|
|
Home - Hi Tech world mews
| Italy in 'quantum bit' advance |
| Tiny magnets could help build computers of tomorrow |
(ANSA) - Rome, January 16 - An Italian-led team has made
an important advance on the way to developing a computer
based on quantum mechanics.
The new research, made by the S3 laboratory of the
National Institute for the Physics of Matter and Basel
University, aims to use tiny magnetic fields to control a
computer's basic information unit, the bit.
''The research is based on a new class of systems called
nanomagnets,'' S3 lab chief Elisa Molinari said.
''The result is new and important because now we can
control the evolution of time. This possibility makes these
devices, which measure billionths of a metre, excellent
candidates for building the quantum bits of the computers of
the future''.
The Italian side of the project was led by a young
researcher, Filippo Troiani, who like hundreds of others in
Italy does not have a full-time post.
''Filippo leads pioneering research, working with top
people around the world. We're proud of that and we hope to
be able to offer him and so many of his colleagues a way to
stay with us,'' Molinari said.
Italian Education Minister Mariastella Gelmini recently
unveiled plans to reverse a growing brain drain to foreign
universities.
Troiani's research paper, co-authored by Basel
University's Daniel Loss, appears in the latest edition of
the Physical Review Letters.
Troiani is one of many researchers competing on an
international level to be the first to make a quantum bit.
The ability to produce a quantum computer is still some
years ahead in the future, experts say.
When it is achieved, they say, it will revolutionise the
computer industry.
Quantum mechanical computation will be able to quickly
solve certain complicated calculations that on an ordinary
computer would take more than the lifetime of the universe to
calculate. |
News of 17 Jan 2009 15.25.21 in Hi Tech world mews
Home - Hi Tech world mews
| Tremonti sees crisis as a videogame |
| Monsters keep popping, economy minister says |
(ANSA) - Paris, January 8 - Dealing with the financial
crisis of the past months has been like playing a videogame,
Italian Economy Minister Giulio Tremonti said on Thursday.
''As soon as you slay one monster, and think you can
catch your breath, another one pops up and challenges you. In
this crisis I think I've battled at least seven monsters,''
the minister explained.
Tremonti made his remarks at a round-table discussion
organised by former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and
French President Nicolas Sarkozy dedicated to the topic ''New
World, New Capitalism''.
Looking at the financial crisis which exploded in the
latter half of 2008, Tremonti observed that this was the
product of a ''debt society'' created over the past few years
by an ''access to debt produced by a finance technology which
has degenerated the structure of capitalism''.
Speaking on the need for the free market to be governed
by effective rules, Tremonti made a reference to Adam Smith,
considered the father of capitalism, and said ''the market's
invisible hand over the past ten years has been a little too
visible''.
The 'invisible hand' was the metaphor which Smith used to
explain his theory that an individual pursuing his own
self-interest will tend to promote the good of the community.
During the round-table discussion Tremonti suggested that
along with Smith, students of economics should perhaps also
read Goethe's Faust and remember that ''borrowing credit is
much like making a pact with the devil''.
Returning to the metaphor of the invisible hand,
Tremonti added his own take and concluded: ''God made us with
two hands, so maybe we should use them both''. |
News of 08 Jan 2009 19.36.03 in Hi Tech world mews
Home - Hi Tech world mews
| Facebook Mafia row rumbles on |
| People who join superboss fan sites 'potential mobsters' |
(ANSA) - Palermo, January 7 - People who have joined
Mafia fan clubs on social networking site Facebook are
mobsters in the making and should be investigated, the
Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe's
transnational crime envoy Carlo Vizzini said Wednesday.
Thousands of people have signed up to fan club pages
dedicated to jailed Cosa Nostra superbosses Salvatore (Toto')
Riina and Bernardo Provenzano.
Reacting to a statement from Palermo public prosecutor's
office that it will not investigate mafioso pages because
they are not a criminal offence, Vizzini said that user's
personal details should still be collected before Facebook is
asked to remove the pages...>>>
|
News of 07 Jan 2009 18.15.04 in Hi Tech world mews
Home - Hi Tech world mews
| 'Mind- controlled house' opens |
| New advance in automated living showcased in Rome |
(ANSA) - Rome, December 24 - Italian scientists have
unveiled what they say is one of the first fully
'mind-controlled' houses in the world.
A special headset relays thoughts to a computer that
controls windows, doors, TVs, stereos and other domestic
appliances.
''The electrodes in the headset capture the brain waves
emitted when an object gets our attention,'' said Fabio
Babiloni of Rome's La Sapienza University, showing reporters
round the lab-based facility.
''A computer hooked up to the headset and the appliances
reads the impulse and sends the command to switch them on''.
The new system could be used to run robot servants, the
scientist said.
Babiloni, who has invented a robot hand, said the
so-called 'domotics' (home automation) residence would be a
boon for handicapped people, stroke victims or patients with
diseases like Alzheimer's or Parkinson's, removing much of
the need for caregivers.
''The European Space Agency has also voiced interest for
the possible use of a house of this kind in space,'' he
added.
Babiloni and Rome Tor Vergata University's Maria Grazia
Marciani leads a team which has worked in the 'domotics' and
robot field for ten years.
|
News of 25 Dec 2008 11.40.12 in Hi Tech world mews
Home - Hi Tech world mews
| Cellphone 'must' in child support |
| Divorced Dad must pay for son's 'need' |
(ANSA) - Rome, December 11 - Divorced parents must buy
cellphones for children as part of maintenance payments after
a marriage break-up, Italy's highest court said Thursday.
Upholding a lower court's verdict against divorced father
M.D., 51, the Cassation Court said maintenance should no
longer cover ''merely food and lodging''.
Cellphones and other forms of communications were
''daily needs'' that had to be met, the court ruled.
The high court judges rejected the father's claim that
his ex-wife Luisa and son Lorenzo were ''getting along
alright'' without such goods.
M.D was ordered to pay 10,000 euros to Luisa and Lorenzo
after skimping on payments for the last four years. |
News of 11 Dec 2008 21.02.35 in Hi Tech world mews
|
|
|
