The quest for a cheap and robust fuel cell for future cars may be a bit closer this week to the "grail" moment. Scientists at the California Institute of Technology have announced that they're getting promising results with a new material that solves various limitations of previously tested fuel cells.

Tom Sterling's Watson Lecture

Carver Mead, a renowned inventor and longtime faculty member of the California Institute of Technology, has been named by President George W. Bush as a recipient of the National Medal of Technology. The announcement was made by the White House today.

PASADENA, Calif. - It's election morning. In the old days you would track down your voter's pamphlet to find your precinct, open a map, figure out how to get there, and determine how you would fit voting into your work day--before work, after work, on your lunch hour, etc. But today, you shuffle to your computer in your pajamas, cast your vote, and go start the coffee.

How far in the future is this scenario? It's a little closer than it once was, thanks to a $643,085 grant from the John S. and James L.

PASADENA, Calif. – With the presentation of the prestigious Jack Edward McKee Medal to Hui-Ming Hung, Joon-Wun Kang, and Michael R. Hoffmann, the Water Environment Federation (WEF) is recognizing the environmental importance of the three scientists' work.

The McKee Medal, named for the past WEF president and Caltech professor, was created to honor achievement in groundwater protection, restoration, and sustainable use. The medal is awarded for significant contributions to the field of groundwater science or engineering, published in any WEF journal.

PASADENA, Calif. -- Christopher Brennen, professor of mechanical engineering at the California Institute of Technology, is the first non-Japanese recipient of the Fluids Science Research Award, given by the Japanese Fluid Science Foundation.

The foundation was created in 1947 by Professor Fukusaburo Numachi and is currently managed by the Institute of Fluid Science at Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan. Tohoku University was founded in 1907 as the third Imperial University of Japan, and is among the most prestigious science and technology institutions in the world.

Caltech has entered the DARPA Grand Challege autonomous race.

Head says it all.

Four hundred years ago, a scientist could peer into one of the newfangled optical microscopes and see microorganisms, but nothing much smaller. Nowadays, a scientist can look in the latest generation of lens-based optical microscopes and also see, well, microorganisms, but nothing much smaller. The limiting factor has always been a fundamental property of the wave nature of light that fuzzes out images of objects much smaller than the wavelength of the light that illuminates those objects. This has hampered the ability to make and use optical devices smaller than the wavelength.

In an advance that holds promise for integrating previously disparate functions on a chip, applied physicists at the California Institute of Technology have created a disk smaller than the diameter of a human hair that can store light energy at extremely high efficiency.