InventorSpot

The 2008 Nobel Prize for Chemistry was awarded today to three biochemists for the discovery and development of the green fluorescent protein, GFP, originating in the Aequorea victoria jellyfish. The three scientists - Osamu Shimomura, Martin Chalfie, and Roger Y. Tsien - contributed greatly to the study of cell biology, by identifying and marking proteins that contribute to illness and disease.

Today, in Stockholm, the Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to three Japanese physicists - Yoichiro Nambu, Makoto Kobayashi, and Toshihide Maskawa. In different studies, 14 years apart, these men contributed to the understanding of broken symmetries at the sub-atomic, or quark, level of matter and antimatter. The work of these men has led to an understanding of why everything in nature does not react symmetrically.

The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden announced today that the 2008 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine would be shared by the discoverers of HPV (human papilloma virus) that causes cervical cancer, and the HIV (human immunodeficiency virus), both sexually transmitted viruses.

The Wall Street Journal announced the recipients of its 2008 Technology Innovation Awards. The top award went to Vidacare, a U.S. firm, that created the EZ-IO device, a high-speed drill that delivers medications and other fluids directly into bones.

Phonevite™, an Internet-based telephone messaging system that debuted last year, has won Best of Show at the 2008 Technology Marketing Corporation's Internet Telephony Conference and Expo (ITEXPO) West, beating 150 other competitors for this prize. This already very popular service is just getting its recognition from the technology community.

Gold nanoparticles that are used today in medicine and other fields of technology, are broken down from gold compounds, or "gold salts," with synthetic chemicals, some of which are toxic -- bad for you, bad for the environment. A research team from the University of Missouri just made big news by finding a biocompatible and environmentally friendly method of obtaining gold nanoparticles through "green" chemistry.

If you like stories of personal struggle that end well, you will like this one. It's about an Iraqi citizen who fled Iraq with his family to avoid the death squads of Saddam Hussein, worked day and night to support himself through the University of Derby in the East Midlands of England, invented a device....

The Discovery Channel, the "number one non-fiction media company," has produced a TV series just perfect for inventors, designers, and wannabes of any age. It's called Prototype This and guess what it is not! It is NOT a reality show! Hurray!

Paper crafters and scrapbookers rejoice! Fiskars is coming out with a cleaner, crisper, time-saving method to do your stamping. Fiskar's new patent pending device is called the Push and Print Stamp Factory and it just won Best Of Class for Scrapbooking and Paper Crafting Innovation from the Craft and Hobby Association. Find out how it works...

The most functional bionic hand ever created for prosthetic use was developed by Touch Bionics, a British prosthetics company that just received the 2008 Royal Academy of Engineering MacRobert Award. The new bionic hand is called the i-LIMB Hand.