[Note: This comment comes from friend Jock Gill. Another take on the MIT solar news. DLH]

From: Jock Gill <jg45@mac.com>
Date: July 31, 2008 7:28:25 PM PDT
To: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne@warpspeed.com>
Subject: EETimes.com – MIT claims 24/7 solar power

This is very interesting.

<http://www.eetimes.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=209900956&cid=NL_eet>

We appear to me much closer to making our own electricity at home. Perhaps enough to power our transportation too. Getting 70% inefficient internal combustion engines off the road would be a very good thing indeed.

Jock

[Note: This item comes from friend Ed DeWath. DLH]

From: Edward DeWath <dewath@prodigy.net>
Date: July 31, 2008 2:56:27 PM PDT
To: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne@warpspeed.com>
Subject: Federal judge rules Bush’s aides can be subpoenaed

Federal judge rules Bush’s aides can be subpoenaed

July 31, 2008

WASHINGTON – U.S. District Court Judge John Bates on Thursday rejected President Bush’s contention that senior White House advisers are immune from subpoenas.

In his ruling, Judge Bates said there’s no legal basis for Bush’s argument.

Bates was appointed as a United States District Judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by President George W. Bush in December 2001.

<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080731/ap_on_go_ot/congress_contempt>

[Note: This comment comes from friend Bob Frankston. DLH]

From: “Bob Frankston” <Bob19-0501@bobf.frankston.com>
Date: July 31, 2008 7:00:06 PM PDT
To: “‘Dewayne Hendricks’” <dewayne@warpspeed.com>
Subject: RE: [Dewayne-Net] NIST Researchers Develop New Technique for Assessing Network Security

Does this mean they are encouraging perimeter security rather than anything smarter?

[Note: This item comes from reader Randall. DLH]

From: Randall Webmail <rvh40@insightbb.com>
Date: July 31, 2008 7:28:14 PM PDT
To: dewayne@warpspeed.com, johnmacsgroup@yahoogroups.com, dave@farber.net
Subject: Sounds like hype to me, but MIT acts like it’s Really Big News

MIT, Chesonis Foundation announce solar revolution

Goal: Bring the sun’s power to the people

April 22, 2008

Promising to transform solar power from a “boutique” option to an affordable, dependable, mainstream energy solution, MIT and the Chesonis Family Foundation today launched a “solar revolution” with the ultimate aim of making solar energy America’s primary carbon-free fuel.

The Solar Revolution Project (SRP), funded by a $10 million gift from the Foundation, will explore new materials and systems that could dramatically accelerate the availability of solar energy. The SRP will complement and interact closely with other large solar projects at MIT, creating one of the largest solar energy clusters at any research university.

The Chesonis gift will allow MIT to explore bold approaches that are essential for transforming the solar industry. Specifically, it will focus on three elements –capture, conversion and storage — that will ultimately make solar power a viable, near-term energy source.

“Solar is thought of as an ultimate energy technology off in the distant future. The goal of SRP is to move this timeframe nearer to the present. The SRP will make solar a practical alternative, by committing a 10-year timeframe for establishing the new base of scientific knowledge it will take to draw a market-competitive energy supply from the sun,” said Daniel Nocera, the Henry Dreyfus Professor of Energy and Professor of Chemistry at MIT, who will direct the SRP. “With SRP, think ’solar’ and think ‘now.’ This is the revolution that is implied in the project name.”

Professor Ernest Moniz, director of the MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI), said, “Climate change makes the search for more environmentally benign sources of energy urgent and hugely important. Many experts have concluded that solar energy is a key, if not the key answer to our global energy challenges in the long term.

“The Chesonis investment — large, flexible, empowering of highly creative MIT faculty and students — embodies this conclusion,” Moniz continued. “We applaud the vision, generosity and confidence in MIT that this extraordinary gift demonstrates.”

Most solar research focuses on known materials and systems, but, thus far, these approaches cannot be implemented on a large scale. The SRP will allow researchers to explore entirely new materials and systems that could transform solar power into a viable, widely deployed and affordable source of energy.

A unique feature of the SRP is its flexibility: The gift’s unrestricted funding is aimed at creating a “no holds barred” research environment that will inspire innovations in the field.

The SRP will initially support 30 energy fellowships for students on a range of solar-related studies, from the development of novel materials for energy conversion and storage to using solar energy to produce hydrogen fuel from water.

Each fellowship will span five years, which allows for significant continuity and greater impact. The gift from the Foundation will also help support an integrated study on the future of solar energy, building on the success of two earlier MIT interdisciplinary reports on the future of coal and of nuclear energy in a carbon-constrained world.

“We are at a breakpoint, both in energy supply and environmental consequences. Solar energy has enormous promise as the ultimate answer to our energy problems,” said Arunas Chesonis, benefactor of the Foundation. “Solar energy is widely distributed and the fuel cost for solar power is zero. It is our hope that by investing in the people at MIT and giving them the freedom to take risks in the lab, we will enable them to be true game-changers — advancing the state of the art to a point where solar power is cheaper and more reliable than electricity from coal.”

The Foundation will also contribute to the MITEI Energy Seed Fund Program (ESFP), which solicits and funds innovative energy proposals from across the MIT campus. The first round of solicitations for the ESFP (and the related Ignition Grant program for junior faculty) provided close to $2 million to fund 20 outstanding proposals. The Chesonis gift will provide an additional $500,000 to supplement funds from MITEI industry partners.

Other large solar projects at MIT include the Eni-MIT Solar Frontiers Center, the MIT-Fraunhofer Center for Sustainable Energy Systems, the Masdar Foundation solar project and a range of solar research grants to MIT from the U.S. Department of Energy and other federal agencies.

———–

MITEI is an Institute-wide initiative designed to help transform the global energy system to meet the challenges of the future. In its first full year of operation, MITEI has attracted more than $100 million from industry and public partners as well as private donors to fund critical energy research to enhance the environmental performance of conventional energy and enable a sustainable energy future through transformational technologies. The current MITEI program will also support more than 175 graduate energy fellows over the next five years to help develop the next generation of energy scientists, technologists and social scientists. For more information, please visit http://web.mit.edu/mitei/.

The Chesonis Family Foundation is a private philanthropic organization that targets environmental and energy research projects. The foundation is working to address global climate change by supporting high-risk, proof-of-concept technology research and providing funding that allows research to move from development to commercial deployment. The foundation’s benefactor, Arunas Chesonis, earned a Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1984 and is Chairman and CEO of PAETEC Holding Corp. (NASDAQ GS: PAET). The Chesonis Family Foundation is based in Cambridge, Mass.

A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk <http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/techtalk-info.html> on April 30, 2008 (download PDF): <http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/techtalk52-24.pdf>

<http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/chesonis-0422.html>

<http://tinyurl.com/5tdjjr>

[Note: This item comes from reader Jim Freebersyser. DLH]

From: Jim Freebersyser <jfree@bbn.com>
Date: July 31, 2008 5:40:05 PM PDT
To: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne@warpspeed.com>
Subject: Not sure whether to laugh or cry…

<http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2008-07-31-Congress-cellphones_N.htm>

Congress: No airplane cellphone calls

WASHINGTON (AP) — Cellphone calls on airplanes in flight are not only unsafe, they are obnoxious and they should be permanently banned, according to some members of the U.S. Congress.

Members of the House of Representatives, most of whom board airplanes almost every week, traded horror stories Thursday about their worst experiences with annoying fellow passengers who talk loudly on cellphones before takeoff and after landing. One lawmaker said his wife sat next to a woman who loudly discussed her sex life on the phone.

Another House member topped that with the passenger sitting him behind on one flight who got a “dear John” phone call from either his wife or sweetheart just before takeoff. The begging and pleading was just terrible to listen to, he said. Finally, with the plane ready to take off, a flight attendant had to threaten to have U.S. Marshals drag the man off the plane before he finally put his phone away.

[snip]

[Note: This item comes from friend Steve Goldstein. DLH]

From: Steve Goldstein <steve.goldstein@cox.net>
Date: July 31, 2008 2:42:10 PM PDT
To: dewayne@warpspeed.com (Dewayne Hendricks)
Subject: NIST Researchers Develop New Technique for Assessing Network Security

<http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Government/NIST-Researchers-Develop-New-Technique-for-Assessing-Network-Security/?kc=EWWHNEMNL073108EOAD>

NIST Researchers Develop New Technique for Assessing Network Security
By Brian Prince
2008-07-25

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology have developed a new technique using attack graphs and the National Vulnerability Database to help IT administrators gauge the security of their network.
Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology have developed a new analysis technique to help IT administrators assess security risk.
The patent-pending technique was developed by computer scientist Anoop Singhal and his research colleagues at George Mason University. Though NIST researchers weren’t available this morning to comment on their findings, Singhal and his team use attack graphs and the National Vulnerability Database in their assessment of network pathways.
“We analyze all of the paths that system attackers could penetrate through a network and assign a risk to each component of the system,” Singhal said in a statement. “Decision makers can use our assigned probabilities to make wise decisions and investments to safeguard their network.”
According to NIST, once inside a network’s firewall, a hacker can take a number of routes through the network to find a treasure-trove of confidential data. NIST researchers evaluate each route and assign it a risk based on the level of difficulty for the hacker. For example, in a simple system there is an attacker on a computer, a firewall, router, an FTP server and a database server, NIST officials explained. The goal for the attacker is to find the simplest path into the database server. Using attack graph analysis, NIST determines three potential attack paths and assigns an attack probability for each path in the graph based on the score in the NVD database.

Because it takes multiple steps to reach the goal, the probabilities of each component are multiplied to determine the overall risk, NIST officials said. The next step is for the researchers to expand their research to handle large-scale enterprise networks, officials added.

[Note: This item comes from reader Randall. DLH]

From: Randall Webmail <rvh40@insightbb.com>
Date: July 31, 2008 2:57:23 PM PDT
To: dewayne@warpspeed.com, johnmacsgroup@yahoogroups.com, dave@farber.net
Subject: Physical Fitness for Mouse Potatoes?

<http://www.scienceblog.com/cms/researchers-identify-drugs-enhance-exercise-endurance-17039.html>

Researchers have identified two drugs that mimic many of the physiological
effects of exercise. The drugs increase the ability of cells to burn fat and are
the first compounds that have been shown to enhance exercise endurance.

Both drugs can be given orally and work by genetically reprogramming muscle
fibers so they use energy better and contract repeatedly without fatigue. In
laboratory experiments, mice taking the drugs ran faster and longer than normal
mice on treadmill tests. Animals that were given AICAR, one of the two drugs,
ran 44 percent longer than untreated animals. The second compound, GW1516, had a
more dramatic impact on endurance, but only when combined with exercise.

Ronald M. Evans, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator who led the
study, said drugs that mimic exercise could offer potent protection against
obesity and related metabolic disorders. They could also help counter the
effects of devastating muscle-wasting diseases like muscular dystrophy. Evans
and his colleagues, who are at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies,
published their findings on July 31, 2008, in an advance online publication in
the journal Cell.

Concerned about the potential for abuse of the two performance-enhancing drugs,
Evans has also developed a test to detect the substances in the blood and urine
of athletes who may be looking for way to gain an edge on the competition.

In 2004, Evans and his colleagues genetically engineered mice that had altered
muscle composition and enough physical endurance to run twice as far as normal
mice. These “marathon mice” had an innate resistance to weight gain, even when
fed a high-fat diet. “We made these mice and they had low blood sugar, they
resisted weight gain, they had low fats in their blood. They were much healthier
animals,” Evans said. “And when we put them on a treadmill, the engineered mice
ran twice as far than normal mice – they transformed into remarkable runners.”

The scientists achieved these effects by modifying a gene called PPAR-delta, a
master regulator of numerous genes. Evans and his colleagues showed that by
enhancing PPAR-delta’s activity, they had shifted the genetic network in muscle
cells to favor burning fat over sugar as their energy source. But the effects
seen in the marathon mice were caused by a genetic manipulation that was present
in their bodies as their muscles were developing. Evans’s group began to wonder
whether they could duplicate these effects by turning on PPAR-delta in adult mice.

“We had shown that we could pre-program muscle using genetic engineering. If you
express this gene while the muscle is being formed, you can increase the amount
of non-fatiguing muscle fibers,” Evans says. “But what about reprogramming in an
adult? When all the muscles are in place, can you give a drug that washes over
the muscle for a few hours at a time and reprograms existing muscle fibers?
That’s a very different question.”

PPAR-delta has long been an attractive drug target because of its central role
in metabolism, so Evans and his colleagues had no shortage of chemical compounds
available to test. They began by testing a compound called GW1516. They treated
young adult mice with the drug for five weeks. “We measured gene changes and the
muscles looked like they were responding, so we knew the drug was working.”

Thus, while fully expecting the drug to dramatically increase endurance – Evans
says, “There was no change at all in running performance. Nothing — not even a
percent.”

Surprised by this spectacular failure, Evans and his colleagues decided to try a
different approach, based on real-life experience. “If you’re out of shape – and
most of us are – and you want to change, you have to do some exercise. The way
we reprogram muscle in adults is by training.”

[snip]

PROJECT TO REBUILD INTERNET GETS $12M, BANDWIDTH

A massive project to redesign and rebuild the Internet from scratch is inching along with $12 million in government funding and donations of network capacity by two major research organizations. Many researchers want to rethink the Internet’s underlying architecture, saying a “clean-slate” approach is the only way to truly address security and other challenges that have cropped up since the Internet’s birth in 1969. On behalf of the government, BBN Technologies Inc. is overseeing the planning and design of the Global Environment for Network Innovations, or GENI, a network on which researchers will be able to test new ideas without damaging the current Internet. The $12 million in initial grants from the National Science Foundation will go to developing prototypes for the GENI network.

<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080730/ap_on_hi_te/tec_techbit_rebuilding_the_internet>

Courtesy of the Benton Foundation <http://www.benton.org>
RSS Feed: <http://www.warpspeed.com/wordpress>

NEW YORK ADVISED TO STUDY BROADBAND ALTERNATIVES TO MUNICIPAL WI-FI

Technology consultants told New York officials today that a municipal Wi-Fi system there would be inadvisable, given the experiences of several other major cities. Representatives of Chicago-based Diamond Management and Technology Consultants Inc. suggested several other ways that the city could expand broadband Internet access. A study and recommendations by Diamond consultants will be reviewed over the coming week’s by the city’s Broadband Advisory Committee, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the New York City Council, city officials said today. The consultant’s study did find that New York is mostly on a par with other major U.S. cities regarding broadband adoption. However, it also noted that Internet usage remains limited among low-income New Yorkers and could be improved in industrial areas.

<http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9111121&source=rss_news50>

Courtesy of the Benton Foundation <http://www.benton.org>
RSS Feed: <http://www.warpspeed.com/wordpress>

Redlasso Suspends Video-Clipping Following Lawsuit
NBC Universal, Fox Television Stations filed suit vs. video-clip-sharing site.
By Alex Weprin — Broadcasting & Cable, 7/25/2008 12:41:00 PM
<http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6581804.html>