• New underwater robots mimic designs found in nature

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    In recent years, robotic underwater vehicles have become more common in a variety of industrial and civil sectors. Now, a new class of underwater robot has emerged that mimics designs found in nature. These “biomimetic” vehicles promise to lead to new underwater technologies that could help the oil and gas industry, underwater humanitarian demining, environmental monitoring, search and rescue operations, anti-terrorist activities, harbor surveillance, coastal security and fisheries management, and more.

  • Young engineers compete in underwater robotics race

    Student-built autonomous underwater vehicles will speed through the depths of a Navy pool in a battle for supremacy at the 16th International RoboSub Competition. The competition is being held this week (22-28 July). In addition to building autonomous underwater vehicles, teams are also responsible for creating Web sites and writing journal papers that outline their work.

  • Ben-Gurion University student team’s Hydro Camel competes in RoboSub Competition

    Today, there are many remotely operated submarines that handle important tasks, such as checking underwater pipelines, mapping underwater minefields, searching for locations to place communication cables, and searching for sunken vessels. These marine vessels, however, are limited by effective communication cables and require frequent human-operator contact. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev is developing a more accurate and effective autonomous, independently thinking underwater vessel that would revolutionize these and other tasks. The BGU entry in the RoboSub Competition is called Hydro Camel.

  • STEM education and U.S. national security

    Los Alamos National Laboratory director Charlie McMillan will be one of seventeen speakers at this year’s TEDxABQ. TEDxABQ is an independently organized event in Albuquerque, New Mexico, affiliated with the popular TED Talks series.McMillan will discuss the linkage between early education in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (known as STEM) and national security.

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  • Better teaching for inquiring minds

    Inquiry-based learning is an educational method centered on the investigation of questions, scenarios, or problems. It is seen by many as a positive alternative to traditional forms of instruction where students are required to simply memorize information.

  • Growing cybersecurity opportunities for young Americans

    With the growing number of cyberattacks on U.S. companies, government agencies, and critical infrastructure, and the likelihood that such attacks will only increase, there has been a corresponding increase in the number of cybersecurity programs and educational opportunities for young Americans.

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  • U California, Berkeley students win National Student Steel Bridge Competition

    The weekend of 31 May residents of Washington State watched as engineers began erecting a temporary steel bridge over the Skagit River, to replace the 160-foot span of a 4-lane bridge that had collapsed a week earlier, after being struck by an over-height truck. Just sixty miles away, on the campus of the University of Washington in Seattle, 620 civil engineering students erected their own temporary steel bridges in a competition to demonstrate their engineering skills. For the second consecutive year and for the second time in the past seven years, a team of students from the University of California, Berkeley captured the title as champions of the ASCE/AISC National Student Steel Bridge Competition (NSSBC).

  • Israel taps 10th graders’ cybersecurity skills to expand cybersecuity recruitment pool

    Israel has been subjected to a growing number of cyberattacks – and has itself used cyber-warfare against its adversaries. To make sure it stays ahead, Israel is accelerating its recruitment and development efforts in cybersecurity. Among other initiatives, the country is expanding the pool of potential cyberwarriors by going into high school classrooms to tap the cyber skills of tenth-graders.

  • Sandia Lab hosting conversations on engineering

    U.S. prosperity depends on effective use of engineering to turn scientific innovation into products that come rapidly to market and increasingly are made in the United States. Sandia Lab has launched a series of conversations  a aimed to help identify what the nation’s engineering community can do to make sure technical talent will be available in the future, prepare engineers for the twenty-first century, and secure U.S. leadership in a global economy which is increasingly focused on innovation.

  • DHS advises Michigan State U on football stadium safety

    By all accounts, Michigan State University’s basketball team has been doing better over the years than the school’s football team (just think Magic Johnson). The university wants to raise the profile of its football team, and is building a new, $24 million stadium — but DHS advised the university that the stadium’s north side stands are too close to the gas tanks and pumps which serve the school’s motor pool. The university is now moving the gas tanks to a new location.

  • N.C. university becomes first in state to offer homeland security degree

    There are 380 security-related academic programs in U.S. colleges, most of which are two-year programs. Campbell University, established in 1887, has become the first university in North Carolina to offer a bachelor’s degree program in homeland security, beginning this fall. The school says the new degree is a direct result of a rising interest in the field.

  • Sponsors: Immigration bill addresses visa flaws highlighted by the Boston bombing

    Lawmakers behind the bipartisan Senate immigration say bill directly addresses some of the security flaws that may have been exploited by the foreign student who helped Dzhokhar Tsarnaev dispose of evidence after the Boston Marathon bombings.

  • Schools do not offer students sufficient practical science experience

    New evidence shows that a worrying number of students are not experiencing a complete and authentic education in the sciences, due to a lack of resources for practical work. Secondary schools reported not having enough of some of the most commonly used equipment, such as microscopes, eye protection, and connecting leads for circuits. The research also shows that many secondary schools lack essential support from qualified technicians to carry out practical work.

  • NASA high school STEM challenge announces winning team

    NASA science challenge asked students in grades 7–12 either to re-design a shield to keep Webb telescope cold enough to “detect infrared light from faint sources such as distant galaxies and extrasolar planets,” or to re-design a mirror assembly “so that Webb telescope may produce images that are “sufficiently bright and sharp to look back in time to when galaxies were young.”

  • U.S. science teachers are not fully prepared for new science teaching standards

    New voluntary guidelines for science education were unveiled earlier this month by the advocacy group Achieve in collaboration with twenty-six states. The new standards call for more hands-on learning and analysis and cover fewer science topics, but in greater depth.A new report says, however, that America’s K-12 teachers are not fully prepared to meet a new set of science standards.