Posts Tagged ‘ Science ’

Eye of Sauron found by Hubble Telescope

The above is a picture of Fomalhaut, a star that offers the best evidence of a star system with a complex planetary group orbiting it. The picture was taken using the Hubble telescope. What makes it interesting, is the strong resemblance to the Eye of Sauron from the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I’m a huge [ READ MORE ]

Self healing rubber

An inventor working at the Industrial Physics and Chemistry Higher Educational Institution (ESPCI) in Paris, France, has come up with a new type of synthetic rubber. The rubber can be cut, torn, or ripped, and then pressed back together to form a bond as strong as if it had never been torn in the first [ READ MORE ]

A gravity powered lamp

A U.S. graduate student, Clay Moulton, created a gravity powered lamp as part of his Masters thesis. The entire lamp is only 4 feet high. To light it, a user moves the weights from the bottom to the top of the lamp and into a mass sled. As the sled slowly drops down, it [ READ MORE ]

Outlets anywhere on your wall

PhysOrg has an article about a new type of wallpaper developed by Philips. The idea is to have the wallpaper contain conducting strips that could be used to power electronics. Everything from TVs to room lights and even general purpose outlets. Since the strips are embedded in the wallpaper, the outlets could be positioned anywhere on [ READ MORE ]

Modern Alchemy

Well, it’s not quite alchemy, but it’s pretty close. Dr. Chunlei Guo of the University of Rochester, has found a way to etch metal with a high powered laser, in a way that causes it to turn nearly any color you can think of. What he does is etch the metal in such a way [ READ MORE ]

Waterproof sand

The video above is showing a special type of sand, that never gets wet. It can be completely submerged in water, and yet it will remain dry. Remove it from the water and it will be as dry as it was before it was submerged. The sand was originally developed for cleaning up oil spills. Because [ READ MORE ]

The Kaye Effect

I found this very interesting video that demonstrates the Kaye effect using a high speed camera and a bottle of shampoo. The Kaye effect was first described by the British engineer Alan Kaye in 1963. Hence the name. The best description I could find, was from the rather sparse wikipedia article on it. “While pouring one [ READ MORE ]

Fasting could help reduce heart disease

PhysOrg has very interesting article on the potential health benefits of Fasting. The practice of fasting, that is abstaining from two or more meals in a row, is common to many different religious and mystic groups. But until recently was not considered to have any health benefits. Now research is showing that fasting once [ READ MORE ]

Velociraptors were just big birds?

Paleontologists at the American Museum of Natural History and the Field Museum of Natural History have conclusively identified Quill knobs on velociraptor bones. Proving that velociraptors had feathers. Scintists have suspected that raptors had feathers for some time, but have never been able to prove it. Now with the discovery of quill knobs they know [ READ MORE ]

Thought Controlled Wheelchair

NewScientist has an article about a new wheelchair that is controlled via a person’s thoughts. It works by intercepting signals sent from their brain to the larynx. No sound actually needs to be produced. So as long as the user thinks the word and sub vocalizes it, he/she can control the machine. Watch the [ READ MORE ]