I’m not incredibly enthusiastic about the a robot-filled battlespace as many defense contractors are, but that doesn’t change the fact that Pentagon brass has been sold on the concept and is investing into this concept in a big way. Unmanned aerial vehicles, robots--you name it.

Having been to a fair number of nanotech/distech/emtech conferences over the years, the one thread that occurs with increasing frequency is how many researchers are going back to nature to answer questions about form, function, durability and efficacy.

Learn what one of the world's top scientist has to say about thin film photovoltaics and what you can expect in coming years.

As alternative energy production grows and “Made in America” energy becomes a hot topic, the real facts about technology get lost in the mix. Mostly it’s because the details—or as we call it, science—is far more complex than the cool concept it represents. For example, electricity is a very cool thing. But how we distribute it and how it’s actually produced makes heads loll and eyes drift shut.

Although it’s somewhat unusual to see the words “good idea” and “Dept of Homeland Security” in the same sentence, it actually appears to have happened last week.

Since NIN is a bi-weekly service in an immediate-response digital world, it seems a bit silly for me to wait until the next issue to give you the scoop from the MIT Emerging Technology Conference (http://www.technologyreview.com/emtech/08/) I’m heading to tomorrow.

This is very much the story of James Bond’s scientist buddy, Q, going public and selling his services to the highest bidder.

I was reading through some e-mails and journals recently, sorting through some of the scientific happenings in the nanotech world, and something started to resonate with me that played out fully when I was at the SPIE Photonics and Optics Conference in San Diego a couple weeks ago. Although there’s great interest from the investor side in nanotech, US industry isn’t moving very quickly into this space.

After a couple days at the San Francisco Money Show, where I did a Webcast event on nanotech investing, including my favorite hot stocks, I’m in lovely San Diego for the next few days attending a SPIE Photonic and Optics Conference. Sunday was the first day and here are my initial impressions. I’ll be blogging on At These Levels while I’m here if you want to read the day-to-day goings on.

Last issue I was fawning over HP’s potential release of the Fourth Passive Circuit technology, the memristor, for computers by next year. This issue isn’t exactly as directly beneficial to consumers as the memristor advance, but it’s equally revolutionary and significant in its own geeky kind of way.