The Strongest, Most Expensive Material On Earth

The Strongest, Most Expensive Material On Earth

Sarah Laskow

The Atlantic 

It was so simple. Take a small flake of graphite and put it on piece of regular old Scotch tape. Pinch it in between the tape, peeling off layer after layer until it leaves only the vaguest, most transparent of marks. Transfer those dustings onto a chip; stick the chip under the microscope.

Congratulations, you've just made graphene - the strongest material humans are aware of. It's only one layer of atoms thick, which means to slice it any thinner would require dividing atoms into their elementary particles.

For years, scientists didn't even believe that creating graphene was possible - even Andre Geim, one of the scientists responsible for the scotch tape discovery. As
he told CNN
:

We live in a 3-dimensional world. My physics intuition, developed over the last thirty years, told me that this material shouldn't exist. And if you had asked 99.9% of scientists around the world they would have said the idea of a 2D material was rubbish and that graphene shouldn't exist.

But it is possible to make it. The problem now is that it's not exactly practical.

There's so much graphene can do. It can make computer chips much, much faster. It can make solar cells more efficient. It can remove salt from water.

Any of these (and there are so many other) applications, though, require more than a tiny flake of graphene, and scaling up production requires something other than a really big piece of scotch tape. As Nature reported last year, when manufacturers rely on the tape method, "just one micrometre-sized flake made in this way can cost more than $1,000 - making [graphene], gram for gram, one of the most expensive materials on Earth."

The challenge now is to develop a less simple but equally effective way to create the stuff. The most commonly used strategy is "chemical vapor deposition," in which a mix of gases react with a surface to create a layer of graphene. The graphene that's produced is of high quality—until it needs to be separated from its substrate, a process that often damages the material.

But there are other ideas in the works. One technique involves mixing graphene with carefully chosen liquids and then sticking the slurry into what's essentially a high tech blender. Another group of researchers took a similar mix and sprayed it at supersonic speeds onto a substrate.

These aren't quite as simple as the scotch tape strategy. But sometimes simple only gets you so far.

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Samsung is ending sales of all its laptops in Europe

Samsung is ending sales of all its laptops in Europe

Carl Franzen

The Verge 

Samsung will stop selling laptops in Europe due to "market demands", according to a statement from the company obtained by PC Advisor.

As the Samsung spokesman said: "We quickly adapt to market needs and demands. In Europe, we will be discontinuing sales of laptops including Chromebooks for now.
This is specific to the region – and is not necessarily reflective of conditions in other markets."
The move follows several years' worth of declining PC sales globally and Sony's sale of its own laptop business.

Yet it also comes after Samsung announced a new Ativ Book laptop running Windows at CES 2014 and a Chromebook 2 later in the year, and in spite of the fact that Western Europe has been one of the better performing markets for laptop sales worldwide over the past decade.
Market research firm Gartner also noted that PC sales had recently stabilized and had projected huge growth in Chromebook sales in the coming years, so the timing of Samsung's exit from Europe may be premature.

Still, the company's statement leaves room for it to resume laptop sales in the region should market conditions change.

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Apple’s IOS Software Update Is Causing Apps to Crash More

Apple’s IOS Software Update Is Causing Apps to Crash More

Adam Satariano

Bloomberg

Sept. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Apple Inc.’s latest software update for the iPhone and iPad tablet is causing popular applications made by Facebook Inc., Dropbox Inc. and others to crash more frequently, according to a report.

Apple’s iOS 8 operating system causes apps to crash about 3.3 percent of the time, or 67 percent more than last year’s version, according to a report by Crittercism Inc., an analytics firm that works with companies such as EBay Inc., Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc. and Yahoo! Inc.

Customers have taken to Apple’s App Store to complain. One user wrote that Facebook’s app -- the way most of the social network’s members access its service -- “constantly freezes and crashes.” Dropbox, a file-storage service, also has put out updates to its app to fix problems it was having with iOS 8.

Crittercism said older iPhones experience the most issues. Andrew Levy, the firm’s chief executive officer, said Apple’s latest software includes more than 4,000 new functions and changes, and developers are struggling to adapt. New coding language also is probably causing trouble for programmers as they “get up to speed,” Levy said.

“It just goes to show how hard it is to test everything before it’s sent out into the wild,” Levy said. As with previous software releases, Apple will make fixes to its iOS 8 software in the weeks and months ahead, Levy said.

Trudy Muller, a spokeswoman for Apple, declined to comment.

Several Hiccups

Apple’s iOS software powers the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Since the latest version became available to download last week, 46 percent of devices connecting to the company’s App Store are running the latest version, according to Apple’s website.

The software crashes are among several hiccups Apple has experienced with iOS 8 since its release. The Cupertino, California-based company also delayed the rollout of its fitness-tracking software, HealthKit, after it discovered flaws. Customers also have complained about how much memory is needed to download iOS 8, requiring people to delete photos, videos and apps from their phones to make room for the new system.

Still, the software snafus haven’t been enough to discourage iPhone buyers. Apple yesterday said it sold a record of more than 10 million of its two new iPhones, which come with iOS 8 built in, in the smartphones’ debut weekend. The company said it could have sold more if not for supply limitations.

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India puts spacecraft into Martian orbit

India puts spacecraft into Martian orbit

KATY DAIGLE

Associated Press

 

NEW DELHI — India has triumphed in its first interplanetary attempt by successfully putting a satellite into orbit around Mars.
Scientists broke into wild cheers Wednesday morning as the orbiter's engines completed 24 minutes of burn time and maneuvered into its designated place around the red planet.
The success of India's Mars Orbiter Mission, affectionately nicknamed MOM, brings India into an elite club of Martian explorers that includes United States, the European Space Agency and the former Soviet Union.
The Indian Space and Research Organisation described the mission as flawless.

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Louis Tomlinson Almost Didn't Want to Be in One Direction

One Direction has confirmed again and again that they're not splitting up, but it turns out Liam Payne isn't the only member who wanted to go solo at first. In an excerpt from the band's upcoming autobiography, Louis Tomlinson revealed that he struggled with being a part of the group.

"I’m the type of person who likes being the center of attention. For the whole of The X Factor I didn’t have a solo which, for me, was a tough pill to swallow," he said.

"I was delighted but at the same time, couldn’t really understand why I was in the band. That was really low, that feeling of not having a purpose, of just being along for the ride."

It sounds like he had a really difficult time — and a lot of self-doubt! Since Louis has previously spilled that he would never be able go solo, we were shocked to hear that he felt awkward about being in a boy band.Now, he gets solos and writes hit songs for the group.

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Is Katy Perry Planning Major Revenge on Taylor Swift

Taylor Swift and Katy Perry are only rumored to be sworn enemies, but these pop stars might be on the brink of a major public showdown! According to Heat magazine, the "Dark Horse" singer has a serious revenge plan for the 2014 MTV European Music Awards.

"She and her friends, including Rihanna, are planning on totally embarrassing her at the awards in front of the world. They've even said they're just going to talk all the way through her performance and make fun of her dance moves," their source said.

While that's totally rude, we don't think it would push the "Shake It Off" singer off her game toomuch. She readily jokes about her bad dancing, and has dealt with worse interruptions on stage. However, her nemesis allegedly wants to freeze her out in person too!

"If she does try to speak to them and pretend things are okay, they'll walk in the opposite direction, ruining any plans Taylor might have to make it look like it's all fine."

We don't think these rumors are true, especially because we doubt Katy would stir up serious drama at an awards show. It would just make her look bad! Still, we'll definitely have to watch out and see if these two interact at all.

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Nasa’s plans to use game controllers to take you into space

Nasa’s plans to use game controllers to take you into space

Will Freeman

The Guardian 

Now commonplace, game controllers are so familiar in scenes of living-room clutter that they have, with the exception of when they are hurled wall-ward in frustration, become almost invisible. Yet these mass-manufactured collections of buttons and circuitry might yet prove to be a prototype tool for exploring the final frontier, having escaped the anonymity of millions of homes and captured the attention of Nasa.

Dr Jeff Norris is the supervisor of the planning software systems group at the Nasa jet propulsion laboratory – designers and operators of space exploration robots such as the Mars rover Curiosity – and he and his colleagues are increasingly taking an interest in gaming devices.
Norris is one of a collective of scientists looking at how best to control a vast range of robots, from giant, experimental, spider-like constructions that carry laboratories on their backs to unmanned spacecraft orbiting Saturn. “Games companies, we’ve noticed, are highly skilled at building control devices that are durable, highly capable and easy to use,” Norris explains.

“They are doing that, of course, because they want their games to be immediate and easy to play. Meanwhile, in control systems at Nasa, the first thing you’d have to do is sit down and read a manual,” he continues. Perhaps you’d also need to follow college through to an advanced degree in a topic that’s relevant.
“So as we started to look at control devices, and the way games present information, we started to wonder how we could leverage and build upon the work of the games industry in our work to explore space.”

And build they did. Today Nasa uses off-the-shelf and modified game controllers in testing robots on Earth, while contemplating how they can be reworked for remote control of similar contraptions elsewhere in our solar system. “We are literally taking unmodified game controllers and building systems to translate their inputs to control our robots here on Earth,” says Norris.
“That’s not quite a suitable technique for controlling a robot on another planet, but it is a way to better understand how we can make our robots easier to operate, and it is a way to imagine how an astronaut might control a robot.

“We’re not attempting to ‘flight modify’ an off-the-shelf game controller for use in space today, but I don’t think it’s far-fetched to say that in partnering with the manufacturers of these controllers we could produce things that are excellent for those kinds of uses.”
And by Norris’s own admission, Nasa can’t do everything alone. The job of venturing into space is simply too big for one organisation. That’s why they use partners, such as tyre and aircraft manufacturers to help. And it’s such collaboration that may one day see controllers originally conceived for use on the sofa redesigned for stellar travel .

“We have to partner to progress,” explains Norris. “In the area of control devices, the game industry seems like a natural place for us to look for partners when we do start asking the question of exactly what controller should be packed in the astronaut’s backpack.”

Yet Nasa’s interest in gaming does not end with the lucky few that will escape the Earth’s gravitational pull. “Exploring space is a journey that belongs to everyone, and through games we can share that with a huge number of people,” enthuses Norris. Through interactive worlds that allow people to explore Mars based on real data, and gaming reimaginings of active missions, they do so to an extent already. Indeed, Xbox 360 owners can try their hand at remotely conducting a virtual Curiosity rover landing. But Nasa also sees the chance to pipe distant planets’ environments into our homes through the potential of VR and graphics technology.

“600 million people shared Apollo through televisions in their living rooms,” concludes Norris. “That at the time was the best technology available to make it feel like we were all there together. It changed lives, it changed careers and it changed the world. And I don’t think it is simply a job for television any more. As a population we don’t just want to watch . We want to participate and interact.”

With consoles almost as ubiquitous now as TVs were then, and Nasa keen to embrace the opportunities they offer, the next time we share such an experience it may well really feel as if we really are all there together. And all it takes is one small step from game developers.

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China’s IPhone 6 Craving Leads to Fistfight in Connecticut

China’s IPhone 6 Craving Leads to Fistfight in Connecticut

Doni Bloomfield

Bloomberg

Sept. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Shoppers at an Apple store came to blows today over the chance to resell iPhones in China for as much as four times their retail price.

Fistfights broke out between rival groups in line at the Apple outlet near Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, according to the city’s police department. Three members of two New York-based groups were arrested after a fight among more than a dozen people maneuvering for a place in line, the department said.

The groups had traveled from New York, about two hours away by car, to buy the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in order to resell them in China for large markups, said David Hartman, a police spokesman. While Apple Inc. sold a record of more than 10 million iPhones during the first weekend in stores around the world, the company hasn’t said when China will get the new devices.

The world’s most populous country isn’t on a list of markets that will get the phones in the next wave, beginning Sept. 26, and that’s driving up the premium the devices will fetch if brought into China from other countries. Some stores have limited the number of iPhones that can be purchased by each shopper, so groups who aim to bring large quantities to China have to assemble recruits to view for the stores’ limited stock.

“It’s our understanding that the markup on these phones when they’re resold in China can be upwards of 300 percent,” Hartman said in a phone interview. “For the most part, the dozens and hundreds of people who are waiting in line are just doing that.”

Apple didn’t immediately respond to an e-mail and phone call requesting comment.

IPhone Tourists

Apple’s iPhone rollout is the most important event this year for the Cupertino, California-based company, and the availability in stores on Sept. 19 drew long lines of people across the country, eager to get their hands on the new devices. The lines also attracted a swell of tourists looking to buy handsets that aren’t available yet back home.

Other shoppers, both American and foreign, have made clear their intent to sell the devices as soon as they’re acquired to take advantage of early demand. Filmmaker Casey Neistat released a short documentary online showing people sleeping on the sidewalk outside an Apple store to be among the first line, acquiring two iPhones apiece in cash, then selling them immediately outside of the store. Many of the people interviewed in the documentary didn’t speak English, and some replied to questions in Mandarin.

Smuggling Rates

The iPhone’s debut has led to skirmishes elsewhere. Large crowds on Friday attempted to storm the Lenox Square mall in Atlanta, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported last week.

Last year’s introduction of an earlier model, the iPhone 5s, was the first -- and so far only -- time that Apple’s phones were available in China on the same day as the global debut.

Previously, the typical three-month lag before the iPhone’s introduction in China helped fuel smuggling of about 20 million iPhones into the Asian country annually, according to Jun Zhang, head of China equities research at Rosenblatt Securities Inc. in San Francisco. As many as 5 million iPhones may be smuggled into China before the new models are officially available, according to Neil Shah, Mumbai-based research director for devices at Counterpoint Research.

“One has to ask the question to what degree is Apple responsible for contributing to this?” said Hartman of the New Haven Police Department. “You know we have a city to police, and this has been going on since Wednesday now.”

--With assistance from Madeline McMahon in New York and Tim Higgins in San Francisco.

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Taylor Swift holds listening party for fans

Taylor Swift holds listening party for fans

WENN

Taylor Swift launched her new album with a secret listening party for fans at her Los Angeles home on Saturday (20Sept14).
Fans took to Twitter.com to express their joy at winning an invitation to the singer's home in a contest via her website. They listened to new record 1989 and hung out with the star for five hours.
The I Knew You Were Trouble hitmaker introduced followers to her parents and her pet cat, Olivia Benson, baked pumpkin chocolate chip cookies for her guests, and took Polaroids with her fans.
The pictures, posted on Twitter, show attendees posing with the singer and holding her Grammy award, her cat and books.
Swift also gave the fans piles of 1989 merchandise to take home with them, including T-shirts, bags and copies of the album.

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Google selects HTC for upcoming Nexus tablet: WSJ

Google selects HTC for upcoming Nexus tablet: WSJ

Reuters

Google Inc has selected HTC Corp to make its upcoming 9-inch Nexus tablet, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
Google had been mulling HTC as a potential Nexus tablet partner since last year and HTC engineers have been flying to the Googleplex in Mountain View in recent months to work on the project, the report said.
Google's decision to pick HTC reflects its long-term strategy of building a broad base of partners from device to device to prevent any one manufacturer from gaining a monopoly, the report said.
That may also be one of the reasons why Google chose HTC over bigger rivals Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, maker of the Nexus 10 tablet.
Representatives at Google were not immediately available for comment outside regular U.S. business hours. HTC declined to comment on the report.

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Apple sells more than 10 million new iPhones in first three days

Apple sells more than 10 million new iPhones in first three days

By Soham Chatterjee

Reuters

Apple Inc said it sold more than 10 million iPhones in the first weekend after its new models went on sale on Friday, underscoring strong demand for phones with larger displays.
Chief Executive Tim Cook said the company could have sold even more iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus models if supplies had been available.

Analysts had estimated first-weekend sales of up to 10 million iPhones, after Apple booked record pre-orders of 4 million on Sept. 12, the day pre-orders opened.

Apple's shares were little changed at $101.03 in early trading on the Nasdaq on Monday.
The company's first-quarter revenue is likely to be 9 percent higher than Wall Street estimates, based on reported sales and projected demand for the new iPhones, Piper Jaffray & Co analyst Gene Munster wrote in a note.

He said he expected earnings per share to be 12 percent higher than estimates.

"Despite the supply chain constraints around the iPhone 6 Plus and tightness around certain models of the iPhone 6, we believe (Monday's) strong print demonstrates that Apple executed extremely well in the face of severe supply constraints," Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Brian White wrote in a note.
First-day pre-orders of the new phones, which went on sale in 10 countries, far surpassed the 2 million first-day pre-orders for the iPhone 5 model two years ago.

"While our team managed the manufacturing ramp better than ever before, we could have sold many more iPhones with greater supply and we are working hard to fill orders as quickly as possible," Cook said in a statement.

Last year, Apple sold 9 million iPhone 5S and 5C models in 11 countries, including China, in the first weekend they were available.
Sales of the latest models in China, the world's largest smartphone market, have been delayed by regulatory issues.

Apple sold 5 million iPhone 5 handsets, 4 million iPhone 4S models and 1.7 million iPhone 4 units during the first weekend.
The company said last week that many U.S. customers would have to wait until next month for their new iPhones due to strong demand.

Apple routinely faces iPhone supply constraints, particularly in years that involve a re-design.
The new iPhones will be available in 20 more countries on Sept. 26, Apple said.
The shipment levels are positive, given that iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus are not initially available in China, unlike iPhone 5S and 5C models, Stifel Nicolaus & Co analyst Aaron Rakers wrote in a note.
Rakers noted that the latest models would be available in 115 countries by the end of this year compared with 100 for iPhone 5S and 5C.

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Sony PlayStation TV to hit stores on October 14

Sony PlayStation TV to hit stores on October 14

Reuter

Sony Corp said PlayStation TV set-top box, which allows users to access movies and TV episodes from the PlayStation store, will hit stores in the United States and Canada on October 14.
The price for a standalone PlayStation TV (PS TV) is $US99.99, the company wrote in a blog. For $139.99, customers can get a wireless controller, an 8 GB memory card and The Lego Movie videogame along with the PS TV.

Around 700 games will be available to PS TV users, including Metal Gear Solid and the franchise Killzone: Mercenary.

PS TV was released in Japan and other Asian countries under the name "PlayStation Vita TV" last fall. Sony is trying to expand its entertainment network services to compete against players like Amazon.com Inc.

Sony did not say when it will launch its online TV service.

The company signed a deal earlier this month to carry 22 Viacom Inc channels, including Comedy Central and MTV, on its planned online TV.

PlayStation boss Shaun Layden told tech blog Re/code in June the company was "on track" to unveil its product some time this year.

Sony's web TV service will join the ranks of an already crowded market with devices from Apple Inc, Amazon.com Inc and Roku.

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