Washington, October 16 : Michigan-based Fanuc Robotics claims to have developed a robot stronger than the KUKA Titan, which has been regarded as the world’s strongest to date.

London, Oct 16 : In a breakthrough study, European physicists have developed a unique computer circuit that can build itself - a development that can lead to self-assembling computers.

A team of European physicists has developed an integrated circuit that can build itself. The work, appearing in this week''s Nature1, is an important step towards its ultimate goal - a self-assembling computer.

Currently, computer chips are made by etching patterns onto semiconducting wafers using a combination of light and photosensitive chemicals.

Hong Kong - Phone users in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur are Asia's most enthusiastic senders of text messages, according to a survey released Thursday.

More than 97 per cent of mobile phone users in Singapore have sent text messages in the past month, followed by 96 per cent of people in Kuala Lumpur and 94 per cent of people in Seoul, the survey found.

More than 87 per cent of people in Melbourne and Sydney said they had sent texts in the past month while the region's lowest rate of text messaging were recorded by Hong Kong (85 per cent) and Bangkok (69 per cent).

The survey was conducted by the market research company Synovate, which studied the habits of more than 5,000 mobile phone users in seven Asian-Pacific markets.

San Francisco - Online retailer and auction house eBay posted a 5-per-cent increase in third-quarter earnings Wednesday but said that the stalling economy would leave its annual revenue well below expectations.

Following the announcement, the company's shares fell 12 per cent in extended trading.

The pioneering website reported net income of 492.2 million dollars, or 38 cents a share, compared with a loss of 935.6 million dollars, or 69 cents a share, in the same quarter a year ago, when the company took a large charge in connection with its acquisition of Skype, the online phone and text-messaging service.

Frankfurt - Sony is to offer its e-book reader, a replacement for paper books, in Germany from the spring of next year, the Japan-based media company said Wednesday at the Frankfurt Book Fair.

The Sony Reader device went on sale in the United States in 2006 and in Britain last month.

Sony said it would link with a German book wholesaler, Libri, and a retailer, Thalia, to market the device, which downloads books from personal computers.

London, Oct 15 : Using cheap lenses like those used in CD players, scientists have devised a new way to collide individual photons and atoms, which may revolutionise quantum networks, making them cheaper and easier to build.

Collision of single atom with a single photon is vital for operating many prototype quantum communications methods, including quantum networks and sending data using "spooky action at a distance".

The new technique uses cheap lenses to transfer data between light and matter.

And, according to physicists from Singapore and Germany, the new method that Quantum communications offers theoretically unbreakable security by encoding data into the quantum characteristics of photons.