Topic: Personal Technology

On this week's Tech Nation the focus is on the recent International Biotech Conference, BIO 2010 from Chicago. We'll hear from Bob Klein, the BioHumanitarian of the Year, Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley, who was named BioGovernor of the Year, Wisconsin Governor Jim Boyle, and BIO's president, Jim Greenwood. David Ewing Duncan also reviews what he picked up trolling the hallways.

Adam Denton discusses his participation in the Race Across America, one of the most respected and longest running annual endurance events holding legendary stature the world over. Riding as part of the Sharp4Prostate team, Adam will use a number of technologies to assist in the race. He talks with Phil about both the physical preparation as well as the likely use of GPS, the web, and social media to assist.

In this conversation with Make Magazine's founder Dale Dougherty, host Jon Udell asks why our tradition of Yankee ingenuity went off the rails, how the social movement sparked by Make (and celebrated at Maker Faires) puts it back on track, and whether a next generation of mechanical and electronic hackers will wind up scratching more itches than just their own.

Dr. Moira Gunn visits with author, George Prochnik, to talk about his new book, In Pursuit of Silence: Listening for Meaning in a World of Noise, where he examines why we began to be so loud as a society, and what it is that gets lost when we can no longer find quiet.

The group discusses tablet-style computers, including the Entourage eDGe, comparing them with the newly released iPad. They also review various apps, as well as the App Store concept. In addition, they assess some recent JavaScript changes and issues.

As attempts to reform and improve the American health care system plod forward, little is said about giving patients more tools to manage their own health and wellness. Rajiv Mehta and Hugh Dubberly, applying their imagination as designers, suggest tools for patients to design their own treatment and improve personal well-being.

Greg Skibiski explains CitySense, a mobile app for the Blackberry and the iPhone that predicts movement over time by mapping observed behavioral similarities rather than just geography. In this presentation from the Where 2.0 Conference, Skibiski discusses how location data using SMS from carriers and various other sources is used to gain market insights and understand real world activity in aggregate, anonymously.

The 2009 presidential election was the most closely monitored election in US history, thanks in part to the efforts of tech entrepreneurs like David Troy. Troy speaks at the 2009 Emerging Communications Conference about how he and his teams were able to create the Twitter Vote Report, which allowed people to report on poll conditions, and the Inauguration Report '09, a first hand documentation of people's experiences at the 2009 presidential election.

Join Alex "Sandy" Pentland as he talks about the indoor spaces of the city and the answers that can be gleaned from human movements within the interiors of buildings. From the movement of bees to the layout of boardroom locations, software can be used to predict and prevent communication failures. Tracking organizational and social behavior through data analysis has the potential to improve and perhaps even change the world.

Broadband in the USA is considered to be anything above 200 kb/sec. In Japan and South Korea broadband is defined as 100 mb/sec and above. This Ecomm presentation by Benjamin Joffe discusses striking differences between the Western world's current technological capability and Asia's. From content infrastructure, to business models, to social networking, Joffe explores what can be learned from the Pacific rim's innovations.