THE MAGAZINE OF TECHNOLOGY INSIDERS 03.09 Disappearing Deterrent THOUSANDS OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS WILL SOON BE TOO OLD TO COUNT ON. HERE’S WHY FIXING THEM MAKES MORE SENSE THAN REPLACING THEM BRINGING PROSTHETIC ARMS INTO THE 21ST CENTURY YOUR PLUG-IN CAR: NOT SO GREEN AFTER ALL THE LASER KITTY TEASER AND OTHER PATENT NONSENSE www.spectrum.ieee.org volume 46 number 3 north american 03.09 UPDATE 11 FUSION FACTORY STARTS UP The US $4 billion National Ignition Facility opens for business. By Willie D. Jones 12 WILL WASHINGTON KICK-START THE U.S. BATTERY BIZ? 14 GAMING IN THE CLOUDS 15 A STOWAWAY MISSION TO THE MOON 16 SIGN LANGUAGE BY CELLPHONE 18 THE BIG PICTURE Here’s a big shocker! OPINION 7 SPECTRAL LINES In hard times, Google has lots of money for tilting at windmills. 10 FORUM Readers offer feedback on our January Winners & Losers—and a solution to RepRap’s self-reproduction problems. 18 25 REFLECTIONS Upgrading to a new computer is A LITTLE COVER STORY a necessary evil. By Robert W. Lucky TURBULENCE: By zapping model aircraft, 26 WHAT ABOUT DEPARTMENTS Lightning 4 BACK STORY Technologies is THE NUKES? An article in this issue has roots in the helping engineers The United States has added no new warheads to its nuclear arsenal meeting of two geeky kids 30 years ago. protect electronic in more than two decades. As the existing stockpile ages, a debate now systems on 6 CONTRIBUTORS real aircraft rages over how best to maintain its safety, reliability, and effectiveness from storms. as a deterrent. By Francis Slakey & Benn Tannenbaum 20 HANDS ON Building your own fusion reactor is 32 THE DEATH OF easier than you think. By Paul Wallich COVER: BUSINESS-METHOD PATENTS CAREERS BRYAN CHRISTIE 22 Working abroad can make you A U.S. appellate court has ended the decadelong run of the business- DESIGN a better engineer. By Susan Karlin THIS PAGE: method patent, and none too soon. By Steven J. Frank BOB O’CONNOR 23 It’s time for baseball—and 36 OPEN ARMS aerodynamics. By Susan Karlin Prosthetic-arm development needs to go open source. BOOKS By Jonathan Kuniholm 23 Technology is changing our brains. By Susan Karlin 42 HOW GREEN IS MY PLUG-IN? 24 How upstart IBM came to rule the The carbon footprint of a plug-in hybrid or a purely electric car video-game market. By Steven Cherry depends on the grid used to recharge it. By John Voelcker 24 TOOLS & TOYS The modern laser is the perfect stylus for 46 STOP THAT TRAIN your old vinyl albums. By Mark Anderson A simple electromechanical braking system is ready to replace the 68 THE DATA Rube Goldberg brakes that have been in use on freight trains for more In the rush to develop green technologies, than a century. You’d think the transition would be quick and easy. let’s not forget old-fashioned You’d be wrong. By Robb Mandelbaum cogeneration. By Prachi Patel-Predd WWW.SPECTRUM.IEEE.ORG MARCH 2009 • IEEE SPECTRUM • NA 1 volume 46 number 3 north american 03.09 WWW.IEEE.ORG/ THEINSTITUTE AVAILABLE 6 MARCH ON THE INSTITUTE ONLINE IEEE MEDAL OF HONOR GOES TO DRAM DEVELOPER IEEE Life Fellow Robert H. Dennard is this year’s recipient of the IEEE Medal of Honor, for his invention of single- transistor dynamic random-access memory and for developing scaling principles for integrated circuits. DRAM has become the standard for RAM and is used in most computers today. LEFT: KIM SHIFLETT/ NASA; RIGHT: MATTHEW NAGER WWW.SPECTRUM.IEEE.ORG AVAILABLE 1 MARCH ON SPECTRUM ONLINE SEEKING “TREASURES HIDDEN IN THE HEAVENS” The quest to answer the age-old question of whether there are other planets like ours will continue this month. NASA’s Kepler spacecraft [above] is scheduled to launch on 5 March from Cape Canaveral. The new planet hunter, which can observe 100 000 stars simultaneously, BUZZ PATROL will explore the structure and diversity of planetary systems and seek IEEE Member Alan Eynon is a mild- Earth-like planets in or near the habitable zone—the distance from a mannered signal-processing engineer, star where liquid water can exist on a planet’s surface. but his beekeeping hobby keeps people abuzz. PUBLIC VISIBILITY ONLINE FEATURES: ALSO ONLINE: PICKS UP STEAM PROGRAMMING FOR THE CLOUD: • Webcasts Ten months into IEEE’s Public Visibility Game developers are excited about • Podcasts Initiative, the program has attracted the possibilities of off-loading graphics • News news coverage in 10 countries and rendering to a supercomputer. • Blogs unveiled a revamped newsroom. Plus, • Videos THE THREE-WAY BATTLE: more and more members are signing • Jobs Texas Instruments, 3M, and Microvision are up to be IEEE technical experts. • Career Accelerator all vying to put a pico projector in the palm • IEEE Xplore® digital library of your hand. • Interviews DREAM ON: Listen every Thursday in March • Opinions Contains over 25% Renewable Resources for a new Dream Jobs profile podcast. • More! IEEE SPECTRUM (ISSN 0018-9235) is published monthly by The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. All rights reserved. © 2009 by The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc., 3 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10016-5997, U.S.A. The editorial content of IEEE Spectrum magazine does not represent official positions of the IEEE or its organizational units. Canadian Post International Publications Mail (Canadian Distribution) Sales Agreement No. 40013087. 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WWW.SPECTRUM.IEEE.ORG MARCH 2009 • IEEE SPECTRUM • NA 3 back story EDITORIAL EDITOR IN CHIEF Susan Hassler, [email protected] EXECUTIVE EDITOR Glenn Zorpette, [email protected] MANAGING EDITOR Elizabeth A. Bretz, [email protected] Geek Summer SENIOR EDITORS Harry Goldstein (Online), [email protected]; Jean Kumagai, [email protected]; Samuel K. Moore (News), [email protected]; Tekla S. Perry, [email protected]; Philip E. n a humid Saturday Ross, [email protected]; David Schneider, [email protected]; afternoon in late June William Sweet, [email protected] of 1978, a dark blue gas SENIOR ASSOCIATE EDITOR Steven Cherry (Resources), O [email protected] guzzler glides up to a dormitory at ASSOCIATE EDITORS Sally Adee, [email protected]; Erico Guizzo, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute [email protected]; Joshua J. Romero (Online), (RPI) in Troy, N.Y. It deposits Steve, [email protected]; Sandra Upson, [email protected] ASSISTANT EDITOR Willie D. Jones, [email protected] a bright high school junior from Fair SENIOR COPY EDITOR Joseph N. Levine, [email protected] Lawn, N.J., and a big trunk stuffed COPY EDITOR Michele Kogon, [email protected] with jeans and rock-concert T-shirts. EDITORIAL RESEARCHER Alan Gardner, [email protected] He looks around at the odd mix of EXECUTIVE PRODUCER, SPECTRUM RADIO Sharon Basco industrial architecture, abandoned They find parallels between William ASSISTANT PRODUCER, SPECTRUM RADIO Francesco Ferorelli, factory buildings, and manicured Golding’s Lord of the Flies and Joseph [email protected] ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANTS Ramona Gordon, [email protected]; lawns and wonders what people do Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. They Nancy T. Hantman, [email protected] for fun in such a place. have adventures and misadventures CONTRIBUTING EDITORS John Blau, Robert N. Charette, Along with 150 other high involving beer, Schedule I controlled Peter Fairley, Alexander Hellemans, David Kushner, Robert W. Lucky, Paul McFedries, Kieron B. Murphy, school students, Steve will be substances, and illegal fireworks, Carl Selinger, Seema Singh, John Voelcker taking courses and getting a including an episode involving all ART & PRODUCTION taste of what college is like. His three that nearly gets them kicked SENIOR ART DIRECTOR Mark Montgomery concern, amid this congregation out of the program and their RPI ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR Michael Solita of elite teenage scientific precocity, credits revoked. (So much for the ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR Brandon Palacio is that he may not manage to “too busy to get into trouble” theory.) PHOTO EDITOR Randi Silberman find someone whose idea of fun A year later, Steve goes off to DIRECTOR, PERIODICALS PRODUCTION SERVICES Peter Tuohy doesn’t necessarily involve an HP Princeton to major in chemistry EDITORIAL & WEB PRODUCTION MANAGER Roy Carubia programmable calculator. and Glenn to Brown for electrical SENIOR ELECTRONIC LAYOUT SPECIALIST Bonnie Nani WEB PRODUCTION COORDINATOR Jacqueline L. Parker Those fears are allayed a few days engineering. They keep up a steady MULTIMEDIA PRODUCTION SPECIALIST Michael Spector later, when he meets Glenn, from stream of letters and occasional Stratford, Conn. They have been sent visits, during one of which, in EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Susan Hassler, Chair; Marc T. Apter, Francine D. Berman, to RPI for much the same reasons Providence, R.I., in 1980, Steve Jan Brown, Raffaello D’Andrea, Stephen L. Diamond, other kids are sent to military decides to transfer to Brown, from Hiromichi Fujisawa, Kenneth Y. Goldberg, Susan Hackwood, Bin He, Erik Heijne, Charles H.