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In brief

The Las Vegas Consumer Electronics Show highlighted many novel gadgets. The floating easel Samsung TV will start at under $30,000 for the smaller 85-inch version.
A group at St Andrew’s University have found a way to generate a special optical field that efficiently reverses the radiation pressure of light producing a mini Star Trek tractor beam.
It is definitely quite small - scientists confirm the surprisingly small proton radius with laser spectroscopy of hydrogen.

IQE one stop shop

Last month, wafer producer IQE announced the purchase of Kopin’s compound semiconductor epiwafer manufacturing business (Kopin Wireless) placing them in a dominant position in the market. The company can now just as easily perform MOCVD processes as it can MBE, supplying the most appropriate wafer for whatever device. The acquisition gives the Cardiff based company a market leading position in MOCVD HBTs; a wider customer base (including Skyworks Solutions, Inc.) and a Taiwan manufacturing facility providing increased access the growing Asian semiconductor market. IQE will pay $75 million for Kopin Wireless.

Hydrogen on tap?

Work at the University of Buffalo has shown that spherical silicon particles about 10 nanometres in diameter, when combined with water reacted to form silicic acid and hydrogen. The reaction didn’t require any light, heat or electricity, and also created hydrogen about 150 times faster than similar reactions using silicon particles 100 nanometres wide, and 1,000 times faster than bulk silicon. Whilst the energy required to create the nano-particles exceeds that available from the generation of hydrogen the work may find use in portable applications.

Free - Introduction to XPS Workshop

The Workshop we held in January at the University of Loughborough was very successful and we plan to run another in March at another of our K-Alpha customer sites, UCL Chemistry Department. If you would like to be kept informed of the details, please email us.

Cash for Graphene

The Cambridge Graphene Centre is underway with the objective to take graphene to the next level, bridging the gap between academia and industry. The £12 million funding is complemented by industrial support, worth an additional £13m, from over 20 partners, including Nokia, Philips and BAE systems. Further funding will support collaborations with the Graphene Institute in Manchester, and Lancaster University. Meanwhile, the European Commission has chosen graphene as one of the first 10-year, 1,000 million euro Future and Emerging Technologies flagship projects. Coordinated by Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden, the mission is to take graphene and related layered materials from academic laboratories to society, revolutionize multiple industries and create economic growth and new jobs in Europe. The Graphene Flagship will include 126 academic and industrial research groups in 17 European countries with an initial 30-month-budget of 54 million euro. The consortium will be later extended with another 20-30 groups.

Drunk and sober decision-making

In these times of limited financial resources how should organisations and governments make decisions? What is a fair and correct process to decide that Project A should get funded but not Project B? Perhaps we can learn from earlier times? A passage from ‘A History of the World’ recently caught my eye. The Greek historian Herodotus traveled widely and was fascinated by the culture, administrative prowess and good governance of the Persians. Herodotus noted that if any important decision is to be made, they discussed the question when drunk and the following day any decisions are reconsidered when they are sober. If they still approve it, it is adopted, if not, it is abandoned. Conversely, any decision they make when they are sober, is reconsidered afterwards when they are drunk.

Please inform me if I am mistaken and this decision making process has remained in use in your locality.

Four legged robot

The Legged Squad Support System (LS3) four-legged robot has been showing off its capabilities.

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