Technology Review: July/August 2006
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From the Editor
- The Alternative
- Catastrophic climate change is not inevitable. We possess the technologies that could forestall global warming. Why can't we use them?
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Features
- The Messenger
- The best scientists, scrutinizing atmosphere, ice, earth, and sea, say global warming is approaching a tipping point. But we still have time to keep it from reaching catastrophic levels.
- The Oil Frontier
- Don't expect the scarcity of fossil fuels to drive us toward alternative energy sources anytime soon: we're getting smarter about finding and extracting oil.
- The Dirty Secret
- Better technologies exist for extracting coal, a major source of carbon dioxide emissions. The challenge is getting people to adopt them.
- The Best Nuclear Option
- The U.S. Energy Department's fuel-recycling initiative could be a distraction from a more achievable goal: reviving today's nuclear industry and averting some carbon emissions in the short term.
- Redesigning Life to Make Ethanol
- Genetically engineered organisms that more efficiently produce ethanol from cheap and abundant sources of biomass, such as agricultural waste, could make it cost competitive.
- It's Not Too Early
- We know where we must go eventually. Why not head there now?
- The Un-Coal
- By investing in energy efficiency, we could vastly reduce carbon dioxide emissions and save money.
- Seeing Your Pain
- Learning to consciously alter brain activity through MRI feedback could help control pain and other disorders.
- Homo Conexus
- A veteran technology commentator attempts to live entirely on Web 2.0.
Photo Essay
- Brazil's Bounty
- Life is sweet for the world's leading ethanol exporter.
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Reviews
- Is Defeating Aging a Dream?
- A panel of independent scientist and technologists reviews criticism of Aubrey de Grey's antiaging proposals.
- The Terabyte Zone
- A thousand gigabytes of hard-drive space is a blessing. But how will we manage that much data?
- Vinge's Singular Vision
- Cyberfiction's founder returns with a preview of our virtual future.
Demo
- Biology and the Engineer
- Subra Suresh is borrowing tools from physics to understand nanoscale changes in diseased cells.
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Massachusetts Institute of Technology