Superconducting Sapphire

“Diamonds may be forever but sapphire is the name of the game when it comes to the next generation of super-efficient electrical conducting wires.

Scientists at Tel Aviv University have developed a new superconductor made of fibers spun from sapphire crystals, which can transmit about 40 times more electricity than a copper wire of comparable size.

The new wire has the potential to push the price of renewable energy down by making it more economical to transmit electricity over long distances.”

Adobe Carousel For Apple Offers Nondestructive Edits

“When Adobe asked users about their photo-sharing pain points, it generated some buzz about an expected cloud solution. And today it delivered.

Adobe Carousel automatically uploads, stores, and syncs photos from all your devices–as long as they’re from Apple–and lets you create shareable galleries (Carousels).

When shared, you and they can edit and apply special effects to the photos nondestructively…

In some ways, Carousel works much like any other photo organizer in that it builds a database of your images as you import them and keeps the databases synced across devices. It also copies each image to its servers, which act as a central repository for all your photos.

Based on some new imaging-specific mesh technology developed by Adobe, these databases also contain information about edits to the photos, which it applies on the fly when you view an image–hence the nondestructive aspect.”

Microspiders Will Swim In Bloodstream To Deliver Drugs

“Scientists at Penn State would like to release tiny spiders into your blood — no, it’s not the premise for a new horror movie, but rather, it’s a medical breakthrough.

The spider-like machines are less than a micrometer wide (just so you know, a red blood cell is around six to ten micrometers), and are designed to travel through veins delivering drugs and a little TLC to damaged areas — not a totally new concept, per se, but even minor advancements can open up all sorts of new doors for troubled patients.

Made of half gold, half silica, these microspiders are self-propelled by a molecule called the Grubbs catalyst, which scientists can control directionally using chemicals.”