 |
Dictionary of Engineering Terms in Science Fiction
(Technovelgy items at top: skip
down to News)
Name |
Author (Publication Date) |
Acoustic Apparatus (Osophone) - original patent filing A device that used bone conduction to transmit sound. |
Hugo Gernsback (1923) |
Actinoscope A device that used a pulsating polarized ether wave to judge the distance to an object (a RADAR) |
Hugo Gernsback (1911) |
Aeriduct (Rain Maker) - watch for showers A specific means of producing rain. |
John Jacob Astor IV (1894) |
Aeropile A fluttering wing airplane for a few passengers. |
H.G. Wells (1899) |
Agile Recording Robot A recording machine that moves toward its subject. |
Philip K. Dick (1955) |
AIRE - reverse engineering software A piece of software that can break through encryption to determine exactly how a compiled program accomplishes its tasks. |
John Barnes (1994) |
Anti-Burglar Installations Every electronic house should have automated defenses. |
Richard R. Smith (1955) |
Antigravity Plate (Antigravity Raft) A thin, circular craft that floats. |
A.E. van Vogt (1942) |
Antiturbulence Wings Wings that are designed to buffer turbulence for passengers. |
Bruce Sterling (1993) |
Architectural Coral - build to any shape A structure grown to a specific shape using small coral-like organisms. |
Larry Niven (1968) |
Artificial Gill Outfit A diving suit that pulls air from the water. |
Philip K. Dick (1966) |
Artificial Island For Ocean Rocket Launch An entirely artificial, floating island used as a launch platform. |
Otfrid von Hanstein (1930) |
Asteroid Garden A method for building a greenhouse on a small, airless body. |
Raymond Z. Gallun (1951) |
Atmosphere Control Recently terraformed planets require constant maintenance. |
Larry Niven (w/J. Pournelle) (1974) |
Atmospheric Pressure Control Plane A vessel that flies by creating pockets of high and low pressure. |
R.H. Romans (1929) |
Atmospherics Switchboard Make sure each hotel room has the right atmosphere from the right planet. |
John Victor Peterson (1941) |
Atom Compactor (Metal Earthworm) A tunneling device. |
Paul Ernst (1936) |
Atomic Drill An atomic-powered auger, for use in drilling deep into planets and asteroids. |
John D. Clark, Ph.D (1937) |
Atomic Energy Motor An engine which utilizes atomic energy. |
G. Peyton Wertenbaker (1926) |
Atomic Engine A motor running on atomic fuel. |
H.G. Wells (1914) |
Atomic Machine A device that shrinks and expands its wearer. |
G. Peyton Wertenbaker (1926) |
Atomic Microscopy A device that can actually visualize a individual molecule and its parts. |
Robert Cromie (1895) |
Atomic Torch An atomic-powered cutting and welding tool. |
Jack Williamson (1939) |
Atomic-Powered Lifting Suits Special exoskeletons that would allow an ordinary human being to walk in doubled gravity. |
John W. Campbell (1938) |
Atomics The field of nuclear energy. |
Lester del Rey (1942) |
Atom-Shifter A device that 'softens' matter, making it possible for a person to pass through. |
Manly Wade Wellman (1940) |
Attractor - come hither and stay still A beam capable of holding objects motionless, as well as adjusting their position. |
L.F. Stone (1931) |
Auto-Clerk An automated accounting system. |
Robert Heinlein (1942) |
Automatic City A city designed to protect itself and maintain itself over millions of years. |
Robert Silverberg (1969) |
Automatic Delivery Library A library able to deliver any volume within a few moments. |
Stanton A. Coblentz (1939) |
Automatic Door - like a roll top desk A wall strip that rolls up automatically to let you through. |
H.G. Wells (1899) |
Automatic Light Switch A device that senses if an illuminated room is empty, and turns off the light. |
Robert Heinlein (1950) |
Automatic Shell A projectile that bores through obstacles - even the Earth! |
Frank Stockton (1897) |
Automatic Speeding Fine An automated device that not only computes the speed of a vehicle, but registers and then issues an electronic citation. |
Nat Schachner (1941) |
Automatics Machinery capable of running some aspect of a space ship's operation on its own. |
Ray Cummings (1932) |
Autonomously Recharging UAV Unmanned aerial vehicles that recharge themselves automatically. |
Roger Zelazny (1980) |
Auto-Seal Automatically deployed cover for power outlets; instant child-proofing. |
John Brunner (1968) |
Autosight Achronic Beam A range-finder for weaponry that isn't limited by time, for the ultimate in accuracy. |
Jack Williamson (1940) |
Avatar Construction Set - build your virtual self A collection of software that allows the building of a complete avatar. |
Neal Stephenson (1992) |
Barber Helmet Cuts your hair quickly and efficiently. |
Don Wilcox (1939) |
Barytrine Field - planet moving Very large scale stasis field. |
George O. Smith (1952) |
Batacitor A storage device for electricity that could be charged in a very short time. |
Philip Jose Farmer (1971) |
Beckerley Electrical Field An energy field that can protect a city or large area. |
R.M. Farley (w/SG Weinbaum) (1936) |
Beltway A moving sidewalk. |
Leo Zagat (1948) |
Bifocal TV Screen Lenses Using the bottom lens of bifocals as a TV screen. |
Edmond Hamilton (1940) |
Bio-Energy - produce electricity from organic material The first reference to extracting electricity from organic materials. |
Jonathan Swift (1726) |
Bolt Anti-Grav This device produces a torus-shaped discharge that causes weightlessness. |
Margaret St. Clair (1949) |
Bone Conduction Receiver A concealed radio receiver. |
Anson MacDonald (1941) |
Boring Heat Machine Takes tunnel boring material and turns it into building material. |
Frank Phillips (1929) |
Buy-Me-Discs Tiny disks attached to products in stores that received transmitted ads to share with consumers. |
Anne Warren Griffith (1953) |
Causality-violation Device (or Weapon) Any of a variety of technologies intended to exploit time travel as a weapon. |
Charles Stross (2003) |
Centrifugal Force Creates 'Artificial Gravity' Using centrifugal force in a rotating cylinder as a substitute for gravity. |
Jack Williamson (1931) |
Cephalic Pattern Door A door that only opens for specific people. |
Philip K. Dick (1965) |
Cheekplate Container - exoskeleton accessory Special compartment of an exoskeleton; provides easy access to medical supplies related to survive heavy gravity environments. |
Fritz Leiber (1968) |
Chemelectric Afferent Nerve-Analogues An engineered sensory skin. |
Roger Zelazny (1965) |
Chemotactic Artificial Jellyfish - big jellies Artificial device modeled on jellyfish capable of seeking specific components of liquid. |
Rudy Rucker (w/B. Sterling) (1994) |
Chromoplastic Dew Collector - when every drop counts A small, egg-shaped device that uses a special surface to collect morning dew on the desert planet of Arrakis. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
Chronoscope A device used to see into specific internals of time. |
John W. Campbell (1936) |
Chronoscopy Using a device to view different points in time. |
Isaac Asimov (1956) |
Clearsac A simple device that filters water perfectly for reuse. |
Paolo Bacigalupi (2015) |
Click-Band Worn on the wrist, it helps you locate your transport. |
Philip K. Dick (1954) |
Clothing Size Scanner A device that scanned a living person to determine clothing sizes. |
Alan Dean Foster (2006) |
Coldlight A means of producing illumination that does not produce heat. |
Leo Zagat (1943) |
Color Generator A variable spectrum light source |
Jack Vance (1964) |
Cone of Silence - the original sound-dampener Distortion field that limits the carrying power of voice or other vibration; it accomplishes noise reduction with an image-vibration 180 degrees out of phase. |
Frank Herbert (1958) |
Control Harness Connects to the brain and nervous system of a host organism for control purposes. |
Philip K. Dick (1964) |
Controlway An automated highway system that takes full operational control of vehicles traveling upon it. |
Robert Heinlein (1941) |
Cop Block - patrol officer's friend A device that allows law enforcement officers to shut down the engine of a suspect's car or truck. |
Greg Bear (2007) |
Crash Balloons Inflatable bags that would both cushion and hold a flycycle driver in the event of a crash. |
Larry Niven (1970) |
Cube Being A living being comprised of linked cubes. |
Jack Williamson (1938) |
Curtain (Force Barrier) An easily set-up protective force barrier. |
Nat Schachner (w. AL Zagat) (1931) |
Cushion Fence Gentle force field |
Alfred Bester (1974) |
Cyborg Collar - controlled work gangs A device worn around the neck that controls the person for the duration of a working day. |
Fritz Leiber (1968) |
Decibel Alarms - shhh! we're protesting Alarms that would go off if the noise in public gathering places was rising to riotous levels. |
Anne McCaffrey (1973) |
Dew Gatherers Devices used to gather morning dew as a source of drinking water. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
Digger Worm - mining robot A robot shaped like a fat snake, or worm; used for mining. |
Connie Willis (1985) |
Digital Ink License Plate License tags that can change both state and number in the blink of an eye. |
Daniel Suarez (2006) |
Disintegrator Ray (Dis Ray) A device that projects a beam reducing matter to nothingness. |
Philip Frances Nowlan (1928) |
Disinto - a disintegrating ray A disintegrating ray. |
Isaac Asimov (1941) |
Disperser - back off Device that gives an electric shock to anyone who touches a vehicle. |
Alan Dean Foster (2006) |
Disposal-Safe Device to store and, if necessary, destroy documents. |
Murray Leinster (1956) |
Dolphin's Hands Digital prosthetic for dolphins. |
Larry Niven (1967) |
Donnersprache A hypnotic transceiver that enhances the charisma of speakers. |
Dean Ing (1991) |
Double-Pane Vacuum Window Double-pane glass separated by vacuum. |
Raymond Z. Gallun (1940) |
Drafting Dan - born before CAD The first computer software drafting program (Computer Aided Design - CAD). |
Robert Heinlein (1956) |
Drop Shaft (Neutralization of Inertia) - watch that first step An 'elevator shaft' in which the user can fall at the speed of gravity, then be stopped without inertia (i.e., instantly). |
E.E. 'Doc' Smith (1937) |
Duplication Chamber A means of precisely duplicating an object. |
William F. Temple (1939) |
Dutch Clock (Time Machine) A tall Dutch clock with hands that move... backward. |
Edward Page Mitchell (1881) |
Earmite A small speaker that you can put in your ear. |
John Shirley (1985) |
Earthsuit Like a spacesuit, but protects you from the Earth. |
Neal Stephenson (2021) |
Electric Protection-Wires (Electrified Fence) An electric fence. |
John Jacob Astor IV (1894) |
Electric Wall A wall of electric force. |
Edmond Hamilton (1942) |
Electric-Space-Strain Projector - wireless power transmission Device enables the wireless transmission of power. |
John W. Campbell (1934) |
Electro-Binox Binoculars with electronic focusing. |
Fritz Leiber (1968) |
Electron Gun How to add a lot of electrons to a lot of positrons? |
Nat Schachner (1934) |
Electronic Image Intensifier Much more sensitive than the human eye. |
Arthur C. Clarke (1961) |
Energy Converter Massive unit on the sunside of Mercury converts heat into energy, and beams it around the solar system. |
Isaac Asimov (1942) |
Energy Curtain Key A small handheld "key" to shut off a force field. |
Nat Schachner (w. AL Zagat) (1931) |
Energy Screen A field of force. |
A.E. van Vogt (1944) |
Evolution Machine A device that accelerates the process of evolution by millions of times. |
Edmond Hamilton (1931) |
Exoskeleton (Medical) - first look Specially designed for Thins, eight-foot tall microgravity humans. |
Fritz Leiber (1968) |
Factory Crawler (or Harvester Crawler) - sift the sands of Arrakis A mobile factory which filtered and processed the sands of Dune for the spice, mélange. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
Fairy Digits (Tiny Waldoes) Waldoes used for very fine work. |
Robert Heinlein (1942) |
Feeler-Planes - sensors for 3D models Special sensors that make extremely detailed three-dimensional models. |
Jack Vance (1954) |
Femfatalatron A device that reverses an infatuation for a particular woman. |
Stanislaw Lem (1965) |
Fenton Silencer - early noise cancellation A device to cancel noise over a broad area. |
Arthur C. Clarke (1957) |
Field-Projector A device that dematerializes a person and then sends forth a ray that will then rematerialize a person at the end. |
Edmond Hamilton (1938) |
Filter Wheel - stepwise refinement A device for filtering liquid or gas to obtain a pure sample of a selected molecule. |
Neal Stephenson (1995) |
Filter-Mask Perfect for dystopian future air pollution. |
John Brunner (1972) |
Filt-Plug - lose no moisture A nose plug worn to collect moisture from exhaled air. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
Finger Jet Bath The ultimate in luxury tubs. |
Jack Vance (1954) |
Flame Barrier A form of protective force field. |
A.E. van Vogt (1943) |
Flexible Stem A long flexible tube that can expand and contract its length quickly. |
Jack Vance (1964) |
Fluor Strips Lighting long narrow devices. |
Margaret St. Clair (1949) |
Flying Harness Device allows free movement in the air. |
E.E. 'Doc' Smith (1928) |
Foam Station Sprayer A device that stills the stormy Great Red Spot on Jupiter. |
Frank Belknap Long, Jr. (1936) |
Fold Box A chest that is bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. |
Robert Heinlein (1963) |
Force-Screen - protective energy A variation on the force shield idea. |
Frank Belknap Long, Jr. (1939) |
Fottengill Process An early mention of the idea that energy can be derived from random noise. |
Lloyd Biggle, Jr. (1956) |
Frictionless Cups Cups with a special surface to which liquid does not adhere. |
Larry Niven (1973) |
Frictionless Toilet A toilet bowl that does not require water, because its surface is frictionless. |
Larry Niven (w/J. Pournelle) (1974) |
Fusion Power Creating energy from nuclear fusion reactions. |
Gerald Vance (1956) |
Garbage Mine - there's gold in them heaps The idea that recycling can spawn entirely new industries. |
David Brin (1990) |
Gateway A device that opens a portal to another dimension. |
Harl Vincent (1933) |
Geofractor Device provides instantaneous teleportation of selected objects over vast distances. |
Jack Williamson (1939) |
Geotect A person who creates landforms and physical environments |
Neal Stephenson (1995) |
Gesture-Controlled Device An electronic device that is controlled by hand gestures. |
Douglas Adams (1979) |
Ghost Trap Device for capture and temporary storage of ectoplasmic entities. |
Harold Ramis (1984) |
Glass Dome Protective cover for cities. |
H.G. Wells (1905) |
Global Climate Control Adjust the Earth's axis so the seasons are more temperate and uniform. |
John Jacob Astor IV (1894) |
Glowstone - great at parties A mineral that absorbs light by day and emits it by night. |
George RR Martin (1977) |
Grapple Tracks - auto parking A means of automating the process of parking and releasing passenger vehicles from a parking garage. |
Frank Herbert (1977) |
Gravitic Lift An elevator with no visible means of support. |
Isaac Asimov (1988) |
Gravity Beam An conical attractive ray, it pulls ships to their doom. |
Ray Cummings (1932) |
Gravity Lens - see the stars An optical lens created using the lightbending properties of gravity. |
Larry Niven (1973) |
Gravity Neutralizing Disks Two plates between which Earth's gravitational influence is cancelled out. |
Edmond Hamilton (1937) |
Gravity Nullification (Gravity Screen) Gravity annulled in its entirety in a small area. |
Hugo Gernsback (1911) |
Gravity Nullifier Shields a large object from the effect of gravity. |
Henri Dahl Juve (1929) |
Gravity Tube - e-z store A special passage way that eases the movement of material within a ship. |
Jack McDevitt (2002) |
Grill-Screen Adaptor Approved General Electronics Corporation solution for bomb shelters, in response to Soviet bore-pellets. |
Philip K. Dick (1955) |
Half-Sphere Force Field - not an ordinary spherical force field A protective force field that can manifest even as a half-sphere. |
Robert Heinlein (1951) |
Hand Wave Control Control an electronic or other device with gestures. |
Philip K. Dick (1955) |
Harvest Power From Stray Energy A means of collecting enough energy from stray electronic impulses to power a device. |
Harl Vincent (1928) |
Headset - wireless ear-clips Wireless headsets provide computer language translation. |
William Gibson (1996) |
Heat Transmitter - warmth to outer planets Device which captures solar energy close to the source and then beams it in concentrated form to outer planets. |
Edmond Hamilton (1928) |
Hedgerly Effect A means of producing a gravitational field artificially. |
George O. Smith (1947) |
Helio-Dynamophores (Sun-Power-Generators) Photo-electric elements which transformed the solar heat direct into electric energy. |
Hugo Gernsback (1911) |
Helium Tubes Lighting that exactly mimics the frequencies of sunlight. |
Louis Tucker, D.D. (1929) |
Helmet-Mounted Display Screen - display where you need it A small electronic display mounted for easy viewing. |
Harry Harrison (1951) |
Hilsch Vortex Tube - Maxwell's demon lives! A T-shaped device that admits air under pressure and outputs hot air from side and cold from the other. |
Frederik Pohl (w/CM Kornbluth) (1952) |
Historical Listening Machine Device can hear sounds from down through the ages. |
A.T. Locke (1933) |
Holodeck A computer-simulated environment. |
David Gerrold (1987) |
House-of-Cards Construction Architectural technique that uses computers to help buildings maintain their balance during earthquakes. |
Vernor Vinge (2006) |
Hush Hood - privacy when you need it A device that cancels noise, ensuring that others cannot overhear. |
Robert Heinlein (1966) |
Hyperbolic Solenoid - mag lock picker Device that creates and manipulates magnetic fields. |
L. Sprague de Camp (1940) |
Hyperstereoscope A book of three-dimensional pages. |
Miles J. Breuer (1929) |
Iceberg Water Tub - fresh water mountain An enormous bag or tub that encloses an iceberg used to supply fresh water. |
Jerry Pournelle (w/L. Niven) (1981) |
Ice-Nine - the final form of water A crystalline form of water so stable that in practical terms it would never melt. |
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (1963) |
Indirect Cold Light Apparently source-less lighting, highly efficient, with no waste heat. |
Henri Dahl Juve (1929) |
Individualized Clothing Manufacture - clothes just for you A device that will produce suits of clothing based on measurement data gathered. |
H.G. Wells (1899) |
Inertia Tank A device that protected its delicate contents by cushioning. |
Raymond Z. Gallun (1939) |
Instant Photography A photograph that develops immediately inside the camera. |
Henri Dahl Juve (1929) |
Inviolability Field A kind of field of force built into a robe, to protect an individual person. |
Fritz Leiber (1943) |
Invisibility Shield A means of concealing a physical object to the naked eye. |
E.E. 'Doc' Smith (1934) |
Invisible Cloak -long before Harry Potter A cloak that renders the wearer invisible. |
Ray Cummings (1930) |
Iridium Spirals (Street Lights) Streetlights provide sunlight at night. |
Hugo Gernsback (1911) |
Jonnytruck A movable bathroom for hire; cost is offset by reclamation. |
Paolo Bacigalupi (2015) |
Kink-Spring - reusable energy source A device that stores energy with near-perfect efficiency. |
Paolo Bacigalupi (2005) |
Lanson Screen An elliptical shield of force large enough to enclose a city. |
Leo Zagat (1936) |
Lethe-Mirror Induces sleepy mindedness. |
Philip K. Dick (1956) |
Levitating Path Anti-gravity metal used to make a floating walkway. |
Ray Bradbury (1952) |
Lighting Panel A large panel that presents illumination without heat. |
Lyle Monroe (1940) |
Liquid Metal Metal that can be sprayed on. |
Arthur K. Barnes (1938) |
Local Time Clock A clock for use in airships that always indicates the time for the place they are flying over. |
Henri Dahl Juve (1929) |
Locatimeter A method for a plane to know its location over the Earth. |
Otis Adelbert Kline (1937) |
Lunar Ice Mining - water on the moon The practice of mining for ice on the moon. |
Robert Heinlein (1966) |
Lunar Observatory Putting an observatory on the far side of the Moon could have advantages. |
Poul Anderson (1958) |
Maelstrom A description of the next generation Internet |
Peter Watts (2002) |
Magnetic Pinions - electromagnetic cuffs Remote control electromagnetic handcuffs. |
Jack Vance (1958) |
Manmade Black Hole Using the power of a hole in the continuum. |
Jack Williamson (1939) |
Matched-Frequency Separable Units Devices that can draw power wirelessly from a matched source. |
E.E. 'Doc' Smith (1930) |
Matter Duplicator Makes a perfect copy of any material object. |
George O. Smith (1945) |
Matter Editation Technology that enables the easy manipulation of atomic properties. |
Sid Meier (1999) |
Matter Transmitter - ride the beam Device which causes a physical object to disappear from one place and reappear in another. |
L.F. Stone (1931) |
Matter Transmitter and Receiver A device that transports matter through space. |
Edmond Hamilton (1931) |
Mechanical Hand A large robotic hand or claw, large enough to grasp a person. |
Philip Nowlan (w/D. Calkins) (1929) |
Mechanical Mole - Underground vehicle A self-contained device for digging large tunnels. |
Jerry Pournelle (w/L. Niven) (1981) |
Mechanical Thought Transformers Machinery to expedite the process of thought transfer. |
L.F. Stone (1931) |
Metaverse - the whole virtual world A virtual universe. |
Neal Stephenson (1992) |
Meteorite Deflector A means of pushing aside asteroids that get in the path of your space ship. |
Miles J. Breuer (1931) |
Micro-Cosmos (Microcosm) The universe in miniature. |
Edmond Hamilton (1935) |
Miniature Universe A microcosmic universe created in the laboratory. |
Edmond Hamilton (1937) |
Miniaturization Making a physical object smaller in size. |
Isaac Asimov (1966) |
Mining Disintegrator A special-purpose boring machine. |
David McDaniel (1967) |
Minisec A device like a personal digital assistant (PDA) today. |
Arthur C. Clarke (1976) |
Mole Probe Automated devices that seek underground routes, burrowing as they go. |
Robert Silverberg (1969) |
Molecular Sieve A device that can extract any element from seawater. |
Arthur C. Clarke (1957) |
Molecule Replacement Lamp A means of attaining practical invisibility. |
Frank Belknap Long, Jr. (1936) |
Monopole Mining Looking for natural sources of monopoles. |
Larry Niven (1973) |
Moondozer - moonmover A bulldozer for lunar conditions. |
Arthur C. Clarke (1961) |
Movable Slideway - it comes to you A slideway (moving sidewalk) that can be extended to a spaceship to ease the debarkation process. |
Robert Heinlein (1951) |
Nanomachine Swarm (Black Cloud) - tiny machines work together A cloud of tiny machines, able to work together autonomously. |
Stanislaw Lem (1954) |
Neutralizing Wall A barrier that stops electrical and mechanical vibrations, rendering the protected area effectively invisible. |
Harl Vincent (1928) |
Nuclear Shears Device uses nuclear power to accomplish basic shop tasks. |
Isaac Asimov (1951) |
Nuclear-Field Depressor A device that causes nuclear-powered devices to stop working. |
Isaac Asimov (1952) |
Nullfield A field of energy that creates a barrier. |
John Varley (1977) |
Object-Finder Beam A unique device that projected a beam that found what you wanted. |
L.F. Stone (1931) |
Oceanic Thermal Energy Converter - energy from the sea A device that uses the sea to help create electricity. |
Larry Niven (w/S. Barnes) (2000) |
Oil Lens - infinitely adjustable lens Oil held in tension in an enclosing force field, used as an optical component. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
One-Way Passage A different way to assure permanent egress. |
Jack Vance (1954) |
Optical-Effect Suit An invisibility garment. |
Keith Laumer (1964) |
Orphids Nanomachines replicate theselves from dust - and cover the Earth. |
Rudy Rucker (2007) |
Osmosis Generator (Cziltang Brone) - the air lock A device that can render a solid permeable to matter. |
Larry Niven (1970) |
Pail of Air A small bucket filled with (liquid) air. |
Fritz Leiber (1951) |
Palm Plate - your hand is the key A device that scanned for a palm print prior to opening a door. |
E.C. Tubb (1958) |
Para-Beam - light of paralysis A beam of energy that paralyzes the victim. |
E.C. Tubb (1958) |
Paralyzing Eye False eye contains mechanism for causing brief paralysis. |
L. Sprague de Camp (1941) |
Parastatics Means of completely eliminating injury in vehicles during crashes. |
Stanislaw Lem (1961) |
People-Sorter - catalog them quickly A device able to sort human beings with incredible speed. |
John Varley (1983) |
Perfect Voice Modulation Artificially creating the perfect human singing voice. |
Bernard Brown (1931) |
Personal Solar Plant A single-home solar-powered energy source. |
Clifford Simak (1952) |
Photic Borer (Artesian Ray) A ray of energy that illuminates a cross-section of Earth as it goes through solid earth and rock. |
Frank Stockton (1897) |
Photoelectric Course Warning - aid to spaceship pilots A means of keeping a spaceship on course using a selected star and a photoelectric cell. |
Robert H. Wilson (1931) |
Photo-Voltaic Robes Outerwear made from material that absorbs sunlight and outputs electricity. |
Neal Asher (2002) |
Pina2bo A huge cannon that shot shells filled with sulfur high into the atmosphere for the purpose of geoengineering a change in climate. |
Neal Stephenson (2021) |
Planet City A planet the surface of which is entirely covered over, forming one single city. |
David M. Speaker (1930) |
Plastibulb A squeezable drink container. |
Lewis Padgett (1943) |
Pneumatic-Tube Zone The portion of a city that is served by direct tubes to each dwelling. |
Miles J. Breuer (1932) |
Pocket Gravity Nullifier Personal device stops gravity's effect. |
Henri Dahl Juve (1929) |
Polyfrequency Neutralizer Dissolves projected solidographs (holograms). |
Fritz Leiber (1943) |
Positron Beam Vast numbers of positrons, the antimatter counterpart of the electron, are beamed around the Earth. |
Nat Schachner (1934) |
Powered artificial exoskeleton A robotic device designed to support someone too weak to comfortably move in high gravity. |
Robert Heinlein (1951) |
Predictograph Capable combining and projecting hundreds of complex curves into the future. |
S.P. Meek (1929) |
Private Flyer A privately-owned air vehicle that used no control surfaces for maneuvering. |
Arthur C. Clarke (1953) |
Probability Time Wave Tube A device that allows the user to see every possible event. |
John W. Campbell (1936) |
Prosthetic Yachting Gloves Robotic gloves for sailors. |
Bruce Sterling (2022) |
Protective Energy Halo A device that cast a hemisphere of protective beams. |
Raymond Z. Gallun (1936) |
Protective Field (Safety Field) An static energy field used to protect a city. |
Robert Silverberg (1969) |
Protoplast Artificial life, tougher than protoplasm. |
Raymond Z. Gallun (1954) |
Psychophone A device that allows the user to tune their mind to a future reality - a time-traveling device. |
Maurice G. Hugi (1941) |
Public Urine Collection Arcologies offer public latrines, then collect for reclamation. |
Paolo Bacigalupi (2015) |
Quantum Power Power generation through photon fission. |
Sid Meier (1999) |
Quench Field Stopped runaway nuclear reactions by quenching the cascades of neutrons. |
E. Waldo Hunter (1941) |
Radar Detection of objects at a distance. |
Hugo Gernsback (1911) |
Radiant Power Receptor (DeKalbs) - broadcast power receiver A device which received and used energy transmitted from a station or satellite. |
Robert Heinlein (1942) |
Radium-Action Lighter A personal device used to ignite tobacco products. |
Manly Wade Wellman (1940) |
Reality Tape The medium upon which the life experience of an electric ant - a robotic person - is presented. |
Philip K. Dick (1969) |
Recording Radio A handheld device that both recorded sound and transmitted it live to a remote broadcasting location. |
H. Beam Piper (1961) |
Reflectocosmic Spectrometer A device that detects and measures cosmic rays that reflect from different metals. |
Philip Nowlan (w/D. Calkins) (1929) |
Refrigeration Tape - ground cooling A strip of material that can be used to keep large tracts of tundra nicely frozen. |
Robert Silverberg (1970) |
Remote-Control Slavery Mental control (possibly mediated by radio waves) of individuals of other species. |
Robert Silverberg (1969) |
Repair Drone Autonomous robots repair damage or sabotage. |
William Gibson (1984) |
Repellor Anti-Gravity Rays Device provides support for planet-side air travel. |
Philip Frances Nowlan (1928) |
Repulsor Ray Fires an invisible beam of electrons for propulsion. |
Edmond Hamilton (1927) |
Rhennius Machine - reverse yourself Device of alien manufacture, which will reverse, or turn inside out, any object passed through its mobilator. |
Roger Zelazny (1976) |
Robomule The robotic equivalent of a mule. |
Harry Harrison (1965) |
Robopark - automated parking garage An automated parking garage. |
Robert Heinlein (1941) |
Robotic Microhands Mechanical replica of hands, that mimic the movements of actual human hands. |
Boris Zhitkov (1931) |
Rooftop Windmill - renewable energy vision Renewable energy source for the home. |
John Jacob Astor IV (1894) |
RUMOKO - island builder A project to create additional land surface by deliberate stimulation of undersea volcanoes. |
Roger Zelazny (1976) |
Sandsnork - breathe under sand A device like a snorkel that would provide air to a tent buried by a sand storm. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
Scanner Palm A document scanner implanted in the palm of the hand. |
Warren Hammond (2007) |
Scanning-Disk Telescope A telescope which uses a television-like monitor instead of an eyepiece. |
Murray Leinster (1931) |
Schrieber Analyzer Superior automatic air testing - for the discriminating space traveler. |
Eric Frank Russell (1955) |
Security Restraint Field A force field that restricts personal movement. |
Robert Heinlein (1951) |
Self-Sustaining Nuclear Reaction An 'atomic fire' is started that consumes all matter in reach! |
Raymond Z. Gallun (1931) |
Servok An 'automatic' or clock-set mechanism to perform simple tasks. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
Ship That Swims Under Water (Submarine) A Ship that could swim under Water. |
Margaret Cavendish (1666) |
Shipstone - lots of power A lot of power in a small, manufactured package. |
Robert Heinlein (1982) |
Shovel-Handed Digging Machines Huge multi-legged machines used to dig and manipulate earth. |
Frank Phillips (1929) |
Slideway - moving sidewalk A slidewalk, or moving walkway, that moves people forward. |
Robert Heinlein (1942) |
Slug An underwater "barge", consisting of a giant tube for transporting oil. |
Frank Herbert (1956) |
Smart Rope Long 'rope' consisting of a variety of intertwined cables with different properties; controlled with special glove interface. |
Bruce Sterling (1994) |
Smartcoral Reef - water purifying reef An artificial coral reef that pulls water in for use in large communities. |
Neal Stephenson (1995) |
Sobriety Ray - instantly sober A ray of a particular wavelength and intensity, that conferred instant sobriety on those it shone upon. |
Lewis Padgett (1942) |
Solar Beam Obtaining solar power by means of a direct connection with the sun. |
George O. Smith (1944) |
Solar Electric Paint - Black Power - solar power in a spray can A black-colored paint that can be sprayed on, making any surface a solar power generator. |
Larry Niven (1995) |
Solar Energy Beam - ultimate in solar power production A solar energy plant on Mercury provides power for projects all over the solar system. |
Clifford Simak (1941) |
Solar Power Generation A very early description of the use of solar powered 'farms' for generating electrical power on a large scale. |
John Jacob Astor IV (1894) |
Solar Power Screen Absorb all solar energy, and emit electrical energy. |
Lyle Monroe (1940) |
Solar Reception Screen - photovoltaics in action A device for converting sunlight to electricity |
Robert Heinlein (1940) |
Solar Station Switch Room A power station for the entire solar system. |
Edmond Hamilton (1940) |
Solar Updraft Tower A renewable-energy scheme that generates power from air movement inside a tall chimney. |
Leigh and Walt Richmond (1964) |
Solar-Powered Aircraft A plane powered entirely by solar energy. |
John W. Campbell (1930) |
Solar-Powered Ball An autonomous round toy that powers itself. |
Raymond Z. Gallun (1954) |
Solar-Powered Electric Helicopter An electric helicopter, with sun cells. |
James Patrick Kelly (1933) |
Solid Power - it's super-valuable! A concentrated form of easily accessed energy to supply any need. |
Edmond Hamilton (1940) |
Sonabarrier - keep the vultures out A type of energy fence, used to keep birds away from particular areas. |
Frank Herbert (1977) |
Sonar Pistol A device that divers can use to find seabottom and objects in extremely dark or murky water. |
Peter Watts (1999) |
Sonic Fold Force field that guides air around an air vehicle. |
Larry Niven (1970) |
Sound Deadener Device that acts to damp excessive noise produced by different species. |
Larry Niven (1970) |
Sound Nullifier A barrier to sound; the cancellation of sound waves. |
Bernard Brown (1931) |
Sound-Killing Air Fluid A means to eliminate all of the noise made by machines in a city, leaving the voices of human beings. |
A.M. McNeill (1930) |
Spaceplane (Clarke-class) An inexpensively powered flight to low earth orbit. |
Peter F. Hamilton (1998) |
Spex (Spexware) Video glasses with computer assistance. |
Bruce Sterling (1993) |
Spinnerettes - handling nanofibers A device that will unspool a nanowire filament and then pull it back in. |
Arthur C. Clarke (1978) |
Stasis Box - infinite storage A space entirely enclosed by a Slaver stasis field, in which time does not pass. |
Larry Niven (1968) |
Stasis Field Energy field which prevents time from passing inside the field walls; no time passes, nobody gets hurt. |
Robert Heinlein (1942) |
Steel Tentacle Flexible robotic steel limbs that can both support a vehicle and grasp objects. |
H.G. Wells (1898) |
Stereoscopic Vernier and Cube A means of photographing in depth. |
Eric Frank Russell (1939) |
Straightening the Earth's Poles By means of a suitable force, push the Earth until the planet's axis of rotation is perpendicular to the ecliptic. |
Jules Verne (1889) |
Stratoplane An airplane that flies up to the edge of the atmosphere. |
Donald Wandrei (1934) |
Structural Scanning Essentially, a whole-object camera, that would take a detailed picture of the structure of an object. |
James P. Hogan (1978) |
Sub-Etheric Below the level at which ordinary light is propagated. |
Jack Williamson (1938) |
Sunparlor A vast esplanade enclosed in glass, to permit sunbathing without leaving an immense building. |
Louis Tucker, D.D. (1929) |
Sunpower Screen - photovoltaic cells power vehicle A solar cell array used to provide power for a vehicle. |
Robert Heinlein (1940) |
Sunray Tank A device that stores sunlight itself for use as an energy source. |
Edgar Rice Burroughs (1914) |
Sun-Room On a planet-wide city, the only way to get some sun without going to the roof. |
Isaac Asimov (1951) |
Sunshade-Photocell Collector A fanciful design for a device that gathers solar energy. |
David Brin (1990) |
Superconductor of Heat A light metal that accepts heat applied to its surface, and then dissipates the energy throughout the material, leaving the temperature of the material unchanged. |
Larry Niven (w/J. Pournelle) (1974) |
Suspensor - suspend gravity An energy field that can nullify gravity for small objects. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
Swiss A small piece of personal gear that combines a great many items in a single device. |
Karen Traviss (2004) |
Talking Speedometer A gauge that tells you its value verbally |
Theodore Sturgeon (1941) |
Tanglefoot Field - non-lethal crowd control A force field that would not harm but merely entangle and stop anyone (or anything) caught in it. |
Robert Heinlein (1954) |
Telelubricator - perfectly frictionless Makes any surface or substance perfectly frictionless. |
L. Sprague de Camp (1940) |
Telepomp (Matter Transmission) - first use A device that transmitted matter from one place to another. |
Edward Page Mitchell (1877) |
Temporal Paradox The paradoxical idea that making changes in the past results in changes in the present. |
Brian Berry (1954) |
Tesseract House A house built in the shape of a four-dimensional figure. |
Robert Heinlein (1940) |
The Cosmic Express A means of transmitting matter wirelessly. |
Jack Williamson (1930) |
The Dip A device that randomly dredges up things from the past... or the future. |
Philip K. Dick (1954) |
Thermlectrium An alloy that turns heat directly into electricity. |
John W. Campbell (1935) |
Tickler - clears smog Clears smog and saves the residue for later use. |
R.A. Lafferty (1972) |
Time Dredge A device that scoops up material from the past, and returns it to the present. |
Robert Arthur (1942) |
Time Line Time seen linearly, as a distinguishable series of events. |
John Russell Fearn (1935) |
Time Line The sequence of events leading up to, and past, this moment. |
Ross Rocklynne (1941) |
Time Loop A series of events repeats, the stream crosses over itself. |
Eando Binder (1936) |
Time Quake Too much energy applied to a time-fault may have started this. |
Philip K. Dick (1954) |
Time Tunnel A gateway into the past. |
Clifford Simak (1938) |
Timepress - time in a bottle A device that makes time go more quickly in a limited area. |
John Varley (1983) |
Time-Space Television A device for seeing into the past. |
Harl Vincent (1932) |
Time-Telespectroscope. See other time-travelers. |
Ray Cummings (1931) |
Tiny Atomic-Power Drive Unit - compact power of the atom A very small power generator that is atomic powered. |
John W. Campbell (1938) |
Tiny Nuclear Generator A complete nuclear-based generator of power no bigger than a walnut. |
Isaac Asimov (1952) |
Traction City Gut The area of a Traction City used for taking apart and consuming captured prey cities. |
Philip Reeve (2003) |
Transmit Camera A camera that both takes pictures and uploads it directly to a news station. |
H. Beam Piper (1961) |
Trans-Oceanic Rocket Ship Rocket-propelled airplanes making short work of long trips on Earth. |
Max Valier (1930) |
Trantor - planet city A city that covers the entire surface of the planet. |
Isaac Asimov (1951) |
Trimagniscope - see inside any object A device that produced a usable cross-sectional image of any part of an object. |
James P. Hogan (1977) |
Trion Library An early visualization of the Internet. |
Stanislaw Lem (1955) |
Ultra-Light Allows the user to see into rock or other solid matter. |
Harry Harrison (1951) |
Ultra-microrobot - small as an insect A nanomachine; a machine whose parts are no bigger than atoms. |
Raymond Z. Gallun (1937) |
Ultra-Vibrator Transports objects into another dimension through intense vibration. |
Maurice Duclos (1939) |
Undersea City A great city under the sea, covered by a crystal dome. |
Andre Laurie (1895) |
Undersea Mining Conducting mining operations on the sea floor. |
Jules Verne (1875) |
Uranatomic An atomic pile that generates electricity. |
Jack Williamson (1941) |
Vanwinkling Another name for time-traveling into the future. |
L. Sprague de Camp (1941) |
Vaporator A device which extracted moisture from the air for use in farming. |
George Lucas (1976) |
Vibratium Wall Time Machine An element that is unstable in time makes time travel possible and enables the Grandfather Paradox. |
Nat Schachner (1933) |
Violet Shrink Ray A miniaturization ray. |
Jack Williamson (1932) |
Virtual Immortality A method for storing the mind and memories of a person, and recalling and reconstituting them at will. |
Arthur C. Clarke (1956) |
Voice-Activated Door - come in A door that opens upon verbal command. |
Kendall Foster Crossen (1953) |
Voice-Clock A clock that could state the time out loud. |
Ray Bradbury (1950) |
Waldo - the origin of telefactoring A telefactoring device; also known as the Waldo F. Jones Synchronous Reduplicating Pantograph. |
Robert Heinlein (1942) |
Wall-Light The walls of a room provide illumination. |
Isaac Asimov (1952) |
Water Repellent Surface - non-wetting surface A surface that water flows over without sticking at all. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
| J. Frederick Arment (2004) | |
Weather Integrator - every day perfect An entire technology for controlling the weather. |
Robert Heinlein (1941) |
Weather Machine A device for controlling the weather. |
Nat Schachner (1932) |
Weather Pod - self-contained meteorology lab Imperial technology available to planetologists only. |
Brian Herbert (2001) |
Weightless Work Area - the ideal workbench A small workspace within which there is no gravitational pull. |
Philip K. Dick (1969) |
Wholographik Hologram-style picture. |
John Brunner (1968) |
Wildcode A vast, actual desert comprised of nanites, nanomachines. |
Hannu Rajaniemi (2012) |
Windmill Mast Enclosed machinery in large masts powers ships. |
John Jacob Astor IV (1894) |
Wind-Suncatcher A combination wind turbine and solar energy gathering device. |
Simpson Stokes (1937) |
Windtrap - pure water source A device which precipitates water from the air for use by people. |
Frank Herbert (1965) |
Win-Reducing Gambling Circuit - very sneaky Circuitry in a game that detects winning strategies and then alters the game to make winning more difficult. |
Philip K. Dick (1967) |
Worldcraft Bubble An incredibly detailed mechanical simulation of a world. |
Philip K. Dick (1953) |
Wrist Search Display A wearable device that uses its own search beam to view scenes close by. |
Harry Bates (1934) |
Zero-Time Jail - no time off for good behavior A building in which an energy field prevents time from passing. |
Larry Niven (1976) |
Zoo Fences - made of acid Caustic water moat |
Frank Herbert (1977) |
Related Science Fiction in the News
Hybrid Wind Solar Devices '...the combined Wind-Suncatcher, like a spray of tulips mounted fanwise.' - Simpson Stokes, 1937. (re: Simpson Stokes, 10/27/2024 ) |
BeamBike Solar Power Canopy For Electric Bikes 'The slender stalks of a sunshade-photocell collector...' - David Brin, 1990. (re: David Brin, 9/23/2024 ) |
REALLY Remote Control Excavators 'It takes over a second for the signal to get to the Moon...' - Pournelle and Niven, 1981 (re: Pournelle and Niven, 9/15/2024 ) |
Your Solar Electric Paint Is Ready, Larry Niven '...you spray it on.' - Larry Niven, 1995 (re: Larry Niven, 8/1/2024 ) |
Taza Aya Air-Curtain Tech Protects Turkey Workers 'I'm going to have to buy a filter-mask.' - John Brunner, 1972. (re: John Brunner, 7/18/2024 ) |
CoulombFly Solar-Powered Micro Aerial Vehicle Weighs 4.1 Grams 'the monitors - almond-sized aerostats...' - Neal Stephenson, 1995. (re: Neal Stephenson, 7/12/2024 ) |
Climate Engineering In California Could Make Europe's Heat Waves Worse 'Pina2bo would have to operate full blast for many years to put as much SO2 into the stratosphere as its namesake had done in a few minutes.' - Neal Stephenson, 2021. (re: Neal Stephenson, 6/8/2024 ) |
Textiles That Harvest Energy And Store It 'The clothes and jewelery drew their tiny power requirements from her movements.' - Alastair Reynolds, 2005. (re: Alastair Reynolds, 5/28/2024 ) |
Coin-Sized Nuclear Battery Good For 100 Years '...power pack the size of a pea.' - Alfred Bester, 1956. (re: Alfred Bester, 5/20/2024 ) |
The FLUTE Project - A Huge Liquid Mirror In Space 'It's area, and its consequent light-gathering capacity, was many times greater than any rigid mirror...' - Raymond Z. Gallun, 1934. (re: Raymond Z. Gallun, 4/28/2024 ) |
'Whisper Mode' ala Blue Thunder Researched At Bristol 'Forest Lawn.' from 'Blue Thunder' 1983. (re: Various, 4/18/2024 ) |
Moonwalkers AI-Controlled Electric Shoes Now that's power walking that Hugo Gernsback would have approved. (re: Hugo Gernsback, 3/28/2024 ) |
Electric Catamaran 'Explorer Eco 40m' Has 'Solar Skin' 'On went the electric-yacht faster and still faster.' - John Baker Hopkins, 1885. (re: John Baker Hopkins, 3/22/2024 ) |
Harvest Power From Tears And Blinking With Smart Contact Lens '...he realized that it was not quite a clear lens. Speckles of colored brightness swirled and gathered in it.' - Vernor Vinge, 2001. (re: Vernor Vinge, 3/18/2024 ) |
AI Enhances Images Your Brain Sees 'I could have sworn the psychomat showed pictures almost as sharp and detailed as reality itself' - Stanley Weinbaum, 1935. (re: Stanley G. Weinbaum, 3/12/2024 ) |
Deflector Plasma Screen For Drones ala Star Wars 'If the enemy persists in attacking or even intensifies their power, the density of the plasma in space will suddenly increase, causing it to reflect most of the incoming energy like a mirror.' (re: EE 'Doc' Smith, 3/8/2024 ) |
Philips Smart Palm Recognition Smart Deadbolt 'A palm lock must be keyed to one individual's hand shape...' - Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 1/18/2024 ) |
MAGGIE Mars Aerial and Ground Global Intelligent Explorer 'placed in the wings of a plane to generate power from the light falling on that surface...' - John W. Campbell, 1930. (re: John W. Campbell, 1/4/2024 ) |
Pipedream Underground Delivery At Peachtree Corners '...open mouths of pneumatic tubes, an endless row of them, each marked with its destination.' - Miles J. Breuer, 1932 (re: Miles J. Breuer, 12/27/2023 ) |
Hangzhou Robotic Trash Sorting '...good enough to recognize most things they pick up.' - Harry Harrison, 1956. (re: Harry Harrison, 12/13/2023 ) |
Wearable Energy Harvester '... he had tightened the chest to gain maximum pumping action from the motion of breathing.' Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 11/23/2023 ) |
Video Manicuring ala Schismatrix 'The program raced up the screen one scan line at a time' - Bruce Sterling (re: Bruce Sterling, 11/17/2023 ) |
Tailsitter Drone Aircraft For SAR '...it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair.' - RH Roman, 1929. (re: RH Roman, 11/11/2023 ) |
Iron Beam Laser Under Development To Shoot Down Missiles With Lasers 'It was sweeping round swiftly and steadily, this flaming death, this invisible, inevitable sword of heat.' - HG Wells, 1989. (re: HG Wells, 10/11/2023 ) |
Philippines Coast Guard Cuts Chinese Barrier 'Each of the four areas is enclosed by a sonic wall...' (re: Roger Zelazny, 9/13/2023 ) |
Giant Lunar Surface Test Bed Built On Earth Astronauts first walked the site, then flew over the site at a few hundred feet in a small Cessna. (re: Various, 8/19/2023 ) |
Zai Pits (West Sahel) And Dew Collectors (Dune) 'Each is planted most tenderly in its own little pit.' - Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 8/15/2023 ) |
Away Rude Mechanicals! I Want Self-Sensing Variable-Stiffness Artificial Muscles. '... it is remarkable that the long leverages of their machines are in most cases actuated by a sort of sham musculature.' - HG Wells, 1898. (re: HG Wells, 7/27/2023 ) |
3D Printing In Mid-Air 'It makes drawings in the air...' - Murray Leinster, 1945. (re: Murray Leinster, 7/15/2023 ) |
Seeing Two Seconds Into The Future '...not a record of what you did just now but what will go on here in the next half hour.' - Philip K. Dick, 1964. (re: Philip K. Dick, 6/15/2023 ) |
Dyson Zone Face Filter-Mask May Have A Point After all 'If this job's likely to involve me in frequent trips to LA I'm going to have to buy a filter-mask.' - John Brunner, 1972. (re: John Brunner, 6/11/2023 ) |
Solar Power Transmitted From Orbit Down To Earth 'The Power Planet, of course, is that vast man-made disk of metal set spinning about the sun to supply the Earth with power...' - Murray Leinster, 1931. (re: Murray Leinster, 6/9/2023 ) |
Skyline Robotics Instantiates Heinlein's 'Window Willie' Skyscraper Robot 'Do you know what window washing used to cost by the hour?' - Robert Heinlein, 1956. (re: Robert Heinlein, 5/27/2023 ) |
Melting Permafrost Endangers Infrastructure 'From the tower's huge octagonal base radiate wide silvery strips...' - Robert Silverberg, 1970. (re: Robert Silverberg, 5/19/2023 ) |
MIT And Rice Create Blade Runner Photo Analysis Rick Deckard, your photo analysis is ready. (re: Ridley Scott, 4/29/2023 ) |
Whisper Aero Ultraquiet Electric Aviation 'A white electric plane approached at great speed...' - Charles Cloukey, 1930. (re: Charles Cloukey, 4/23/2023 ) |
Maybe We Should Harvest Saturn's Rings While We Still Can 'One infuriated astronomer had been euthanized for burning the chairman of the board.' - Alfred Bester, 1974. (re: Alfred Bester, 4/21/2023 ) |
Devices Powered By Bacteria In Your Future '[It] had not yet objected to being made over into a portion of an electronic system... '- Philip K. Dick, 1964. (re: Philip K. Dick, 4/19/2023 ) |
Atomic Force Microscopy Works On Living Cells 'He stood rigid as feeler-planes brushed down his body.' - Jack Vance, 1954. (re: Jack Vance, 4/7/2023 ) |
Diamond NanoTech Battery Lasts 28,000 Years 'In the pearly light of the pocket nucleo-bulb...' - Isaac Asimov, 1951. (re: Isaac Asimov, 3/29/2023 ) |
Cheap Paper-Based Sensors Let You Snoop For Pesticides '...the unobtrusive inspections with tiny remote-cast snoopers.' - Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 3/25/2023 ) |
Modern App Provides Video Technology From Bradbury's 'Fahrenheit 451' 'A special spot-wavex scrambler also caused his televised image, in the area immediately about his lips, to mouth the vowels and consonants beautifully.' - Ray Bradbury, 1953. (re: Ray Bradbury, 3/9/2023 ) |
Win $250K By Reading Ancient Scrolls Carbonized By Vesuvius '... it was as if the upper part had been removed, like a cut deck of cards.' - James P. Hogan, 1977. (re: James P. Hogan, 3/7/2023 ) |
LIAM F1 UWT Clever Rooftop Windmill '...a windmill on his roof...' - John Jacob Astor IV, 1894. (re: John Jacob Astor IV, 2/23/2023 ) |
Liberty Lifter X-Plane From DARPA '...the tremendous speed that the Jupiter was turning up under the thrust of her twenty-four screws whirling on the shafts of twelve powerful motors.' - Ed Earl Repp, 1929. (re: Ed Earl Repp, 2/15/2023 ) |
Synthetic Voices Demanded Of New Actors 'The tape-recorded synthetic voice spoke with its usual dispassionate calm.' - Thorton Ayre (re: Thorton Ayre, 1/27/2023 ) |
'Make Sunsets' Tweaks Climate By Atmospheric Alteration 'Pina2bo would have to operate full blast for many years to put as much SO2 into the stratosphere as its namesake had done in a few minutes.' - Neal Stephenson, 2021. (re: Neal Stephenson, 1/17/2023 ) |
Fusion Power Breakthrough? 'The prospect of enough D-N beryllium to make fusion power really cheap...' - Gerald Vance, 1956. (re: Gerald Vance, 12/15/2022 ) |
Thin Film Dome Protects Cities From Nuclear Blasts 'What fabric can take that kind of a load? Synthetic spider silk.' - Robert Heinlein, 1939. (re: Robert Heinlein, 11/1/2022 ) |
Cyborg Eye Flashlight Lights Up The Room 'Foyle pressed a tooth with his tongue and the peripheral cells of his retina were excited into emitting a soft light.' - Alfred Bester, 1956. (re: Alfred Bester, 10/17/2022 ) |
Aeromine Technologies Rooftop Wind Energy '...a windmill on his roof for light and heat.' - John Jacob Astor IV, 1894. (re: John Jacob Astor IV, 10/3/2022 ) |
Roomba Hoovers Up More Than Dirt 'He had brought that tiny instrument to map their movements.' - Jack Williamson, 1936. (re: Jack Williamson, 10/1/2022 ) |
VToonify Video Manicuring Program 'The program raced up the screen one scan line at a time, subtly smoothing, deleting and coloring.' - Bruce Sterling, 1985. (re: Bruce Sterling, 9/27/2022 ) |
Longest Immersed Tunnel Will Connect Denmark and Germany '... iron tubes... the ends of the tubes were joined to each other...to preserve it from the action of the seawater.' - Michel Verne, 1895. (re: Michel Verne, 9/13/2022 ) |
Solar-Powered Remote-Control Cockroaches! 'A cable, here, from the controller to the interface plug... wires from that to the brain.' - Thomas A. Easton, 1990. (re: Thomas A. Easton, 9/9/2022 ) |
SolarBotanic Tree For Solar Energy - Would You Need A Forest, Or Just One? 'The slender stalks of a sunshade-photocell collector...' - David Brin, 1990. (re: David Brin, 9/7/2022 ) |
SolarXOne Solar-Powered Drone Flies (almost) Forever 'It's an Indian Air Force drone; its solar cells could power an entire farm.' - Interstellar. (re: Various, 8/3/2022 ) |
Experts Decry Planet-Scale Schemes To Limit Global Heating 'Light from the sun hit those little spheres and bounced.' - Neal Stephenson, 2021. (re: Neal Stephenson, 7/25/2022 ) |
Shine On, Portable Wind Turbine 'Sometimes a man has a windmill on his roof...' - John Jacob Astor IV, 1894. (re: John Jacob Astor IV, 7/17/2022 ) |
The Mojo Smart Contact Lens Experience '... the lens displays would be useless without a wearable computer to do the graphics.' - Vernor Vinge, 2001. (re: Vernor Vinge, 7/3/2022 ) |
Low-Cost Gel Pulls Water From Atmosphere Like Star Wars Vaporator 'The atmosphere yielded its moisture with reluctance. It had to be coaxed down...' George Lucas, 1976. (re: George Lucas, 6/15/2022 ) |
SpaceX Rocket Quick Reaction Force '... the ship went into free flight, arching in a high parabola.' - Robert Heinlein, 1951. (re: Robert Heinlein, 6/3/2022 ) |
Vortex Rings Of Light 'He pressed the release button, and from the inch-wide muzzle a stream of blue-glowing rings sprang...' (re: John W. Campbell, 5/29/2022 ) |
Envisioning Starship Earth Travel - In 1930 By Max Valier 'Why must we travel ever faster in a seemingly insatiable desire to conquer space and time?' - Max Valier, 1930. (re: Max Valier, 5/17/2022 ) |
Liquid Lenses Adjust Automatically, Not Quite Dune Binoculars 'Hufhuf oil held in static tension... within a viewing tube...' - Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 5/7/2022 ) |
The Dune Ornithopter, Movie And Book 'The wings were at full spread-rest, their delicate metal interleavings extended.' Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 5/3/2022 ) |
Two Towns Linked By Sculpture Portal In Real Time 'I am the Guardian of Forever.' - Gene Roddenberry, 1967. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 4/23/2022 ) |
Plasma Window Technology, Pressure Cushions and Deflector Doors 'The Marine Gunner stepped gingerly through the invisible barrier. He had to push.' - Niven and Pournelle, 1974. (re: Niven and Pournelle, 4/1/2022 ) |
Giant Telescope Lenses Made In Space '...a cyclopean beast living among the asteroidal rubble of some distant sun.' - Arthur C. Clarke, 1953. (re: Arthur C. Clarke, 3/17/2022 ) |
Polestar O2 Electric Car Concept With Integrated Drone Your personal eye-in-the-sky watching over you and your car. (re: Denis Villeneuve, 3/15/2022 ) |
Quantum Sensing Searchlight Maps The Interior Of The Earth '...a powerful ray... which would penetrate down into the earth, passing through all substances which it met in its way, and illuminating and disclosing everything through which it passed.' - Frank Stockton, 1897. (re: Frank Stockton, 2/25/2022 ) |
Prufrock-1 Tunnel Maker Arrives In Vegas 'There was no reason why such shells should not be constructed for the express purpose of making tunnels.' - Frank Stockton, 1897. (re: Frank Stockton, 2/11/2022 ) |
E-Nose NOS.E Knows Whiskey With One Sniff 'It's picking up diphenyl compounds and tetrahydrocarbons...' - Michael Crichton, 1985. (re: Michael Crichton, 1/25/2022 ) |
Solar Trees In Chisinau Moldova '...a sunshade-photocell collector.' - David Brin, 1990. (re: David Brin, 1/15/2022 ) |
Wearable Biomedical Sensors Printed Directly On Your Skin 'The dragon is a skin computer... People put it on their arms and exchange personal data.' Greg Bear, 2009. (re: Greg Bear, 12/29/2021 ) |
The First Multi-User Hologram Table? Let the Wookiee win. - George Lucas, 1976. (re: George Lucas, 12/17/2021 ) |
The Details Of Teslas FSD Full Self-Driving 'As the beautiful old car cruised in almost perfect silence under the guidance of it's automatic controls...' - Arthur C. Clarke, 1976. (re: Arthur C. Clarke, 11/27/2021 ) |
Augmented Reality Palm Keyboard 'Three rows of four colored dots appeared on the heel of my left hand.'- John Varley, 1992. (re: John Varley, 11/17/2021 ) |
Taihang Solar Farm Accurately Pictured In 1911 'The entire expanse, twenty kilometers square, was covered ... the photo-electric elements which transformed the solar heat direct into electric energy.' - Hugo Gernsback, 1911. (re: Hugo Gernsback, 11/1/2021 ) |
Amazon Automatic Packaging Catches Up With Gernsback's 1911 Book 'The automatic packing machine could pack anything from a small package a few inches square up to a box two feet high by three feet long.' - Hugo Gernsback, 1911. (re: Hugo Gernsback, 10/27/2021 ) |
Seriously, Was Our Universe Created In A Lab? 'It is an instrument with which I am going to create a microcosm.' - Edmond Hamilton, 1935. (re: Edmond Hamilton, 10/15/2021 ) |
Monarch Tractor - It's Electric, Autonomous and Smart 'Driver-optional' and follows gestures. (re: John Campbell, 10/1/2021 ) |
Hovermap By Emesent Autonomous Mapping Works Indoors - and Out Perfect for exploring ancient artifacts on distant planets. (re: Ridley Scott, 9/27/2021 ) |
Ingenious Engineer Creates DIY Feeding Robot 'Waldo flexed and extended his fingers gently; the two pairs of waldoes in the screen followed in exact, simultaneous parallelism.' - Robert Heinlein, 1942. (re: Robert Heinlein, 9/17/2021 ) |
Do Smart Glasses Need Forward-Facing Cameras? 'They were stylish, with yellow-tinted lenses and hip frames, but the posts were unusually thick.' - Daniel Suarez, 2009. (re: Daniel Suarez, 9/13/2021 ) |
Magnetically Driven Rotary Microfilter 3D Printed '... not really walls but nearly infinite grids of submicroscopic wheels.' - Neal Stephenson, 1995. (re: Neal Stephenson, 8/21/2021 ) |
Aquaer Brings Vaporators To Namibia 'The atmosphere yielded its moisture with reluctance.' - George Lucas, 1976. (re: George Lucas, 7/27/2021 ) |
Force Fields Of Directed Energy Wanted By USAF 'The downrushing bombs bounced off the cone-curtain of light as though from an invisible rubber wall.' - Frank Phillips, 1929. (re: Frank Phillips, 7/17/2021 ) |
Hovering F-22 Raptor Predicted in 1929 (Sort Of) '... it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair.' - R.H. Roman, 1929. (re: R.H. Roman, 7/1/2021 ) |
Instant Photography, Predicted By sf In 1929, Makes A Comeback '... when the film is exposed in the camera the picture appears instantly and requires no development.' - Henri Dahl Juve, 1929. (re: Henri Dahl Juve, 6/19/2021 ) |
Poisoning Big Tech's Data Well Bring on the Civic Notification Distorter. (re: Philip K. Dick, 2/23/2021 ) |
Sci-Fi Organic Technology 'This latter is a sharp -whoof- almost a thunderclap...' - Gary Shockley, 1984. (re: Gary Shockley, 2/21/2021 ) |
Nuclear Batteries May Pack Inner Punch '... the most super-valuable substance in the solar system.' - Edmond Hamilton, 1940. (re: Edmond Hamilton, 2/17/2021 ) |
Listen Up, Coppertop - Wearable Device Turns You Into A Battery 'It's our way or the highway.' (re: Wachowskis, 2/9/2021 ) |
Smellicopter Combines Live Moth Antenna With Mechanical Drone 'The organic tissue is inserted in the master tank and then sealed.' - Philip K. Dick, 1955. (re: Philip K. Dick, 12/7/2020 ) |
DARPA's Virtual Caves Explored By Virtual Robots 'If there's anything in here worth looking at, these pups'll find it.' - Ridley Scott, 2012. (re: Ridley Scott, 11/19/2020 ) |
Samsung Gets Transparent Smartphone Patent The Transparency of Things to Come (re: HG Wells, 11/7/2020 ) |
Jet-Powered Flying Suits Tested By Navy 'With his motor in operation, he moves like a diver, head foremost...' - Philip Frances Nowlan, 1928. (re: Philip Frances Nowlan, 10/17/2020 ) |
Pub Installs Electrified Fence Around Bar 'I start twelve immensely strong wires--naked, not insulated --from a big dynamo...' - Mark Twain, 1889. (re: Mark Twain, 10/15/2020 ) |
Armano Remote Control Excavator 'The bulldozer moved through the... mine... ' - Niven and Pournelle, 1981. (re: Niven and Pournelle, 9/29/2020 ) |
Metalenses Now Reconfigurable With Liquid Crystal 'Hufhuf oil held in static tension...' - Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 9/3/2020 ) |
NDB Nuclear Waste Battery Lasts A Lifetime 'Trillions of units of power could be compressed thus into an inch-square cube of what looked like blue-white ice.' - Edmond Hamilton, 1940. (re: Edmond Hamilton, 8/15/2020 ) |
Blaux Your Personal Commuter Cooling Unit A cooling unit had to be strapped to every commuter's back, by law. (re: Philip K. Dick, 6/19/2020 ) |
SunnyFive 'Window' Has Full Spectrum Angled Natural Light 'On the ceilings are screens.' - Stanislaw Lem, 1961. (re: Stanislaw Lem, 5/27/2020 ) |
Liftware Level, Google's Smart Spoon 'The result was indeed marvelous... I did not stagger and I did not reel.' - Ellis Parker Butler, 1926. (re: Ellis Parker Butler, 5/21/2020 ) |
Prufrock The Newest Boring Machine 'It sounds to me as though you had invented a kind of metal earthworm...' (re: Paul Ernst, 2/11/2020 ) |
Stratuscent Electronic Nose 'It's picking up diphenyl compounds and tetra hydrocarbons.' - Michael Crichton, 1985. (re: Michael Crichton, 1/28/2020 ) |
Smart Contact Lenses Charges With 3D Printed Antenna 'He realized that it was not quite a clear lens.' - Vernor Vinge, 2001. (re: Vernor Vinge, 1/9/2020 ) |
Physicist Inspired By SciFi And Seeing Back In Time 'Here is the chronoscope... Scansion depends upon a special curved field...' (re: Jack Williamson, 1/5/2020 ) |
Moving Suns To Different Galactic Neighborhoods '...to swerve their star from its course, the globemen made use of a simple physical principle.' - Edmond Hamilton, 1928. (re: Edmond Hamilton, 12/29/2019 ) |
Adafruit's New Clue All-In-One Sensor Tricorder 'Instruments register only those things they're designed to register. Space still contains infinite unknowns.' (re: Gene Roddenberry, 12/9/2019 ) |
Road Noise Charges Electric Cars With Peugeot Piezoelectric Billboard ''... major cities of Earth have free electrical power conveniently processed from their own noise.' - Lloyd Biggle, Jr. 1956. (re: Lloyd Biggle, Jr., 11/9/2019 ) |
California Gets Shockwave Rider-Style Avoidance Zones 'It was cheaper to pay the refugees to go without up-to-the-minute equipment.' (re: John Brunner, 10/17/2019 ) |
Helios Modular Touch Screen Wall Lights 'The walls and ceiling bore an irregular spacing of illuminum tiles...' - Richard Morgan, 2003. (re: Richard Morgan, 9/11/2019 ) |
Harvest Water From Air With Sunlight 'The atmosphere yielded its moisture with reluctance.' - George Lucas, 1976. (re: George Lucas, 9/5/2019 ) |
Better Than Dune Chromoplastic? This Guy Might Have Done It 'But when Old Father Sun departs, the chromoplastic reverts to transparency in the dark.' - Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 8/9/2019 ) |
Gather, An AI Warehouse Inventory Drone Startup 'It extended three of its tiny arms sideways to lock onto the registration pins...' - James P. Hogan, 1979 (re: James P. Hogan, 8/7/2019 ) |
Dim The Sun With Stratospheric Controlled Perturbation Experiment 'Those twin volcanoes; d'ye see them, Mr. Renner?' - Niven and Pournelle, 1974. (re: Niven and Pournelle, 7/17/2019 ) |
Tiny LEDs Developed For Dust-Sized Computers 'They use sparkles to talk to each other...' - Neal Stephenson, 1995. (re: Neal Stephenson, 6/5/2019 ) |
Seabreacher, H.G. Winter's 1932 Torpoon 'Ken lay full-length in the padded body compartment, his feet resting on the controlling bars of the directional planes, hands on the torpoon's engine levers.' - HG Winters, 1939. (re: HG Winters, 3/25/2019 ) |
Project Soli Radar Gesture Chip Now FCC Approved 'He waved his hand and the circuit switched abruptly.' - Philip K. Dick, 1955. (re: Philip K. Dick, 2/25/2019 ) |
Implosion Fabrication Shrinks 3D Objects To Nanoscale 'Carter had watched miniaturization a hundred times...' - Isaac Asimov, 1965. (re: Isaac Asimov, 12/17/2018 ) |
ODYSSEUS Solar-Powered Stratospheric Plane Flies Forever 'The planes flew continuously, twenty-four hours a day...' - EB White, 1950. (re: EB White, 11/13/2018 ) |
Phil Nuyttnn's City Under The Sea ''Under the lower roof there was no water, but a clear and luminous atmosphere...' - Andre Laurie, 1895. (re: Andre Laurie, 9/23/2018 ) |
Stick-On Tape Speakers, As Predicted By Bruce Sterling Flexible tape speakers, someday. (re: Bruce Sterling, 7/27/2018 ) |
Has Climate Change Already Been Solved By Aliens? 'I had explained," said Nessus, "that our civilisation was dying in its own waste heat.' - Larry Niven, 1970. (re: Larry Niven, 6/10/2018 ) |
Skin Electronics 3D Printed 'June's body is a tracery of lambent lines, like some arcane capillary circuitry...' - Paul Di Filippo, 1985 (re: Paul Di Filippo, 5/27/2018 ) |
Super-Resolution Microscopy Provides '4D' Views View the magnified interior of living cells. (re: James Hogan, 4/3/2018 ) |
Physicists Try To Turn Light Into Matter If E=mc squared, then... m=E/c squared! (re: John W. Campbell, 3/16/2018 ) |
Dune Fans! Power Your Devices With Sweaty Shirts Yet another power source from humans. (re: Frank Herbert, 12/8/2017 ) |
Zero Mass 'Vaporators' Pull Drinking Water From The Air Did you think of Star Wars? (re: George Lucas, 11/21/2017 ) |
Integrated Circuits Printed Right Onto Fabric! '...a shirt that displayed email on its sleeve. - Margaret Atwood, 2003. (re: Margaret Atwood, 11/8/2017 ) |
Drones Guided By The Mind Alone 'His treads left no tracks upon the floor...' - Clifford Simak, 1961. (re: Clifford Simak, 10/19/2017 ) |
3D Printed Artificial Muscles Are Stronger Than Yours Bots don't need to work out. (re: Martin Caidin, 10/12/2017 ) |
Crazyflie Drone Swarm Technology '...Programmed to hang in space in a hexagonal grid pattern.' - Neal Stephenson, 1995. (re: Bruce Sterling, 9/28/2017 ) |
L16 Revolutionary Optics Spells End For Ordinary DSLRs? Time for Esper Photo Analysis, Blade Runner fans. (re: Ridley Scott, 9/18/2017 ) |
MIT Tunes Ions For Frictionless Surface - Superlubricity! 'My telelubricator here neutralizes the interatomic bonds the surface of any solid...' - L. Sprague de Camp, 1940. (re: L. Sprague de Camp, 8/21/2017 ) |
RFly Drones Rule The Warehouse 'The wasp homed unerringly on the face of the honeycomb...' - James P. Hogan, 1979. (re: James P. Hogan, 8/11/2017 ) |
Hand Gestures And Body Poses Control Devices 'He waved his hand... the circuit switched...'- Philip K. Dick, 1955. (re: Philip K. Dick, 7/18/2017 ) |
Cellphone Harvests Power From Ambient Radio Signals And Light A battery-free phone. (re: Robert Heinlein, 7/15/2017 ) |
Chairless Chair Exoskeleton By Sapetti 'Earth's scientists... devised rigid metallic clothing...' - Edmond Hamilton, 1932. (re: Edmond Hamilton, 7/9/2017 ) |
Autonomous BADGER Robot Drilling Machine 'The compacted matter... makes a better tunnel lining than concrete, don't you think?' - Paul Ernst, 1936. (re: Paul Ernst, 6/8/2017 ) |
Does Earth's Middle Mantle Hold Oceans Of Water? Al Gore, you have no idea. (re: Stephen Baxter, 5/23/2017 ) |
Anti AI AI Wearable Detects Artificial Voices Combats another wearable, the voice-changing bowtie. (re: Various, 5/6/2017 ) |
Drones Will Transform Cities Where we're going, we don't use roads. (re: Arthur C. Clarke, 5/5/2017 ) |
Prynt Pocket Prints AR Pix Right In Your Hand A printer for the palm of your hand. (re: John Brunner, 5/3/2017 ) |
Geoengineering The Atmosphere For Climate Change '...a uniform temperature for each degree of latitude the year round.' - John Jacob Astor IV, 1894. (re: John Jacob Astor IV, 4/27/2017 ) |
Humans Use Mental Power For Turtle Slavery Now we need to start looking for animals with fingers... (re: Robert Silverberg, 3/28/2017 ) |
Solar-Powered Moisture Vaporator 'The atmosphere yielded its moisture with reluctance.' - George Lucas, 1976. (re: George Lucas, 3/27/2017 ) |
Smartflower Solar Panel Unfolds In Video '...the slender stalks of a sunshade-photocell collector.' - David Brin, 1990. (re: David Brin, 3/20/2017 ) |
3D Printed Prosthetic Coral Be sure to read The Diamond Age - still worth it. (re: Neal Stephenson, 3/19/2017 ) |
Wink To Magnify View Hopefully upgrade will be less than six million dollar man paid. (re: Various, 3/14/2017 ) |
Wear Your Self-Powered Generator 'It's basically a micro-sandwich...' - Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 2/19/2017 ) |
Auto-Focus Smart Glasses Have Liquid Lenses 'Hufhuf oil held in static tension by an enclosing force field within a viewing tube...' - Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 2/14/2017 ) |
Google Perfects 'Blade Runner-style' Photo Details 'Pull back... stop... enhance 57-19...' - Blade Runner, 1982. (re: Ridley Scott, 2/8/2017 ) |
CloudFisher - Moroccan Fog Farmers Harvest Moisture From The Air 'That moisture trickles down...', Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 2/3/2017 ) |
Dilbert Writer Scott Adams Plans For Immortality 'Nothing will be left of Jeserac but a galaxy of electrons frozen in the heart of a crystal.'- Arthur C. Clarke, 1956. (re: Arthur C. Clarke, 1/21/2017 ) |
Galaxy Note 7 Kill Switch? Keep right on quoting regulations, Mr. Savvik. (re: Various, 12/13/2016 ) |
Solar Geoengineering Spray Cools, Heals 'the maintenance posts fire jets of tailored algae into the air stream.' - Niven and Pournelle, 1974. (re: Neal Stephenson, 12/7/2016 ) |
Nuclear Batteries Based On Diamonds Last Millennia 'they just package it and ship it around to wherever people want it...' - Robert Heinlein, 1982. (re: Robert Heinlein, 11/24/2016 ) |
MIT Researchers Predict The Future From Still Photos 'What I have in this camera is not a record of what you did just now but what will go on here in the next half hour...'- Philip K. Dick, 1964. (re: Philip K. Dick, 11/20/2016 ) |
Arctic Cities Crumble As Permafrost Melts 'The tapes stretch several kilometers in each direction.' - Robert Silverberg, 1970. (re: Robert Silverberg, 11/3/2016 ) |
Sip From Your Ford When Catchpocket Shows Dewsparkle '... living on reclaimed moisture from his own breath.' - Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 10/28/2016 ) |
Robo-Dolphin Demonstrates Porpoising 'With one fluid motion, it surged forward, plunged, and was gone.' - Michael Swanwick, 2002. (re: Michael Swanwick, 10/21/2016 ) |
Untethered Drone Gets Wireless Power 'We'll use my 'broomstick'.' - Robert Heinlein, 1942. (re: Robert Heinlein, 10/15/2016 ) |
How Can Amazon Patent A Voice-Controlled Drone? ''Tight mid-shot...' he told it.' Karen Traviss, 2004. (re: Karen Traviss, 10/10/2016 ) |
'North Sense' Wearable Piercing From Cyborg Nest 'The fingers opened from the many-scaled stellarimeter grafted onto his palm.' - Samuel R. Delany, 1966. (re: Samuel R. Delany, 10/9/2016 ) |
Wearables For Animals Totally A Thing 'Twin deformities on either side of his skull had been engineered to house sensor units.' - William Gibson, 1981. (re: William Gibson, 9/30/2016 ) |
Duoskin Control Tattoo 'Three rows of four colored dots appeared on the heel of my left hand.'- John Varley, 1992. (re: John Varley, 9/23/2016 ) |
Tractor Beams? They're Working On It 'Brandon swung mighty tractor beams...' - Doc Smith, 1931. (re: EE Doc Smith, 9/12/2016 ) |
Reading A Scroll Burned To Charcoal 'The scope was adjusted to generate... an image of the lower section of the book.' - James P. Hogan, 1977 (re: James P. Hogan, 9/9/2016 ) |
Samsung's Smart Ring 'Crayn glanced at his finger watch...' HB Fyfe, 1951. (re: HB Fyfe, 8/30/2016 ) |
Converting Low Temp Waste Heat To Electricity 'Our civilisation was dying in its own waste heat.' (re: Larry Niven, 8/18/2016 ) |
Augmented Reality On Construction Sites 'The walls had become blue glass...' - Niven and Barnes, 1992. (re: Niven and Barnes, 8/6/2016 ) |
Festo's AquaJellies 2.0 'It was a chemotactic artificial jellyfish designed to slither into undersea vents...' - Rucker/Sterling, 1994. (re: Rucker/Sterling, 7/26/2016 ) |
Solar Plane Circles The Globe 'Tropism-like pursuit of the sun across the sky as they recharged their batteries...' - Roger Zelazny (re: Roger Zelazny, 7/3/2016 ) |
Turing's Nose - Was That Scent Real Or Artificial? 'Rippling arpeggios of thyme and lavender...' - Aldous Huxley, 1932. (re: Aldous Huxley, 4/29/2016 ) |
The First 'Drone Cafe' Started By Dutch Students 'It was a smooth ovoid floating a few inches from the floor...'- H. Beam Piper, 1962. (re: H. Beam Piper, 4/24/2016 ) |
Cost Effective Smart Windows To Replace Curtains? 'The polawindow, which he tuned to clear transmission.' - Frank Herbert, 1972. (re: Frank Herbert, 4/11/2016 ) |
Autonomous Tractor Harvest-Ready '[He] dropped the handles of the plough that was plugged into the robomule...' - Harry Harrison, 1965. (re: Harry Harrison, 4/6/2016 ) |
Here's Your Man-Made Quake Danger Map Never thought I'd see this in my lifetime. (re: Various, 3/24/2016 ) |
Scanify 3D Scanner For You! '... Feeler-planes brushed down...' - Jack Vance, 1954. (re: Jack Vance, 3/23/2016 ) |
FingerIO Active Sonar Smartphone Finger Tracking 'Wave your hand in the general direction of the components and hope.' - Douglas Adams, 1979. (re: Samuel R. Delany, 3/18/2016 ) |
Experimental Flying Wing 'The ship was a tremendous flying wing.' - Doc Smith, 1934. (re: EE Doc Smith, 3/13/2016 ) |
Volcanoes Terraformed Mars? 'When yon volcanoes belch gas...' - Niven and Pournelle. (re: Niven and Pournelle, 2/23/2016 ) |
Joint Precision Airdrop System (JPADS) 'When it sees a tank silhouette, it steers toward it.' - Niven and Pournelle, 1985. (re: Niven and Pournelle, 2/13/2016 ) |
NTT Docomo To Create 'Ghost In The Shell' Technology That's a lot of science-fictional tech! (re: , 2/10/2016 ) |
Artificial Muscles To Power UAV Drone Wings 'The long leverages of their machines are in most cases actuated by a sort of sham musculature...' - HG Wells, 1898. (re: HG Wells, 2/5/2016 ) |
SCiO Scanner Wants You To Be Spock Almost as easy as a tricorder? Apparently, you can pre-order one now. (re: Amitav Ghosh, 1/27/2016 ) |
Harvesting Energy From Internal Resonance 'Sometimes a man has a windmill on his roof...' - John Jacob Astor, 1894. (re: John Jacob Astor, 1/22/2016 ) |
Sticker Harvests Energy From Your Skin Another way to harvest power from the body. (re: Frank Herbert, 1/21/2016 ) |
Army Wants Invisibility Cloaks No, you can't see me. Nope, not here. (re: Ray Cummings, 12/17/2015 ) |
Hybrid Chips: Solid-State Device With Integrated Biological Cells 'Living protoplasm incorporated into the Ampek F-a2 recording system...' - Philip K. Dick, 1966 (re: Philip K. Dick, 11/30/2015 ) |
Store Electricity In Paper - Next Stop, E-Paper! 'It looked exactly like a dirty, wrinkled, blank sheet of paper.' - Neal Stephenson, 1995. (re: Neal Stephenson, 11/28/2015 ) |
MIT 3D Scanner - 1000x Improvement? '... Feeler-planes brushed down...' - Jack Vance, 1954. (re: Jack Vance, 11/26/2015 ) |
Denmark Island Earth (Verdenskortet ala Ringworld) 'They wanted to keep something of what they were losing...' - Larry Niven, 1970. (re: Larry Niven, 11/19/2015 ) |
Self-Filling Water Bottle Is Beetle-Based 'That moisture trickles down...', Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 11/8/2015 ) |
BitDrones Flying Microbots Model Programmable Matter '... as though a child should build from nursery blocks a fantastic shape which abruptly is filled with throbbing life.'- Abraham Merritt, 1920. (re: Abraham Merritt, 11/2/2015 ) |
Starship Turbolift Elevators Coming From ThyssenKrupp AG Your sideways elevator is getting closer to your floor. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 11/1/2015 ) |
Reduce Hurricanes By Altering The Atmosphere 'When yon volcanoes belch gas, the maintenance posts fire jets of tailored algae into the air stream.' - Niven and Pournelle, 1974. (re: Niven and Pournelle, 10/21/2015 ) |
Skin Sensor Signals Brain 'Which permitted it to gauge to an ounce the amount of pressure necessary...' - Roger Zelazny, 1966. (re: Roger Zelazny, 10/19/2015 ) |
UM Solar Car Now Also With IBM Research Power 'It drew its power from six square yards of sunpower screens on its low curved roof.' - Robert Heinlein, 1940. (re: Robert Heinlein, 10/1/2015 ) |
3D Printed Spherical Flying Machine 'Gold dots against blue, basketball-sized, twelve feet up....' - Larry Niven, 1972. (re: Larry Niven, 6/15/2015 ) |
Nanotech Used To Create Custom Water Filters In Tanzania 'People started out squeamish about Clearsacs...'- Paolo Bacigalupi, 2015. (re: Paolo Bacigalupi, 6/11/2015 ) |
Google Project Soli - Control Devices With A Gesture 'He waved his hand and the circuit switched...'- Philip K. Dick, 1955. (re: Philip K. Dick, 6/2/2015 ) |
NASA's Subvocal Speech System 'She took a subvocal input device from its rack...'- David Brin, 1990. (re: David Brin, 5/16/2015 ) |
Robotic Trash Can Wants Your Garbage 'The can pivoted on broad rubber treads and rolled toward her...'- Bruce Sterling, 1988. (re: Bruce Sterling, 5/8/2015 ) |
Velkess Energy Storage System (It's A Flexible Flywheel!) 'The kinetic man unjacked Laljis kink-springs from the winding treadmills...'- Paolo Bacigalupi, 2005. (re: Paolo Bacigalupi, 4/17/2015 ) |
Man-Made Earthquakes Now A Reality Fracking yields unexpected increase in energy. Earthquake energy, that is. (re: Various, 3/30/2015 ) |
Love That Shear Thickening Fluid Body Armor 'The pressure suit was soft ... instantly became rigid all over when something struck it...'- Larry Niven, 1966. (re: Larry Niven, 3/29/2015 ) |
Zoom Contact Lenses 'You've got DreamTime technology in contact lenses?'- Niven and Barnes, 1992. (re: Niven and Barnes, 3/27/2015 ) |
Graphene Cytobot - Cyborg Bacterial Spores May Help Astronauts '[It] had not yet objected to being made over into a portion of an electronic system... '- Philip K. Dick, 1964. (re: Philip K. Dick, 3/15/2015 ) |
Coleus LED 'Skylight' Dispenses Natural Sunlight Indoors 'How do they work it so that the sky is visible at every level of the city?'- Stanislaw Lem, 1961. (re: Stanislaw Lem, 3/9/2015 ) |
iSkin On-Body Touch Sensors 'Three rows of four colored dots appeared on the heel of my left hand.'- John Varley, 1992. (re: John Varley, 3/5/2015 ) |
Skin Wearable Harvests Power With Triboelectric Effect 'He had tightened the chest to gain maximum pumping action...'- Frank Herbert, 1965. (re: Frank Herbert, 1/23/2015 ) |
Neuroscientist Works Toward Virtual Immortality ala Clarke 'Nothing will be left of Jeserac but a galaxy of electrons frozen in the heart of a crystal.'- Arthur C. Clarke, 1956. (re: Arthur C. Clarke, 12/19/2014 ) |
Colloidal Quantum Dots Make Spray-On Solar Cells Possible 'Black Power... you spray it on.'- Larry Niven, 1995 (re: Larry Niven, 12/4/2014 ) |
Race Into The Future With Bionic Boots 'The tremendous loping strides afforded by such devices... '- Neal Stephenson, 1995. (re: Neal Stephenson, 11/27/2014 ) |
Lightpaper Way Thinner Than OLED 'You have this on Siwenna?'- Isaac Asimov, 1952. (re: Isaac Asimov, 11/21/2014 ) |
DARPA Wants Airborne Launch Facility For Drones This was tried with recon craft in WWII. (re: Daniel Suarez, 11/8/2014 ) |
Physicists Build Repulsor / Tractor Beam 'Brandon swung mighty tractor beams upon the severed halves of the Jovian vessel...'- EE 'Doc' Smith, 1931. (re: E.E. 'Doc' Smith, 10/23/2014 ) |
New Video Of Arducorder Mini Open Source Science Tricorder Perfect for exploring our planet. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 9/28/2014 ) |
Low Cost Spray-On Solar Cells 'It turns sunlight into electricity... you spray it on.'- Larry Niven, 1995. (re: Larry Niven, 7/31/2014 ) |
Wristify, Your Personal Cooling and Heating Device 'By law [a mandatory cooling unit] had to be strapped to every commuter's back...'- Philip K. Dick (re: Philip K. Dick, 6/21/2014 ) |
Solar Roadways Could Power USA - Times 3 This would be great if it works - the roads might be better maintained as well. (re: Various , 5/14/2014 ) |
Spaser-Based Circuits Could Be Printed On Clothing 'Alex rolled his wrist over to check the watch imprinted on his sleeve.'- Niven and Barnes, 1981. (re: Niven and Barnes, 4/26/2014 ) |
Full-Size Invisibility Cloak Now Possible 'I donned it and drew its hood, and threw on its current.'- Ray Cummings, 1930. (re: Ray Cummings, 4/8/2014 ) |
Self-Assembling Nanoparticles Move Like Tiny Gears 'Microscopic machinery, smaller than ants, smaller than pins, working energetically...'- Philip K. Dick, 1955. (re: Philip K. Dick, 4/6/2014 ) |
Navy's Orbiting Solar Panels To Beam Energy Down To Earth 'Curt shuddered at the thought of a beam of terrific power smashing into... perhaps into a city.'- Clifford Simak, 1941. (re: Olaf Stapledon, 3/24/2014 ) |
Myo Armband Controller Just 149 Bucks 'Actuators touch the tendons in your right wrist...'- Harry Harrison, 1960. (re: Harry Harrison, 3/1/2014 ) |
AllSee Low Power Gesture Recognition 'It saved a lot of muscular expenditure, of course...'- Douglas Adams, 1979. (re: Douglas Adams, 2/21/2014 ) |
3D Printing Your Winter Reality 'It makes drawings in the air following drawings it scans with photo-cells...'- Murray Leinster, 1945. (re: Murray Leinster, 2/9/2014 ) |
QuickScann3D Has Your Full Body Duplicate '... In a glass dome a three-dimensional simulacrum of himself six inches high took form.'- Jack Vance, 1954. (re: Jack Vance, 1/9/2014 ) |
Aireal Haptics Inching Towards Holodeck Experience How to feel something that isn't there? (re: Gene Roddenberry, 10/28/2013 ) |
Control Your Dog Remotely Your mutt will handle like a neodog with this advanced hardware and software. (re: Robert Heinlein, 9/22/2013 ) |
Elon Musk Creates Parts With Gestures Like Iron Man For some men, tomorrow is too long to wait for the future. (re: Various, 8/24/2013 ) |
Preorder Recon Jet - It's Heavy Duty Glass 'All displays are thrown on a mirror in front of your forehead...'- Robert Heinlein, 1959. (re: Robert Heinlein, 6/28/2013 ) |
Swiss HCPVT Giant Photovoltaic 'Flower' '...leaning against one of the slender stalks of a sunshade-photocell collector.'- David Brin, 1990. (re: David Brin, 5/1/2013 ) |
Peel And Stick Thin Film Solar Cells 'It turns sunlight into electricity, just like any solar power converter, but you spray it on.'- Larry Niven, 1995. (re: Larry Niven, 4/24/2013 ) |
Microbattery Extreme High Performance 'To this Foyle affixed a power pack the size of a pea and switched it on.'- Alfred Bester, 1956. (re: Alfred Bester, 4/17/2013 ) |
Speeding Ticket Robots To Cite Autonomous Cars? 'There is no danger of a vehicle's speed exceeding that allowed in the section in which it happens to be...'- John Jacob Astor IV, 1894. (re: John Jacob Astor IV, 4/10/2013 ) |
Russia's Self-Contained Nuclear Lighthouses 'They don't break down. They never break down. They were built for eternity.'- Isaac Asimov, 1951. (re: Robert Heinlein, 3/22/2013 ) |
Triton Respirator Concept Looks Jedi To Me Just don't stay down too long. (re: George Lucas, 3/20/2013 ) |
MYO Armband Provides Control For Your Phone, UAV 'Sensitive actuators touch the tendons in your right wrist.'- Harry Harrison, 1960. (re: Harry Harrison, 2/27/2013 ) |
IfIHadGlass - I'd Make PKD's Cephscope 'in Bob Arctor's living room his thousand dollar custom-quality cephscope crafted by Altec...'- Philip K. Dick, 1977. (re: Philip K. Dick, 2/20/2013 ) |
Will Google Glass Use Bone Conduction 'Sound vibrations transmitted directly to the osseous tissue of the body.'- Hugo Gernsback, 1924. (re: Hugo Gernsback, 2/5/2013 ) |
Telescopes With Liquid Mirrors Go Mainstream 'The bowl contained mercury. As the container spun on its perfectly balanced axis, centrifugal force caused the mercury to spread...'- Raymond Z. Gallun, 1934. (re: Raymond Z. Gallun, 1/21/2013 ) |
Nanotech Electronic Nose Sniffs Explosives Like Dogs 'It's picking up diphenyl compounds and tetrahydrocarbons...'- Michael Crichton, 1985. (re: Michael Crichton, 12/4/2012 ) |
GestIC Gesture Recognition Controller Uses Electrical Fields '...now all you had to do was wave your hand in the general direction of the components and hope.'- Douglas Adams, 1979. (re: Douglas Adams, 11/15/2012 ) |
World's First 3D Printing 'Photo Booth' 'On the counter-top appeared a three-dimensional replica of Farr.'- Jack Vance, 1954. (re: Jack Vance, 11/14/2012 ) |
Transparent Solar Cell Film Has Clear Advantages 'It turns sunlight into electricity... you spray it on.'- Larry Niven, 1995. (re: Larry Niven, 11/14/2012 ) |
Store Extra Energy In Liquid Air Off-peak energy storage just got another storage option. (re: Various, 10/2/2012 ) |
Arizona Solar Updraft Tower By 2015 'And eventually, an hour later, it reached its glorious one thousand feet of height.' (re: Leigh and Walt Richmond, 8/29/2012 ) |
Cyborg Tissues Combine Transistors and Cells 'Nat Flieger reflexively poured water into a cup and fed the living protoplasm incorporated into the Ampek F-a2 recording system...' (re: Philip K. Dick, 8/26/2012 ) |
Artificial Jellyfish Swims On Its Own 'It was a chemotactic artificial jellyfish designed to slither into undersea vents...' (re: Rucker/Sterling, 8/13/2012 ) |
Laser Lofts UAV for Two Day Flight Based on an idea from a physicist and science fiction writer in the 1960's. (re: Niven/Pournelle, 8/6/2012 ) |
Spray-On Lithium Ion Battery '...the five-year battery-plate contained within the back cover of the mag.' (re: Philip K. Dick, 6/28/2012 ) |
'Mind Uploading' Issue Now Downloadable 'The estimated duration of this model is five hundred thousand years...' (re: Richard Morgan, 6/25/2012 ) |
Archeo-Robot Scans Ancient Roman Sewers Great video of the 'cloaca maxima'. (re: Ridley Scott, 6/22/2012 ) |
Eole Water Turbine Like Star Wars Vaporator 'The atmosphere yielded its moisture with reluctance.' (re: George Lucas, 6/21/2012 ) |
$99 Lidar Plus UAV Equals Prometheus Mapping Device Sounds like a fun way to map indoor spaces. (re: Ridley Scott, 6/19/2012 ) |
Artificial Noses For Disease Diagnostics '...Set the ticking combinations of the olfactory system of the hound...' (re: Ray Bradbury, 6/8/2012 ) |
Real-Time 3D Electron Microscopy Clever device lets researchers use those red/blue 3D glasses they picked up at the local theater... (re: Robert Cromie, 5/5/2012 ) |
Kinze Autonomy Project's Autonomous Tractors Will farms become safer with robots? (re: Harry Harrison, 5/2/2012 ) |
Printable Liquid Solar Cells 'What's finally knocked the bottom out is this new solar electric paint.' (re: Larry Niven, 4/29/2012 ) |
Sonic Screwdriver From Dundee University See the Top 11 Sonic Screwdriver Scenes! (re: Various, 4/19/2012 ) |
Computers Powered By Harvested Environmental Energy '...the now famous Fottengill process.' (re: Lloyd Biggle, Jr., 4/8/2012 ) |
Open Source Tricorder 'Insufficient facts always invite danger.' - Mr. Spock (re: Gene Roddenberry, 4/1/2012 ) |
Control Robot Planes With Hand Gestures! Be careful waving at planes from now on. (re: Douglas Adams, 3/15/2012 ) |
Fracking Causes Ohio Earthquakes Another report that blames fracking for earthquakes in areas that are typically free of naturally-occurring quakes. (re: Various, 3/8/2012 ) |
Speechjammer To End Your 1st Amendment Rights Try to express yourself now; it's technology with intended consequences. (re: Arthur C. Clarke, 2/29/2012 ) |
T-Rays And Tricorders Amazing miniaturization could lead to science-fictional devices. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 1/23/2012 ) |
Hide An Event With Temporal Cloaking What would you want to put in the 'time hole'? (re: Various, 1/6/2012 ) |
Solar Power Paint For Any Size Solar Cells One coat solar paint can be applied to any conductive surface to create an instant solar cell. (re: Larry Niven, 12/21/2011 ) |
Airdrop Moisture Vaporator 'A vaporator sunk securely through sand and into deeper rock.' (re: George Lucas, 11/11/2011 ) |
Nth Lights From NthDegree Are 'Printed Lights' Let there be light, and let it be flat. (re: Isaac Asimov, 11/9/2011 ) |
Multi-Target Photo-Radar System No more safety in numbers when speeding, thanks to this Cordon system. (re: John Jacob Astor IV, 10/29/2011 ) |
Throw This Panoramic Ball Camera! Let's hope that it proves possible to manufacture this camera at a price at which we can afford it. (re: Robert Silverberg, 10/26/2011 ) |
See People Through Walls You (and your imaginative proxies, sf writers) have been trying to see through walls for a long time. (re: John W. Campbell, 10/18/2011 ) |
SMELL-IT 'Surround Sound' For The Nose Smell-o-Vision! One day, we'll breathe deeply of our favorite movie or game. (re: Aldous Huxley, 10/12/2011 ) |
10 Exotic Human-Energy Harvesting Devices And Technologies Presented all on one page! and yet, profusely illustrated. (re: Frank Herbert, 10/9/2011 ) |
Generate Elecricity From Breathing With Microbelt PVDF Device Unique method of harvesting energy from low speed airflows will have many applications. (re: Frank Herbert, 10/8/2011 ) |
The Garbage Mines Of Ghana 'They break down electronics with hammers and hands.' (re: David Brin, 9/25/2011 ) |
Stratospheric Particle Injection for Climate Engineering Project Save the planet from global warming the all-natural way. Is there such a thing as geomimicry? (re: Neal Stephenson, 9/14/2011 ) |
Harvesting Power From Flying Insects DARPA has been looking for a way to power the devices that will be carried by tiny HI-MEMS cyborg insects. (re: Thomas A. Easton, 9/7/2011 ) |
Energy-Harvesting Shoes With Reverse Electrowetting A new energy-harvesting technology that could be embedded in your shoes. (re: Frank Herbert, 8/25/2011 ) |
Sony DEV-5 Digital HD Binoculars Perfect for looking for Bantha and Sand People. (re: George Lucas, 8/17/2011 ) |
Bioelectronic Nose To Have Biomimetic Chemical Sensors How many uses can you think of for a bioelectronic nose? (re: Michael Crichton, 8/3/2011 ) |
Mobile Devices At Core Of Future Appliances Just wait till all of your appliances start talking back. (re: Philip K. Dick, 8/2/2011 ) |
Shape-Changing Metal Antenna Once the skin is ruptured, the metal flows extremely quickly in a few milliseconds. (re: Robert Heinlein, 7/31/2011 ) |
Menlo Device By Microsoft Tracks You Precisely This little gizmo can track you everywhere, indoors and out. (re: Jack Williamson, 7/27/2011 ) |
CFM LEAP Engine Perfect For Podracing Just watch out for those wrenches thrown by competitors (I'm looking at you, Sebulba!) (re: George Lucas, 7/18/2011 ) |
NASA's Forward Osmosis Bag (For Stillsuits?) Perfect for astronauts - and maybe Fremen. (re: Frank Herbert, 7/9/2011 ) |
PossessedHand Borgs Your Hands To Teach You The future of hand learning is now here; let the Machine take control of your hands. (re: Robert Heinlein, 7/1/2011 ) |
SIlver Pen Writes Flexible Circuits Write your own circuits informally. (re: Niven and Purnelle, 6/28/2011 ) |
Lytro Living Pictures Camera Revolution Astonishing consumer light-field camera will be available later this year in a point and shoot model. (re: Ridley Scott, 6/22/2011 ) |
Russian ATM Knows When You Lie This ATM knows more about you than you might think; oh, and be sure to stick to the truth. (re: William Gibson, 6/8/2011 ) |
'Cambridge Crude' Semi-Solid Flow Cell Battery This could change the way we recharge our electric cars - from -plug in- back to -fill'er up!- (re: Various, 6/6/2011 ) |
China's Weather Modification Office Engineering the rain with artillery. (re: Robert Heinlein, 5/23/2011 ) |
DustBot Video Shows Robotic Future Of Trash This robot is ready to help clean up the planet, one household's recyclables at a time. (re: Harry Harrison, 4/22/2011 ) |
Fog Harvesting For Fresh Water Like water off your back - if you're a Namib beetle (re: Frank Herbert, 4/20/2011 ) |
Nanogenerator Intros New Energy Unit - The Pinch Just the thing for the stillsuits of the future. (re: Frank Herbert, 3/31/2011 ) |
Through The Crust, Into the Mantle What's your favorite story of a visit to the interior of the Earth? (re: Lincoln Child, 3/27/2011 ) |
Quick-Charging Batteries Needed For Vehicles 3D films made by coating a surface with self-assembled nanoscale spheres may hold the answer to fast 'fill-ups' at vehicle recharging stations. (re: Philip Jose Farmer, 3/23/2011 ) |
Fracking Gas Companies Suspend Operations Let's not tell DARPA about the 'terrain deformation' possibility. (re: Various, 3/7/2011 ) |
Microcamera Big As Grain Of Salt New manufacturing process yields tiny cameras no larger than a coarse grain of salt. (re: Raymond Z. Gallun, 3/5/2011 ) |
Anti-Laser Is A Coherent Perfect Absorber This device, which as of now has no practical applications, can absorb laser light perfectly. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 2/17/2011 ) |
Thinnest Pocket Projector These tiny projectors will one day be a standard item in every smartphone. (re: , 1/31/2011 ) |
'Air Laser' Long-Range Sensor The stronger signal should also allow for detection of much smaller concentrations of airborne contaminants. (re: Gene Roddenbaerry, 1/28/2011 ) |
Digital Radiation Spectrometer Mr. Spock, if you could take just one tool down to a new planet, what would it be? (re: Gene Roddenberry, 1/4/2011 ) |
Fracking Earthquakes Oil companies pump a dense slurry into the rocks far under a town, hoping to create fractures to release natural gas. What could go wrong? (re: Various, 12/20/2010 ) |
Invisibility Cloak Fools Naked Eye interesting new technique uses naturally-occurring materials to form an invisibility cloak. (re: EE 'Doc' Smith, 12/15/2010 ) |
Sonic Screwdrivers Using Ultrasonic Force Fields Ultrasonic force fields can apply real forces to tiny objects. (re: Various, 12/8/2010 ) |
Undersea Mining With Nautilus Minerals Seafloor Production System Nautilus Minerals is developing the first seafloor gold and copper exploration and mining operation. (re: Jules Verne, 10/14/2010 ) |
MovieReshape Like Bruce Sterling's Video-Manicuring Impressive video shows what can be accomplished with image manipulation. (re: Bruce Sterling, 10/11/2010 ) |
MIT Glider Lands On a Perch Like A Bird This little glider has an amazing biomimetic feature. (re: Roger Zelazny, 10/11/2010 ) |
Stretchable Electronic Skin Input Device Video Let your fingers do the walking - on your own skin. (re: John Varley, 10/6/2010 ) |
DEMON UAV Has No Moving Flaps Successful demonstration of 'flapless flight' in this unmanned aerial vehicle. (re: Arthur C. Clarke, 9/30/2010 ) |
Swiss Thought-Controlled Wheelchair More research on brain-controlled assistive devices; success for the Swiss. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 9/9/2010 ) |
Improve MAVs By Studying Bees In Flight Nature has solved the problem of flight by tiny machines; let's see how She did it. (re: Neal Stephenson, 8/1/2010 ) |
Biofuel From Algae Can we improve the ability of algae to produce material we need? Should we? (re: Hal Clement, 7/27/2010 ) |
'Invisibles' Provides Tactile Feedback For VR This is just the kind of prototype system that could give you you virtual reality world. (re: David Brin, 7/21/2010 ) |
Terahertz Remote Sensing Detectors See through walls, containers and clothes from hundreds of feet away - and identify the unique signature of different substances. (re: E.E. 'Doc' Smith, 7/12/2010 ) |
Solar Impulse Completes Night Flight Recharge by day, fly by night. Solar Impulse completes a 26-hour journey. (re: John W. Campbell, 7/11/2010 ) |
Unlimited Urban Woods - A Forest In A Box What's bigger on the inside than it is on the outside? Maybe this box. (re: Various, 7/5/2010 ) |
Lung On A Chip - Electronics Plus Human Cells This device combines living human cells with electronics; can Philip K. Dick's swibble-culture be far behind? (re: Philip K. Dick, 7/5/2010 ) |
Solar Impulse Solar-Powered PlaneFlies! First flight test for this plane. (re: John W. Campbell, 4/7/2010 ) |
Sand Pirates In Indonesia Slowly, the natural features of our solar system disappear, thanks to the Better Building Conglomerates. (re: Alfred Bester, 3/28/2010 ) |
Scanner Could Let You 'Rip' Books If this device could be commercialized, you could 'rip' a book like you can rip a CD, digitizing its contents for easy storage on your computer. (re: Vernor Vinge, 3/19/2010 ) |
Robots May Repair Pipes From Inside Six billion gallons of drinkable water are wasted every day. But robots can help. (re: Various, 3/9/2010 ) |
Earthquake Machine Simulator Video Is research at UC Davis more precise than research done at MGM studios over thirty-five years ago? You be the judge. (re: Various, 2/23/2010 ) |
Bloom Box Brick Powers Your Home This Silicon Valley start-up wants to power your house and thereby take you off the grid. (re: Robert Heinlein, 2/22/2010 ) |
Laser Fusion Test Successful Successful test at National Ignition Facility shows that laser-plasma interactions may not be a problem in the pursuit of thermonuclear fusion. (re: Robert A. Metzger, 2/13/2010 ) |
Computational Wood: Grow Circuits In Living Trees Is computational wood possible? The harvesting of circuits? Or even Avatar-style living memory? (re: Dan Simmons, 2/5/2010 ) |
Wasabi Smoke Alarm Now Available Oh, this will get you out of bed all right. (re: Frank Herbert, 2/1/2010 ) |
Implantable Energy-Harvesting Rubber Sheets This remarkable material can let us take energy from movements we make anyway. Take a deep breath, and power up that cell phone! (re: Frank Herbert, 1/31/2010 ) |
Bose Ride System Smooths Your Ride Yes, you'll ride the spaceways - uh, roads - in much greater comfort with a highly technological seat. (re: John W. Campbell, 1/30/2010 ) |
Nexus One? Nexus Six Is Google Phone You Want It has 'ten million possible combinations of cerebral activity'. Now, that would be a smart phone. (re: Philip K. Dick, 12/16/2009 ) |
DARPA Cyborg Insects With Nuclear-Powered Transponders Now that the 'spy flies' are coming along, we need the power source for minned receptors and recording spools. DARPA, what would we do without you? (re: Philip K. Dick, 12/15/2009 ) |
Seawater To Cool Downtown Honolulu Water will be pumped from the oceans depths to cool buildings in downtown Honolulu. (re: Neal Stephenson, 12/11/2009 ) |
Handheld Fusion Reactors Planned Is 'neutron-less fusion allowing safe deployment for handheld power sources' possible? (re: Isaac Asimov, 12/9/2009 ) |
Solar Impulse HB-SIA Solar-Powered Plane Tested Who will be the first person to fly a solar-powered plane around the world? (re: John W. Campbell, 11/27/2009 ) |
Bio-Mechanics And Micro-Robotic Flight Take a close look at one of nature's wonders - the micro air vehicle called a dragonfly. (re: Raymond Z. Gallun, 11/11/2009 ) |
Star Trek Replicator For Space Station? Electron beam freeform fabrication is what they're testing, but sf fans know a replicator when they see one. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 11/5/2009 ) |
NASA iPhone Sensors Like Tricorder Tricorders will be here before we know it! Although it's true we've been waiting a long time. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 11/4/2009 ) |
Europa May Support Life Is there life on Europa? SF author Arthur C. Clarke popularized the idea in a book and a subsequent movie. There is a liquid ocean - but is there enough oxygen? (re: Arthur C. Clarke, 10/15/2009 ) |
Liquid Semiconductor Nuclear Battery Big As A Penny You might have trouble believing that a nuclear battery could be no larger than a dime, even if you didn't study under the great Bler at the University of Trantor. (re: Isaac Asimov, 10/8/2009 ) |
Be Martin Jetpack Test Pilot Via eBay Of course you do. Now, you have your chance at free flight with a jetpack. (re: John W. Campbell, 10/1/2009 ) |
Solar-Powered Aircraft In Fact and Fiction Solar aircraft have certain advantages; that's why they're attractive in fact and in fiction. (re: John W. Campbell, 9/27/2009 ) |
iRex DR800SG E-Reader Has Unlimited 3G Data Unlimited 3G data from Verizon make this an interesting entry. (re: Stanislaw Lem, 9/24/2009 ) |
Flexible Building Survives Test Quakes Flexible buildings that flex for earthquakes, concentrating the damage in replaceable steel 'fuses'. (re: Vernor Vinge, 9/19/2009 ) |
Self-Healing Circuits For Cellphones? This may just help alleviate one of the most terrible feelings you can have in modern times - the way you feel when you drop your cellphone or other expensive digital device. (re: Various, 9/11/2009 ) |
Magnetic Monopoles Detected? Do magnetic monopoles exist? And can you mine them? (re: Larry Niven, 9/7/2009 ) |
Laser Cooling Big Chill SF movie goers and comic book fans alike have long been used to the idea of super-fast cooling. Scientists now put the big chill on. (re: George Lucas, 9/4/2009 ) |
Spray-On Nano-Ink Solar Cells Solar cells in a convenient spray can? Not impossible, say University of Texas researchers. (re: Larry Niven, 8/25/2009 ) |
Bio Acoustic Fish Fence May Protect Great Lakes Another interesting technology to try to keep the Great Lakes free of Asian carp; I read about the idea first in a Zelazny story three decades ago. (re: Roger Zelazny, 8/16/2009 ) |
TruFocals Glasses Do Not Use Hufhuf Oil Eyeglasses suitable for the Kwisatz Haderach, if he needed glasses. (re: Frank Herbert, 8/12/2009 ) |
Geoengineering To Mitigate Climate Change This policy statement focuses on large-scale efforts to geoengineer the climate system to counteract the consequences of increasing greenhouse gas emissions. (re: John Jacob Astor IV, 7/23/2009 ) |
Cleaning Up Chernobyl With Beets Another interesting scheme to try to cut the amount of time that tens of thousands of kilometers of countryside must lay fallow due to radioactive fallout. (re: Gregory Benford, 6/28/2009 ) |
AltaRock's Quake-Inducing Geothermal Energy Search People need alternative energy sources in California; are there any ways of getting what we need that are free of consequences? (re: LucasArts, 6/25/2009 ) |
Saser - Sonic Equivalent Of Laser It appears that this is the first working prototype of a device long theorized; it is the first device to produce coherent sound waves in the terahertz frequency range (re: Gene Roddenberry, 6/19/2009 ) |
Flame Jet Drill To Bore 10 Miles Into Our Planet Didn't I see this done from orbit in the last Star Trek movie? Take a look a the video of a prototype device that can drill quickly and efficiently in search of geothermal power. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 6/14/2009 ) |
Negev Moisture 'Vaporators Planned W/ Solar Power Hopefully, these devices to condense water out of the air on a vast scale will not require special droids that speak the binary language of moisture vaporators. (re: George Lucas, 6/10/2009 ) |
RF Cochlea Chip 'Seashell Radio' This unique device draws on the marvelous human ear for its capabilities, which can be described as a 'universal or cognitive radio' much faster than any existing RF spectrum analyzer. (re: Ray Bradbury, 6/4/2009 ) |
Water Purity Detection In Real Time 'Will someone try chaumurky tonight - poison in the drink?' Not if Professor Katzir has anything to say about it. (re: Frank Herbert, 5/22/2009 ) |
U-Met Utility Helmet For First Responders This helmet would be of use in a variety of situations, from disaster response to ordinary police work. (re: Davin Brin, 5/21/2009 ) |
MIT Conversation Shielding Like Cone Of Silence Keeping those office conversations private needs serious technology. MIT researchers are there with the goods. (re: Robert Heinlein, 5/10/2009 ) |
Brush Up On Star Trek Tech Made Real So much Star Trek technology has been brought into being - at least partly - that I'm wondering what new worlds are left to conquer, technologywise, in the new Star Trek movie. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 5/7/2009 ) |
Walking Gel Caterpillar Like The Blob! Didn't I just write an article on squishy robots? Looks like these researchers are way ahead of the curve. (re: Various, 4/29/2009 ) |
Flexpeaker Paper Thin Speakers Can you imagine a movie poster - that plays the movie soundtrack - right off the surface of the flat paper movie poster? Well, get to work on it. With video. (re: Larry Niven, 4/28/2009 ) |
Power Generating Shoe Instructions Don't let the power from walking go to waste - start gathering up that energy now with these DIY parasitic power harvesting shoes. (re: Frank Herbert, 4/27/2009 ) |
Face Mining Star Trek For Kirk, 7-Eleven For You Face mining and facial recognition are getting some real face time with their fans on the Internet. Take a look at what Pittsburgh Pattern Recognition has been up to. (re: Joseph E. Kelleam, 4/26/2009 ) |
Conductive Bodypaint Skin Circuitry Why carry a cell phone or other electronic device when you can be the device? Also makes electronics prototyping easier. (re: Various, 4/19/2009 ) |
Arm Swing Authentication For Mobile Phones A unique bit of biometric data you didn't even know you had will authenticate users of mobile devices. Just don't stand near people opening their phones. (re: Douglas Adams, 4/17/2009 ) |
SolarEn To Sell Satellite Solar Power This idea has been kicked around by sf authors for several generations. Has the time for SBSP (space-based solar power) finally come? (re: Clifford Simak, 4/15/2009 ) |
Flat Flexible Loudspeakers From Warwick Audio The development of this technology will make possible devices by authors like Ellison, Dick and Sterling. (re: Philip K. Dick, 4/2/2009 ) |
Carbon Nanotube Muscles This technology provides an amazing increase in force per unit area of standard (i.e., human) muscles. (re: HG Wells, 3/22/2009 ) |
Laser Kills Mosquitoes Like Brin's Bee Zapper This story is even better because it arose in the context of intellectual property; if Brin had the idea in 1990, doesn't he own it? (re: David Brin, 3/16/2009 ) |
Light-Trapping Nanodoughnut Like Slow Glass Fascinating development shows that it is possible to trap - and hold indefinitely - a photon, releasing it at will. (re: L. Sprague de Camp, 3/10/2009 ) |
Eye Of God Found - But No Mote In the Niven and Pournelle novel, a similar sight inspired the founding of the Church of Him. Himmists, take note. (re: Niven and Pournelle, 2/27/2009 ) |
Mobius Circuit Perfect For Science-Fictional Electronics This seems like the perfect start to your science-fictional electronics project. (re: Various, 2/19/2009 ) |
Kindle 2 Reads Aloud, As SF Writers Predicted The idea of a mechanized 'book reader' or 'news reader' has been around for more than 100 years; take a look at the imaginative works of five sf writers. (re: Stanislaw Lem, 2/13/2009 ) |
Radio-Controlled Beetle By UC Berkeley The researchers picked rhinoceros beetles because they look cool - enslaved. (re: Thomas A. Easton, 1/31/2009 ) |
Japan's Double-Armed Rescue Vehicle It's handy to have a rescue vehicle with two arms; Ripley might be able to fight aliens with it, too. (re: Various, 1/26/2009 ) |
Broadband Invisibility Cloak - Now You See It This breakthrough demonstrates that it is possible to build a single material that reroutes light over a broad swath of light wavelengths. (re: Ray Cummings, 1/18/2009 ) |
Star Wars Force Trainer (NeuroSky, Not Sith) Ah, those playful Sith at NeuroSky are at it again. Now, they have a toy for your kids. The 'Force Trainer' is a powerful ally. (re: George Lucas, 1/13/2009 ) |
That's Mr. Gasification, Not Mr. Fusion Take a look at a cool video showing a real-life version of a car that runs on miscellaneous bits of trash. Just like in the movies. Almost. (re: Various, 1/6/2009 ) |
Meatricity - Meatrical Energy From Meatric Sources Are we heading toward a human-powered future? Probably not, but the power goes out in our neighborhood often enough to check it out. (re: Various, 1/3/2009 ) |
Attention Assist - Drowsy-Driver Detection Standard German engineering gives rise to the exact opposite of a famous sfnal automotive prediction. (re: Robert Heinlein, 12/28/2008 ) |
Teen Arrested For Home Chemistry Lab Should ordinary people, like this teen-aged college student, be allowed to experiment? (re: Various, 12/28/2008 ) |
Gel Remote Concept Like Metaflesh Perhaps it would be better for us if our TV remotes repulsed us. (re: David Cronenberg, 12/17/2008 ) |
Choking On Our Own Waste Heat Interesting speculation by two UK professors; even if we solve global warming due to greenhouse gases, this problem still exists. (re: Larry Niven, 12/1/2008 ) |
Geoplasma Plasma Refuse Plant Neat idea to use Sixties NASA tech to turn trash into electricity. Hope it works. (re: Various, 11/16/2008 ) |
First Optical Image Of Planet Orbiting Sun-Like Star Very exciting development from Hubble demonstrates exoplanets can be normal-sized and be in orbit around Sun-like stars. (re: Various, 11/14/2008 ) |
Hyperion Power Module Neighborhood Nuclear Reactor The story about small 'nuclear batteries,' small plants that produce enough power for small towns or big neighborhoods, just keeps coming back. (re: Robert Heinlein, 11/11/2008 ) |
Atomic Pen Uses Atoms For Pixels Technique allows researchers to write with atoms; talk about a very tiny point size. (re: Ridley Scott, 10/25/2008 ) |
NTT Energy-Generating Shoes Are Squishy I really like the cool retro technology used to power these power walkers. (re: Frank Herbert, 10/17/2008 ) |
Machine Prints Lights In Sheets Even though these won't fit in any of those 20 billion light sockets, sheets of light are worth looking at. (re: Isaac Asimov, 10/14/2008 ) |
Liquid Camera Lens Controlled By Sound Using a liquid as a lens? I read about it forty years ago. (re: Frank Herbert, 10/6/2008 ) |
Photovoltaic Paint On Steel Sheets By The Corus Group Fascinating new technology comes only about a decade after Larry Niven wrote about it. (re: Larry Niven, 10/5/2008 ) |
Element Four Watermill Needs No Droid These devices keep adding features. Soon, you'll be saying 'What I really need is a droid that understands the binary language of moisture vaporators.' (re: George Lucas, 9/29/2008 ) |
LHC 'Malfunction' No Accident? Interesting alternate explanation for the problems that have temporarily halted the onward march of particle physics. (re: John Cramer, 9/25/2008 ) |
The Fremen Urinal Frank Herbert Never Imagined These devices could save countless gallons of water, which helps even on water-rich planets. (re: Frank Herbert, 9/7/2008 ) |
Personal Wind Turbines And Rooftop Windmills Interesting strategy for a personal supply of renewable energy has been around for about a century. (re: John Jacob Astor, 9/4/2008 ) |
Intel Wireless Power Transmission Wireless transmission of power inflamed the imaginations of early twentieth century sf writers; Intel appears to have improved the efficiency of a basic technique. (re: John W. Campbell, 8/22/2008 ) |
Solar-Hydrogen House Is Energy Independent This story about America's first solar-hydrogen residence is still good; the owner is energy-independent in a way that most of us can only envy. (re: Clifford Simak, 8/6/2008 ) |
Venture Capitalists Fight Over Water If the investments of this legendary Texas oilman are any example, there is reason for concern here. (re: Various, 8/6/2008 ) |
Solar-Powered Fuel Cells Easy As Photosynthesis Impressive discovery by MIT scientists may unlock the potential of fuel cells for homeowners. Prof. Nocera explains how it works in a video interview. (re: Various, 8/4/2008 ) |
Volcanoes To Be Harnessed For Power Now that oil-fired power is getting more expensive, it's time to put our boots and spurs on, and tame a real power source - volcanoes! (re: Carl Binder, 7/31/2008 ) |
Microwave Drill Heats And Pokes Interesting development is a new twist on a basic requirement; drilling holes through different kinds of materials. (re: Frank Herbert, 7/14/2008 ) |
Klimatec AirWater Machine Good News For Moisture Farmers This device lets you get fresh water anywhere; at last, an office water cooler that never needs restocking. (re: George Lucas, 7/9/2008 ) |
Breast Motion Power Harvesting iPod-Charging Bra Interesting engineering challenge with several possible solutions; women may one day charge their iPods with their bras. (re: Frank Herbert, 6/25/2008 ) |
Massive Balls In Fact And Fiction For some reason, enormous (and, often, spinning) spheres form a kind of focal point for science fiction movies. I don't know why that is. (re: Various, 6/25/2008 ) |
GINGER Moon Radar Benefits Miners On Earth Very neat technology transfer from ESA's space program helps keep Canadian miners safer by detecting hidden cracks in the roofs of mines. (re: Larry Niven, 6/22/2008 ) |
Acoustic Cloak Research Turns Practical Creating sonically invisible pillars in concert halls would probably confuse the dickens out of bats, but music lovers would like it. (re: Various, 6/13/2008 ) |
The Secret Lives Of Invisible Magnetic Fields I really don't understand what is being presented, but you'll enjoy it. (re: Various, 6/3/2008 ) |
Ion-Etched Human Hair Shows Branding Possibilities Interesting idea, I'm sure I've seen something like this before. (re: Ridley Scott, 4/7/2008 ) |
Inferno Sonic Barrier Is A Sonabarrier The Inferno device is intended to create a barrier impassable by human beings. (re: Frank Herbert, 4/3/2008 ) |
BigBelly Solar Compactor Vs. WALL-E Robot Pixar has long delayed the release of WALL-E, the story of an autonomous compactor; they'd better hurry up. (re: Pixar, 4/1/2008 ) |
Acoustic Bazooka Concept Can the Acoustic Bazooka exist? What would it be good for? (re: Various, 4/1/2008 ) |
Steampunk Crab Fort Art Really terrific art concept for a Victorian nightmare. (re: Various, 3/12/2008 ) |
Sociable Garbabge Can Robot This little trash can robot prototype may remind you of an upcoming Pixar film - or a Bruce Sterling novel from twenty years ago. (re: Bruce Sterling, 3/11/2008 ) |
Solar Leaves - Electrochemical and Biological There are TWO uses for artificial solar leaves - do you know what they are? Also, not all artificial solar leaves are electrochemical. (re: Thomas Easton, 3/7/2008 ) |
Zimmer Frame-based Nursing Home Positioning System Nifty invention provides navigational support for people with short term memory problems. (re: Various, 3/3/2008 ) |
Rain-Making Bacteria May Affect Climate If we knew more about how rain forms, we might be able to have some control over rainfall. (re: Robert Heinlein, 2/29/2008 ) |
Adobe Light-Field Lens Video - Blade Runner Cluster The Adobe superlens cluster seems pretty close to what Deckard used in Blade Runner to find amazing details in a photograph. (re: Ridley Scott, 2/23/2008 ) |
Garbage-Eating Factories Now, Voracious Cities Later Isn't it odd how sometimes machines shrink down, and others grow to giant size? (re: Philip Reeve, 2/10/2008 ) |
Biomechanical Energy Harvester Is The Bee's Knees Waste not the body's moisture - or its many free ergs of power. (re: Frank Herbert, 2/9/2008 ) |
HI-MEMS: Control Circuits Embedded In Pupal Stage Successfully Researchers have succeeded in implanting electronic control structures in the early stages of metamorphosis, ensuring a viable controllable insect. (re: Thomas A. Easton, 1/27/2008 ) |
HI-MEMS: Cyborg Beetle Microsystem Those DARPA scientists had the help of a futuristic blueprint provided by sf writer Thomas Easton. (re: Thomas A. Easton, 1/27/2008 ) |
Use Roads As Solar Energy Collectors Interesting system started out as a study on how to make roads more sustainable, with less maintenance. Passive solar heating is a bonus (other examples also covered). (re: Various, 1/2/2008 ) |
Toshiba Micro Nuclear Reactor For Home Fission Although I'm prepared to pull this story at any moment, it appears to be a real possibility. (re: Issac Asimov, 12/18/2007 ) |
Smart Chair Follows You Like A Chairdog Mesmerizing concept video for a mechanical version of Frank Herbert's chairdogs will have librarians drooling. (re: Frank Herbert, 12/14/2007 ) |
NeuroSky ThinkGear Mind-Controlled Toys With Sega Finally, mind-controlled devices will be available to our children. What could possibly go wrong? (re: Various, 12/13/2007 ) |
Perching Autonomous Aircraft Perfects Prop Hang Very cool video of a small aircraft model switching from completely autonomously controlled vertical hang to horizontal flight. (re: Various, 11/24/2007 ) |
WatAir Dew-Harvesting 'Web' Kit Dune fans are not surprised at this development; dew is a remarkable water source. (re: Frank Herbert, 11/15/2007 ) |
Breath Powered USB Charger (And Stillsuit) It appears that a key element of Frank Herbert's stillsuit is now available to help you recharge your gadgets. (re: Frank Herbert, 11/5/2007 ) |
Mood Recognition Technology: Pivo 2 Driver Experience Enhanced Here's a closer look at Pivo 2 and its unique effort to sense the mood of the driver to improve vehicle safety. (re: Frank Herbert, 10/29/2007 ) |
Flexible Integrated Energy Device (FIED) - Wearable Rechargers One is fictional, the other one doesn't exist yet - but engineers are working on it. (re: Frank Herbert, 10/28/2007 ) |
Caltech Electronic Nose: The Lewis Group Smells Success The electronic nose knows; the Lewis group has created an olfactory sensor remarkably like yours, and just the thing for a certain mechanical hound. (re: Ray Bradbury, 10/24/2007 ) |
Virtual Fence To Be Tested This Month A virtual barrier between the US and Mexico is being tested; the glitches that stopped this Boeing product from being complete last summer have been fixed. (re: Robert Heinlein, 10/21/2007 ) |
Could Lightning Power Generators? If this works, I'm going to festoon my house with lightning rods, and then sell the power back to DTE. (re: Steven Spielberg, 10/16/2007 ) |
Invisibility Cloak Works In Visible Spectrum Is this the world's first true invisibility cloak? (re: Ray Cummings, 10/4/2007 ) |
Solar-Powered Bike From Thera-P This is a really flashy looking bicycle - but does it run at night? (re: Various, 9/27/2007 ) |
Vocal Terrorism Via Virtual Vocal Chords British scientists spend the week worrying about future forms of terrorism. (re: Various, 9/15/2007 ) |
Diamond Light Source Illuminates Manuscripts Scientists take only thirty years to turn James P. Hogan's fantasy into reality. Well done! (re: James P. Hogan, 9/13/2007 ) |
EEStor Ultracapacitor 'Battery' And Heinlein's Shipstone Yet another reason to hope that electric vehicles might soon become a practical, affordable transportation choice. (re: Robert Heinlein, 9/7/2007 ) |
The Thinking Man's Wheelchair A remarkable development for the disabled, this idea was derided as mere science fiction in 1966. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 9/7/2007 ) |
'Benevolence Kings' Protect Japanese Workers Automatically This system is designed to provide a warning to construction workers in the event of out-of-control motorists. (re: Various, 9/5/2007 ) |
Crowd Farms And 'Coppertops' Those parasitic power harvesters never give up. (re: Harl Vincent, 8/15/2007 ) |
Backpack Laser - Just Don't Cross The Streams If you think about it just a little, I'm sure you can come up with alternative uses for a backpack laser system. (re: Harold Ramis, 8/12/2007 ) |
Vortex Engine - Tame Tornadoes May Generate Power Not only could this technique produce electricity, it could also serve as a form of planetary air conditioning to counter global warming. (re: Pohl/Kornbluth, 7/24/2007 ) |
Cheap Paint-On Flexible Solar Panels I keep thinking there must be some way to turn all the sun-soaked surfaces in my life into power-generators... (re: Larry Niven, 7/20/2007 ) |
BigBelly Solar-Powered Trash Can - Good/Evil? Oh, yes, someone has already thought about solar-powered trash cans. (re: Bruce Sterling, 7/19/2007 ) |
No-Way Physics And Science Fiction Do you like your physics possible, or impossible? SF lets you have it both ways. (re: Various, 7/11/2007 ) |
Vibration Energy Scavenging By Tiny Generator This tiny generator might appear in a heart near you. (re: Harl Vincent, 7/7/2007 ) |
EQGuard Home Earthquake Warning Appliance This system can give you just enough time to run outside. (re: Various, 6/28/2007 ) |
Max Water By Max Whisson Dr. Max Whisson is back with more information about his Max Water invention to provide potable water to everyone. (re: , 6/5/2007 ) |
Chinese Government To Control Olympic Weather The Chinese government appears to have more control over the weather than you might think. (re: Robert Heinlein, 5/23/2007 ) |
Building Shaker Quake Machine Engineers get out from behind their laptops and shake up a real 275-ton building. (re: Vernor Vinge, 4/17/2007 ) |
Nanogenerator Harvests Mechanical Energy We might not need to keep track of a half-dozen little charger devices if this works. (re: Frank Herbert, 4/11/2007 ) |
NextEngine 3D Scanner Captures Your World This device provides excellent three-dimensional CAD files when presented with small objects. (re: Jack Vance, 4/6/2007 ) |
Your Scrap Copper Future I've seen this science-fictional future before; where's my personal smelter now that I need one? (re: John Brunner, 4/4/2007 ) |
Tactical Biorefinery Turns Garbage Into Energy Fascinating invention by Purdue researchers helps an army camp as well as march on its stomach. (re: Steven Spielberg, 3/23/2007 ) |
Microsoft Researches The Future On Video Interesting short video from Microsoft research has science-fictional (and real) precursors. (re: , 3/15/2007 ) |
HeadThere Giraffe Telepresence Robot This is a pretty cool-looking example of an inexpensive remote-controlled telepresence device. (re: Niven and Pournelle, 3/12/2007 ) |
Varioptic Liquid Lens For Phone Cameras The oil (and water) lens finally makes it into consumer products that will be available near you. (re: Frank Herbert, 2/18/2007 ) |
The Wisdom Door Knows You Clever use of biometrics to identify those who may pass. (re: Philip K. Dick, 2/16/2007 ) |
Robot Parking In Fact and In Fiction Okay, George Jetson had a car that folded into a briefcase; but you can take your car to NYC and have the robot garage park it for you in real life. (re: Robert Heinlein, 2/3/2007 ) |
Whisson Windmills To Water Australia Like Vaporators? Inventor from Oz creates windmills that pull water from the air - then you'll really need a droid that speaks the binary language of moisture vaporators. (re: George Lucas, 1/30/2007 ) |
Invisible RFID Ink Tattoos For Cattle, People This new technology solves several vexing problems, and it makes it easy for large unruly herds to be tracked more easily. (re: Niven/Barnes, 1/18/2007 ) |
Use Google To Search The Heavens Google has once again allied themselves with a spectacular scientific project - have they bitten off more data than they can chew? (re: Neal Stephenson, 1/8/2007 ) |
Desktop Nanofactory Video Excellent visualization of how it might work; not really news, but worth watching. (re: Philip K. Dick, 1/4/2007 ) |
Power Sheet Provides Flexible Wireless Electricity This system could provide great flexibility for recharging all of your zillions of devices, without having to take a zillion separate chargers everywhere. (re: Various, 12/15/2006 ) |
Compact Vortex Generator Inspired By Squids Biomimetics scores another triumph - this time, pulsatile jet propulsion. (re: Various, 12/14/2006 ) |
Sawfish Underwater Lumberjack Robot This product dives underwater to recover lumber otherwise wasted in reservoirs and lakes. (re: Various, 12/6/2006 ) |
Femtosecond Laser Pulse Turns Metals Pitch Black Remarkable process creates a perfectly black finish without paints or other coatings. (re: E.E. 'Doc Smith, 12/3/2006 ) |
Detect Aggressive Voices With Sigard By Sound Intelligence If you've been waiting for HAL to tell you to take a stress pill, your wait is over. (re: Arthur C. Clarke, 11/26/2006 ) |
Wireless Power For Laptops, Cellphones? An old concept perhaps made new with "non-radiative" wireless power transmission. (re: Robert Heinlein, 11/16/2006 ) |
Terminator Tongues - USAF Seeks Voice Transformation Tech Why does the USAF want soldiers to be able to talk like someone else? (re: Various, 11/13/2006 ) |
Energy Curtain Captures Energy From Sunlight This fascinating and useful project is both decorative and thought-provoking in its demonstration of energy choices. (re: Various, 11/2/2006 ) |
SunTracker One Brings The Sun Inside Very cool device to bring a significant amount of light inside your house or building regardless of the sun's direction. (re: Ray Bradbury, 10/27/2006 ) |
RealSnailMail With RFID-Chipped Snails You just thought you've been using snail mail - this is email, with real snails. (re: Frank Herbert, 10/11/2006 ) |
Airblade From Dyson Airblast From Heinlein Dyson's latest product offers 400 kph winds of drying power - more than Heinlein's 1940's airblast. (re: Robert Heinlein, 10/9/2006 ) |
Aqua Sciences Water From Atmospheric Moisture Remarkable (and secret!) technology to lower the price of water to troops in Iraq, and help people in need. (re: Frank Herbert, 10/6/2006 ) |
Planetary Annihilation Chances 'Totally Miniscule' Black holes generated beneath the Earth's surface? I sense no danger here... (re: David Brin, 9/19/2006 ) |
Lo-Tek Book Reading (In Bed) Stand How to read a heavy book in bed hands-free. The anwer comes from Japan. (re: Robert Heinlein, 8/29/2006 ) |
Knock-Based Commands Like Heinlein's Heinlein called this one; Linux programmers now using knock-codes on accelerometer-equipped laptops. (re: Robert Heinlein, 7/30/2006 ) |
Headband Telepathy And Robinson's Mindkiller Mind to mind transfer will take at least twenty years, but we're getting there, according to scientists. (re: Spider Robinson, 7/28/2006 ) |
Chinese Military Takes Page From NASA Apollo Program NASA actually used this same technique in the 1960's to practice for the Apollo missions. (re: , 7/27/2006 ) |
MIT Light-Detecting Fibers Create Niven's Webeye Amazing fiber web detects light; science fiction gadgets galore may soon exist. (re: Larry Niven, 7/24/2006 ) |
Invisibility Cloaks Seen As Possible With Metamaterials Invisibility stories continue to appear; when do I get my cloaking device? (re: Ray Cummings, 5/28/2006 ) |
Invisibility Possible With Superlenses Ah, the invisibility cloak once again... well, it doesn't appear because... you know. (re: Ray Cummings, 5/3/2006 ) |
Mol Switch Project Nanoactuator Opens New Vistas An amazing molecular magnetic switch bridges the gap between the biological and silicon worlds; this invention will make possible many other applications. (re: , 4/25/2006 ) |
HAL-5 Exoskeleton To Carry Mountain Climber Exoskeletons helped humans raised in microgravity over come Earth's gravity in a 1968 novel; now they help people overcome gravity on Earth in real life. (re: Fritz Leiber, 4/4/2006 ) |
MIT Battery Research To Enable 'Electric Phaetons' John Jacob Astor dreamed of electric cars that would serve us in 1894; all he needed was a really good battery technology. (re: John Jacob Astor, 2/19/2006 ) |
Quantum Telecloning And 'The Enemy Within' It happened once to Captain Kirk by accident; now scientists have demonstrated that they can do it on purpose. Now that's progress. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 2/16/2006 ) |
NASA Strategy For Urban Heat island NYC NASA has strategies to help small urban heat islands like NYC. Who can help a species with a 'planet' heat island? Larry Niven, that's who. (re: Larry Niven, 2/9/2006 ) |
StarChase Tracking Tag And Star Wars Homing Beacon The Los Angeles police are taking a page from Obiwan Kenobi's book on how to chase suspects; hopefully, they will stay out of asteroid fields. (re: George Lucas, 2/6/2006 ) |
Hungry? Print Yourself Some Bacon If scientists can just about print organs, I can certainly print myself some bacon. (re: Frank Herbert, 2/3/2006 ) |
Concrete Canvas - Inflatable Concrete Buildings This great portable shelter lets you create housing anywhere - even if a housing development would look like hundreds of loaves in a baker's window. (re: Larry Niven, 2/2/2006 ) |
Honda Accord ADAS Heinlein Wannabe We are SO close to Heinlein's Camden Speedster. (re: Robert Heinlein, 2/1/2006 ) |
Algae To Clean Atmosphere Atmospheric cleansing by means of carefully selected algae has been suggested before. (re: Niven and Pournelle, 1/12/2006 ) |
Ratheon Swimmer Denial Divers beware; Raytheon has your (pulse and frequency) number. (re: Roger Zelazny, 1/12/2006 ) |
USB Memory 'Swiss' Karen Traviss thinks about the USB Memory Swiss Army knife a year in advance of the press release. (re: Karen Traviss, 12/30/2005 ) |
Palm Vein Authentication First, Then Book No more worries about lost library cards; just flash your palm at the reader. (re: William Gibson, 12/23/2005 ) |
Tweezer Magnifier Available Now (Bush Robots - Not) What will they think of next? As my eyes age, I need this. (re: Robert Heinlein, 12/15/2005 ) |
Crickets Now Have 'Holodeck' Crickets get theirs first, thanks to helpful humans. (re: Gene Roddenberry, 12/13/2005 ) |
Taipei 101 Tower Causing Earthquakes? Has the world's tallest skyscraper caused quakes in a normally stable zone? (re: William Alden, 12/4/2005 ) |
ANPR Cams - Britain's Roadside Big Brother The UK's ANPR cameras will log the movement of every vehicle on the roads. (re: Robert Heinlein, 11/16/2005 ) |
Lower Limit For Nanobot Size Discovered Scientists and science fiction writers must accept new limits to imagination, thanks to a remarkable first-ever measurement. (re: Philip K. Dick, 9/25/2005 ) |
Light Captured In A Crystal Normally speedy light stopped for a full second in a crystal by Australian researchers. (re: Bob Shaw, 9/17/2005 ) |
Backpack Generator Harnesses Power Of Walking The brisk strides of hikers converted into electricity. (re: Frank Herbert, 9/10/2005 ) |
Babelfish Necklace: Environment Translator Provides a 3D soundscape, 'translating' the environment for the visually impaired. (re: Douglas Adams, 8/22/2005 ) |
Tanaka Auto Door You may be wondering what is so great about a door that opens only just enough to let a person come in or out... besides being cool. (re: Jules Verne, 8/21/2005 ) |
NextFest 2005 - Festival Of Technovelgy Yes, you read that right - technovelgy, ideas and inventions straight from science fiction books and movies. NextFest is a science fiction-lovers dream come true. (re: Various, 6/24/2005 ) |
3D Holographic Images And Heinlein's Stereovision Tank Harold Garner and his research team have used a gel-filled tank and a Texas Instruments Digital Light Processing (DLP) Digital Micromirror Device (DMD) to generate dynamic three-dimensional views from holograms. (re: Robert Heinlein, 6/21/2005 ) |
Breathe Like A Fish Thanks To Alan Bodner Alan Izhar-Bodner, an Israeli inventor, has developed a way for divers to breathe underwater without cumbersome oxygen tanks. His apparatus makes use of the air that is dissolved in water, just like fish do. (re: Various, 6/1/2005 ) |
QinetIQ First Automatic Shipboard Landing Of STOVL Craft QinetIQ experimental VAAC craft with 'Autoland' technology succeeded in the first fully automatic landing of a short take-off vertical landing (STOVL) aircraft on a ship. (re: Various, 5/26/2005 ) |
Scientists Succeed At (Cryogenically Enhanced Magneto-Archimedes) Levitation Scientists at the University of Nottingham have succeeded in (Cryogenically-Enhanced-Magneto-Archimedes) levitating some of the heaviest elements in nature, including lead and platinum. (re: Isaac Asimov, 5/12/2005 ) |
Flexible Fabric Speakers Are Coming A Korean research firm has announced that it has developed a technology for the mass production of sound speakers that are as flexible as fabric. (re: Bruce Sterling, 5/1/2005 ) |
New Phase Of Ice May Exist A new phase of ice may exist at temperatures between 4 degrees Kelvin to 50 degrees Kelvin, at high pressures, according to researchers at the National Synchrotron Radiation Research Center. (re: Kurt Vonnegut, 4/20/2005 ) |
Nanostructured Thermoelectric Devices (And John W. Campbell, Jr.) Nanostructured thermoelectric devices may have a wide variety of practical applications, generating electricity from heat; sounds a lot like John W. Campbell's thermelectrium from a 1935 story. (re: John W. Campbell, Jr., 4/7/2005 ) |
RepRap: Self-Replicating Rapid Prototyping A self-replicating, rapid prototyping machine developed at the University of Bath in England could transform the nature of manufacturing. People could produce everyday household objects in their own homes and put them together. (re: Philip K. Dick, 3/25/2005 ) |
Electrical Barrier To Keep Asian Carp Out Of Great Lakes A permanent electrical barrier will go into use in February to protect the Great Lakes from Asian carp that are moving up the Mississippi river. (re: Roger Zelazny, 1/13/2005 ) |
Niven's 'Black Power' Now Available In Infrared A team lead by University of Toronto scientist Ted Sargent has created a sprayable plastic composite that could harvest as much as thirty percent of the solar power that strikes a surface. (re: Larry Niven, 1/10/2005 ) |
Afroditikrassa World View LED Cluster Lamp Industrial design consultants Afroditikrassa have created a virutally weightless lighting fixture called 'world view.' It's pretty close to Frank Herbert's suspensor lamp from Dune. (re: Frank Herbert, 11/12/2004 ) |
The Smart Construction Site Of The Future The future construction site detailed in Bruce Sterling's Distraction is closer than you think. (re: Bruce Sterling, 9/28/2004 ) |
uFR-II Micro Flying Robot - (Lighter) Son of Micro Flying Robot Micro flying robot enthusiasts rejoice! Now you can revel in the (lighter) son of the uFR Micro Flying Robot - uFR-II. (re: Neal Stephenson, 8/18/2004 ) |
Fatal Vision Goggles - Simulate Impaired Driving Fatal Vision Simulator Goggles are designed to help you see poorly. They simulate the experience of driving while under the influence. (re: Rudy Rucker, 8/14/2004 ) |
Electronic Number Plate RFID Keeps Tabs On Vehicles A South African company now offers Electronic Number Plate RFID technology to keep track of your comings and goings in your car. (re: Robert Heinlein, 8/9/2004 ) |
Data Mining In Three Dimensions Graphical representation of information is not new; the first graphs appeared in the late eighteenth century. More recently, Sandia National Laboratories has created a data mining and visualization software suite that is able to accept information fr (re: William Gibson, 7/12/2004 ) |
Printing RFID Tags With Magic Ink Security technology like RFID devices, barcodes and smart cards are going to be smaller, more flexible and easier to manufacture responsibly thanks to a metal printing technology developed by QinetiQ Metal Printing. (re: Larry Niven/Steven Barnes, 7/7/2004 ) |
Deterministic Quantum-State Teleportation Achieved With High Fidelity Teleportation, the transfer of quantum states between widely separated atoms, was achieved by different research teams in Austria and the United States. (re: Clifford Simak, 6/17/2004 ) |
Zombie RFID Tags Arise To Face Privacy Advocates Zombie RFID tags may find their way into your pockets - causing some privacy advocates to breath a sigh of relief. (re: Neal Stephenson, 5/21/2004 ) |
Super-Photons Used For Good, Not Evil Super-photons may be able to provide a way to encode yet more information on CDs; more powerful computers and higher data security may also be possible. This is not your father's Thessian super-proton technology. (re: John W. Campbell, 5/19/2004 ) |
Talking Washing Machines Are More Accessible New washing machines are starting to look, well, more modern, with LCD displays and smooth, easy-to-clean panels. Unfortunately, that makes appliances much more difficult to use for people with vision problems, who would prefer large knobs. (re: William Gibson, 5/18/2004 ) |
Global Water Crisis An excellent article from The Scientist provides excellent details about the global water crisis, and some possible solutions. (re: Frank Herbert, 5/11/2004 ) |
Obtaining Unobtainium at DARPAtech 2004 DARPA searches for impossible materials - unobtainium - and is succeeding. (re: William Gibson, 4/10/2004 ) |
Tunnel Boring Machine B6 For Sale 580 tonne boring machine used to dig the Eurotunnel on sale now - perfect ornament for the garden. (re: Jerry Pournelle, 4/6/2004 ) |
StrikeAlert Personal Lightning Detector Gives Warning There are 8,600,000 lightning strikes per day on Earth - better get your StrikeAlert detector before the Mother of Storms comes to an open field near you! (re: John Barnes, 3/29/2004 ) |
NASA Debates Terraforming Mars NASA will hold a formal debate on terraforming Mars tomorrow night at its third Astrobiology Science Conference. (re: Larry Niven, 3/29/2004 ) |
Nanotechnology Grand Challenge Events Called For We've all had fun watching the recent Grand Challenge race run by DARPA. Let's help DARPA set up the nanotechnology Grand Challenge for very small vehicles. (re: Technovelgy.com, 3/17/2004 ) |
Philips FluidFocus: Variable Focus Fluid Lens Philips FluidFocus - a variable-focus lens system with no mechanical moving parts - is very similar to Frank Herbert's oil lens in Dune (1964). (re: Frank Herbert, 3/4/2004 ) |
Extreme 2003: Hydrothermal Vent Grind The National Science Foundation (NSF) is hosting students from around the world on a 23-day research expedition to the Pacific Ocean floor: Extreme 2003 - To the Depths of Discovery. (re: Peter Watts, 12/8/2003 ) |
Bush Signs Nanotech R&D Act At 2:10 P.M. EST this afternoon, President Bush is scheduled to sign the 21st Century Nanotechnology Research and Development Act into law. (re: Philip K. Dick, 12/3/2003 ) |
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