III) has announced the most accurate measurements yet of the distances to galaxies in the faraway universe, giving an unprecedented look at the time when the universe first began to expand at an ever-increasing rate.
The results, announced at a press conference in Manchester, England, are the culmination of more than two years of work by the team of scientists and engineers, including a Penn State astronomer, behind the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS), one of the SDSS-III's four component surveys. (more)
Compelling evidence of the impact of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill on deep-sea corals will be published online in the Early Edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences during the week beginning March 26. The diverse team of researchers, led by Penn State Professor of Biology Charles Fisher, used a wide range of underwater vehicles, including the research submarine Alvin, to investigate the corals. They also used comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography to determine precisely the source of the petroleum hydrocarbons they found. (more)
Transistors are the building blocks of the electronic devices that power the digital world, and much of the growth in computing power over the past 40 years has been made possible by increases in the number of transistors that can be packed onto silicon chips. But that growth, if left to current technology, may soon be coming to an end.
Researchers at Penn State and the University of Notre Dame have announced breakthroughs in the development of tunneling field effect transistors (TFETs), a semiconductor technology that takes advantage of the quirky behavior of electrons at the quantum level. Their advances show that these transistors are on track to solve problems with current technology, namely power leakage and the generation of excessive heat, while delivering much greater energy efficiency. (more)
Penn State's Applied Research Laboratory and Sciaky, Inc., a subsidiary of Phillips Service Industries, will establish the Center for Innovative Materials Processing through Direct Digital Deposition as a Manufacturing Demonstration Facility under the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's Open Manufacturing Initiative. The project will receive $3.8 million over four years. (more)
Production of energy from the difference between salt water and fresh water is most convenient near the oceans, but now, using an ammonium bicarbonate salt solution, Penn State researchers can combine bacterial degradation of waste water with energy extracted from the salt-water fresh-water gradient to produce power anywhere. "We are taking two technologies, each having limitations, and putting them together," said Bruce E. Logan, Kappe Professor of Environmental Engineering. "Combined, they overcome the limitations of the individual technologies." (more)
Not all wines are created equal; neither are all wine tasters. A wine expert's acute sense of taste may mean that expert ratings and recommendations are irrelevant to wine consumers who were not born with the ability to discern small differences in a broad range of tastes, according to a team of international researchers. "What we found is that the fundamental taste ability of an expert is different," said John Hayes, assistant professor, food science, and director of Penn State's sensory evaluation center. (more)
Detectable for only a few seconds but possessing enormous energy, gamma-ray bursts are difficult to capture because their energy does not penetrate the Earth's atmosphere. Now, thanks to an orbiting telescope, astrophysicists are filling in the unknowns surrounding these bursts and uncovering new questions. The Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope, formerly called the Gamma-Ray Large Area Space Telescope, launched on June 11, 2008. As part of its mission, the telescope records any gamma-ray bursts within its viewing area. (more)
Caffeinated drinks such as coffee and soda are the pick-me-ups of choice for many people, but too much caffeine can cause nervousness and sleep problems. Caffeine Zone, a software app developed by Penn State researchers, can help people determine when caffeine may give them a mental boost and when it could hurt their sleep patterns. The software takes information on caffeine use and integrates it with information on the effects of caffeine to produce a graph of how the caffeine will affect the users over time. (more)
