digimills

The methods still being used in 2008 are ridiculous. This is a long time coming:

The next time your children get cavities, they might get tooth regeneration instead of fillings.

That’s because materials scientists are beginning to find just the right solutions of chemicals to rebuild decayed teeth, rather than merely patching their holes. Enamel and dentin, the materials that make teeth the strongest pieces of the body, would replace the gold or ceramic fillings that currently return teeth to working order.

link

Henry Liu has invented a fabulous brick. This new building material is made of fly ash (a waste product of coal power plants), it’s as strong and safe as a regular brick, costs 20% less to make and may improve air quality.

It has earned him the Popular Science 2007 Invention Award

link

I deposited a check today at a Bank of America ATM here in Miami Beach and was at first confused to find the envelope container missing. I soon noticed that they now use a scanning device to receive checks (and cash I presume) directly into the ATM. I didn’t need to enter a deposit amount and it showed a copy of the check on my receipt. Hopefully they don’t charge me $5 per transaction for that shit…

Just announced on Sirius.com, Backseat TV! It’ll only be three channels to start, Nickelodeon, Disney Channel and Cartoon Network.

“SIRIUS Backseat TV will initially be available in the all-new 2008 Chrysler Town & Country and 2008 Dodge Grand Caravan minivans, available later this year.”

link

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is on the horizon.

“Researchers have created a drug that wipes out a single, specific memory in rats. They trained the rats to be scared of a specific tone, as they always got shocked when they heard it, but after given the drug they ceased to be afraid of the sound.”

link (via gizmodo)

If you pick up a Volkswagen from their factory in Wolfsburg, Germany you get to hang out at the bottom of the above garage and wait for the robot to deliver your car.

A similar garage recently opened in Chinatown NYC and a few others are in the works.

link (via core77)

The first and only handheld GPS that shows your current position on downloaded satellite or aerial photos (or topographical maps). Unfortunately you have to pay for maps and for some reason they only gave it 32MB of memory. $249.95

link (via therawfeed)

Proctology exams are recommended at age 40 for men? Doctors, you have 12 years to get this pill completed…

link (via medgadget)

Time to upgrade that dvd player again…

“Toshiba has submitted a triple-layer, 51GB HD DVD-ROM disc to the standard’s overseer, with the intention of getting it adopted by the end of the year.

That will exceed the currently superior 50GB storage capacity of Blu-ray. The HD DVD standard currently offers single and dual-layer discs, which are capable of holding 15GB and 30GB of data, respectively. That’s enough for a movie encoded in 1080p HD resolution, along with all the extras.”

link (via techdigest)

If you haven’t seen Who Killed the Electric Car?, add it to your netflix today. If you have, you’ll know all about this car’s predecessor, the EV-1. Apparently the Chevrolet Volt will be a little better, but you’d hope so since this one won’t be ready for at least 15 years after the EV-1 debuted (and was quickly and literally crushed).

“If you lived within 30 miles from work (60 miles round trip) and charged your vehicle every night when you came home or during the day at work, you would get 150 miles per gallon,” Lutz said. “More than half of all Americans live within 20 miles of where they work (40 miles round trip). In that case, you might never burn a drop of gas during the life of the car.”

Here’s hoping this comes out very soon and no assholes kill it.

link

“Snake-like robots are under development at Johns Hopkins University for use in throat surgery. The tiny robotic “snakes” have tools at the ends and are fabricated from non-magnetic materials.”

Here’s another creepy snake robot.

On a side note, I can’t decide if Alfred Molina was better as Doc Ock or if Willem Dafoe was superior as Green Goblin.

link (via technovelgy)

“Currently under construction in Dubai, Hydropolis is the world’s first luxury underwater hotel. It will include three elements: the land station, where guests will be welcomed, the connecting tunnel, which will transport people by train to the main area of the hotel, and the 220 suites within the submarine leisure complex. It is one of the largest contemporary construction projects in the world, covering an area of 260 hectares, about the size of London’s Hyde Park.”

But will they have a talking dolphin?

link (via geekblue)

The Magenn Power Air Rotor System (MARS) is a helium floated device that generates electricity through wind-powered rotors.

It’s in the first steps of development and the company is planning to demonstrate a 4 KW prototype in the latter part of 2006.

Looks good for the backcountry and a little less pollution. I’m guessing it won’t be affordable for a good 2-3 years.

link (via gizmowatch)

Warning, this may only exist as a clip in an asian fetish video. I don’t see it for sale anywhere.

link (via gizmodo)

Proud of my former school and employer (I worked a few semesters in the Chemistry Library) for getting involved in Google Print and trying to get as much material out there as possible.

“The University of Wisconsin-Madison and Google plan to provide access to hundreds of thousands of public and historical materials from the UW-Madison libraries and the Wisconsin Historical Society Library, they said.”Those books and documents represent one of the largest U.S. collections of historical and government documents. They will be selected from a combined 7.2 million library holdings.”"The University of Wisconsin-Madison joins the University of California and Spain’s Universidad Complutense de Madrid — two other major libraries Google has announced are participating in the library book search project in the past two months.”

“The Google Books Library Project began last year with five participating libraries — the University of Michigan, Harvard University, Stanford University, the New York Public Library and Oxford University. Google is also conducting a pilot project with the Library of Congress.”

link (via CNN Technology)