Printing The World's Fastest Running Shoe

French-born engineer and designer Luc Fusaro claims he has invented a way to make the world’s fastest running shoe. The process allows Fusaro to take 3-D scans of a runner’s foot, then prints the shoes out of nylon polyamide powder on a 3D printer. It's said that the shoe can improve performance by as much as 3.5%--or about .35 seconds.  In a 100-meter dash, that could be the difference between a silver and a gold medal.

You wouldn't want to run a marathon in them, though. “It’s not good for more than 400 meters because it’s too stiff,” says Fusaro.

Remotely Activated Protein-Producing Nanoparticles

That was a mouthful, but it describes something that, if made practical, would be very useful for medical purposes. A group of scientists from MIT and the University of British Columbia have discovered a way to use nanotech to create “mini-factories” that can be programmed using lasers to produce different types of proteins and, when implanted into living cells, would distribute those proteins throughout the body. This would have many uses, from treating diabetes to cancer.

Here is a link to the American Chemical Association abstract and a link to the site Gizmo-Crazed where I picked this up.

Liberty Tool

Ah, what a good idea. Recycle tools. With the high cost of everything these days, being able to find usable tools at reduced rates could make the difference in getting your job done. Liberty Tool in Liberty, Maine is just such a place. Their services are available in person, online and on Ebay.

This place is the very essence of cool tools.

Fun Time! Godzilla In The Forecast!

The weather has been acting kind'a strange lately.

Walmart Fail = Library Success

Your Walmart has just gone out of business because everyone in town has all the cheap, shoddy consumer goods they can ever use. What to do with the empty cavernous shell that drove all your locally owned businesses out?

How about a library? That's what McAllen, Texas did with theirs. This article on Artinfo.com shows you how!

Physics Mysteries Coming Unraveled

Yesterday the big news (other than America's annual birthday party) was that the Higgs Boson has finally been seen. Unless you've been living with the Amish you know that the Higgs is one on the last pieces of the Standard Model of Physics puzzle to be put in place.

Well today comes news that Jörg Dietrich, an astronomer at the University Observatory Munich in Germany and his colleagues have mapped a dark matter filament that connects two massive galaxies.

“Filaments of dark matter have never been seen before,” says Dietrich, whose team reports the finding online July 4 in Nature. “For the first time, we successfully mapped one.”

From the Science News Article: "To improve the odds of seeing one, Dietrich and colleagues focused on Abell 222/223, a pair of galaxy clusters that are close together and thus should be connected by a relatively massive filament. X-ray observations had already revealed a ribbon of hot gas between the clusters — the first hint of a dark matter link. Using the Subaru telescope in Hawaii, the researchers looked at light from distant galaxies passing through the space between the clusters."

"The distorted shapes of the galaxies revealed a thick cord of matter with a mass comparable to that of a small galaxy cluster. Gas can account for only about 9 percent of that mass. Dark matter seems to make up the rest."

Now can we get on with inventing warp drive?

Travel Photo of the Week

Making Saltwater Drinkable With Graphene

Graphene, that amazing substance that's stronger than steel, thinner than paper, can generate electricity and so much more, now appears to be very useful taking the salt out of saltwater. Two or three magnitudes of order more useful, it appears. Here's an article from Geekosystem.com detailing the process.

Boston Tries To Engineer Away Its Traffic Problems

Boston is a terrible city to drive in. I know; I used to do it. In fact, it got so bad I gave up. I walked and took the T.

Well it seems that IBM had a com-
petition (Smarter Cities Challenge) and awarded 33 cities each $400k worth of engineering aid to help figure out and alleviate each city's problem (good luck, LA).

Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino tasked the IBM team with tackling two big issues: How can the city quickly spot and undo congestion while slashing greenhouse gas emissions at the same time.  “We don’t do a good job of moving traffic,” said Menino. “We’ve got to modernize, and understand our carbon footprint.”

The IBM team developed an app for city planners that will eventually be available to all. IBM will formally present its work later this year.

50 Healthiest Foods

This list of the healthiest foods is from Huffington Post and was developed by their "favorite medical and nutritional experts." I expected green tea, cherries and flax seeds to be on the list, but it's good to know that good old tomatoes and potatoes still count as health food. Coffee and dark chocolate, too!