Science Niche » Scientist And Researchers

The “GoldenColor Classic” – Upgrade Shenanigans!

maward — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 17:34:29 +0000

Almost a year agoÂ posted this page with info on his “Golden Color Classic”, with the project stuck at an upgrade to an LC 630 motherboard, I thought my goal of creating a “poor man’s iPod” was dead. What I wanted to accomplish was an elegant mp3 server and Internet radio station that I could hook up to the stereo system in my front room without having to have an entire clunky computer system on a shelf.Success! After initial attmepts to add a PowerPC 5500 motherboard failed, I got ahold of a PowerPC 6500 motheboard, and everything fell into place! The Golden Color Classic now runs system 9.1 at 250 MHz!

This little beauty has been equipped and configured especially as a Internet music machine with the following features:

Startech.com 10/100 PCI Ethernet Card.
10 GB ATA hard drive – for holding mp3s!
Screen mod – 640×480 resolution.
Specially wired to bypass keyboard startup – did not want a stinky keyboard on the shelf! Therefore flipping the switch at the back turns on the unit immediately. (Still works with a keyboard though).
Beautiful golden finish, with a silver mouse to boot!
Oh, and last but not least, a CD-ROM for playing traditional CDs! The case had to be altered a bit to accomodate the side-loading CD, but I think it looks pretty good:

Note that setting a machine up like this involves sacrifices – with a full sized hard drive and CD-ROM, there is no room for the floppy drive or an internal speaker. But in this case, both are unnecessary for the intended application. There is also no room for the double riser PCI card of the 6500, so I switched to the single riser from a 5500.The only improvement I’d like to add is to throw in a Yamaha SCSI CD burner I have lying around – that will be done shortly!

Why go through so much effort to upgrade an old Mac? No particular reason, other than the challenge and fun of tinkering! If you are interested in upgrading a Colour Classic, it has turned into quite a cult, especially in Japan. Some people have even turned Colour Classics into G4s! Here are (just a few!) links if you are interested:

Colour Classic – Low End Mac

Colour Classic Screen Upgrade

Colour Classic Screen Modification

World of the Power Colour Classic

Colour Classic Discussion Forum

Club for Creating the Stongest Colour Classic

More views of the original version (December 2001):


Click on any of the images for a larger view!

Laser Refraction Demonstration

Mervin — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 05:53:20 +0000

A good idea for illustrating refraction is using a laser with some sort of reflective medium in an aquarium. If you’ve never tried it before, I highly recommend Kaleidoscopic fluid… you can find it in your Boreal science supply catalog;

I add about 75-100ml of the fluid to a small aquarium full of water, and then I add some green food coloring just for a “neat” effect…if you don’t have Kaleidoscopic fluid, a few pinches of flour, starch or chalk dust or some milk will do. The idea is to add particles that the laser light can reflect off of.

Notice the path of the beam compared to the orientation of the laser. The situation changes quite a bit when you raise the laser above the water line…

For the sake of the digital camera, these pictures were taken with the lights on, so I highly recommend doing it a darkened room – students really get a kick out of the glowing beam!

A Nerd’s Atomic Paradise

Mervin — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 20:24:08 +0000

Being the ultimate nerd, I carry a periodic table with me every wherever I go. What if a person accosts me on the subway, demanding to know the atomic molar mass of vanadium? You can never be too careful.I can understand however, why some of you would not want to be caught with a periodic table on your person, lest you be accused of some sort of “element fetish”. Besides, most periodic tables have so much information written so infinitesimally small, they require a good set of nerdy coke-bottle glasses to read. So whatâ€™s a dedicated chemist or physicist to do? Simple: enter the information for all the elements into a database! Wait, thatâ€™s way too much work. Thankfully, some scientifically minded shareware authors have (elegantly) done all the work for you.

Three choices pop to mind when it comes to getting excellent element information. First thereâ€™s Sodium by Nat Tabris. Nat has put together all the basic element information you need with very clear, concise and beautifully constructed displays. Of all the element programs itâ€™s the only one with a resizable window, a great advantage if youâ€™re working on a small screen.

Nat offers Sodium for the incredible price of only $5, so you can get a very capable atomic reference for the price of a Happy Meal.But what if youâ€™re hungry for more information? What if you absolutely must know the crustal abundance of osmium? You may just want to sink your teeth into the Big Mac of atomic references, Periodic Table from Synergy Creations. This program is jam-packed with well-organized features. Almost every possible tidbit of element information is displayed on the splash screen that greets you.

Changing units for most of the information is a breeze with convenient pop-ups embedded in the element windows. The element displays also have a set of arrows that let you browse your way through the periodic table, a pastime every self-respecting nerd does in their spare time.

Periodic Table includes a molecular weight calculator that allows you to either click on elements or type them, with only the slight annoyance of not understanding parentheses such as in the formula (NH₄)₂SO₄. On the whole though, I highly recommend this amazing reference tool; itâ€™s a bargain at $15.Now itâ€™s time for the “20 pack of McNuggets” main course! The mother-of-all atomic references is The Atomic Mac. Chris Smolinski, the creator, has put together the ultimate atomic reference tool. It blows the competition out of the water, providing every bit of data you can think of from linear expansion coefficients to solar abundance! One outstanding feature is the beautiful spectrum window, which displays the emission spectrum for any chosen element. I also like the “state” window with its temperature slider – watch the phases of the elements change as you move the slider!

The molecular weight calculator works like a charm, allowing you to enter brackets or even hydrated compounds.

The Atomic Mac lives up to its name (and will really please the nerd in you) by providing isotope decay equations, half-lives for isotopes and the ability to draw the decay pathway for any isotope. So The Atomic Mac wins the war of the atomic reference programs but getting the best is going to cost you. The price tag for The Atomic Mac is $25 but is worth every penny.Still need more information? Wow, you really are a nerd after , You can read in-depth reviews by clicking on the following – Sodium, Periodic Table, and The Atomic Mac. Have fun!

Interface Osmosis Lab

admin — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 19:52:50 +0000

Yesterday promised an idea for the sometimes annoying osmosis lab involving a dialysis baggie and glass tubing;index

Â Â Instead of waiting for 20 minutes or longer just to see a small amount of solution movement up the tube, I decided to hook up a low pressure sensor (see above) to the top of the glass tube – this is accomplished with some simple plastic tubing. When you’ve got the whole thing set up, it should look like this;

The black cable you see in the picture above leads to the science interface, which is connected to the computer (see above). So what is the advantage of this setup? The really big advantage is time. Instead of waiting long periods of time to see a pathetic amount of solution movement in the tube, the low pressure sensor yields readable results in just seconds – if you look at the time scale in the graph below, you’ll see the pressure change is stretched out over only 200 seconds. Looking at the graph, you can see even that time interval was unnecessarily long in order to see a pressure change;

Having this kind of sensitivity makes all sorts of other things possible! What I did is let the experiment run for a while, then I changed the surrounding liquid from distilled water to highly concentrated salt solution. Then for the heck of it, I changed it back again a little while later. Here’s the result;

Pretty cool, eh? Give it a try and letÂ know how it works out!

The biomedical industry should concentrate more on research

admin — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 07:58:36 +0000

Investments in production are down in the field and pharmaceutical industries are turning to relationships with research or public institutions (hospitals, clinics …). A growing number of clinical trials should emerge in 2010.

Soo Kee Chee, director of the National Cancer Center Singapore (NCCS) said that academic institutions are beginning to conduct clinical trials for the private sector. For example, the center is currently assisting a pharmaceutical company to arrange a trial taking place in 22 institutions in 12 countries. The NCCS is also engaged in a clinical phase III with a large Danish group, and hopes to see lead this major project.

Many collaborations between Asian and foreign companies should also appear. The director of the healthcare division in Asia Pacific by Frost & Sullivan, Simranjit Singh, said that international companies should take account of Asia in their strategic vision, not as a market or plant relocation, but as a key element of discovery new molecules. The trend has already started in Singapore, for example, the establishment by Schering-Plow Corp a unit translational medical research of several million euros. In January 2009, Abbott has also opened a research and development of 3.5 million euros, its first laboratory on Singaporean soil.

Coral Reef: marine reserves against climate change

admin — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 10:01:23 +0000

Faced with attacks by global warming, corals will arrive may not recover and may disappear. That is the fatal predictions of scientists. A study by the University of Exeter brings some hope to these organizations.

It is not good to be a coral. Elevated temperature of the seas, rising sea levels, ocean acidification … the list of dangers of climate change in addition to other human activities: urbanization, pollution, invasive species, etc..

The effectiveness of marine reserves as a conservation tool is subject to recognition of their benefits by local people and, alas, this efficiency is often misunderstood and controversial part. This is even more true in the case of coral reefs because there was not so far documented example of the impact of these reservations about their ability to withstand climate change.

Thus, only about 2% of coral reefs are included in reserves that protect them from human activities such as fishing or dredging. Peter Mumby, a researcher at the University of Exeter, is in despair.

“Coral reefs are the largest living structures on Earth and are home to the largest biodiversity of the planet, said he. Result of climate change, the environment that made the corals can thrive for hundreds of thousands years is changing too quickly for the coral can adapt. ”

In an attempt to demonstrate that the ecological benefits of marine reserves could allow the corals to better withstand the effects of global warming, a study was launched in the Caribbean region.

This study focused on 10 sites, both within and outside reserves, and lasted two and a half years. In the study area, the coral had been severely affected by bleaching and by the Hurricane Frances in 2004. At the beginning of the study, they represented only 7% of the area of reef. At the end of the project, those in marine reserves had reached 19% of the reef surface while those in unprotected area had not recovered.

A gang war for coral

Whence this difference? Peter Mumby explains that “the reserve has increased the number of parrots and fish such as parrotfish graze on algae, coral can grow freely without being overwhelmed by algae. Result, the reefs within the reserve showed signs of recovery, while those with more algae do not show.

Macroalgae (seaweed large visible to the eye, by contrast to microalgae, microscopic) are indeed in competition with corals. Both types of organisms growing on the same site favor binding to the substrate and rocky capture light rays for photosynthesis. The development of one is then at the expense of another.

Peter Mumby added that “such evidence could help to persuade governments to reduce fishing of herbivorous keys as parrotfish and help reef to respond to threats of climate change inevitable.”

It is noteworthy that the degree of degradation of corals was very high and that such recovery had not yet been described to date. Similar results, even more important, should be visible in other parts of the region where reefs are in better condition if measures are taken in this direction.

“To protect the reefs in the long term we need radical action to reduce emissions of CO 2. However, our research shows that local action to reduce fishing may contribute to the fate of coral significantly, “concluded Professor Mumby.

Rosetta reveals the nature of the asteroid Steins

admin — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 10:56:02 +0000

The close views of the asteroid (2867) Steins, obtained with the OSIRIS (Optical, Spectroscopic, and Infrared Remote Imaging System) on Rosetta, have provided extensive new measurements of physical properties of the asteroid main belt. Steins is proving to be a pile of rubble rather inconsistent with the diamond shape has been shaped by the YORP effect. This is the first time that this effect is seen in the asteroid main belt. The results are reported by H. Uwe Keller and his colleagues in the edition of 08 January 2010 from Science magazine.

The closest approach of the asteroid was held at 18h38 UTC at a distance of 803 kilometers. About 60% of the surface has been solved in providing an overview of all single image from which a certain number of important physical properties can be deduced.

Little was known about the asteroid (2867) Steins when he was chosen in early 2004 as a target for a fly closer during the Rosetta mission. At this time, it was classified as an E-type asteroid based on its visual spectrum and near infrared and its high albedo. Later, ground-based observations have estimated a diameter of approximately 4.6 km and identified a period rotation of about 6 hours

The new images of OSIRIS show that Steins is a body flattened at the poles, like a brilliant diamond, with dimensions of 6.67 x 5.81 x 4.47 km. Its surface is mostly covered with shallow craters with some scattered larger craters smaller. Analysis of impact craters indicates a deficit of small craters (those with a diameter of less than 0.5 km) that Keller and his colleagues attributed to a reorganization of the surface resulting from the effect Yarkovsky-O’Keefe-Radzievskii – Paddack (YORP). The effect would have caused landslides that have caused the filling of craters smaller. This is the first time that the YORP effect is seen in the asteroid main belt.

Absorption spectroscopy

An incident photon can also be absorbed by a molecule and then the photon energy is converted into an excitation of that molecule’s electron cloud. This type of interaction is sensitive to the internal structure of the molecule, since the laws of quantum mechanics only allow for the existence of a limited number of excited states of the electron cloud of any given chemical species. Each of these excited states has a defined energy; the absorption of the photon has to bridge the energy gap between the ground state (lowest energy state) and an allowed excited state of the electron cloud. Molecules can therefore be identified by their absorption spectrum: Their wavelength-dependent capacity for absorbing photons depends on the energy spacing of the states of their electron cloud. (Astronomers use absorption lines to determine the composition of stars, for example.) Molecules which strongly absorb visible light appear colored to the human eye and are therefore called “chromophores,” i.e. “carriers of color.”

Gilles Cuny – Paleontologist(1965 – …)

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 08:49:03 +0000

Born in 1965 in Paris, Gilles Cuny studied natural science and paleontology at the University Pierre and Marie Curie – Paris 6. After a dissertation on the biological crisis of Triassic-Jurassic boundary edited by Eric Buffetaut, Gilles spent 5 years as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Bristol in England, where he specialized in study of sharks and their fossil dental histology.

He then taught paleontology for 1 year at the University of Maha Sarakham in Thailand before taking up his duties as curator of collections of vertebrate fossils in the geological museum in Copenhagen in Denmark, ext it still occupies today.

His current research includes the study of fossil shark fauna Lower Cretaceous of Thailand and Tunisia. Another major focus of his research involves the study of the emergence ofÂ Triassic and study of histology of dental maill de sharks. His work, based mainly on the study of vertebrate microremains (teeth , scales and small bones alone), has also led to interest in many other groups (bony fish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals primitive) in collaboration with many colleagues in France and abroad. His research in the field l have resulted in most countries of Western Europe, Tunisia, Madagascar, China and Thailand.

Gilles is the author of some forty scientific papers and a dozen articles for the general public.

Opening a center for energy research in Galway

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 09:06:59 +0000

A new center for energy research has just been launched at the National University of Ireland Galway in western Ireland. This center will work on new sources of energy generation from micro-organisms, such as improving the performance of wind turbines. Besides research activities, it also perform the functions of education and information for the general public.

The center recently received 5 million euros of public funding to start its activity. Eventually, 20 scientists and technicians should be hired. The center coordinates the activities of a hundred researchers in other laboratories of the university in civil engineering, environment, microbiology, chemistry, molecular electronics.

The opening of this center is integrated into the new decisions for Irish research. Renewable energy has become the third topic of research priority for Ireland, in addition to information technology and life sciences.

Source: http://www.nuigalway.ie/news/main_press.php?p_id=914

The award honors Max Planck research on collective memory

Sun, 16 Aug 2009 08:38:53 +0000

The price of the Max Planck Research, with a total of 1.5 million was awarded in 2009 two researchers whose work focuses on the history of memory. Traditionally awarded to a German scientist and a foreign researcher, the price this year was won by Aleida Assmann, professor of English literature at the University of Constance and the American philologist Karl Galinsky. Both now receive each of 750,000 euros to conduct their research projects.

Aleida Assmann is one of the pioneers in the history of memory and advocates in Germany, as part of his research, an interdisciplinary approach involving history, psychology, neurobiology and literature. It is one of the researchers in literature the most famous in the world. His work, known to a wider audience, are initiators of debates on the memory of the Holocaust or the creation of a culture of collective European memory. The allocation of the price will allow it to deepen its research on European history from memory and strengthen the international research network on the memory of the University of Constance.

Karl Galinsky is a professor of classical philology at the University of Texas at Austin (USA) and is one of the most innovative in the field of culture. There lie studies of ancient languages, history and social history of art, and religions of antiquity. He particularly highlighted the links between ancient and its impact on modern culture, focusing simultaneously on modern issues such as multiculturalism and the disinterest in politics. Through this award, Karl Galinsky will be able to work in the Seminar of Classical Philology of the Ruhr University Bochum (RUB) in the field of interdisciplinary research on memory and history of religions and establish a group of young researchers. Galinsky has already received the prize in 1993 for research and Humboldt is already cooperating with colleagues from Berlin and Mainz.

The Price of Research Max Planck, which is the international price of the Max Planck Society and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). It supports German and foreign researchers working in specific disciplines for the future. He always rewards a researcher working abroad and a second conducting his research in Germany, both already recognized internationally and can generate new impulses and results in the framework of international cooperation. Next year, the price is alternately open to the natural sciences and engineering sciences, life sciences or social sciences.