Soon, a portable optical atomic clock

October 1st, 2009 SYDNEY - Building super-fast computers has just become easier, thanks to a breakthrough that lets researchers grab hold of tiny components and probe their inner structure using only a beam of light. The discovery takes researchers a step closer to utilising semi-conductor nano-wires that will be key components of future integrated devices and circuits.

September 29th, 2009 WASHINGTON - If scientists have their way, then a "telescope" that can magnify time could soon dramatically increase the amount of data that can be sent through fibre optic cables, speeding up broadband internet and other long-distance communications. Though it isn't possible to speed up the flashes of light that stream through the global network of optical fibres at around 200 million metres per second, more information can be squeezed into each burst of light, according to Mark Foster at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, using what he and his colleague Alexander Gaeta call a "time telescope" fitted with "time lenses".

September 11th, 2009 SYDNEY - A new way of storing and 'echoing' pulses of light allows bursts of laser to work as a flexible optical memory and potentially assist in extending the range of quantum information systems. A team at the ARC Centre of Excellence in Quantum-Atom Optics has demonstrated how photon echoes can be used to create a quantum memory device - meaning that pulses of light can be captured, stored and then released on demand.

September 10th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Alexis Webb enters a small room painted dark green, turns off the lights and bends over a microscope over a black box to see a single nerve cell on a glass cover slip glowing dimly - indicating the isolated cell is busy keeping time. Researchers at Washington University in St.

September 3rd, 2009 LONDON - Scientists and artists are planning to build a 40m-wide lunar clock by the River Thames by the year 2012. According to a report by BBC News, the aim is to create a new London landmark close to the proposed Olympic stadium as a monument to a more natural way of marking time.

August 12th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have said that an experimental atomic clock based on ytterbium atoms is about four times more accurate than it was several years ago, giving it a precision comparable to that of the NIST-F1 cesium fountain clock, the civilian time standard of the US. NIST scientists evaluated the clock by measuring the natural frequency of ytterbium, carefully accounting for all possible deviations such as those caused by collisions between the atoms, and by using NIST-F1 as a "ruler" for comparison.

July 4th, 2009 LONDON - An optical transistor, successfully crafted from a single molecule, brings researchers a step closer to an optical computer, which would be much faster and more powerful than existing counterparts. Existing central processing units (CPUs) limit the performance of computers, for example, because they produce an enormous amount of heat.

July 3rd, 2009 WASHINGTON - In a new study, scientists have suggested that the internal clock in plants can help make climate change scenarios and CO2 level figures more accurate. The study was done by an international team of researchers led by the University of Castilla-La-Mancha (UCLM) in Spain.

July 2nd, 2009 LONDON - Swiss researchers have made an optical transistor that uses one laser beam to control another, an instrument that could form the heart of a future generation of ultrafast light-based computers. Conventional computers are based on transistors, which allow one electrode to control the current moving through the device and are combined to form logic gates and processors.

June 30th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A team of scientists is developing hand-held devices that can detect the presence of aerosols in air above oceans by measuring how light scatters as it strikes the particles. The portable photometers have been developed by Alexander Smirnov, an AERONET (Aerosol Robotic Network) project scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, and his team.

June 29th, 2009 SYDNEY - Researchers have hit upon a new and simpler way of manipulating light to enable quicker, more secure data transfer. The discovery is based on existing optical technology, but uses it in such a way that fewer components and light beams are required, said research leader Jiri Janousek, from the Australian National University (ANU).

June 27th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A group of students have developed a portable device to detect the weapons of suicide bombers. Improvised explosive devices (IEDs), the weapons of suicide bombers, are a major cause of soldier casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan.

June 25th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A team of researchers at the University of Illinois (U. of I.) has created the world's first acoustic "superlens," an innovation that could have practical implications for high-resolution ultrasound imaging, non-destructive structural testing of buildings and bridges, and novel underwater stealth technology.

May 27th, 2009 WASHINGTON - If you thought that Star Trek scanners that fix injuries with beams of light was just a piece of fiction, just be ready for this-scientists have developed a new optical technology that could lead to better artificial tissues and wounds that heal faster with less scarring. The new technology lines up living cells and controls their movements to effectively heal the wounds faster.

February 3rd, 2009 BERLIN - The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mohamed ElBaradei, has called for a drastic cut in atomic weapons, in an article published Wednesday. Writing in German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung, the Nobel peace laureate appealed to the US and Russia to 'verifiably reduce their arsenals to 1,000 or even 500 warheads'.