Yoshimoto Cube – Transformation of two stellated rhombic dodecahedrons from a cube

Yoshimoto discovered this cube when he was searching for a way to divide a cube equally in three-dimensional space. The result is a peculiar polyhedral dyad consisting of eight interconnected cubes that can be opened in multiple ways. The cube can be divided into two cubes and then transformed into two rhombuses, one silver the other gold with twelve faces each. Great animation here: http://www1.ttcn.ne.jp/a-nishi/y_cube/z_y_cube.html  Check out other Ployhedral toys here:http://www1.ttcn.ne.jp/a-nishi/z_p_toy.html

And for ~$50 buy one here: http://www.momastore.org/museum/moma/ProductDisplay_Yoshimoto%20Cube_10451_10001_45657_-1_11480_11482_Y_Games%20and%20Puzzles_

The Holidays are all about the kids..

a Gift idea for the kids… ‘Kids Rock”..

Santa Sighting ..

On Saturday Dec 20th, 2008 my family and I were driving to the store to pick up some Christmas Gifts.  Then it happened; Santa was on his “sleigh” on Manchester Rd. He seemed to be having some problems with his beard, which made me wonder how Santa deals with this when he’s *really* going fast at night.  How could he possibly see?  I guess Rudolph takes care of getting Santa safely to each home.  Happy Holidays!  

Einstein Cross – Macrolensing and Microlensing Produce Crisp Details of Galaxy 10 Billion Light Years Away

I had not heard of microlensing prior to reading this article, but apparently both a galaxy and the individual stars both help gravitational lensing to allow astronomers to see details described as :

“[It] enabled astronomers to probe regions on scales as small as a millionth of an arcsecond. This corresponds to the size of a one euro coin seen at a distance of five million kilometers, i.e., about 13 times the distance to the Moon! "

Google Street View – Sampsonia Way

Have you seen Google Street view?  In a nutshell, Google outfitted cars with special cameras to take photos of all major streets in many of the US cities.  It’s quite amazing idea, and already some businesses are using it to make their job easier / keep costs down.  My brother works for a large insurance company that used to send folks to accident sites to take photos of the area.  Now if they just need to see what the road or an intersection looks like, they simply pull it up on the street view of Google. 

A local neighborhood decided they wanted to do something special for the camera car when it visited.  Check out the “making of” video first:

Then go to the Street view from Google to see the results: http://maps.google.com/maps?cbp=12,453.27181675734937,,0,8.89249651051198&cbll=40.456786,-80.012446&layer=c&ie=UTF8&panoid=lSBvKglurQAKmE49AlGQgA&ll=40.456785,-80.011722&spn=0,359.986095&z=17

Obama pick for Department of Energy

I’ve submerged myself in technology since I was a toddler, taking apart my mother’s vacuum to see how it worked, to stringing “parts” all over the house.  I shocked myself hundreds of times before I was seven, when I first started working with a Tandy Color Computer.  So basically what I am saying is technology and it’s draw for energy keep me intrigued.   

This leads me to the current state of the U.S., with all it’s problems has the potential to make huge leaps forward both economically and technically.  Obama has made an interesting pick to head the Department of Energy (see http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20081211-obama-pick-for-energy-dept-may-herald-much-needed-shakeup.html)

But the most intriguing choice by far is the decision to place Steven Chu in charge of the Department of Energy. Chu has a PhD in physics, and was a wide-ranging experimentalist, sharing a Nobel Prize for his work in trapping metal atoms in ultracold gas clouds, a technique with a variety of applications. Chu brings a wealth of experience to the position; he has spent time in academic positions at Berkeley and Stanford, and won his Nobel Prize for work performed while at Bell Labs at a time when it was an icon of industry-funded "blue sky" research.

Since 2004, he has headed the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, which has undoubtedly given him a wealth of administrative experience. LBL hosts some work from the DOE’s joint genome initiative, which has given Chu some experience with biology; he can now speak comfortably about termite endosymbionts. During his tenure, he helped refocus the facility on renewable and sustainable energy, primarily directed toward biofuels and solar. In his talk at the World Science Festival last year, Chu said he felt that solar technology has hit a critical mass where the number and quality of the people working on it had risen rapidly in recent years. He was clearly hoping that biofuels would go the same direction, suggesting that we needed to start engineering plants to contain complete biosynthetic pathways that produced some of the hydrocarbons we need for fuel and industrial purposes.

Chu clearly lacks some of the political skills of the other appointees—he’s bluntly termed corn-based biofuels "a dumb way to do things"—but we’ve argued before that US energy policy needs a major shake up, and Chu’s role in directing this sort of focus at LBL may make him the right person to do so. Regardless of political experience, he’s incredibly personable and persuasive, and it’s impossible to be anything but impressed with his sheer intellectual capacity after seeing him speak. His choice, along with several of the other environmental staff, clearly indicates that the scientific focus of the Obama administration will clearly be in the energy arena.

Four-dimensional (4D) Electron Microscopy Captures Nano Word

Caltech has developed a movie-microscope to show atomic particles behavior. 

“More than a century ago, the development of the earliest motion picture technology made what had been previously thought "magical" a reality: capturing and recreating the movement and dynamism of the world around us. A breakthrough technology based on new concepts has now accomplished a similar feat, but on an atomic scale–by allowing, for the first time, the real-time, real-space visualization of fleeting changes in the structure and shape of matter barely a billionth of a meter in size.

Such "movies" of atomic changes in materials of gold and graphite, obtained using the technique, are featured in a paper appearing in the November 21 issue of the journal Science. (4D microscopy videos can be viewed at http://ust.caltech.edu/movie_gallery/.) A patent on the conceptual framework of this approach was granted to the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in 2006. “ 

Read the story here: http://www.physorg.com/news146409320.html

sample move here:http://ust.caltech.edu/movie_gallery/NanoDrumming.html

Wack a Mouse!

http://www.neatorama.com/2008/11/28/whack-a-mouse/

 

too funny!

FDA Sets Standards for Melamine contamination in Baby Formula

It amazes me that a standard is needed for a product consumed by the littlest of us, but apparently it’s necessary. Apparently one part in a million is safe enough; as was set by the FDA this month.  This is a pull-back from the FDA’s initial standing:

“ The agency had left the impression of a zero tolerance on Oct. 3 when it stated: "FDA is currently unable to establish any level of melamine and melamine-related compounds in infant formula that does not raise public health concerns."

Melamine was traced to four infant deaths in China due to contamination, and two samples of US made infant formula were found to have traces below the new standard.  Read more here:http://www.physorg.com/news147111214.html

Medical use of Isotopes

My wife works in Nuclear Medicine, and on a couple of occasions now due to tightening of regulation, shrinking sources for supplies and other factors. It’s a fascinating field to me since it involves science to a high degree.  My great uncle says she “fixes sick Bombs,” which may explain why some people freak out when i tell them what she does.  It instills images of nuclear bombs etc, so even though my uncle is jesting I bet it’s close to what some people actually think.   Nuclear medicine has exploded as a modality, especially with the combination with other technologies, such as CAT scans and PET.  My wife is actually working with the latest in dual-modality equipment in the state. The combining of the technologies should help Nuke Med to shave it’s old “unclear medicine” name, due to the large pixel size of the images.  The software for these cameras has come a long way, to 3-d rendering of the heart actually pumping.

affectionately called Unclear Medicine due to the less than crisp images, it is the one of the best imaging for detecting unnatural growths, bone density, and heart function. 

So this brings me to an article I found that might help one of the most difficult parts of the job: obtaining the isotope needed from a very limited supply. 

“Researchers in Canada have proposed a new way to make key medical isotopes that avoids the need for nuclear reactors and weapons-grade uranium.

The alternative technique uses a particle accelerator and could help secure a long-term, reliable supply of technetium-99m, which is a radioisotope that is used in around 80% of all diagnostic nuclear medicine tests worldwide. “

http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/36822