Author Archives: Guest Post

Air Quality Worsened by Paved Surfaces

*Widespread urban development alters weather patterns*

New research focusing on the Houston area suggests that widespread urban development alters weather patterns in a way that can make it easier for pollutants to accumulate during warm summer weather instead of being blown out to sea.

The international study, led by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), could have implications for the air quality of fast-growing coastal cities in the United States and other mid-latitude regions overseas. (more…)

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Made in IBM Labs: Researchers Unveil Nanotechnology Circuits for Wireless Devices

*Scientists Build the First Wafer-Scale Graphene Integrated Circuit Smaller than a Pinhead*

Yorktown Heights, NY – 10 Jun 2011: Today, IBM Research scientists announced that they have achieved a milestone in creating a building block for the future of wireless devices. In a paper published yesterday in the magazine Science, IBM researchers announced the first integrated circuit fabricated from wafer-size graphene, and demonstrated a broadband frequency mixer operating at frequencies up to 10 gigahertz (10 billion cycles/second).

Designed for wireless communications, this graphene-based analog integrated circuit could improve today’s wireless devices and points to the potential for a new set of appli-cations. At today’s conventional frequencies, cell phone and transceiver signals could be improved, potentially allowing phones to work where they can’t today while, at much higher frequencies, military and medical personnel could see concealed weapons or conduct medical imaging without the same radiation dangers of X-rays. (more…)

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comScore Releases May 2011 U.S. Search Engine Rankings

RESTON, VA, June 10, 2011 – comScore, Inc., a leader in measuring the digital world, today released its monthly comScore qSearch analysis of the U.S. search marketplace. Google Sites led the explicit core search market in May with 65.5 percent of search queries conducted.

The May 2011 qSearch data represents the second month of results including the impact of Yahoo! Search Direct, Yahoo!’s new feature that delivers search results in real-time while users type their query. (more…)

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‘Mountain Pine Beetle Activity May Impact Snow Accumulation And Melt’

A new University of Colorado Boulder study indicates the infestation of trees by mountain pine beetles in the high country across the West could potentially trigger earlier snowmelt and increase water yields from snowpack that accumulates beneath affected trees.

Led by CU-Boulder geological sciences department doctoral student Evan Pugh, the study was undertaken near Grand Lake, Colo., adjacent to Rocky Mountain National Park, an area that has been devastated by mountain pine beetle attacks in recent years. Mountain pine beetles have killed more than 4 million acres of lodgepole pine trees in Colorado and southern Wyoming since 1996, the most severe outbreak on record. (more…)

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Facebook Users in Argentina Spend 9 Hours a Month on Site, Second Only to Israel in User Engagement

*comScore to Host Complimentary Webinar “The State of the Internet in Argentina” on June 14*

Buenos Aires, Argentina, June 9, 2011 – comScore, Inc., a leader in measuring the digital world, today released a study on Internet usage in Argentina from its online audience measurement and media planning solution comScore Media Metrix. The study found that Microsoft Sites led all web properties in audience size in April reaching more than 95 percent of the online population, while visitors averaged the most time on Facebook.com at 8.8 hours per visitor during the month. These findings and others will be presented via a live webinar, The State of the Internet in Argentina, on June 14. For more information and to register, please visit: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/698116824 (more…)

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IBM and The Metropolitan Museum of Art Collaborate to Preserve Works of Art

Physical Analytics Technology Can Predict Environmental Conditions within Buildings and Optimize Microclimates for Preservation of Works of Art

NEW YORK – 09 Jun 2011: IBM and The Metropolitan Museum of Art today announced the successful installation of a new wireless environmental sensor network at the Museum called Low-Power Mote that will help preserve the works of art in its world-renowned, encyclopedic collection. (more…)

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Mass Extinction Victim Survives! Snail Long Thought Extinct, isn’t?

ANN ARBOR, Mich.—Think “mass extinction” and you probably envision dinosaurs dropping dead in the long-ago past or exotic tropical creatures being wiped out when their rainforest habitats are decimated. But a major mass extinction took place right here in North America in the first half of the 20th century, when 47 species of mollusk disappeared after the watershed in which they lived was dammed. (more…)

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