ahaefner

Lawrence Berkeley National Lab | Berkeley, CA | Scientific Engineering Associate

We use computer vision and machine learning to improve gamma-ray radiation detection and mapping. For example, we have used these techniques to map contamination, in real-time, in 3-D in Fukushima, Japan. We integrate LiDAR and visual sensors with gamma-ray detectors on handheld and aerial platforms (UAVs).

We are looking for an engineer who is interested in working with computer vision sensors. This can include: building multi-sensor packages with small computers, designing and implementing algorithms and analyzing data. We use ROS, Linux and scientific Python. Some interest/background in physics could be helpful. https://lbl.taleo.net/careersection/2/jobdetail.ftl?lang=en&...

it might be an ode to boings skunkworks witch designed a lot of their specialized planes, like the SR-71 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skunk_Works

This is similar to nuclear gamma-ray imaging, such as in medical application, where the number of counts is inherently low because the high energy photons are more penetrating and thus escape the camera.

It was said that "Trane was the father, Pharoah was the son and I am the Holy Ghost" by Albert ayler, referring to three different saxophone players. I suppose this completes the religious metaphor

Commercial power reactors are very expensive initially (multiple billions). This is a huge barrier to entry for most power plants. So the thinking is if the size can be reduced so can the cost.

The military is interesting because they already have small reactors in submarines and ships. And they have access to the highest grade fuel because they don't have to follow power plant regulations. So it seems like if these modular reactors would be useful to them, they could easily adapt these reactors for land use.

This startup is hard to gauge because there's so few actual details about their design. For example, how are they going to use thorium as a fuel? You can't just use thorium without a strong neutron starter source or some other fuel engineering.

It's interesting that a lot of these instruments are electronic recreations of pre-existing instruments. As a saxophone player who has played an EWI, the electronic versions take time to learn and often end up feeling not as expressive.

Also their interface for tracking plays has gotten significantly worse. And you have to pay extra to get most of the same information you get for free from youtube.

Directions are routed away from the bridge while it's closed, so maybe they removed it for this reason.

To everyone bashing Intellectual Ventures, the key here is that TerraPower is a spinoff. They are becoming independent of IV precisely because they don't want to be a patent troll.

Also one LOL of having Bill Gates fund your nuclear company is you end up with the biggest Windows cluster for simulations.

Source: I'm a PhD student in nuclear engineering with friends working at TerraPower.

I saw a presentation about Blaze at PyData. The CEO of Continuum was the author of Numpy and said they are doing everything he would have done differently in Blaze.

Also, Blaze is attempting to abstract the concept of having huge arrays distributed across multiple systems, clusters, clouds, whatever. So imagine having large distributed arrays that you can easily perform computations on. Could be very powerful if it works as planned.