Gizmag News - HondaJet achieves maximum speed in flight testing

Welcome to the newsletter for Gizmag Emerging Technology Magazine. These are the headlines for March the 30th, 2011. HondaJet achieves maximum speed in flight testing Honda's first light business jet has exceeded its projected top speed just three months on from its maiden flight. Michimasa Fujino first sketched the HondaJet with its distinctive over-the-wing engine-mount design in 1997. Almost 15 years later the journey towards production is almost complete with the latest milestone seeing the 5-seater aircraft hit 425 KTAS (that's "knots true airspeed") or 489 mph at 30,000 ft – topping the 420 KTAS maximum cruising speed projected for the production model. Read More MESSENGER sends back historic first image of Mercury from orbit After reaching orbit around Mercury on March 17, NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft has sent back its first image of our solar system’s innermost planet. The historic image, which was captured at 5:20 am EDT (U.S.), is the first ever captured from a spacecraft in orbit and is dominated by the rayed crater named Debussy. The bottom portion of the image also shows a region of Mercury’s surface near the planet’s south pole that had not previously been seen by spacecraft. Read More Panasonic and XPAND look to create universal standard for active-shutter 3D glasses When a new technology comes on the scene it often sparks a format war. It's logical that the big players will push their proprietary technology as the market standard so they can recoup some of the money they've spent on R & D. It happened with Beta and VHS, HD-DVD and Blu-ray and more recently with active-shutter glasses for 3D TVs. Now Panasonic has teamed up with XPAND, the company behind a line of Universal 3D glasses, to create a new "universal standard" for 3D active-shutter glasses called M-3DI. But although there are a few companies on board, a number of big players are yet to sign up. Read More Microwaves utilized to convert used motor oil into fuel It has been estimated that over 8 billion US gallons (30.3 billion liters) of used motor oil are produced every year by the world’s cars and trucks. While some of that is re-refined into new oil or burned in furnaces for heat, neither of those processes are entirely environmentally-innocuous. In other cases, it is simply discarded. Today, however, researchers from the University of Cambridge announced the development of a process that uses microwaves to convert waste oil into vehicle fuel. Read More Coffee Joulies - just the way Goldilocks likes it Unless you’re someone who drinks their coffee fast, you likely face a bit of a conundrum when it comes to temperature – either you start with it at the perfect temperature but end up with it getting too cold, or you end up with it cooling down to the perfect temperature by starting with it too hot. Two young entrepreneurs, however, have created a product that they claim quickly cools your hot coffee to the right temperature, but then holds it at that temperature twice as long as it would stay there otherwise. Their product is called Coffee Joulies. Read More Wysips technology can turn any surface into a PV power plant Mobile phones sporting photovoltaic panels are nothing new but thanks to some lens wizardry, a French company recently showed off a prototype phone where the touchscreen display itself housed the solar-soaking cells. Similar to the lenticular optics which sends slightly different images to each eye for glasses-free 3D viewing, Wysips technology allows light to pass through a semi-cylindrical lens onto thin strips of photovoltaic cells below, while also allowing the surface underneath to show through. The developers say that many surfaces could potentially become self-sufficient power producers. Read More PreVue would offer parents a live 4D baby watch window during pregnancy Checking the health of a baby inside the womb using ultrasound has been going on for a good many years and can be a useful tool for detecting problems early. A new concept from industrial designer Melody Shiue proposes using the technology to enhance the bond between parents and the growing fetus. PreVue would take advantage of developments in e-textile research and advances in ultrasound technology to offer mother and father a live window into the various stages of their little treasure's development. Read More Partially-biodegradable plastic made from waste bone meal Creepy as it may sound, for decades one of the key ingredients in cattle feed was meat and bone meal (MBM), made from by-products of – you guessed it – slaughtered cattle. Sheep, farmed deer, elk and bison were also unknowingly eating their own kind. With the onset of the Mad Cow Disease scare in 1997, the U.S. and other countries banned the use of MBM-containing feeds, as it was believed that the disease could spread via the ingestion of infected animals' body parts. That ban has resulted in large quantities of MBM simply ending up in landfills. Now, however, scientists are suggesting that it could be used to make green(ish) plastics. Read More StrongArm helps load boats onto cars Sea kayaks are quite possibly one of the finest things ever created by mankind, but they can be rather difficult to load onto the top of one’s car – this is particularly true for people who are trying to do the job single-handed, or who have a tall vehicle. Australia’s Steve Scott identified this problem as an opportunity, and invented the StrongArm Kayak Loader. Read More If you would like to refer this newsletter to a friend or colleague, please point them at our free subscription page. Please don't try to forward this email, as the formatting is unlikely to remain intact. And don't worry, we don't share email addresses. Please read our privacy policy if you are concerned. Watch for more of the best new innovations, ideas and practical technologies in your inbox. You are receiving this email because you signed up for our daily newsletter at http://www.gizmag.com. If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter please click here to unsubscribe. COPYRIGHT GIZMAG (C) 2011