It sounds different because it is different. "When you speak, the vocal folds in your throat vibrate, which causes your skin, skull and oral cavities to also vibrate, and we perceive this as sound," explains Ben Hornsby, a professor of audiology at Vanderbilt University. The vibrations mix with the sound waves traveling from your mouth to your eardrum, giving your voice a quality — generally a deeper, more dignified sound — that no one else hears.

Through a loudspeaker or recording device, you pick up sound only through air conduction. "The sound we're used to hearing has a lower frequency from the bone vibrations," Hornsby says. "We like that because it sounds rich and full." Many people cringe at the playback sound because our brain struggles to accept that this foreign voice is our own !!!

 

Njoy …

My daughter has a snake, a tiny 8-inch-long, innocuous corn snake, and I hate that thing.
I have seen it, and once, in the name of pretending to be a good mother, I actually touched it. But I hope to never see or touch it again as long as I live.
As an anthropologist, I know that most people around the globe hate snakes (and yes, I know there are people like my daughter who love these disgusting reptiles, but really, they are freaks, all of them except my daughter). The fear of snakes is called ophidiophobia, which is apparently a subset of herpetophobia, the more inclusive fear of reptiles. Although ophidiophobia might seem like a pathology — how often, really, do we encounter poisonous snakes? — anthropologist Lynn Isbell of the University of California, Davis, suggests in her new book "The Fruit, The Tree, and the Serpent: Why We See So Well" (Harvard University Press, 2009) that this fear is not only part of our nature, it's also a good thing.

 

( no , its not snake of my favorite Metal Gear Solid )

Isbell came to this conclusion while studying monkeys. One day she put a fake snake into the large outdoor cage of Rhesus macaques at the Davis Primate Center only to see a real snake slither into the cage. About half the 80 resident monkeys gathered around the real thing, mobbing it, calling out in alarm. The fear of snakes, Isbell reasoned, must be deeply embedded in our primate history.
More surprising, Isbell claims that the fear of snakes has driven the evolution of our excellent visual abilities. Primates, including humans, see really well. Sure, our vision is not as good as eagles, but still, we see in color and have very good 3-D perception. We also have a pit in each retina that gives us the ability to spot small objects, like little things in bushes. In general, Isbell explains, the neurology of vision, that is what we see and how we perceive it, is expanded in primates over other mammals.
Anthropologists have always assumed that this great vision was a necessary adaptation for life in the trees. Leaping around the canopy requires depth perception, and color vision comes in handy when looking for ripe fruits and leaves.
Going against the standard thinking, Isbell thinks that spotting snakes is the real reason we see well. Snakes, it seems, were the oldest known predator on primates, and they have been the most persistent predators over millions of years. Today, monkeys are scared of them and humans make horror films about them, like "Snakes on a Plane."
Isbell reasons that our vision co-evolved with venomous snakes having monkeys for dinner. As a result, humans have good vision too. But Isbell thinks there might be even more to the snake story for humans.
People are famous for pointing at things, especially things that scare us. And we usually say something like "Ahhh, snake" (or "spider" or "gun") when pointing at something that elicits fear. It may be that the neurological system that brought us good vision to deal with snakes also pushed for the evolution of human communication. And thank goodness for that development because it allows me, a human with naturally good vision and a highly evolved fear of snakes, to say to my snake loving daughter, "Get that thing away from me."

from Live Science …

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When I was kid, this question had always puzzled me … why why why clock hands always show 10 10 ( almost )  …. or in cases with seconds hand , they all position at 10 9 6 …  ???

No wonder, i was not the only genius to note this positions … so just like me , many people had already tried to figure out what’s the reason …

There are many Myths laying around this 10 10 mystery …

• First and most common , ( for Western countries of course ) America’s first president Abraham Lincoln was shot / died at that time , but fact is , he was shot at 10.15 PM , and died next morning at 7.22 … so its not true .. right ??
• Second and Third Myth was same , but for John F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. … that they died at this time … which isn’t true ..
• Fourth and popular in asian countries … is … it is time when America dumped their first nuclear bomb, “ Little Boy “ on Hiroshima, Japan …
• Fifth and silly reason is , it displays name of manufacture without interrupting clock hands …

 

But the fact is … the only reason why this hands are placed in this manner is , the official statement is something like this …

Timex says -- The hands on a clock are placed at10:10 because it’s a creative standard industry. The hands on timepieces are placed at 10:10 so that the company’s logo on the face gets framed and not blocked by the hands. The industry standard used to be 8:20 but that looked too much like a frown and created an unhappy look.
In its ads' , the clock hands are placed at 10:09:36, exactly below 12 o’ clock .

The practice started in the 1920s, and its stuck since then.

  

Darn … finally mystery solved … its nothing but just a marketing analogy ??? no fancy reason … too bad …

anyways … this is the story why clock hands are at 10 10 …

Njoy …

 

When First satellite … Sputnik I … was launched on October 4, 1957 into space no one in the world would had ever thought that after couple of decades we will have to take serious measures to remove this Junk that we send in space !!! But at present , it is perhaps one of the most notorious thing that scientist are worried about …

Space itself is a very dangerous place , why ??? may be because here if you got into any troubles then you won’t find any hospital in near by few thousands miles … or worse , you even won’t be able to see or predict the incoming danger !!!

The danger i am talking about here is a very small parts of waste materials from satellites , some are parts of dead satellite … or dead satellite itself ( as you may know that satellites are then tend to be dead or fail time to time !!! ) … these junk is known as SPACE DEBRIS  … it varies in size from a golf ball to say a football ?? … and it varies in form too … astronaut hand glove , camera , tools or toolbox or even garbage bags are some examples !!! The most talked space encounters that created space debris are , the most recent collision between IRIDIUM commercial satellite and Russian satellite which is the most discussed collision (BTW , speed of collision was 26,170 MPH !!! )… or anti-satellite weapon test by china … or same by USA …

Now imagine that such an un-controlled element get hit to another working satellite … or to a guy who just got out of space shuttle to stretch his leg !!! or even worse … a shuttle in process of entering earth’s atmosphere !!!  

At present at U.N. , they don’t have any rule “forced” for this kind of space junking … so unfortunately there are no standards for it and it solely depends upon individual space agency and its budget ( leaving waste behind is cheaper then brining it back to recycle )  … but there are some government organizations which look over and keep track of each of these debris such as Space Surveillance Network (SSN) part of US strategic air defense command center … 

Upto today , there were no major considerable “encounters” with these debris have be met … but space studies shows that in near future if they don’t take any preventive measures then soon the nightmare will become true … so talked International Space Station is equipped with defensive shield from this kind of “encounter” … known as WHIPPLE SHIELD …

Image below shows population of debris view from out of geosynchronous orbit of earth … gives the idea of population in space !!!

Njoy …

 

For the first time in 11 years, Friday the 13th is falling in two consecutive months. This double threat can only occur in certain non-leap years and only in a February-March combination. Look for it—or avoid it—again in 2015. The double whammy isn't the only Friday the 13th claim to infamy for 2009, a particularly tough year for superstitious minds.

The ominous date falls on three Fridays this year: February 13; this Friday, March 13; and again on November 13.

But three Friday the 13ths is the yearly maximum, as long as societies continue to mark time with the Gregorian calendar, which Pope Gregory XIII ordered the Catholic Church to adopt in 1582.

"You can't have any [years] with none and you can't have any with four because of our funny calendar," said Underwood Dudley, a professor emeritus of mathematics at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, and author ofNumerology: Or, What Pythagoras Wrought.

The calendar works just as its predecessor the Julian calendar did, with a leap year every four years. But the Gregorian calendar skips leap year on century years except those divisible by 400. For example, there was no leap year in 1900 but one was observed in 2000. This trick keeps the calendar in tune with the seasons.

The result is an ordering of days and dates that repeats itself every 400 years, Dudley noted. As time marches through the order, some years such as 2009 appear with three Friday the 13ths. Other years have two or one.

Curious Calendar

"It's just that curious way our calendar is constructed, with 28 days in February and all those 30s and 31s," Dudley said.

When the 400-year order is laid out, another revelation occurs: The 13th falls on Friday more often than any other day of the week. "It's just a funny coincidence," Dudley said.

"At the end of every cycle you get a year with three Friday the 13ths the year before the last year in the cycle … and you also get one on the tenth year of all the cycles," he said. Two-thousand nine is the tenth year of the cycle that started in 2000.

Is it really unlucky number !!!

In history too this number was always considered as unlucky number … in last supper with Jesus, Judas was the 13th guest who betrayed him … in ancient Rome, witches reportedly gathered in groups of 12. The 13th was believed to be the devil !!! In Norse myth tale when about 12 gods having a dinner party at Valhalla, their heaven. In walked the uninvited 13th guest, the mischievous Loki. Once there, Loki arranged for Hoder, the blind god of darkness, to shoot Balder the Beautiful, the god of joy and gladness, with a mistletoe-tipped arrow, another example !!! numerologists consider 12 a "complete" number. There are 12 months in a year, 12 signs of the zodiac, 12 gods of Olympus, 12 labors of Hercules, 12 tribes of Israel, and 12 apostles of Jesus. In exceeding 12 by 1, 13's association with bad luck "has to do with just being a little beyond completeness. The number becomes restless or squirmy”. How can we forget apollo 13, right ??? Some biblical scholars believe Eve tempted Adam with the forbidden fruit on Friday. Perhaps most significant is a belief that Abel was slain by his brother Cain on Friday the 13th. We all know that Jesus was crucified on Friday … right ??

Modern Trend ???

actually its not like that people used to do this from all the time …

"It's been estimated that [U.S] $800 or $900 million is lost in business on this day because people will not fly or do business they would normally do," said Dossey, who is also the founder of the Stress Management Center and Phobia Institute in Asheville, North Carolina.

Among other services, Dossey's organization counsels clients on how to overcome fear of Friday the 13th, a phobia that he estimates afflicts 17 to 21 million people in the United States !!!

This fear of 13 can even be seen in how societies are built. More than 80 percent of high-rise buildings lack a 13th floor. Many airports skip the 13th gate. Hospitals and hotels regularly have no room number 13.On streets in Florence, Italy, the house between number 12 and 14 is addressed as 12 1/2. In France, socialites known as the quatorziens (fourteeners) once made themselves available as 14th guests to keep a dinner party from an unlucky fate !!!

Well personally , i don’t believe in this myth … i believe there is only one thing unlucky for us and it is we are to each other !!! …

Njoy …

 

When we hear word COMET … we visualize the most famous comet we have ever seen … Halley’s Comet … right ?? the bright asteroid followed by long bright tail of dust .. right ?? but here we are talking about Dark comet , which are like name suggest … very dark and not visible easily ?? … man, i was thinking that comets are always bright …

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hazardous comets and asteroids are monitored by various space agencies under an umbrella effort known as Spaceguard. The vast majority of objects found so far are rocky asteroids. Yet UK-based astronomers Bill Napier at Cardiff University and David Asher at Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland claim that many comets could be going undetected. "There is a case to be made that dark, dormant comets are a significant but largely unseen hazard," says Napier.

In previous work, Napier and Janaki Wickramasinghe, also at Cardiff, have suggested that when the solar system periodically passes through the galactic plane, it nudges comets in our direction.

These periodic comet showers appear to correlate with the dates of ancient impact craters found on Earth, which would suggest that most impactors in the past were comets, not asteroids.

Now Napier and Asher warn that some of these comets may still be zipping around the solar system. Other observations support their case. The rate that bright comets enter the solar system implies there should be around 3000 of them buzzing around, and yet only 25 are known.

Such dark comets are not unheard of. They occur when an "active" comet's reflective water ice has evaporated away, leaving behind an organic crust that only reflects a small fraction of light.

In 1983, Comet IRAS-Araki-Alcock passed by Earth at a distance of 5 million kilometres, the closest known pass by any known comet for 200 years. It was spotted only two weeks ahead of its closest approach. "It had only 1 per cent of its surface active," says Napier. Comet Borrelly, visited by NASA's Deep Space 1 probe in 2001, was found to have extremely dark patches over much of its surface.

"There may be merit to this idea," says Steve Larson of the University of Arizona's Catalina Sky Survey in Tucson, one of the main contributors to Spaceguard.

Clark Chapman at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, is sceptical, but points out that such dark comets "would absorb sunlight very well" and so could be detected by the heat they would emit.

Njoy …

 

Ha, i was just going through some science site and they had explained why did dinosaurs grow so biggggggg ?? well , i never questioned this … why they grew so big then i saw Jurassic park movie …

well , according to that site explains reason ,

Sauropod dinosaurs such as apatosaurus are the largest animals ever to walk on land. The heaviest weighed up to 100 tones and the longest might have measured as much as 60 meters from head to tail.

Why they became so big is a long-standing conundrum. In 2002, Jeremy Midgley, an ecologist at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, suggested that it was down to deficiencies in their diet.

In the Jurassic, herbivorous dinosaurs had a serious problem getting enough nitrogen, Midgley argues. "The average nitrogen content of most plants living then was typically lower," he says. "And then the carbon dioxide levels were much higher, maybe 10 times today's. That suppresses the nitrogen content of plants even more."

How does getting big help? As an animal's body size rises, its metabolic rate falls, along with the growth rate. Why this is so is controversial but it does affect nitrogen requirements: the lower an animal's metabolism and the slower its growth rate, the less protein and DNA it has to make, and thus the less nitrogen it will need per mouthful.

Juvenile sauropods must have supplemented their diet with a little meat, and perhaps fungi. Once they had become truly gigantic, however, they could survive solely on low-nitrogen leaves, Midgley believes.

Solving one dietary problem might have created another, though. Jim Elser, an expert in ecological stoichiometry at Arizona State University, Tempe, suspects that giant sauropods had problems getting enough phosphorus.

To support their weight, giants need relatively larger bones than smaller animals. This means they need relatively more phosphorus, because bones are made of hydroxyapatite, a phosphorus mineral. Large and fast-growing plants have a higher phosphorus content, so the giant sauropods may have been able to get enough of this element by eating the leaves of large trees.

 

Njoy ??? …

 

As technology has played a bigger role in our lives, our skills in critical thinking and analysis have declined, while our visual skills have improved, according to research by Patricia Greenfield, UCLA distinguished professor of psychology and director of the Children's Digital Media Center, Los Angeles.

Learners have changed as a result of their exposure to technology, says Greenfield, who analyzed more than 50 studies on learning and technology, including research on multi-tasking and the use of computers, the Internet and video games. Her research was published this month in the journal Science.

Reading for pleasure, which has declined among young people in recent decades, enhances thinking and engages the imagination in a way that visual media such as video games and television do not, Greenfield said.

How much should schools use new media, versus older techniques such as reading and classroom discussion? … "No one medium is good for everything," Greenfield said. "If we want to develop a variety of skills, we need a balanced media diet. Each medium has costs and benefits in terms of what skills each develops."

Schools should make more effort to test students using visual media, she said, by asking them to prepare PowerPoint presentations, for example.

"As students spend more time with visual media and less time with print, evaluation methods that include visual media will give a better picture of what they actually know," said Greenfield, who has been using films in her classes since the 1970s.

"By using more visual media, students will process information better," she said. "However, most visual media are real-time media that do not allow time for reflection, analysis or imagination — those do not get developed by real-time media such as television or video games. Technology is not a panacea in education, because of the skills that are being lost.

"Studies show that reading develops imagination, induction, reflection and critical thinking, as well as vocabulary," Greenfield said. "Reading for pleasure is the key to developing these skills. Students today have more visual literacy and less print literacy. Many students do not read for pleasure and have not for decades."

Parents should encourage their children to read and should read to their young children, she said.

Among the studies Greenfield analyzed was a classroom study showing that students who were given access to the Internet during class and were encouraged to use it during lectures did not process what the speaker said as well as students who did not have Internet access. When students were tested after class lectures, those who did not have Internet access performed better than those who did.

"Wiring classrooms for Internet access does not enhance learning," Greenfield said.

Another study Greenfield analyzed found that college students who watched "CNN Headline News" with just the news anchor on screen and without the "news crawl" across the bottom of the screen remembered significantly more facts from the televised broadcast than those who watched it with the distraction of the crawling text and with additional stock market and weather information on the screen.

These and other studies show that multi-tasking "prevents people from getting a deeper understanding of information," Greenfield said.

Yet, for certain tasks, divided attention is important, she added.

"If you're a pilot, you need to be able to monitor multiple instruments at the same time. If you're a cab driver, you need to pay attention to multiple events at the same time. If you're in the military, you need to multi-task too," she said. "On the other hand, if you're trying to solve a complex problem, you need sustained concentration. If you are doing a task that requires deep and sustained thought, multi-tasking is detrimental."

Do video games strengthen skill in multi-tasking?

New Zealand researcher Paul Kearney measured multi-tasking and found that people who played a realistic video game before engaging in a military computer simulation showed a significant improvement in their ability to multi-task, compared with people in a control group who did not play the video game. In the simulation, the player operates a weapons console, locates targets and reacts quickly to events.

Greenfield wonders, however, whether the tasks in the simulation could have been performed better if done alone.

More than 85 percent of video games contain violence, one study found, and multiple studies of violent media games have shown that they can produce many negative effects, including aggressive behavior and desensitization to real-life violence, Greenfield said in summarizing the findings.

In another study, video game skills were a better predictor of surgeons' success in performing laparoscopic surgery than actual laparoscopic surgery experience. In laparoscopic surgery, a surgeon makes a small incision in a patient and inserts a viewing tube with a small camera. The surgeon examines internal organs on a video monitor connected to the tube and can use the viewing tube to guide the surgery.

"Video game skill predicted laparoscopic surgery skills," Greenfield said. "The best video game players made 47 percent fewer errors and performed 39 percent faster in laparoscopic tasks than the worst video game players."

Visual intelligence has been rising globally for 50 years, Greenfield said. In 1942, people's visual performance, as measured by a visual intelligence test known as Raven's Progressive Matrices, went steadily down with age and declined substantially from age 25 to 65. By 1992, there was a much less significant age-related disparity in visual intelligence, Greenfield said.

"In a 1992 study, visual IQ stayed almost flat from age 25 to 65," she said.

Greenfield believes much of this change is related to our increased use of technology, as well as other factors, including increased levels of formal education, improved nutrition, smaller families and increased societal complexity.

The Children's Digital Media Center, Los Angeles, has received federal funding from the National Science Foundation.

from ScienceDaily …

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Green technology was hot in 2008. Barack Obama won the presidential election promising green jobs to Rust Belt workers. Investors poured $5 billion into the sector just through the first nine months of the year. And even Texas oilmen like T. Boone Pickens started pushing alternative energy as a replacement for fossil fuels like petroleum, coal and natural gas.

10. THE ISLAND OF THE SOLAR

With money flowing like milk and honey in the land of solar technology, all sorts of schemers and dreamers came streaming into the area. One Swiss researcher, Thomas Hinderling, wants to build solar islands several miles across that he claims can produce hundreds of megawatts of relatively inexpensive power. Though most clean tech advocates question the workability of the scheme, earlier this year, Hinderling's company Centre Suisse d'Electronique et de Microtechnique received $5 million from the Ras al Khaimah emirate of the United Arab Emirates to start construction on a prototype facility, shown above, in that country. (Image: Centre Suisse d'Electronique et de Microtechnique)

9. NEW MATERIALS CAGE CARBON

Carbon capture and sequestration has a seductively simple appeal: We generate carbon dioxide emissions by burning geology — coal and oil — so to fix the problem, we should simply capture it and inject it back into the ground.

It turns out, however, that it's not quite so simple. Aside from finding the right kind of empty spaces in the earth's crust and the risks that the CO2 might leak, the biggest problem with the scheme is finding a material that could selectively snatch the molecule out of the hot mess of gases going up the flues of fossil fuel plants.

That's where two classes of special cage-like molecules come into play, ZIFs and amines. This year, Omar Yaghi, a chemist at UCLA, announced a slough of new CO2-capturing ZIFs and Chris Jones, a chemical engineer at Georgia Tech, reported that he'd made a new amine that seems particularly well-suited to working under real-world condition. Both materials could eventually make capturing CO2 easier -- and therefore, more cost effective.

Perhaps better still, Yaghi's lab's technique also defined a new process for quickly creating new ZIFs with the properties that scientists — and coal-plant operators — want. Some of their crystals are shown in the image above. (Image: Omar Yaghi and Rahul Banerjee/UCLA)

8. GREEN TECH LEGISLATION GETS REAL

On the federal and state levels, several historic actions put the teeth into green tech bills passed over the last few years. A review committee of the EPA effectively froze coal plant construction, a boon to alternative energy (though earlier this month the EPA ignored the committee's ruling and it is unclear how the issue will be settled). In California, the state unveiled and approved its plan to regulate carbon dioxide emissions, which could be a model for a nationwide system. Combined with the green-energy tax credits in the $700-billion bailout bill, the government did more for green tech in 2008 than in whole decades in the past.

7. THE CATALYST THAT COULD ENABLE SOLAR
In July, MIT chemist Daniel Nocera announced that he'd created a catalyst that could drop the cost of extracting the hydrogen and oxygen from water.

Combined with cheap photovoltaic solar panels (like Nanosolar's), the system could lead to inexpensive, simple systems that use water to store the energy from sunlight. In the process, the scientists may have cleared the major roadblock on the long road to fossil fuel independence: Reducing the on-again, off-again nature of many renewable power sources.

"You've made your house into a fuel station," Daniel Nocera, a chemistry professor at MIT told Wired.com. "I've gotten rid of all the goddamn grids."

The catalyst enables the electrolysis system to function efficiently at room temperature and at ordinary pressure. Like a reverse fuel cell, it splits water into oxygen and hydrogen. By recombining the molecules with a standard fuel cell, the O2 and H2 could then be used to generate energy on demand.

6. PICKENS PLAN PUSHES POWER PLAYS INTO AMERICAN MAINSTREAM

Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens might be a lot of things, but environmentalist he is not. That's why his support for a nationwide network of wind farms generated so much excitement. While his solution for transportation, natural gas vehicles, may not pan out, his Pickens Plan is the most visible alternative energy plan out there and it began to channel support from outside coastal cities for finding new sources of energy.

Of course, no one said Pickens is stupid. If his plan was adopted and major investments in transmission infrastructure were made, his wind energy investments would stand to benefit.

5. SOLAR THERMAL PLANTS RETURN TO THE DESERTS

When most people think of harnessing the sun's power, they imagine a solar photovoltaic panel, which directly converts light from the sun into electricity. But an older technology emerged as a leading city-scale power technology in 2008: solar thermal. Companies like Ausra, BrightSource, eSolar, Solel, and a host of others are using sunlight-reflecting mirrors to turn liquids into steam, which can drive a turbine in the same way that coal-fired power plants make electricity.

Two companies, BrightSource and Ausra, debuted their pilot plants. They mark the first serious solar thermal experimentation in the United States since the 1980s. BrightSource's Israeli demo plant is shown above. (Image: BrightSource)

4. OBAMA PICKS A GREEN TECH EXPERT TO HEAD DOE

President-elect Barack Obama ran on the promise of green jobs and an economic stimulus package that would provide support for scientific innovation. Then, Obama picked Steven Chu, a Nobel-prize winning physicist, to head the Department of Energy. Chu had been focused on turning Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory into an alternative-energy powerhouse. The green tech community rejoiced that one of their own would be in the White House.

That's because green tech is going to need some help. With the world economy falling into recession, the price of oil has dropped, even though there are serious concerns about the long-term oil supply. When energy prices drop, clean tech investments don't seem quite as attractive, and the renascent industry could be in trouble. It's happened before, after all.

Back in the '70s, geopolitical events sent the price of oil soaring, which, as it tends to, created a boom in green tech. But the early 1980s saw the worst recession since the Depression. Sound familiar? In the poor economic climate, focus and funds were shifted away from green tech. The last nail in the coffin was the election of Ronald Reagan, who immediately pulled off the solar panels Jimmy Carter had placed on the White House. The green tech industry collapsed.

History has given U.S. alternative energy research a second chance and environmental advocates hope that a different president will lead to a very different result. (Image: DOE)

3. SOLAR CELL PRODUCTION GETS BIG, GIGA(WATT)BIG

Every clean tech advocate's dream is a power-generating technology that could compete head-to-head with coal, the cheapest fossil fuel, on price alone. Nanosolar, one of a new generation of companies building solar panels out of cheap plastics, could be the first company to get there. Early this year, the company officially opened its one-gigawatt production facility, which is many times the size of most previous solar facilities.

Nanosolar, in other words, has found a process that can scale: it works as well in production as it does in the lab. That's the main reason that the company has picked up half-a-billion dollars in funding from investors like MDV's Erik Straser.

"[It's the] first time in industry a single tool with a 1GW throughput," Straser wrote in an e-mail. "It's a key part of how the company is achieving grid parity with coal."

2. PROJECT BETTER PLACE FINDS HOMES
Green technologies are dime a dozen, but a business model that could allow an entirely new, green infrastructure to be built is a rare thing.

Doing just that is the centerpiece of Sun Microsystems' SAP veteran Shai Agassi's vision for Project Better Place, a scheme that would distribute charging and swappable battery stations throughout smallish geographies like Israel, Hawaii and San Francisco. So far, there's very little steel in the ground, but in early December, the company's first charging location opened in Tel Aviv, Israel. Agassi's plan is one of several projects — like new biofuels rail terminals — that could create fundamentally new energy ecosystems.

Some of these systems, however, are actually throwbacks to earlier eras. As Peter Shulman, a historian of technology at Case Western Reserve University, likes to remind his students: in the early 20th century, before the Model T, one-third of all cars were electric. (Image: Joe Puglies/WIRED)

1. CALERA'S GREEN CEMENT DEMO PLANT OPENS

Cement? With all the whiz bang technologies in green technology, cement seems like an odd pick for our top clean technology of the year. But here's the reason: making cement — and many other materials — takes a lot of heat and that heat comes from fossil fuels.

Calera's technology, like that of many green chemistry companies, works more like Jell-O setting. By employing catalysis instead of heat, it reduces the energy cost per ton of cement. And in this process, CO2 is an input, not an output. So, instead of producing a ton of carbon dioxide per ton of cement made — as is the case with old-school Portland cement — half a ton of carbon dioxide can be sequestered.

With more than 2.3 billion tons of cement produced each year, reversing the carbon-balance of the world's cement would be a solution that's the scale of the world's climate change problem.

In August, the company opened its first demonstration site next to Dynegy's Moss Landing power plant in California, pictured here.

Taken from Wired …

Njoy …

When silicon chips were invented ... they were thought to be more durable and tough ... yet cheap for very rough uses ... and it was never thought that in future it could make environmental problems ... till some years before ... but at present time we are already facing problems regarding silicon chips waste management ...




Like we know ... no known electronics item has been made without use of silicon chips ... some call them PCBs .. printed circuit boards ... and when we buy electronics item , for example computer we never think that what we are gonna do after use of certain years .. right ?? , but at present time this junk has been piled up to very high value and environmentalists are worried for its impact on our atmosphere ...

Good news is that , people are becoming aware of this problem are whole new concept of recycling ... E-Cycling .. has be developed ... main purpose of it is to properly recycle that silicon waste and if possible reuse them ...

Recently Toshiba, Sharp and Panasonic have teamed up to offer a recycling system for electronics across the whole of the United States.

The three set up a joint venture, the Electronic Manufacturers Recycling Management Company, which will now set up 280 recycling points across all 50 states. It will also work with commercial recyclers, municipal recycling centers and not-for-profit organizations to widen the number of recycling points available.

“Consumers are thinking more and more about their impact on the planet and as a result they are looking for brands and products that are committed to the environment,” said Maria Repole, associate vice president or corporate communications at Toshiba.

“This year, Toshiba is putting even more emphasis on improving its environmental practices and demonstrating its commitment to sustainability.”

The eventual goal is to have a network of over 800 recycling points across the country, making it much easier for businesses and consumers to dispose of their electronic waste.

"We continuously seek ways to reduce impact on the environment," said Sharp chief executive Doug Koshima.

Thats all for now ....

Being student , when ever i come across any new word , i first try on wikipedia ... and sometimes i tried that for my term papers and assignments too ... ( ahh , i was not the only one .. ) ... but i found that our professor used to remind us every time that "DON'T SEARCH ON WIKIPEDIA , BETTER USE BOOKS" ... but heyyyyyy , i'm not teacher's pet .. so i always try to find information in wikipedia first and then look in books ( only if can't find it on wikipedia or google ) ...



And i always wonder why people hate wikipedia ?? .... few days back i heard a chunk of information ... according to that , there are millions of people who browse Wikipedia in any given month, but only 2 percent of them (roughly 1,400) are responsible for editing nearly 75 percent of the information on the entire website.In other words, Wikipedia, while editable by anyone, is fueled almost entirely by the knowledge of a small, select group of individuals.

Consider them the Illuminati of Wikipedia; they control the flow of information that often finds its way into our college essays, despite our professors’ best attempts to dissuade us from citing it. The source of this startling revelation? The face of Wikipedia, Jimbo Wales. But, [Wales] insisted, the truth was rather different: Wikipedia was actually written by "a community ... a dedicated group of a few hundred volunteers" where "I know all of them and they all know each other". Really, "it's much like any traditional organization."

Now a days , people become more aware of environment coz of one or another reasons and so , it has proven a good market for automakers too ... ain't it ??

Big vehicles naturally weigh more than small vehicles. The more weight, the more power necessary to accelerate. If we lived in a world of small vehicles, it would be far simpler to cheaply and cleanly power those vehicles.



Ultimately, I hope that all vehicles, if not smaller, are significantly lighter. Then vehicles like the Vespa Granturismo Scooter could go screaming down the freeway without fear.



The Granturismo's 20 horsepower, 200cc four-stroke engine is the biggest, fastest, and makes the new Vespa faster than ever, reaching 70 mpg with the GT version also the looks and design is very tempting for me ...

still its not that much costly ... nearly $ 5000 ...

trendy , stylish and environment friendly !!!

This is not a new technology for energy generation , infact this process is used to produce power in power stations where fossil fuels are burnt , coal fired power plant or diesel power plant for example. But in place of fossil fuels like coal or diesel , in this method solar heat is used to produce steam.

Have you seen solar water heater ?? well , Concentrated Solar Power Plant or CSP for short uses same method but in a larger scale to produce heated fluid which in terms , heats water flowing in heat exchanger device and generates steam which finally runs turbine ... the same way it is used at thermal power plants. This method of solar energy conversion is known as in-active or passive solar energy conversion , compared to active energy conversion like Photo Voltaic cells a.k.a. Solar Cells.

Well the roots of experiment lies at roman ages when , great inventor and scientist Archimedes used concentrated heat of sun with help of some kind of shiny metal and burn out the roman fleet !!! well its just a myth , but who knows may be it is true ... after all myths just don't got story in one night .. right ?? or another ancient example is tower of Alexandria .. just like its world famous library , the lighthouse of alexandria was also famous in ancient world and was considered as one of the seven wonders of ancient world. In that tower too they had used same concentration of heat concept.

So , inspired from ancient history , modern scientists developed whole new kind of technology to produce electricity , knows as Concentrated Solar Power or CSP for short. The basic working logic is pretty simple ... they use larger / small mirrors and concentrate heat of sun at one spot which contains some kind of liquid material ( synthetic oil or molten salt for example ) ... and then this liquid goes through heat exchanger mechanism with water and converts that water in to hight pressure steam which then runs steam turbine .. ( don't ask more details , as its whole new subject of study ) ...

Depending on design CSP is catagorized into three methods.




First one is , Tower Type , in which solar energy is concentrated in the tower placed between field of mirrors ,known as heliostats which follows movement of sun and keep their self in such a position that , they always reflect maximum solar radiation. The first CSP , Tower project in USA was Solar One ... at california which was among first generation of CSP plants . It was able to produce about 10MW electricity.






Second one is , known as Trought type , in which instead of heating single spot like in tower type , heat is concentrated on individual troughs passing though series of concave highly reflective mirrors. The CSP, Trought project in USA is built at , Nevada known as Nevada Solar One ... and another project is at Kremer Junction , California. Both CSP plants uses trought system.






Third type is , Disc Type, in which parabolic dish reflector is used which concentrates solar heat at its focal point where close cycle re-generative heat engine is placed. Which runs with help of heated fluid.The biggest system of this kind is placed near Canberra , Australia.

Out of all these 3 types , it has been said that , the Disc Type CSP system works more efficiently because of its compact and effective design.

The biggest challenge with these systems are , they require larger area of operation and clear sky of sunny weather. Also the fluid that they use for heating must be having great conductivity and heat storage capacity. And hence still researches are being done to improve performance of the whole system.

But , all these CSP systems have been proved that all these system can work very efficiently and effectively at lower cost. They gives us clean green energy that we have ever imagined , a better less polluted future.

May the force be with us ...

Sometimes today , I read this at National Geographic Website ... And its really shocking for me ... About 19 percent of coral reefs have disappeared during the last 20 years, said IUCN's director general, Julia Marton-Lefèvre.

"If current trends in carbon dioxide emission continue, many of the remaining reefs will be lost in the next 20 to 40 years," Marton-Lefèvre said at Wednesday's U.N. talks, which are focused on creating a new climate change treaty.

"Climate change must be limited to the absolute minimum if we want to save coral reefs. We need to move forward and substantially cut emissions," she said.

Increasing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, which fuels global warming , is raising ocean levels and temperatures. When oceans absorb carbon dioxide from air, the gas reacts with water to produce carbonic acid.That makes the water more acidic, dissolving the calcium shells of reef-building coral and other creatures that rely on the mineral.

Njoy ???

Couple of days before , i saw one video of youtube ... it was about evolution, globalization and information technology ... it was quite fancy video ... i don't think that computers will ever reach to intelligence level of human or some day , technology will be such a cheap that a $ 1000 computer will be having more computing power then whole population of earth !!! ( that's really funny !! ) ... but some facts of present are very true but it doesn't mean that this will continue in future too , right ?? .. anyways .... njoy the video ....

Hey guys , well i don't think that i am writing something very new ... but it sure looks sweet ... the animated tag cloud just like you can see right of this page .... it is tags that we put at end of each posts ...... There is a one good lady ... "Amanda" , she actually wrote code for this cloud , i am just copy and pasting her code ... ( ahh , i am not good at coding ... sigh sigh .. )

pre-requisites ...

... you must have some tags ...

... number of tags must not be much ... ( she didn't mentioned this but i was not able to get this thing done for long time till yesterday just because of this reason , i got load of tags for both blogs )


... good skill to do copy and paste ... ( i guess , i am maestro of this skill !!! )

... ability to read english !!! ( .. hmm , i guess i have to put it first :p )

okie .. here are the steps ...

1. log in into blogger account and then go to layout in it , go to Edit HTML.
2. make sure to NOT to have checked expand widget templates , it will just make things more complicated .
3. find , ... in HTML code. ( you can do it by hitting Ctrl+F and then simply search it !!! )
4. just below this line paste this code ...

5. and preview the template ... if you are lucky , you will see the animated tag cloud just like mine.
6. You can change parameters like height, width , font color and background colors but for colors you must be knowing HTML color codes.
7. To change the height and width of cloud simply search and replace the following code,

<object type="application/x-shockwave-flash" data="http://halotemplates.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-cumulus-example/tagcloud.swf" width="250" height="200" allowscriptaccess="always" >

8. And to change color of fonts and back ground … find and edit following code,

<param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff" /> ( for background color)

<param name="flashvars" value="tcolor=0x000000&mode=tags&distr=true&tspeed=100&tagcloud=<tags> ( for font color )

Njoy ….

Last week our professor sent me a link of one web-site ... on that site they have posted speach of Barack Obama the president elect. , at Lansing , Missisippi about his vision of an american dream of energy as a part of his election campain !!!

By winning elections at Nov, '04 2008 ... democrate Barack Obama made history in the united states by becoming first black man ever as a president in history. I think he was a good candidate compared to John Mccain of republican ... Obama looks more down to earth person and he knows what people really need ... ( ow , i am not political analyist but this what i felt from his speaches ) , then his opponents ... and perhaps this is the reason why he won crown of president .... :p ...

But one thing that i liked more about him is his visions about energy ... he is more willing to increase govt. helping and resources for alternative energy production methods like solar cells or geo thermal energy ... he want to reduce dependance of USA on oil ...

He is planning to pump in about $150 billion to boost up efforts to make clean green energy ... he also want to put PHEV ( Plugin Hybrid Electic Vehicle ) on the roads on large numbers to reduce green gases ... more over large number of green collar jobs will be generated becase of these r&d and manufacturing ...

perhaps he is the first president who ever thought about making green energy as a national agenda and make country an oil independent ....

here is that site that our professor sent up to read / watch / listen ...


may the force be with us ...

DST ... its Daylight Saving Time ... we advance our clock one hour during summer and at start of fall, we change it to original one hour back position ... that is basic definition of DST.

But DST has a very brief and controversial history ... it was firstly proposed by William Willett an english builder ... but it has been said that DST has roots to romans too !!! William as a visonary , realized that most of the people sleep during sunny summer days' mornings which was waste of energy for him !!! so brought up with an idea to forward his clock an head of time !!! ( was a simple but effective solution right ?? ) ...





Since then , almost all europian countries and USA has adopted DST standards ... but it is not an easy job to implement that time ... because , they need to calculate sun rise and fall time and also need to co-ordinate with all govt. departments and lot of other stuffs ... even at time of first implementation , it was opposed politically too !!!




and Today , Nov. 02 ... at night of 2 a.m. clock is set back to 1 a.m. .... end of DST ...

i found one interesting website for getting for information about this ... they have done it with nice interface ... check it out ...


Keep reading ....

This tuesday , 28th october , was "diwali" .... the festival of lights ... being majority populated by hindus , diwali is major festival of india and is celebrated all over it with joy ... well , like almost all festival, this festival too has ancient roots joined with religion ...

But for me , its just festival of lights and i simply love its celebration ... not as hindu or as an indian ... i bet , if anyone around the world has ever visited india at diwali , surely they would have loved it ... and perhaps its true for all festivals , like ... holi or navaratri for example ... when i was kid, we used to say , we indians don't feel good if we don't have anything to celebrated at least once in a week ... and its almost true that we always have celebrations ...( ah .. old days ... i miss them ... :( ) ...




We follow lunar calander , and hence all festivals are calculated based on moon phase ... we celebrated diwali for 5 days ... the first day is "dhan teras" ... its 13 phase of moon, on that day we pray deity of "dhan" .. Money ... thats goddess lakhami ... we pray her to not to leave us !! ( ha.. it sounds funny ... but in real life , i guess we all do that every day .. right ?? ) and to drive away evil spirits.

The next day is "kali chaudas" , 14th phase day of moon... the day of evil spirits ... when i was kid , my mom used to force me to stay at home at night at that day , because it is believed that on this day evil spirits are on their maximum power. People who pray goddess of black magic and evil spirit "kali" , do special religious ceremony on this day ...

Diwali is the third day , and its no moon day , that we call "amavasya" ... this is also last day of one of the old indian calander , "vikram samvat" ... ( btw, vikram was name of the king who was said to be one of his kind .. ahh ... its another story to tell you guys ) ... so this is very special day for us ... we lit "diyas" everywhere ... actually "diyas" are symbolic presentation of light , which represents meaning that by lighting "diyas" we are trying to drive away darkness that is surrounding us in our life !!!

Next , fourth day is ... any guess ????? ........ ya .. its "new year" ..... my most fav. day of the year perhaps .... this is the day when celebration is at peak i guess ... families go out to meet relatives , and that relatives too come again to meet them !!! , we have already made special snacks and sweets for this days ... actually these snacks are not made other then for diwali so .. when i was kid .. i used to eat them lots because, we never get chance to eat them again till next year !!! ( sometimes .. i hate traditions ... ) ... another good thing was , as a sign of good blessings elders give $$$ to younger ones .. ( now you know why i liked this day ?? ) ...

The last and fifth day is "Bhai beej" ... well this day is also celebrated in special way ... actually this day is for brothers and sisters ... at this day , sisters invite their brother/s for special meal ... and in return brother give gifts to sister !!



Overall , it is perhaps the best time of my life .. i enjoy typical indian traditions for 5 days at every moment ... we make traditional dishes of celebration ( though some are now available though out the year ) ... at india some people make a colored design "rangoli" near their entrance of their home , which is basically a free hand design made from color powder and chalk .. to keep evil spirits away ... we lit our house with lights and diyas ... visit temple on new year day ... but as said by someone ... when you're in rome , do as romans do ... so living at usa , its never so fun to celebrate that i had at india ... but still i try to "feel" that i used to feel at india ....


always love your traditions ...

Yesterday , i came across about 3 month old page of BBC ... actually it was picture gallery ... title was .. Ethiopia's impending famine ... i am placing some of the snapshots here ... just take a look at them ... i guess, it takes courage to even take photos like this ...





When i see so much pain and suffering in people of this world , it always makes me think ... " Are they from our Earth ?? " ... because here places around me all i see , is a whole materialistic world ... people hungry for power , money and position !!! Mostly they don't think or even care for others ... well it includes me ... its so easy to write all this things lying on cozy bed and having all comforts of life that makes my life easy ... It amazes me that , we all know one bitter truth that at one day we will standing in front of " the One " , the god for some people ... and at that day , we may not be able to answer his question that , have you ever done anything for others ?? ...





you know , i always worry for my weight ( coz , i am getting overweighted !!! ... ) but when i see these people , i feel shame for my self ... i feel like i have stolen their share of food !!! I wish i can help people like them all around the world ... i wish i can make this world a better place to live for every one ... i am not any kind of activist , i even don't have courage to leave everyone and just run to help people ... but i DO KNOW that , i will try my best what i can ...

Bless 'Em