tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-86839170935393330632024-03-05T08:05:17.409-08:00Science and Other Civilization InvestigationsThe research aims to produce valid information and must use reliable instruments that guarantee accurate and make it quantifiable and possible reproducibility. Allowing the exclusion or at least control prejudice of personal insights and trends that may distort the results.Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.comBlogger2115125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-79773857285411830582012-11-03T12:31:00.003-07:002012-11-03T12:31:50.653-07:00Were Dinosaurs Destined to Be Big? Testing Cope's RuleIn the evolutionary long run, small critters tend to evolve into bigger beasts -- at least according to the idea attributed to paleontologist Edward Cope, now known as Cope's Rule. Using the latest advanced statistical modeling methods, a new test of this rule as it applies dinosaurs shows that Cope was right -- sometimes.
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"For a long time, dinosaurs were thought to be the example of Cope's Rule," says Gene Hunt, curator in the Department of Paleobiology at the National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) in Washington, D.C. Other groups, particularly mammals, also provide plenty of classic examples of the rule, Hunt says.
To see if Cope's rule really applies to dinosaurs, Hunt and colleagues Richard FitzJohn of the University of British Columbia and Matthew Carrano of the NMNH used dinosaur thigh bones (aka femurs) as proxies for animal size. They then used that femur data in their statistical model to look for two things: directional trends in size over time and whether there were any detectable upper limits for body size.
"What we did then was explore how constant a rule is this Cope's Rule trend within dinosaurs," said Hunt. They looked across the "family tree" of dinosaurs and found that some groups, or clades, of dinosaurs do indeed trend larger over time, following Cope's Rule. Ceratopsids and hadrosaurs, for instance, show more increases in size than decreases over time, according to Hunt. Although birds evolved from theropod dinosaurs, the team excluded them from the study because of the evolutionary pressure birds faced to lighten up and get smaller so they could fly better.
As for the upper limits to size, the results were sometimes yes, sometimes no. The four-legged sauropods (i.e., long-necked, small-headed herbivores) and ornithopod (i.e., iguanodons, ceratopsids) clades showed no indication of upper limits to how large they could evolve. And indeed, these groups contain the largest land animals that ever lived.
Theropods, which include the famous Tyrannosaurus rex, on the other hand, did show what appears to be an upper limit on body size. This may not be particularly surprising, says Hunt, because theropods were bipedal, and there are physical limits to how massive you can get while still being able to move around on two legs.
Hunt, FitzJohn, and Carrano will be presenting the results of their study on Nov. 4, at the annual meeting of The Geological Society of America in Charlotte, North Carolina, USA.
As for why Cope's Rule works at all, that is not very well understood, says Hunt. "It does happen sometimes, but not always," he added. The traditional idea that somehow "bigger is better" because a bigger animal is less likely to be preyed upon is naïve, Hunt says. After all, even the biggest animals start out small enough to be preyed upon and spend a long, vulnerable, time getting gigantic.
Abstract: <a href="http://">https://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2012AM/webprogram/Paper211594.html</a>Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-20892527095460177162012-11-03T12:30:00.000-07:002012-11-03T12:30:04.244-07:00A New Order in the Quantum World: Using Laser Beams Scientists Generated Quantum Matter With Novel, Crystal-Like Properties<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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By using laser beams MPQ scientists generate quantum matter with novel, crystal-like properties.
Both high-valued diamond and low-prized graphite consist of exactly the same carbon atoms. The subtle but nevertheless important difference between the two materials is the geometrical configuration of their building blocks, with large consequences for their properties. There is no way any kind of material could be diamond and graphite at the same time. However, this limitation does not hold for quantum matter, as a team of the Quantum Many-Body Physics Division of Prof. Immanuel Bloch (Max-Planck-Institute of Quantum Optics and Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) was now able to demonstrate in experiments with ultracold quantum gases.
Under the influence of laser beams single atoms would arrange to clear geometrical structures. But in contrast to classical crystals all possible configurations would exist at the same time, similar to the situation of Schrödinger's cat which is in a superposition state of both "dead" and "alive." The observation was made after transferring the particles to a highly excited so-called Rydberg-state. "Our experiment demonstrates the potential of Rydberg gases to realise exotic states of matter, thereby laying the basis for quantum simulations of, for example, quantum magnets," Professor Immanuel Bloch points out. The experimental work was supported by theoretical model calculations performed in the group of Dr. Thomas Pohl (Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Dresden).
The experiment begins with cooling an ensemble of a couple of hundred rubidium atoms down to temperatures near absolute zero and catching the atoms in a light trap. The atomic cloud is then superimposed with a periodic light field -- a so-called optical lattice which provides an almost uniform filling in the central region of the trap. In the next step laser light is applied to transfer the atoms into a Rydberg-state in which the outermost shell electron is located at a huge distance from the atomic nucleus. As a result, the sphere of influence of these atoms is blown up, like a balloon, by a factor of about 10 000, reaching a comparatively "huge" diameter of several micrometres -- about the size of a tenth of the diameter of an average hair. These super-atoms now interact strongly via so-called van der Waals forces, which act over a long range.
For the Rydberg states chosen in the experiment, the interaction between the atoms is strongly repulsive, such that the atoms have to keep a minimum distance of several micrometers from each other. This mutual blockade leads to spatial correlations between the atoms such that, depending on the number of Rydberg-atoms, states with different geometrical configurations can emerge (see fig. 1). "However, we have to be aware that in our excited quantum system all geometrical orders are present at the same time. To be precise, all the excitation states form a coherent superposition," Dr. Marc Cheneau says, a scientist at the experiment. "This new state of matter is a very fragile, crystal-like formation; it exists as long as the excitation is sustained, and fades away once the beam is switched off."
As soon as the system undergoes an observation the superposition collapses into a specific geometric configuration of Rydberg-atoms, in analogy to the famous example of Schrödinger's cat which is found, once it is observed, either dead or alive. In a series of "snap shots" of such configurations the scientists revealed the different patterns of the individual excitation states. This is possible by using a special technique which images each Rydberg-atom directly with very high spatial resolution. "We observe the emergence of spatially ordered excitation patterns with random orientation, but a well defined geometry," Peter Schauß explains, who works at the experiment as a doctoral candidate. In order to recognize the fundamental structures the individual images are grouped according to the number of Rydberg-atoms. Typical microscopic configurations are shown in figure 2. Three atoms are arranged on an equilateral triangle, four or five atoms form quadratic or pentagonal configurations. The experimental data was in good agreement with numerical simulations of the many-body dynamics which were performed by the group of Dr. Thomas Pohl.
As far as the pattern of each individual excitation state is concerned the observations can be described classically. "In order to reveal the quantum physical behaviour of our system we investigated the time-dependent probabilities for the different excitation states, each characterized by a certain number of Rydberg-atoms," Peter Schauß says "Thereby we were able to discover that the dynamic of the excitation process is ten times as fast as in classical systems without blockade effects. This is a first indication that our system is indeed in a coherent quantum state, composed of different spatially ordered configurations."
A future challenge for the scientists is the deterministic preparation of Rydberg crystals with a well defined number of excitations. Combining the blockade effect with the single-atom addressing one could engineer quantum gates which can serve as an experimental toolbox for a variety of quantum simulations. Several Rydberg-atoms could be connected to a scalable quantum system for quantum information processing. Olivia Meyer-StrengNathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-20608470651289542372012-11-03T12:28:00.000-07:002012-11-03T12:28:40.474-07:00NASA Rover Finds Clues to Changes in Mars' Atmosphere<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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NASA's car-sized rover, Curiosity, has taken significant steps toward understanding how Mars may have lost much of its original atmosphere.
Learning what happened to the Martian atmosphere will help scientists assess whether the planet ever was habitable. The present atmosphere of Mars is 100 times thinner than Earth's.
A set of instruments aboard the rover has ingested and analyzed samples of the atmosphere collected near the "Rocknest" site in Gale Crater where the rover is stopped for research. Findings from the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instruments suggest that loss of a fraction of the atmosphere, resulting from a physical process favoring retention of heavier isotopes of certain elements, has been a significant factor in the evolution of the planet. Isotopes are variants of the same element with different atomic weights.
Initial SAM results show an increase of five percent in heavier isotopes of carbon in the atmospheric carbon dioxide compared to estimates of the isotopic ratios present when Mars formed. These enriched ratios of heavier isotopes to lighter ones suggest the top of the atmosphere may have been lost to interplanetary space. Losses at the top of the atmosphere would deplete lighter isotopes. Isotopes of argon also show enrichment of the heavy isotope, matching previous estimates of atmosphere composition derived from studies of Martian meteorites on Earth.
Scientists theorize that in Mars' distant past its environment may have been quite different, with persistent water and a thicker atmosphere. NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, or MAVEN, mission will investigate possible losses from the upper atmosphere when it arrives at Mars in 2014.
With these initial sniffs of Martian atmosphere, SAM also made the most sensitive measurements ever to search for methane gas on Mars. Preliminary results reveal little to no methane. Methane is of interest as a simple precursor chemical for life. On Earth, it can be produced by either biological or non-biological processes.
Methane has been difficult to detect from Earth or the current generation of Mars orbiters because the gas exists on Mars only in traces, if at all. The Tunable Laser Spectrometer (TLS) in SAM provides the first search conducted within the Martian atmosphere for this molecule. The initial SAM measurements place an upper limit of just a few parts methane per billion parts of Martian atmosphere, by volume, with enough uncertainty that the amount could be zero.
"Methane is clearly not an abundant gas at the Gale Crater site, if it is there at all. At this point in the mission we're just excited to be searching for it," said SAM TLS lead Chris Webster of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "While we determine upper limits on low values, atmospheric variability in the Martian atmosphere could yet hold surprises for us."
In Curiosity's first three months on Mars, SAM has analyzed atmosphere samples with two laboratory methods. One is a mass spectrometer investigating the full range of atmospheric gases. The other, TLS, has focused on carbon dioxide and methane. During its two-year prime mission, the rover also will use an instrument called a gas chromatograph that separates and identifies gases. The instrument also will analyze samples of soil and rock, as well as more atmosphere samples.
"With these first atmospheric measurements we already can see the power of having a complex chemical laboratory like SAM on the surface of Mars," said SAM Principal Investigator Paul Mahaffy of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "Both atmospheric and solid sample analyses are crucial for understanding Mars' habitability."
SAM is set to analyze its first solid sample in the coming weeks, beginning the search for organic compounds in the rocks and soils of Gale Crater. Analyzing water-bearing minerals and searching for and analyzing carbonates are high priorities for upcoming SAM solid sample analyses.
Researchers are using Curiosity's 10 instruments to investigate whether areas in Gale Crater ever offered environmental conditions favorable for microbial life. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, and built Curiosity. The SAM instrument was developed at Goddard with instrument contributions from Goddard, JPL and the University of Paris in France.
For more information about Curiosity and its mission, visit: <a href="http://">http://www.nasa.gov/msl</a> and<a href="http://"> http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl </a>.
You can follow the mission on Facebook and Twitter at: <a href="http://">http://www.facebook.com/marscuriosity</a> and <a href="http://">http://www.twitter.com/marscuriosity</a> .Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-26090886781807088152012-11-03T12:26:00.000-07:002012-11-03T12:26:01.768-07:00Our Solar System Is Not Quite as Special as Once Believed, New Research Suggests<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Some 4.567 billion years ago, our solar system's planets spawned from an expansive disc of gas and dust rotating around the sun. While similar processes are witnessed in younger solar systems throughout the Milky Way, the formative stages of our own solar system were believed to have taken twice as long to occur. Now, new research lead by the Centre for Star and Planet Formation at the Natural History Museum of Denmark, University of Copenhagen, suggests otherwise. Indeed, our solar system is not quite as special as once believed.
<b>Supergiant</b>
Using improved methods of analysis of uranium and lead isotopes, the current study of primitive meteorites has enabled researchers to date the formation of two very different types of materials, so-called calcium-aluminum-rich inclusions (or CAI's for short) and chondrules, found within the same meteorite. By doing so, the chronology and therefore overall understanding of our solar system's development has been altered. The study has just been published in the scientific journal Science.
4.567 billion years -- this is how far back we must travel to experience our nascent solar system. The researchers at the University of Copenhagen Centre for Star and Planet Formation took a closer look at the first three million years of the solar system's development by analysing primitive meteorites composed of a blend of our solar system's very oldest materials. In part, the study confirmed previous analyses demonstrating that CAI's were formed during a very short period of time. The new discovery is that the so-called chondrules were formed during the first three million years of the solar system's development as well. This stands in contrast with previous assumptions asserting that chondrules only started forming roughly two million years after CAIs.
Painting a new picture of the Solar System
"By using this process to date the formation of these two very different types of materials found in the same meteorite, we are not only able to alter the chronology of our solar system's historical development, we are able to paint a new picture of our solar system's development, which is very much like the picture that other researchers have observed in other planetary systems," says James Connelly of the Centre for Star and Planet Formation.
We aren't that special...
Showing that chondrules are as old as CAIs addresses a long-standing question of why chondrule formation should be delayed by up to 2 million years after CAIs. The answer -- it is not.
"In general, we have shown that we are not quite as unique as we once thought. Our solar system closely resembles other observable planetary systems within our galaxy. In this way, our results serve to corroborate other research results which indicate that earth-like planets are more widespread in the universe than previously believed," says Professor Martin Bizzarro, head of the Centre for Star and Planet Formation.
Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-20325248043792147922012-11-03T12:24:00.000-07:002012-11-03T12:24:09.330-07:00The 10 Silicon Valley Companies You Wish You Worked for (or Started)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The history of Silicon Valley is the history of digital technology. To become a part of that history, do you go to work for one of the giants — Apple, Google, Intel, HP, Oracle, Facebook? Or do you catch a wave that hasn't crested yet?
Longtime Silicon Valley venture capitalist turned Stanford faculty member and entrepreneur Andy Rachleff tells his students the best thing they can do is join a mid-size company that has proven its durability but is still growing rapidly. In a recent blog post on the website of his software-driven money management service Wealthfront, he writes:
You get more credit than you deserve for being part of a successful company, and less credit than you deserve for being part of an unsuccessful company. Success will help propel your career. At a fast-growing company, chances are good you’ll have a higher position two years after you join. At a slow-growth company, no matter how good a job you do, you won’t have the same opportunities to advance. When it comes time to leave the successful company, you’ll be able to write your own ticket.
Rachleff's advice is actually geared toward aspiring tech stars who are thinking about going to work at a startup. He says don't. But it sounds equally applicable to going to work for a giant company where you're in danger of becoming just another cog.
In our last post, we highlighted the 10 San Francisco tech companies you wish you worked for based on Rachleff's recommendations. They tended toward the fun and quirky. In Silicon Valley the geeks get serious. Rachleff says these 10 private companies, each with revenue between $20 million and $300 million, are among the best you could join to launch a successful career in tech. (Coming next: 10 tech companies you wish you worked for outside of California.)
Above: Arista Networks
<a href="http://">http://www.wired.com/business/2012/11/best-silicon-valley-tech-companies/</a>
Sun Microsystems' founding hardware engineer Andy Bechtolsheim started Arista in 2005 with partner David Cheriton to build networking switches to power the cloud. This year LinkedIn named Arista the top Bay Area startup for engineers.Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-60864922755415140452012-09-16T08:09:00.001-07:002012-09-16T08:09:43.527-07:00Nanoengineers Can Print 3-D Microstructures in Mere Seconds<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Nanoengineers at the University of California, San Diego have developed a novel technology that can fabricate, in mere seconds, microscale three dimensional (3D) structures out of soft, biocompatible hydrogels. Near term, the technology could lead to better systems for growing and studying cells, including stem cells, in the laboratory. Long-term, the goal is to be able to print biological tissues for regenerative medicine. For example, in the future, doctors may repair the damage caused by heart attack by replacing it with tissue that rolled off of a printer.
<b>Human biology</b>
Reported in the journal Advanced Materials, the biofabrication technology, called dynamic optical projection stereolithography (DOPsL), was developed in the laboratory of NanoEngineering Professor Shaochen Chen. Current fabrication techniques, such as photolithography and micro-contact printing, are limited to generating simple geometries or 2D patterns. Stereolithography is best known for its ability to print large objects such as tools and car parts. The difference, says Chen, is in the micro- and nanoscale resolution required to print tissues that mimic nature's fine-grained details, including blood vessels, which are essential for distributing nutrients and oxygen throughout the body. Without the ability to print vasculature, an engineered liver or kidney, for example, is useless in regenerative medicine. With DOPsL, Chen's team was able to achieve more complex geometries common in nature such as flowers, spirals and hemispheres. Other current 3D fabrication techniques, such as two-photon photopolymerization, can take hours to fabricate a 3D part.
The biofabrication technique uses a computer projection system and precisely controlled micromirrors to shine light on a selected area of a solution containing photo-sensitive biopolymers and cells. This photo-induced solidification process forms one layer of solid structure at a time, but in a continuous fashion. The technology is part of a new biofabrication technology that Chen is developing under a four-year, $1.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (R01EB012597). The Obama administration in March launched a $1 billion investment in advanced manufacturing technologies, including creating the National Additive Manufacturing Innovation Institute with $30 million in federal funding to focus on 3D printing. The term "additive manufacturing" refers to the way 3D structures are built layering very thin materials.
The Chen Research Group is focused on fabrication of nanostructured biomaterials and nanophotonics for biomedical engineering applications and recently moved into the new Structural and Materials Engineering Building, which is bringing nano and structural engineers, medical device labs and visual artists into a collaborative environment under one roof.Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-80194795103248746982012-09-16T08:08:00.002-07:002012-09-16T08:08:05.404-07:00Computer Program Can Identify Rough Sketches<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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First they took over chess. Then Jeopardy. Soon, computers could make the ideal partner in a game of Draw Something (or its forebear, Pictionary).
<b>Application software Graphical user interface</b>
Researchers from Brown University and the Technical University of Berlin have developed a computer program that can recognize sketches as they're drawn in real time. It's the first computer application that enables "semantic understanding" of abstract sketches, the researchers say. The advance could clear the way for vastly improved sketch-based interface and search applications.
The research behind the program was presented last month at SIGGRAPH, the world's premier computer graphics conference. The paper is now available online (http://cybertron.cg.tu-berlin.de/eitz/projects/classifysketch/), together with a video, a library of sample sketches, and other materials.
Computers are already pretty good at matching sketches to objects as long as the sketches are accurate representations. For example, applications have been developed that can match police sketches to actual faces in mug shots. But iconic or abstract sketches -- the kind that most people are able to easily produce -- are another matter entirely.
For example, if you were asked to sketch a rabbit, you might draw a cartoony-looking thing with big ears, buckteeth, and a cotton tail. Another person probably wouldn't have much trouble recognizing your funny bunny as a rabbit -- despite the fact that it doesn't look all that much like a real rabbit.
"It might be that we only recognize it as a rabbit because we all grew up that way," said James Hays, assistant professor of computer science at Brown, who developed the new program with Mathias Eitz and Marc Alexa from the Technical University in Berlin. "Whoever got the ball rolling on caricaturing rabbits like that, that's just how we all draw them now."
Getting a computer to understand what we've come to understand through years of cartoons and coloring books is a monumentally difficult task. The key to making this new program work, Hays says, is a large database of sketches that could be used to teach a computer how humans sketch objects. "This is really the first time anybody has examined a large database of actual sketches," Hays said.
To put the database together, the researchers first came up with a list of everyday objects that people might be inclined to sketch. "We looked at an existing computer vision dataset called LabelMe, which has a lot of annotated photographs," Hays said. "We looked at the label frequency and we got the most popular objects in photographs. Then we added other things of interest that we thought might occur in sketches, like rainbows for example."
They ended up with a set of 250 object categories. Then the researchers used Mechanical Turk, a crowdsourcing marketplace run by Amazon, to hire people to sketch objects from each category -- 20,000 sketches in all. Those data were then fed into existing recognition and machine learning algorithms to teach the program which sketches belong to which categories. From there, the team developed an interface where users input new sketches, and the computer tries to identify them in real time, as quickly as the user draws them.
As it is now, the program successfully identifies sketches with around 56-percent accuracy, as long as the object is included in one of the 250 categories. That's not bad, considering that when the researchers asked actual humans to identify sketches in the database, they managed about 73-percent accuracy. "The gap between human and computational performance is not so big, not as big certainly as it is in other computer vision problems," Hays said.
The program isn't ready to rule Pictionary just yet, mainly because of its limited 250-category vocabulary. But expanding it to include more categories is a possibility, Hays says. One way to do that might be to turn the program into a game and collect the data that players input. The team has already made a free iPhone/iPad app that could be gamified.
"The game could ask you to sketch something and if another person is able to successfully recognize it, then we can say that must have been a decent enough sketch," he said. "You could collect all sorts of training data that way."
And that kind of crowdsourced data has been key to the project so far.
"It was the data gathering that had been holding this back, not the digital representation or the machine learning; those have been around for a decade," Hays said. "There's just no way to learn to recognize say, sketches of lions, based on just a clever algorithm. The algorithm really needs to see close to 100 instances of how people draw lions, and then it becomes possible to tell lions from potted plants."
Ultimately a program like this one could end up being much more than just fun and games. It could be used to develop better sketch-based interface and search applications. Despite the ubiquity of touch screens, sketch-based search still isn't widely used, but that's probably because it simply hasn't worked very well, Hays says.
A better sketch-based interface might improve computer accessibility. "Directly searching for some visual shape is probably easier in some domains," Hays said. "It avoids all language issues; that's certainly one thing."
Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-85573108113128360712012-09-16T08:06:00.003-07:002012-09-16T08:06:36.869-07:00NASA Mars Rover Opportunity Reveals Geological Mystery: Spherical Objects Unlike Previously Found 'Blueberries'<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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NASA's long-lived rover Opportunity has returned an image of the Martian surface that is puzzling researchers.
<b>Exploration of Mars</b>
Spherical objects concentrated at an outcrop Opportunity reached last week differ in several ways from iron-rich spherules nicknamed "blueberries" the rover found at its landing site in early 2004 and at many other locations to date.
Opportunity is investigating an outcrop called Kirkwood in the Cape York segment of the western rim of Endeavour Crater. The spheres measure as much as one-eighth of an inch (3 millimeters) in diameter. The analysis is still preliminary, but it indicates that these spheres do not have the high iron content of Martian blueberries.
"This is one of the most extraordinary pictures from the whole mission," said Opportunity's principal investigator, Steve Squyres of Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. "Kirkwood is chock full of a dense accumulation of these small spherical objects. Of course, we immediately thought of the blueberries, but this is something different. We never have seen such a dense accumulation of spherules in a rock outcrop on Mars."
The Martian blueberries found elsewhere by Opportunity are concretions formed by action of mineral-laden water inside rocks, evidence of a wet environment on early Mars. Concretions result when minerals precipitate out of water to become hard masses inside sedimentary rocks. Many of the Kirkwood spheres are broken and eroded by the wind. Where wind has partially etched them away, a concentric structure is evident.
Opportunity used the microscopic imager its arm to look closely at Kirkwood. Researchers checked the spheres' composition by using an instrument called the Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer on Opportunity's arm.
"They seem to be crunchy on the outside, and softer in the middle," Squyres said. "They are different in concentration. They are different in structure. They are different in composition. They are different in distribution. So, we have a wonderful geological puzzle in front of us. We have multiple working hypotheses, and we have no favorite hypothesis at this time. It's going to take a while to work this out, so the thing to do now is keep an open mind and let the rocks do the talking."
Just past Kirkwood lies another science target area for Opportunity. The location is an extensive pale-toned outcrop in an area of Cape York where observations from orbit have detected signs of clay minerals. That may be the rover's next study site after Kirkwood. Four years ago, Opportunity departed Victoria Crater, which it had investigated for two years, to reach different types of geological evidence at the rim of the much larger Endeavour Crater.
The rover's energy levels are favorable for the investigations. Spring equinox comes this month to Mars' southern hemisphere, so the amount of sunshine for solar power will continue increasing for months.
"The rover is in very good health considering its 8-1/2 years of hard work on the surface of Mars," said Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager John Callas of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "Energy production levels are comparable to what they were a full Martian year ago, and we are looking forward to productive spring and summer seasons of exploration."
NASA launched the Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity in the summer of 2003, and both completed their three-month prime missions in April 2004. They continued bonus, extended missions for years. Spirit finished communicating with Earth in March 2010. The rovers have made important discoveries about wet environments on ancient Mars that may have been favorable for supporting microbial life.
JPL manages the Mars Exploration Rover Project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.
To view the image of the area, visit: <a href="http://">http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/mer/multimedia/pia16139.html</a>Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-61577656497815541682012-09-16T08:04:00.002-07:002012-09-16T08:04:51.875-07:00Scientists Differentiate Chemical Bonds in Individual Molecules for First Time Using Noncontact Atomic Force Microscopy<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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IBM scientists have been able to differentiate the chemical bonds in individual molecules for the first time using a technique known as noncontact atomic force microscopy (AFM).
<b>Scanning tunneling microscope</b>
The results push the exploration of using molecules and atoms at the smallest scale and could be important for studying graphene devices, which are currently being explored by both industry and academia for applications including high-bandwidth wireless communication and electronic displays.
"We found two different contrast mechanisms to distinguish bonds. The first one is based on small differences in the force measured above the bonds. We expected this kind of contrast but it was a challenge to resolve," said IBM scientist Leo Gross. "The second contrast mechanism really came as a surprise: Bonds appeared with different lengths in AFM measurements. With the help of ab initio calculations we found that the tilting of the carbon monoxide molecule at the tip apex is the cause of this contrast."
As reported in the cover story of the Sept. 14 issue of Science magazine, IBM Research scientists imaged the bond order and length of individual carbon-carbon bonds in C60, also known as a buckyball for its football shape and two planar polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which resemble small flakes of graphene. The PAHs were synthesized by Centro de Investigacion en Quimica Bioloxica e Materiais Moleculares (CIQUS) at the Universidade de Santiago de Compostela and Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) in Toulouse.
The individual bonds between carbon atoms in such molecules differ subtly in their length and strength. All the important chemical, electronic, and optical properties of such molecules are related to the differences of bonds in the polyaromatic systems. Now, for the first time, these differences were detected for both individual molecules and bonds. This can increase basic understanding at the level of individual molecules, important for research on novel electronic devices, organic solar cells, and organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). In particular, the relaxation of bonds around defects in graphene as well as the changing of bonds in chemical reactions and in excited states could potentially be studied.
As in their earlier research (Science 2009, 325, 1110) the IBM scientists used an atomic force microscope (AFM) with a tip that is terminated with a single carbon monoxide (CO) molecule. This tip oscillates with a tiny amplitude above the sample to measure the forces between the tip and the sample, such as a molecule, to create an image. The CO termination of the tip acts as a powerful magnifying glass to reveal the atomic structure of the molecule, including its bonds. This made it possible to distinguish individual bonds that differ only by 3 picometers or 3 × 10-12 meters, which is about one-hundredth of an atom's diameter.
In previous research the team succeeded in imaging the chemical structure of a molecule, but not the subtle differences of the bonds. Discriminating bond order is close to the current resolution limit of the technique and often other effects obscure the contrast related to bond order. Therefore the scientists had to select and synthesize molecules in which perturbing background effects could be ruled out.
To corroborate the experimental findings and gain further insight into the exact nature of the contrast mechanisms, the team performed first-principles density functional theory calculations. Thereby they calculated the tilting of the CO molecule at the tip apex that occurs during imaging. They found how this tilting yields a magnification and the very sharp images of the bonds.
This research was funded within the framework of several European projects including ARTIST, HERODOT, CEMAS, the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and the Regional Government of Galicia.
Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-54297245808976962752012-08-25T11:52:00.001-07:002012-08-25T11:52:32.323-07:00Mysterious Maya Calendar & Mural Uncovered<object data="http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/sites/video/swf/ngplayer_v2.3.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="609" height="375" seamlesstabbing="false" allowfullsecreen="true" id="ngplayer" name="flashObj"><param name="movie" value="http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/sites/video/swf/ngplayer_v2.3.swf"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><param name="scale" value="noscale"><param name="wmode" value="opaque"><param name="menu" value="false"><param name="quality" value="best"><param name="bgcolor" value="#000000"><param name="name" value="ngplayer"><param name="flashvars" 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Sun God Temple Reveals Maya Beliefs<object data="http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/sites/video/swf/ngplayer_v2.3.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="500" height="307" seamlesstabbing="false" allowfullsecreen="true" id="ngplayer" name="flashObj"><param name="movie" value="http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/sites/video/swf/ngplayer_v2.3.swf"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><param name="scale" value="noscale"><param name="wmode" value="opaque"><param name="menu" value="false"><param name="quality" value="best"><param name="bgcolor" value="#000000"><param name="name" value="ngplayer"><param name="flashvars" value="adenabled=&adprogramid=4a67dd6268de7&caption=%3Cp%3EJuly%2020,%202012%E2%80%94Archaeologists%20in%20Guatemala%20have%20uncovered%20a%20series%20of%20masks%20and%20a%20newfound%20temple%20believed%20to%20honor%20the%20Maya%20sun%20god,%20both%20of%20which%20may%20reveal%20more%20about%20Maya%20beliefs.%3C/p%3E&img=http://video.nationalgeographic.com/exposure/core_media/ngphoto/image/56986_1_610x343.jpg&permalink=/video/news/history-archaeology-news/guatemala-maya-sun-god-vin/&share=false&restricted=false&siteid=syndicatedplayer&slug=http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/data/xml/guatemala-maya-sun-god-vin.smil&vtitle=New%20Sun%20God%20Temple%20Reveals%20Maya%20Beliefs&cuepoints=&vwidth=500&vheight=307&autoplay=false&"></object>Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-11156863056273783042012-08-25T11:48:00.001-07:002012-08-25T11:48:16.991-07:00Mars Rover's "Seven Minutes of Terror"<object data="http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/sites/video/swf/ngplayer_v2.3.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="609" height="375" seamlesstabbing="false" allowfullsecreen="true" id="ngplayer" name="flashObj"><param name="movie" value="http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/sites/video/swf/ngplayer_v2.3.swf"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><param name="scale" value="noscale"><param name="wmode" value="opaque"><param name="menu" value="false"><param name="quality" value="best"><param name="bgcolor" value="#000000"><param name="name" value="ngplayer"><param name="flashvars" value="adenabled=&adprogramid=4a67dd6268de7&caption=%3Cp%3EJuly%2031,%202012%E2%80%94NASA%20has%20planned%20one%20of%20the%20most%20complicated%20spacecraft%20landings%20ever%20attempted%20for%20the%20Curiosity%20rover's%20touchdown%20on%20August%206%20at%20about%201:30%20am.%20ET.%3C/p%3E%3Cp%3EThe%20complex%20procedure%20involves%20the%20use%20of%20the%20largest%20supersonic%20parachute%20ever%20built%20and%20a%20%22sky%20crane%22%20to%20lower%20the%20rover%20onto%20the%20Martian%20surface.%20%22If%20any%20one%20thing%20doesn't%20work%20just%20right,%22%20says%20one%20engineer,%20%22it's%20game%20over!%22%3C/p%3E&img=http://video.nationalgeographic.com/exposure/core_media/ngphoto/image/57409_1_610x343.jpg&permalink=/video/news/space-technology-news/mars-curiosity-rover-vin/&share=false&restricted=false&siteid=syndicatedplayer&slug=http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/data/xml/mars-curiosity-rover-vin.smil&vtitle=Mars%20Rover's%20%22Seven%20Minutes%20of%20Terror%22&cuepoints=&vwidth=609&vheight=375&autoplay=false&"></object>Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-11893656090674078992012-08-25T11:46:00.001-07:002012-08-25T11:46:33.782-07:00Rubber Robot Can Change Colors<object data="http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/sites/video/swf/ngplayer_v2.3.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="609" height="375" seamlesstabbing="false" allowfullsecreen="true" id="ngplayer" name="flashObj"><param name="movie" value="http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/sites/video/swf/ngplayer_v2.3.swf"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true"><param name="scale" value="noscale"><param name="wmode" value="opaque"><param name="menu" value="false"><param name="quality" value="best"><param name="bgcolor" value="#000000"><param name="name" value="ngplayer"><param name="flashvars" value="adenabled=&adprogramid=4a67dd6268de7&caption=%3Cp%3EAugust%2016,%202012%E2%80%94Researchers%20at%20Harvard%20University%20have%20created%20a%20flexible%20robot%20that%20can%20change%20colors%20to%20hide%20from%20animals%20and%20people.%20The%20camouflaging%20system%20may%20be%20useful%20in%20studying%20animal%20behavior%20and%20other%20subjects%20where%20stealth%20is%20an%20advantage.%3C/p%3E&img=http://video.nationalgeographic.com/exposure/core_media/ngphoto/image/58368_1_610x343.jpg&permalink=/video/news/space-technology-news/flexible-robot-vin/&share=false&restricted=false&siteid=syndicatedplayer&slug=http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/data/xml/flexible-robot-vin.smil&vtitle=Rubber%20Robot%20Can%20Change%20Colors&cuepoints=&vwidth=609&vheight=375&autoplay=false&"></object>Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-46657880882304095922012-08-25T11:42:00.002-07:002012-08-25T11:42:28.877-07:00ONE GREEN THING BOTH PARTIES AGREE ON<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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If there's one thing Democrats and Republicans can agree on it's pedal-powered buses, seriously!
Humana, Inc. will provide 20 pedal-powered buses from Freewheelin for both parties National Conventions in Charlotte, N.C. and Tampa F.L., respectively, in the coming weeks.
What is a pedal-powered bus? Think Fred Flintstone's car, but bigger and green. The buses can hold eight people, along with a driver, that will pedal along the special trails at the conferences as well as popular areas in both cities.
The idea behind this was to provide a fun, environmentally friendly, and healthy way for visitors to get around. Humana's Chairman and CEO Mike McCalister said in a press release, "Whether it's a pedal bus, bicycle, hand-cycle or unicycle, pedaling is good for the body, the mind and the environment."
The shaded vehicles are estimated to save one pound of carbon dioxide from being emitted into the air and burn between 140 to 380 calories per rider. Freewheelin first started as a bike-sharing initiative on the health insurance company's Louisville K.Y., campus in 2007, which was then replicated at the 2008 political conventions.
The Republican National Convention starts next week on Aug. 27-30 in Tampa, Florida. The Democrats meet up in Charlotte, North Carolina Sept. 2-6. If you're planning to attend and want to catch a ride, find a representative on site to register.Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-61323445022546996592012-08-25T11:41:00.001-07:002012-08-25T11:41:06.078-07:00VAPORIZING PLANETS IN THE NAME OF SCIENCE<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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One sure-fire way to grab an audience's attention is to vaporize a planet, amirite? We saw the destruction of Vulcan in Star Trek, the end of Krypton in the Christopher Reeves-era Superman, while the Death Star vaporized Alderaan in Star Wars: A New Hope.
As for Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams went all in, vaporizing the Earth right off the bat, all because an alien race known as the Vogons want to make way for a hyperspatial express route, leaving poor Arthur to roam about the Milky Way in his bathrobe.
But can you really vaporize a planet? According to the latest computer simulations by a couple of planetary scientists in St. Louis, you betcha! As outlined in their new paper in The Astrophysical Journal, Bruce Fegley and his colleagues (Katharina Lodders and Laura Schaefer) mathematically constructed a couple of model "Super-Earths" and put them through a series of atmospheric simulations.
The object wasn't really to study how to destroy the Earth. Fegley et al were trying to learn more about the kinds of atmospheres most likely to be found on Super-Earths -- i.e., exoplanets with masses that are more than that of Earth but less than that of Neptune, while still being rocky in nature, instead of, say, a gas giant.
Having detailed knowledge of likely chemical compositions could help astronomers who hunt for such planets find them. And one way of gaining that knowledge is to build computer models of Super-Earths and vaporize them.
Most exoplanets within that size range that have been found are gaseous in nature, because they orbit so close to their host stars that any rocky stuff gets melted. (How Stuff Works has an excellent summary of the various techniques astronomers use to hunt for exoplanets.)
For instance, using photometry, astronomers can detect an exoplanet as it transits the host star, because of predictable periodic dimming of a star's brightness as the planet momentarily blocks its light. Astronomers can also determine the chemical composition of said planet's atmosphere because the star's light gets filtered through that atmosphere -- think of it as stellar spectroscopy.
This, in turn, provides clues as to the planet's density, because the gases in the atmosphere likely came about because of vaporized rock. So it would be nice to have tidy simulated models to compare with the measured spectra of actual exoplanets.
One model Super-Earth had a continental crust just like our Earth, dominated by granite, while the other simulated Earth's composition before its crust formed, when it was mostly bulk silicate. (Water is the key ingredient in getting Earth today from that precursor Earth. Without it, our planet's crust would more closely resemble Venus.)
Then they plugged in the likely surface temperatures of observed Super-Earths, ranging from between 270 to 1700 degrees Celsius, just to see what would happen to the atmosphere. "The vapor pressure of the liquid rock increases as you heat it, just as the vapor pressure of water increases as you bring a pot to boil," Fegley explained via press release. "Ultimately this puts all the constituents of rick into the atmosphere."
In both models, the atmospheres would likely be mostly steam and carbon dioxide. Once the Super-Earths achieved temperatures above 760 degrees Celsius, there would also be sulfur dioxide. Think an especially steamy Venus.
And at temperatures higher than 1430 degrees Celsius, the uber-heated rock would produce silicon monoxide vapor. Even exoplanetary atmospheres have "weather," so should a "storm front" move through at those extreme temperatures, the simulations showed that the silicon monoxide could condense and produce "pebble rain."
Crank the temperature really, really, high, and you wouldn't just vaporize the Earth's crust and mantle. Theoretically, at least, you could destroy the entire planet. "You're left with a big ball of steaming gas that's knocking you on the head with pebbles and droplets of liquid iron," said Fegley. "But we didn't put that into the paper because the exoplanets the astronomers are finding are only partially vaporized."
Or maybe they just didn't want to give the Vogons any bright ideas.Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-85053082173214818192012-08-25T11:39:00.001-07:002012-08-25T11:39:24.216-07:00ALIEN ROBOTS THAT LEFT THEIR MARK ON MARS: PHOTOS<a href="http://news.discovery.com/space/photos-man-made-marks-mars-120824.html"></a>Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-13570204622990655942012-07-16T08:50:00.001-07:002012-07-16T08:50:35.967-07:00NASA's new Mars picture<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The US space agency NASA has recently pieced together a panoramic view from the camera on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity, calling it the "next best thing to being" on the Red Planet.
Here's The Most Stunning Photo of Mars The World Has Ever Seen
A TextureCam analysis of a Mars image is able to distinguish rocks from soil.
Future Planetary Rovers May Make Their Own Decisions In this undated image provided by NASA, Mars Rover Opportunity catches its own late-afternoon shadow in a view eastward across Endeavour Crater on Mars. The rover used a panoramic camera between about 4:30 and 5:00 p.m. local Mars time to record images taken through different filters and combined into this mosaic view. Most of the component images were recorded during the 2,888th Martian day, or sol, of Opportunity's work on Mars, which corresponds to March 9, 2012 on Earth. The view is presented in false color to make some differences between materials easier to see, such as the dark sandy ripples and dunes on the crater's distant floor. Opportunity has been studying the western rim of Endeavour Crater since arriving there in August 2011.
In this undated image provided by NASA, Mars Rover Opportunity catches its own late-afternoon shadow in a view eastward across Endeavour Crater on Mars. The rover used a panoramic camera between about
A close-up of the sunset on Sol 24 as seen by the Imager for Mars Pathfinder was released by the Jet Propulsion Labratory August 27. The red sky in the background and the blue around the Sun are approximately as they would appear to the human eye but the color of the Sun itself is not correct -- the Sun was overexposed in each of the 3 color images that were used to make the picture. The true color of the Sun itself may be near white or slightly bluish.
Mars Mars
A portion of the west rim of Endeavour crater sweeps southward in this color view from NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity released by NASA August 10, 2011. This crater has a diameter of about 14 miles (22 km). This view combines exposures taken by Opportunity's panoramic camera (Pancam) of the rover's work on Mars August 6, 2011. Opportunity arrived at the rim during its next drive on August 9, 2011. Endeavour crater has been the rover team's destination for Opportunity since the rover finished exploring Victoria crater in August 2008. Endeavour offers access to older geological deposits than any Opportunity has seen before. The lighter-toned rocks closer to the rover in this view are similar to the rocks Opportunity has driven over for most of the mission. However, the darker-toned and rougher rocks just beyond that might be a different type for Opportunity to investigate. The ground in the foreground is covered with iron-rich spherules, nicknamed "blueberries," which Opportunity has observed frequently since the first days after landing. They are about 0.2 inch (5 millimeters) or more in diameter. REUTERS/NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell/ASU/Handout (UNITED STATES - Tags: SCI TECH) FOR EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NOT FOR SALE FOR MARKETING OR ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS. THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. IT IS DISTRIBUTED, EXACTLY AS RECEIVED BY REUTERS, AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS
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Unrelenting winter nights and endless summer days. Temperatures that can plummet to 120 below or more. Snow, ice, and rock. There are few environments on earth more hostile than the frozen Antarctic wastelands. But even with winds of up to nearly 200 mph, it’s not impossible for people to survive in the coldest place on the planet.
In fact, humans are able to live in almost every world climate, driest deserts and densest jungles included—and it helps if you’ve got the right kind of shelter.
With permanent bases from countries all over the world, there are a number of approaches to building design in the harsh Antarctic region. Construction company Misawa Homes, which built most of the Antarctic facilities for the Japanese government’s Showa Station, opted for single-shell housing technology — useful when trying to keep out some of the coldest temperatures on earth.
On the other end of the climate spectrum, rainforests demand a much different approach to adaptive construction. One house in the outskirts of São Paulo, Brazil, is specially built to its jungle environment. The Iporanga “tree house” stands three stories tall, is partially wrapped in glass walls, and is tightly nestled into the forest, with the trees all but scraping the windows. The house, with its modest use of concrete and steel, plays chameleon by blending into the leaves which surround it.
Frozen Wasteland Cocoons
East Ongul Island, Antarctica
Outdoors, the thermometer reads 80 below and the winds whirl at 120 mph. Indoors, it’s toasty warm. The ultimate in form following way behind function, these Antarctic boxes are also wrapped in a “single shell,” with features to withstand the most unforgiving climactic conditions on the planet. With a design based on the company’s wooden-panel adhesion system, the polar dwellings are built to take an estimated 100 years of Antarctic punishment.
Iporanga Jungle Tree House
Near São Paulo, Brazil
Chimps have got it figured out: if you’re going to live in a rainforest, it’s better to be perched up in the trees. Brazilian architecture company Nitsche Arquitetos Associados designed this home in the thick forest outside São Paulo in 2006.
Five bedrooms on the top level of this three-story home provide both a high lookout from which to survey the surrounding jungle and privacy due to the height. But the main level is unquestionably the main attraction of the home, with a hyper-modern living room, dining room and kitchen. Structural elements, such as I-beams, are as exposed as the residents within. Though much of the home is made of steel, glass and concrete, the house never feels out of place, thanks to the way in which outside foliage plays a central role in the design scheme.
Rondolino Residence
Near Scotty's Junction, Nevada
Nottoscale, a San Francisco-based architectural company, used its own prefab building system to put together this one-bedroom, 1,200-square-foot desert house. Situated on a 40-acre lot, the home is completely dwarfed by its surroundings and looks every bit like the prefab home (with a modern sensibility) that it is. But the home isn’t the point – the location is.
“Isolation is much of the beauty of the property,” says the firm’s website. Another beautiful aspect? Its environmental efficiency. The desert dwelling is heated with a hydronic radiant system and features high-performance insulation. The home’s minimalist approach includes a simple 900-square-foot deck.
Hof House
Skakafjördur Fjord, Iceland
Located 60 miles south of the Arctic Circle, this sturdy home efficiently protects its residents from outside elements. Built on an estate that includes a church, barn and a cowshed, the home is built with natural and recycled construction materials such as cedar and concrete walls designed to visibly age according to the weather.
Geothermal and solar sources heat the entirety of the home. The grass turf on the roof, which was salvaged from some of the ground on which the home was built, isn’t the only material the architects reused: stone from the old house was cut to pave ground surfaces outside the new one, and old telegraph poles were used for building windows. The home was designed by Icelandic architectural firm Studio Granda.
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<a href="https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&ik=0869f42dad&view=att&th=13833acb7cfc258d&attid=0.7&disp=emb&zw&atsh=1" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left:1em; margin-right:1em"><img border="0" height="434" width="620" src="https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&ik=0869f42dad&view=att&th=13833acb7cfc258d&attid=0.7&disp=emb&zw&atsh=1" /></a></div>Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-47662027495826901602012-07-08T12:24:00.002-07:002012-07-08T12:24:53.045-07:00The BlackBerry, Trying to Avoid the Hall of Fallen Giants<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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FORGET the Union — what’s the state of the BlackBerry?
Research in Motion, maker of BlackBerry smartphones and tablets, sent its co-chief executives packing last week and replaced them with Thorsten Heins, who had been RIM’s chief operating officer. How would he characterize his employer?
“We make the best communications devices in the world,” said Mr. Heins, who met with editors and reporters from The New York Times on Friday.
Not everyone feels the same way. Over the last year, RIM’s share price has plunged 75 percent. The company once commanded more than half of the American smartphone market. Today it has 10 percent.
RIM has two, maybe three ways forward.
The first — the one that Mr. Heins is clearly aiming for — is a triumphant comeback after a near-death experience. Think Apple and its iMac. RIM is on the verge of upgrading its PlayBook operating system — now with, among other things, e-mail, a feature that the original PlayBook bafflingly lacked — and will release the BlackBerry 10 OS this year.
Behind Door No. 2 is a gradual decline and diminution as rivals like Apple, Google and Microsoft devour most of the market; to some degree, they already have. BlackBerry would keep the scraps — a small but dedicated following of corporate and government customers who want its proprietary messaging and security features.
Then there is the third option: oblivion. The road of progress is littered with the corpses of fallen titans. Objects that once seemed as indispensable as the companies that made them have been mercilessly superseded — as seen below. And RIM ought to know: with mobile devices like the BlackBerry 957, it helped to extinguish the pager era.
SONY WALKMAN (1979-2010) Before the Walkman, “personal audio” meant holding a transistor radio to your ear. Sony’s invention created an entire category of devices and helped make the company the technology leader of the 1980s. New models (Thinner! Auto-reverse!) were eagerly anticipated, the LP was relegated to the attic and tender moments spent listening to mix tapes from that certain someone proliferated across teenage bedrooms. Sony seemed incapable of putting a foot wrong. It successfully moved the brand into compact discs with the Discman, then bought record labels and movie studios to bring about that illusory marriage of technology and content. When the digital revolution hit, Sony was too beholden to its proprietary formats, as well as to the inertia inside its media companies. Enter Apple and the iPod.
PAGERS (BORN 1951) At first, pagers were attached to people who worked in fields where lives were on the line. That usually meant doctors, though the group expanded in the late 1980s to include drug dealers. Early beepers displayed only numbers, giving rise to a numerical lexicon that included codes like 911 (call me back immediately) and 07734, which resembles “hello” when read upside down. Pagers briefly gained fame in early 1990s hip-hop, showing up in songs like “Skypager,” by a Tribe Called Quest. The pager’s fall was attributable to the disruptive and destructive powers of another technology: the mobile phone. Why beep when you can talk? And a pager message is so tiny that it makes a tweet look like “The Iliad.” The beeper does live on, in limited circles: its network remains more reliable than cell networks, making it useful to E.M.S. and other rescue workers.
PALM PILOT (1997-2007) Filofax brought personal organizers to their analog apogee in the early ’90s, but Palm brought them into the digital age. Palm Pilots were dazzling when they first appeared: all of your contacts, calendars and notes in one slim, pocket-size device. A touch screen, which required a stylus, made navigation easy. And you could add software, bought through an online store. Want a Zagat guide to go along with your personal data? No problem. In later years, Palm even added telephone features, creating a compelling, all-in-one gadget. Despite boardroom dramas that affected the company’s name and its ownership, Palm’s reputation as a source of innovative hardware and software endured until Jan. 9, 2007. Why that date? That’s when Apple introduced the iPhone.
POLAROID INSTANT CAMERAS (1948-2008) Edwin Land’s invention of instant-developing film in 1948 put a darkroom inside a handheld camera. That achievement gave his Polaroid Corporation a distinct advantage over traditional film cameras. By 1980, Polaroid was selling 7.8 million cameras a year in the United States — more than half of all the 15 million cameras, instant and traditional, sold that year. In 1985, it won a major patent-infringement suit, forcing Kodak to abandon its own instant-camera efforts. The victory was short-lived. The late ’80s brought the rise of the digital camera. By 2000, digital cameras began appearing on cellphones, placing cameras in millions of pockets. Polaroid declared bankruptcy for the first time in 2001 and stopped making instant film in 2008. Kodak declared bankruptcy on Jan. 19.
ATARI 2600 (1977-c.1984) It wasn’t the first game console, but the Atari 2600 brought video games into the home and popular culture. Over its life span, more than 30 million were sold. Pong, Combat, Pitfall and Frogger soaked up children’s afternoons. Then came the PC, which could play games and do much more. Atari rushed out games, assuming that its customers would play whatever it released. They didn’t. Millions of unsold games and consoles were buried in a New Mexico landfill in 1983. Warner Communications, which bought Atari in 1976 for $28 million, sold it in 1984 for no cash.
New York TimesNathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-38776773456908097202012-07-08T12:23:00.000-07:002012-07-08T12:23:08.768-07:00Egypt begins restoring ancient boat near pyramidsIn this Thursday, June 23, 2011 file photo, an Egyptian and Japanese team of scientists …
CAIRO (AP) — Archaeologists on Monday began restoration on a 4,500-year-old wooden boat found next to the pyramids, one of Egypt's main tourist attractions.
The boat is one of two that were buried next to the Pharaoh Khufu, spokesmen for a joint Egyptian-Japanese team of archeologists said. The boats are believed to have been intended to carry pharaohs into the afterlife.
Khufu, also known as Cheops, is credited with building the Great Pyramid of Giza, the largest of the pyramids. Khufu, son of Snefru, was the second ruler of the 4th Dynasty around 2680 B.C. and ruled Egypt for 23 years.
Both boats, made from Lebanese cedar and Egyptian acacia trees, were originally discovered in 1954. One of the boats is on display at a museum near the pyramids.
The second boat, which is now undergoing the restoration, remained buried. It is thought to be smaller than its sister ship, which is about 140 feet (43 meters) long.
The head of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, Mustafa Amin, said Egyptologists began taking samples of the wood for restoration on Monday.
"The boat was found in a complete shape, intact and in place," he said, adding that the focus now is on taking samples of the wood.
He said Egyptologists are studying "the different components and fungus in the wood in order to find the most sufficient and advanced way to work on the wood."
Last year in June, a team of scientists lifted the first of 41 limestone slabs each weighing about 16 tons to uncover the pit in which the ancient ship was buried, said Sakuji Yoshimura, professor from Japan's Waseda University.
At the time, experts said restoration would likely take about four years and that at its completion, the boat would be placed on display at the Solar Boat Museum near the pyramids, which routinely attract millions of tourists and boost one of Egypt's most important industries.
The team had initially thought the vessel would be safer left underground than exposed to pollution, but evidence showed that pollution, water and insects had invaded the boat's chamber.
A $10 million grant from Waseda University has helped in preparing the ship's excavation process.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://l1.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/dBme4S822cw60MF.Sa9dMg--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9aW5zZXQ7aD00MjQ7cT04NTt3PTYzMA--/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ap_webfeeds/441f8c030363f60ef00e6a706700f418.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left:1em; margin-right:1em"><img border="0" height="424" width="630" src="http://l1.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/dBme4S822cw60MF.Sa9dMg--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9aW5zZXQ7aD00MjQ7cT04NTt3PTYzMA--/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ap_webfeeds/441f8c030363f60ef00e6a706700f418.jpg" /></a></div>Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-14023880961499042802012-07-08T12:21:00.000-07:002012-07-08T12:21:40.667-07:00Facebook’s Got a Reputation Problem: Harris Poll<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Nearly 850 million people use Facebook each month and roughly 480 million people use it every day. With a user rate like that and an upcoming $75 to $100 billion initial public offering, one might think Facebook is not only a highly visible company, but also one of Corporate America's most reputable.
But that's not really the case, according to the findings discovered by Harris Interactive. The company recently conducted its 13th annual Reputation Quotient Study, which measures companies' reputation with consumers.
In performing the survey, Harris first asked 17,000 people to chose the companies that are most visible to them on a daily basis. The respondents were then asked to rate the top 60 most visible companies on wide rage of attributes, including emotional appeal, products and services, social responsibility, vision and leadership, workplace environment and financial performance.
Apple bumped Google for the number one spot as the most reputable company in America, followed by Coca-Cola, Amazon.com and Kraft Foods. (See: Apple Ranks #1 With Consumers as J&J Tumbles in Harris Poll: Big Banks Come in Last)
But Facebook did not even make its way onto the most visible list of companies for consumers to rank, which is surprising for a company that has a shocking number of users and plans to go public. So how can this be? Well, it turns out that the public fails to recognize the social networking website as an actual corporation. Most people see Facebook rather as a tool, service or a channel for communication, says Robert Fronk, executive vice president for Harris Interactive.
While Facebook did not make the list this year, unlike last year, Harris still rated the company on its reputation. Facebook received a reputation rating bordering between fair and good, falling short of very good and excellent. The company's reputation waned in 2012 because 25% of the general public holds a negative perception of the company on a wide-rage of issues, including trust and respect. Those feelings are in line with the countless privacy concerns facing the company.
In terms of Facebook's shortcomings, here's what the study found:
People do not trust Facebook to do the right thing if faced with a problem.
People do not believe Facebook maintains high ethical standards.
People do not believe Facebook is sincere in its communications.
People do not believe Facebook is transparent in its communications.
Why does reputation matter anyway?
"One of the reasons companies want to build reputation is so that they can over time build equity so that when a crisis comes along, when they need to influence a particular stakeholder they have build up some of that equity," says Fronk. "And right now Facebook has an equity gap."
As mentioned, Facebook is set to go public in the coming months. But it turns out that only 7% of the general public would purchase shares in the company. Seventeen percent said they definitely would not. And 0% of the general public would recommend the stock to someone else.
"When you are going to be a public corporation there is a burden on you, there is an expectation for you to communicate a little bit more," says Fronk. "What the public is looking for are companies who communicate sincerely, with a certain amount of transparency and honesty and on those measures right now Facebook also has a serious gap."
Tell us what you think! Do you think Facebook has a good reputation? Would you buy stock in the company?Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-46128534666962184442012-07-08T12:20:00.000-07:002012-07-08T12:20:39.614-07:00Shark devours another shark whole (Photo)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Photo courtesy Tom Mannering
National Geographic has released this soon-to-be classic photograph of one shark eating another shark whole.
The photo comes from Daniela Ceccarelli, of Australia's Research Council Center of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies. Ceccarelli was working with fellow researcher David Williamson on conducting a "fish census" off Great Keppel Island, part of the country's Great Barrier Reef. That's when Ceccarelli thought she spotted a brown-banded bamboo shark hanging out near the ocean's floor.
"The first thing that caught my eye was the almost translucent white of the bamboo shark," Ceccarelli told National Geographic in an email. Instead, as Ceccarelli moved in for a closer look she noticed a camouflaged wobbegong shark emerging from seclusion with the same bamboo shark partially wedged inside its jaws.
"It became clear that the head of the bamboo shark was hidden in its mouth," she said. "The bamboo shark was motionless and definitely dead."
As the New Scientist explains, Wobbegongs, aka carpet sharks, are silent predators, waiting at the bottom of the ocean floor for their pray to pass by. And as stunning as this photo may be, it's not uncommon for Wobbegongs to devour such large meals. Like several kinds of snakes, the Wobbegong has a dislocating jaw and rearward-pointing teeth that help it consume disproportionately large prey.
Although Wobbegongs bite humans with some regularity, these usually aren't actual attacks where the shark is hunting for prey. Rather, these bites tend to be more of a defensive reflex after the shark itself has been assaulted, usually by someone unintentionally stepping on it.
While shark attacks were down in the U.S. last year, deaths from shark bites more than doubled worldwide with 12 reported deaths all happening outside of the U.S. However, Florida still led the overall national count for most attacks, with 11 of the 29 attacks reported inside the U.S.
"We had a number of fatalities in essentially out-of-the-way places, where there's not the same quantity and quality of medical attention readily available," George Burgess, director of the Shark Attack File, told Gannett. "They also don't have histories of shark attacks in these regions, so there are not contingency plans in effect like there are in places such as Florida."Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-62067095673222227342012-07-08T12:19:00.000-07:002012-07-08T12:19:40.145-07:00Strange sea creature on South Carolina coast ID’d as Atlantic sturgeon<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This mysterious sea creature is actually a sturgeon. Click photo for more images. (Photo: Facebook)Something strange washed ashore on Folly Beach in South Carolina this past weekend. The beast had some wondering if it was some sort of new species.
Be not afraid, land dwellers. According to AOL's Pawnation, the freakishly large creature may look alien, but it is harmless. A veterinarian from a South Carolina aquarium identified the fish as a sturgeon. The Atlantic sturgeon can grow to 15 feet in length and weigh over 800 pounds.
It won't win any beauty contests, but the Atlantic sturgeon has a lot more to fear from humans than we do from it. The Atlantic sturgeon was recently placed on the endangered species list. According to a February article from the Washington Post, the Atlantic sturgeon is a popular target for caviar. Limits have now been placed on the number that can be caught.Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-90897783095651685792012-07-08T12:18:00.000-07:002012-07-08T12:18:38.798-07:00Google puts legally blind man behind the wheel of its self-driving car<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://">http://newstotalk.com/google-self-driving-car-puts-legally-blind-man-behind-the-wheel/</a>
Google's experiment to build a self-driving Toyota Prius has already logged hundreds of thousands of miles with only one known fender bender. To tout its potential, Google put a legally blind man behind the wheel and filmed the quotidian yet touching results shown above. What we still don't know is: Who would have been responsible if something had gone wrong?
There's no denying the impact of the video, or the idea that a self-driving car could aid people -- like driver/rider Steve Mahan -- whose mobility has been curbed by disability regain a portion of freedom. Several automakers and parts suppliers, including Volkswagen, General Motors and Continental, have experiments underway to automate some driving scenarios, to research how it could improve safety and fuel economy.
But there's a few things not noted in Google's push, starting with the phrase "self-driving." The Prius used by Google doesn't pick its own locations, and it still needs a human operator; even in Nevada, which has approved self-driving cars for the street, two people must be inside the car at all times, one of which can take control in emergencies. (Google says Mahan's drive was "carefully programmed.")
While technology has advanced, many basic questions remain unanswered, and most experts say any builder of an autonomous vehicle sold to the public could face a massive amount of legal liabilities. With federal agencies arguing that driver distraction poses such a threat that cellphones and moving navigation screens should be limited, a self-driving car would be the ultimate proof of driver distraction. Any good traffic lawyer filing suit after a crash with a self-driving vehicle would immediately use its presence as proof that the owner's habits ran to ignoring the road -- whether the system was on or not. And the web of radar and sensors used in all self-driving experiments remains far from foolproofNathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8683917093539333063.post-47713276298165555492012-07-08T12:17:00.000-07:002012-07-08T12:17:19.051-07:00Cool Jobs You’ve Never Heard OfTechnically, the recession is over, and on paper, there has been positive job growth for months. Unfortunately, “technically” and “on paper” don’t cut it for people who have been out of work for a long time. For the long-term unemployed, it’s time to start thinking outside of the box and looking for work that falls outside of the parameters of the everyday.
What follows is a list of jobs that are obscure, unheard-of or otherwise out of the ordinary. Some of them pay well, some have salaries that are a closely guarded secret and some look like so much fun that the salary is almost beside the point.
Gold Stacker
T<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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he United States Bullion Depository — better known as Fort Knox — is not the largest gold repository in the United States. That distinction belongs to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in lower Manhattan, where approximately $194 billion worth of the trapezoidal gold bars are stored.
Occasionally, those bars will need to be moved, and gold stackers are the people who do it. Each 27-pound bar has to be moved manually, and the repetitive strain is so significant that they work in teams so shifts can relieve one another.
Bed Tester
Rob Melnychuk/Digital Vision/Getty ImagesNo matter who you are or what you do for a living, you occasionally have days where you’d like nothing better than to blow off work and stay in bed. Some people have taken that urge and parlayed it into a career as a bed tester.
This job involves bouncing on beds to test comfort. It may sound cushy, but it’s serious business to professional bed tester Natalie Thomas, who works for the Premier Inn hotel chain in the U.K. She and her team are tasked with testing all of the chain’s 46,000 beds. In 2011, she reportedly had her behind insured for $6.3 million.
Field Test Analyst for Recreational Equipment
Chase Jarvis/Getty ImagesRecreational Equipment Inc. sells sporting goods and recreation gear in over 100 retail locations around the U.S., and in 2011 the company reported sales of $1.66 billion during the previous year. Part of its success is due to an intimate knowledge of the products it sells, gained through extensive testing.
Until October 2011, the testing was performed by field test analyst Adam Hockey. When he wasn’t testing the equipment himself, he farmed out the research to the company’s 9,500 employees. But in a 2011 interview, he confessed that testing the products was his favorite perk.
Cup Keeper
When hockey season ends, some fans must wonder what happens to the Stanley Cup. Does it go to the game’s MVP for safekeeping, or the winning team’s coach? In fact, it goes to Mike Bolt, a 42-year-old fan from Toronto who has been protecting the trophy since 2000.
Although the compensation for this position is a closely guarded secret, it’s a highly coveted position. “Fans want this job,” he said in an interview in New York magazine. “You hear it from players, and, heck, the commissioner, Gary Bettman, has even said, ‘Oh, I think you have one of the greatest jobs.’” The job has even allowed Bolt to hobnob with CNBC’s own Darren Rovell.
Waterslide Tester
Peter Essick/Aurora/Getty ImagesShooting down an amusement park waterslide is an exciting way to cool off in the summertime. But to offer the maximum amount of fun, it has to work properly, which means testing it for stress factors and aerodynamics. For Tommy Lynch, it also means traveling the world and riding down the waterslides to make sure they’re up to snuff.
Lynch works for First Choice, a British travel company that was part of a $12.5 million rebranding effort in 2011. He calls his job “the best job in the world,” and it’s easy to see why.Nathanielhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04099537482364904085noreply@blogger.com0