Negative Refraction of Light

A recent development by scientists is the ability to negatively refract visible light (within the blue-green region). What does this mean to us? Well, many new developments and applications will arise within the next few years including things like cloaking, being able to actually see DNA, and working much more accurately in the nanoscale.

This breakthrough literally bends light backwards. One really cool application is that of an Invisibility Cloak that requires no electronics just the material. Another good article can be found here and gives credit to its developers.

One thing I would like to note is that if a cloak is developed I will buy it for sure.

Federal Spending mashup Map

Today I found a cool mashup site called Federal Contracts by State that combines government data (FedSpending.org) with a US map (Google Map API) to give a visual idea of how our government spends its money. This mashup is really awesome because it breaks down each state into subcategories like top products and services, top contracting agencies, top parenting companies, etc. I find this especially useful if I were doing research on what companies I think I government offers more "aid" to than others. Also, it breaks down these numbers by year so you can get an idea of the growth or deterioration of federal spending in certain areas.

Flying Car

Another technology that will be hitting the public this year is the Skycar. Not exactly affordable to me, but we will start seeing some people flying over our heads while we sit in traffic. I'm sure that within ten years time the price of these flying wonder machines will be within my reach. There are several types of flying cars that will hit the market but you can read up on one of them at Moller. You can also hear it from Paul Moller himself at YouTube.

Again, I am very excited for this upcoming year and all of the cool new technology that will be available to the public.