Universal Radio

Inspired by the human ear...

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-06/miot-nmr060309.php

Wind-powered craft aims to smash ice speed record

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SPORT/04/08/land.sailing.record/index.html

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/03/wireds-top-inte.html

"Spin Battery" Effect Discovered

Researchers at the University of Miami and at the Universities of Tokyo and Tohoku, in Japan, have discovered a spin battery effect: the ability to store energy into the magnetic spin of a material and to later extract that energy as electricity, without a chemical reaction. The researchers have built an actual device to demonstrate the effect that has a diameter about that of a human hair. This is a potentially game-changing discovery that could affect battery and other technologies. Quoting: Although the actual device... cannot even light up an LED..., the energy that might be stored in this way could potentially run a car for miles.

Advancement in Nuclear Fusion

The article titled "How to build a star on earth" goes to explain the attempted advancements in science to generate limitless amounts of energy using nuclear fusion. As you may know, stars in the core are fusing the atoms to release vast amounts of energy. To be able to do what the stars are able to, they are literally trying to get this to work in one hundred million degrees! Imagine making a small scale star to generate limitless energy... now that would spark a major revolution!

Happy 1234567890 Day!

As all of you nerds would already know... On Friday, February 13, 2009 at exactly 23:31:30 (UTC), Unix time was equal to '1234567890'. Parties and other celebrations are planned around the world among various technical subcultures, to celebrate 1234567890 day.

High-Tech Shocks Turn Bumps Into Power

Another one of those 

"Why didn't I think of that" moments... using the shock absorber to generate enegy!

Scientists Debate a Robot War

I found this article interesting as I do see a trend of warfare and robotics merging together; from smart bombs to sniper robots that have better accuracy than the pros. The potential for what the machines can do is unlimited. Now as to whether they will take over... thats really debatable :)

Micron demonstrates the fastest SSD ever

Micron introduced a SSD drive that supposedly hit a data transfer rate around 800 MB/s, which can be increased to 1GB/s. This is of course not done through sata II interface but rather PCIe interface, because sata II is only capable of transferring data of 300Mb/s. This speed was attained by attaching the SSD to the computer through PCIe connections and the drives have “flash data management enhancements".

To put the speed into perspective note that the fatest notebook hard drives can write at approximately 70 MB/s, while their desktop cousins achieve around 100MB/s. Velociraptor which is considered the fastest desktop hard drive performs around 122 MB/s. Yes, your math is correct; Micron claims to run at 8x the speed of the current fastest hard drive!

Finally we have come to a point where our hard drives do not need to be the slowest parts on our PCs. The question remains though, can the Motherboards keep up? :)

Russian Tsar Hydrogen Bomb Explosion Video

Here is a video i came accross of a Russian Hyrdrogen Bomb. Now this is not the real thing (I can't imagine where they would be able to test this) but instead its a simulation. Still interesting to watch none-the-less. 

Now if i remember correctly, reflecting back to what i remember from my grade 9 history, the Nagasaki and Hiroshima atomic bombs of WWII were one of the early bombs so they were small compared to how destructive they were eventually able to make them. The better ones were something like 20 times as powerful as the ones detonated on Japan (again i'm ballparking the numbers but you get the idea). Now the interesting part was that eventually they designed the H-bomb (or the Hydrogen Bomb) which was several thousand magnitudes more powerful than any atomic bomb. So yeah... imagine the destructive power we are capable of today. 

During the Cold War we apparantly had enough nuclear warheads to blow up the world over 20 times over. I'll leave it with Einstein's famous quote: "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."

How to imagine the 10th Dimension

I found an unlikely video to see on break.com... 

It's a pretty short/simple video explaining how you could picture each dimension... I definetely learned something new!

How To Imagine The Tenth Dimension - Watch more How-to

Autonomous Robots Invade Retail Warehouses

I have/do expect this to become a trend in the future. The use of robots to do as much work as they are able to do reliably. Sure, many of the tedious human jobs will become obsolete and unemployed but it's a fact of life. It's like China, North American jobs are all being lost to China's workers, but it's the only way for these companies to be able to compete amongst themselves. The next trend will be to use robots to replace labour. A sure way to find a job: Design robots!

Electric Bandages

Heres another one of those inventions that you think to yourself, "why didn't i think of that before he did?!" :)

My Ramble on Alternative Energies

In response to Green Tech Could Get Economy High, With a Little Help From the Feds:
I think investing in green tech cannot lead you wrong. People seem to resist change almost naturally, but the fact of the matter is that our economies are always sliding in peril until a new innovative technology comes along. Somehow my intuition tells me that the next phase must deal with energy. Solving this would take care of so much. Primarily it would provide for more much needed homegrown jobs, it would lead us to a more environmentally friendly approach, but more importantly it would wean us away from oil. Besides, much more can come of this.

I find it ironic how we despise the way of life of these oil rich countries in the defense of democracy yet we feed them by sustaining our addiction to oil. Being reliant on them will only let them prosper. A little piece of history... In the 1970's when the price of oil went to record heights we finally realized how reliant we were on oil and Jimmy Carter vowed to solve the energy crisis. Now there are many reasons as to why that soon became a thing of the past but i find it "coincidental" how the price of oil soon drastically decreased after talk of the governments investing in alternative energies. It is at this time period that OPEC finally realized that keeping prices sky high would only give them short term profits, and hurt their long term profits if other technologies were to be developed. Honestly, why are our policies so harsh towards alternative energies? Why is it so inconvenient for me to put up a solar panel on my rooftop if i'm willing to do so?

Feds throw $30 million to NORTEL

It amazes me how a company that has done so well at one point can take a nose dive. Maybe the last CEO? It would make sense to me that with money you can make more money... assuming you don't mess up!

Flying car takes high road to Timbuktu

Yet another flying car in development. As great as all these flying cars are they will always be more expensive than cars and consume more energy. I'm loving the concept though for non-mainstream transportation. Too bad it runs on biofuel....

Touch Keyboard

So I was studying for the OS design exam and i came across a random thought. The idea was to make a "touch" keyboard, thinking this could potentially have a better design than your average mechanical keyboard.

In the end I looked to see if the idea has been done before, and wouldn't you know it someone has done a similar idea:
Optimus Tactus Touch Keyboard

How Servos Work

So I was thinking that if i ever mount that directional antenna it would be cool if i mounted some kind of motor on it so i can make it rotate where i need it to point to

And that is how i came across learning how a servo works

MS Remix

I found myself watching the entire video.... he portrays the importance of design quite nicely
Here is the MS Remix Video

Build a Variable Voltage Supply for Cheap

Found a cool way to make a variable voltag supply...
Basically with this you can switch from 5V, 9V, and 12V
All under $10