If you live in a big city like London, you have to get reasonably good at ignoring sound. I usually don't realise how loud my city is at night until I go somewhere that's extremely quiet, and I only notice when I can't sleep because it's too quiet. To truly keep out the sounds of the night in a city, you need to double or even triple glaze your window, which is fine really, it's not so expensive and it doesn't look that bad. But if the team from the Fraunhofer Institute for Structural Durability and System Reliability LBF in Darmstadt, Germany , could figure out a way to make their noise canceling window device commercially viable, they could have a huge city rat client base on their hands. The device is a piezoelectric patch which detects sound-generated vibration and then vibrates at a phase that cancels out the sound. Before I can get my silent night, though, the team need to make the patch transparent, minimize the cost of maintenance, and boost the effectiveness of the patch against intermittent noises - which could take a while. Good job I've just invested in some ear plugs.
ABC News Australia. (PHOTO: LOCOSTORM)
Solar barbeques are a nice idea, but...
Before I start, let me just apologise to the vegetarians among you, because I'm about to talk about meat sandwiches again. But this time it's the king of the meat+bread equation, the hamburger. No matter how skillfully you cook a burger in a frying pan or under a grill, it will never taste as nice as if you'd barbequed it. However, I live in England, where the number of days sunny enough to fire up the barbeque is severely limited. So we hardy British folk are resigned to cooking our meat outside in those 'summer days' also known as overcast days, mild breezes, freezing rain and icy fog. So a solar powered barbeque is a neat idea, but not one that will cut the mustard in our cloudy isle. I like the funky design, I like the idea of cooking my hotdog or drumstick with the power of the sun rather than coal or gas, and the image of dining al fresco in the beaming sun is tempting. But. There aint no smoke without fire and there aint no solar barbeque without sunshine. Sorry Gizmodo, try California.
Fund science or bail out MG Rover?
Last year, the last British-owned mass-production car manufacturer MG Rover, went bust. It was a sad and expensive day when MG Rover went under: thousands of people lost their jobs, national pride was dented, a huge hole was burnt in the UK taxpayer's pockets, and it turns out another huge hole is about to be burnt in UK science funding.
The government agency responsible for mopping up after the collapse of MG Rover is the same agency that holds the purse strings for science research, the Department of Trade and Industry. "Ongoing costs" relating to the carmaker going bust mean that £68m earmarked for science research is being taken back. See this BBC News article for a full list of who will lose out. An official spokesperson has said that the money represents a small percentage of the total amount spent on science research, but it still means that bodies like the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and the Medical Research Council will get tens of millions of pounds less than they were expecting.
I'm all for supporting British industry, I really am. And also for responsible employer behaviour and honoring a committment to the workforce. But I'm also all for investing in the future of science and technology. That backup pot of free money the government has just dipped into wasn't free, it was waiting to be given as grants to scientists and researchers across the country. There also seems to be a whiff here of anachronism, a throwback to when a job was for life and the government was responsible. It's incredibly sad that MG Rover has died a death, but it died because it just wasn't commercially viable anymore. Science shouldn't have to suffer as a result.
(PHOTO: MERGEMIND)
We didn't kill Napoleon after all
HOW DOES IT FEEL THAT YOU WON THE WAR? (PHOTO: FDECOMITE)
Even though millions of people pour through Waterloo station each day, I'd bet many of them would be hard pushed to explain the significance behind the name. It's named after the 1815 Battle of Waterloo, last stand of French ruler Napoleon. This very un-English crowing has not gone unnoticed on the other side of the Channel, the French have several times requested that Waterloo be renamed. They seem think that the name of the station that is the gateway between England and France is insulting rather than simply historic.
Anyway, as well as thinking we're slighting them with our choice of station names, the French also apparently think we poisioned their great leader when he was living in exile in St Helena. This is, apparently, an 'enduring French myth'. Well, let it endure no longer. Wasn't us, guv. According to a team at the University of Texas, Napoleon died of a stomach tumour, and a pretty nasty one at that. To add insult to injury, scientists think that the high concentrations of arsenic found in his hair came not from poisoning but from his excessive use of hair tonic, and that his over-rich diet of the fancy cuisine the French are so proud of may have helped hastened his demise...
Via ABC Australia.
For we all like foggy pudding
In the last few days of this week before Christmas, London (along with much of Britain) has been cloaked in a freezing fog. It has turned Heathrow into even more of a massive disaster than usual, which has had a knock on effect on the roads and rail networks, because everyone knows if there is one thing we Brits can't deal with it's 'adverse' weather.Everything grinds to a halt. Because I have no plans to go anywhere, I quite like the fog. It gives the city a Sherlock Holmes, Victorian kind of feel, largely thanks to the triangle of orange light under each streetlamp. And it makes it doubly cosy being inside.
The only effect this fog has had on me is to make me pick up a bit of meteorology, as every other news bulletin carries an item on the subject. The fog is apparently being caused by a large area of high pressure over the UK, coupled with weak sun and no wind. The high pressure traps moist air near the surface, which then cools, the water condenses and forms a fog particle. The more fog particles, the worse the visibility. Clearly there are a fair few particles in the air over London tonight.
Slightly off the subject, I looked up London fog in Wikipedia to find out about London Pea Soup fogs and what made them so bad, and discovered that there is a drink called a London Fog that is made of steamed milk, vanilla syrup and an Earl Grey teabag. According to Wikipedia its very popular in Vancouver of all places...
(PHOTO: GWIRE)
You cut I'll choose
OF COURSE THE BEST WAY OF BEING FAIR ABOUT DIVIDING UP CAKE IS TO GET CUPCAKES....
Every now and then when my brother and I were small, our parents used to give us a cake or a cookie or somesuch sugary snack and say "split that between the pair of you". Each time this happened, my brother would say "you cut, I'll choose". And I'd think, ha ha, I know, I'll make one much bigger than the other and then I'll have that one and he'll get the stingy one. It took an embarrassingly long while to realise that if I made one bigger than the other that logically he'd pick the big one. If only I'd started studying maths earlier on, then I'd have known the mathematical method of cutting cakes fairly so that everyone ends up happy. But, I have to say, only mathematicians would think about perimeters, triangles and icing density when slicing up a victoria sponge...
Some choice material goods at the Tate Modern
The Tate Modern is THE geek destination in London this November. Why? Well, first off you can enjoy some great G forces while riding its rocking slides in the main hall. Second, the Materials Library is hosting four talks based on the Tate Modern's Rehang each Monday evening. You're guaranteed the chance to poke, prod, and play the art to your heart's content:
Each night will contain different activities and materials conjectures such as the opportunity to play a lead bugle, to stand on a thermochromic Matisse and sit amongst The Surrealists and to do battle on the smallest chess set in the world.
The first night "Materials Gesture", on Nov 6th, seems a case in point. It features "Thermochromic Matisse, The Sound of Rothko, and the chance to encounter non-newtonian fluid" all capped off with drinks and discussion. And the rest follow wacky geektastic suite. What does this all mean? No clue. But aren't you intrigued enough to drop 10 quid to find out? Knowing what Rothko's sound is like is worth the price of admission alone. For sure. (I've always imagined it as the voice of a chainsmoking humpback whale slowed down by a hundred. Let me know if that's close)
(Thanks Alom. You rule)
Easing the pain of pavements
YOU'RE WELCOME TO WALK, JUST DON'T WALK INTO ME. (PHOTO: WALLYG)
The pavements around Oxford Street and Picadilly Circus at Christmas are two places in the world that could drive to me to violent bloody murder. The pavements are terribly designed and the people are insanely stupid, and all so walking from store to store is a wretched experience. So I for one am a big fan of Professor Nick Tyler of University College London. He and his colleagues from PAMELA (Pedestrian Accessibility & Movement Environment Laboratory - love it) have built a fake pavement in a warehouse, and plan to "use the computer-controlled surface to recreate all sorts of pedestrian nightmares". Like Oxford street. Yes, it suffers from an excess of idiot tourists/people, but it's also been designed by morons. Sorry, but it's true.
Here's how it will work:
"The fake pavement covers 80 square metres of floor
space, and is supported by 208 mechanical legs which can change its
slope and evenness.
Researchers can alter the lighting and noise conditions, creating
scenarios ranging from street-light-illuminated midnight scenes to a
dawn landscape accompanied by birdsong."
Birdsong! It's all in the detail. Anyway, the scientists will monitor heart rate and eye movement of voluteers as they navigate the various scenarios. They're hoping this will help them to plan optimum pavement layouts and designs to avoid irritations and injuries. And frustration and murder.
Via BBC News.
Tea - truly the amber nectar
If there is one thing we Brits love, it's tea. Tea fixes everything. Need a kick start in the morning? Tea. Feeling a bit blue and need some comforting? Tea. Greasy fry up on a Sunday morning to cure the hangover? Tea. Celebrating? Tea. So how delighted was I to read (as I sipped Earl Grey in a polystyrene cup at work), that tea is good for you?
These days, we're all meant to be drinking lots and lots and lots of water, but I'd always believed that not only did drinking tea not count as part of my daily water quota (which, by the way, I always miss), it was actually counting against me due to its diuretic properties. Not so! As well as the happy healthy flavanoids (good for the heart, helps the fight against cancer), tea contains fluoride and, of course, lots and lots of water. It's true that caffeine dehydrates, but a cup of tea gives you more water than its caffeine can take away from you. Hence a net gain of fluid which is a Good Thing.
This is good news, my fellow tea drinkers. Now all I need to hear is the health benefits of a nice chocolate digestive and I'll be sorted. In the meantime, anyone for a cuppa?
Via BBC News.
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