Developing science, technology and innovation indicators: What we can learn from the past

The science-technology-innovation system is one that is continuously and rapidly evolving. The dramatic growth over the last 20 years in the use of science, technology and innovation (STI) indicators appears first and foremost to be the result of a combination of, on the one hand, the ease of computerized access to an increasing number of measures of STI and, on the other hand, the interest in a growing number of public policy and private business circles in such indicators. Such growing interest might be expected in societies that increasingly use organised science and technology to achieve a wide variety of social and economic objectives and in which business competition is increasingly based on innovation. On the basis of 40 years of indicators work, we argue that frontiers and characteristics of STI indicators that were important last century may no longer be so relevant today and indeed may even be positively misleading.     

Microwave frequency sensor for detection of biological cells in microfluidic channels

We present details of an apparatus for capacitive detection of biomaterials in microfluidic channels operating at microwave frequencies where dielectric effects due to interfacial polarization are minimal. A circuit model is presented, which can be used to adapt this detection system for use in other microfluidic applications and to identify ones where it would not be suitable. The detection system is based on a microwave coupled transmission line resonator integrated into an interferometer. At 1.5 GHz the system is capable of detecting changes in capacitance of 650 zF with a 50 Hz bandwidth. This system is well suited to the detection of biomaterials in a variety of suspending fluids, including phosphate-buffered saline. Applications involving both model particles (polystyrene microspheres) and living cells—baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) and Chinese hamster ovary cells—are presented.     

Device physics vis-à-vis fundamental physics in Cold War America: the case of quantum optics

Historians have convincingly shown the close ties U.S. physicists had with the military during the Cold War and have raised the question of whether this alliance affected the content of physics. Some have asserted that it distorted physics, shifting attention from fundamental problems to devices. Yet the papers of physicists in quantum electronics and quantum optics, fields that have been exemplary for those who hold the distortion thesis, show that the same scientists who worked on military devices simultaneously pursued fundamental and foundational topics. This essay examines one such physicist, Marlan O. Scully, with attention to both his extensive foundational studies and the way in which his applied and basic researches played off each other.