Wireless technology is getting better all the time. I just bought an N1 router from DLINK (with Gigabit LAN!) and a Belkin N1 PCI card. With local access at a staggering 300 Mbps over the air, I am fairly pleased with the performance. I do not have anything that supports Gigabit yet, but expect to have something later.

Now, researchers from Georgia Tech have devised a method to push data through the air at speeds reaching 15 gigabits a second… at one meter. Also, each additional meter between the source and the client drop the speeds 5Gbps. Okay, so at this point, you might as well buy a Gigabit router and a 50 ft ethernet cable and get 1Gbps at farther range, but this device has its advantages.

Apply this to a media center PC (I am currently building a Linux-based Media Center, coming in a future NextLust article) or a laptop on a couch right next to an access point, and the potential for awesomeness expands. While the technology is still officially unnamed, it is referred to as standard 802.15.3c. Heres to hoping that they increase the range to at least 15 meters, so that this would be a much more interesting product.

[Via Georgia Tech]

Researchers at the Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College are some very busy bees. When they’re not occupied with inventing solar powered scalable robotic platforms for arctic research, they’re outside measuring snow. The journey on foot is tiresome and slow when one day they had a sudden “DUH” moment. Why not attach a sled to the robots and let them do all the hard work? Before they knew it, they were snow surfing.

Hopefully this will be the start of a new collegiate competition.

The University of Missouri- Columbia has received another supporter for its nanotechnology research to the tune of 3.5 million dollars from the U.S. Department of Defense, making two new partnerships now created by support from U.S. Senator Kit Bond. The research, lead by the studies performed by professor Shubhra Gangopadhyay, “will primarily focus on the project to develop alternative energy sources and sensors that will detect biological and chemical weapons.” This ability in the devices designed for the military will be accomplished by using “microchip-based technology and nanotechnology to generate a powerful reaction with millions of shockwaves” and the innovative machine “can also can be used for health and medical applications” (or total world domination).

More paranoia after the jump.
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