Artificial Leaf
This year, MIT chemistry professor Daniel Nocera and his team made Mother Nature look lazy. Their “artificial leaf” – a credit card-size device that splits water into hydrogen and oxygen when exposed to sunlight – is 10 times more efficient than the real thing. Researchers are developing the technology as a potential solution for energy-starved areas in the developing world, predicting that just a gallon of water a day could provide enough hydrogen and oxygen to feed a fuel cell capable of powering an entire home.
Boston Marathon Rolling Registration
Everyone knows you need to be fast to qualify for the Boston Marathon. But then the rush to get a bib number turned into an unfair online race: spots for 2011 were snatched up in a record eight hours, leaving thousands of fleet-footed runners on the sidelines. So in September, the Boston Athletic Association instituted a two-week rolling registration, letting the fastest men and women by age group enter online first with times from their qualifying races. The system returns the marathon to its roots as an event for fast amateurs – and ensures the toughest racing will take place far from the information superhighway.
www.baa.org
Boston’s Problem Properties Task Force
The house at 102 Blue Hill Avenue in Roxbury didn’t look so bad from the outside. Its rap sheet told a different story. That’s right, its rap sheet. The house, raided by the cops in July, was the much ballyhooed first target of a policing initiative that pinpoints the places crimes are occurring (not just the people perpetrating them). The city’s Problem Properties Task Force is at work cross-referencing databases to build dossiers on trouble spots – combing city records to see whether buildings have shady histories involving everything from loud parties to criminal acts to back taxes. Data in hand, the city is targeting landlords with fines, hoping more of them make like the landlord of that place on Blue Hill: He’s reportedly cleaned up the building as well as his other properties.
www.cityofboston.gov/mayor/problemproperties
Community-Supported Art
