Tech universe: Friday 19 November

The Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis AG is developing a pill containing a microchip. Photo / Thinkstock

DRUG SPIES: The Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis AG is developing an Ingestible Event Marker. To you and me that's a pill containing a microchip. The Proteus microchip collects biometric data such as heart rate, body temperature and body movements. Stomach acid activates the chip which sends the data to a patch on the patient's skin, and from there to a doctor via the Internet or a smartphone. Data can show if the drug's working as intended, and if the patient is taking the correct dosage at the right time. It sounds like the start of a very useful system. More at Physorg.

IT'S A TRAP: The ALPHA team (Antihydrogen Laser PHysics Apparatus) at CERN created anti-hydrogen atoms. That's routine these days. But for the first time they trapped some of the slowest atoms in superconducting magnetic mirrors - 38 atoms out of 10 million, to be precise. Now they can catch them they'll start experimenting on them. The slow ones are always the most vulnerable. More at CBC.

TIME WARP: Imagine if you could slow down a few photons to create a gap in the stream of light - pulling the threads of light apart. This gap would create a temporal void, making a few nanoseconds invisible. A team at Imperial College London are working on creating such gaps in light by clever use of bright light from a laser to speed up some light while slowing down the photons behind. The technique could allow for hidden messages or high-priority signals. So wait - some light will travel faster than light? Details at Kurzweilai.

FULL FATHOM ONE: The British company, WaterSpace, designs apartments and offices - that float. Their Floating Studio Flat has a bedroom, kitchen bathroom and lounge, along with a rooftop sun deck. Solar panels and a wind generator are optional. The apartments are designed for use on inland waterways. Like living in a caravan, only floatier. More at BornRich.

SEEING RED: Current techniques for detecting blood at a crime scene are toxic, disrupt the evidence and can produce false positives. A prototype camera from the University of South Carolina takes photos of blood that the eye can't see. Infrared light reflected off a surface passes though a transparent, 8-micrometre-thick layer of the protein albumin. The protein filters out irrelevant wavelengths, leaving a clear image of blood stains. Crime scene photos just got more weird. More at NewScientist.

- Miraz Jordan knowit.co.nz