Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science that aims to create it. AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents"[1] where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its chances of success.[2] John McCarthy, who coined the term in 1956,[3...] defines itas "the science and engineering of making intelligent machines."[4]

The field was founded on the claim that a central property of humans, intelligence—th e sapience of Homo sapiens—can be so precisely described that it can be simulated by a machine.[5] This raises philosophical issues about the nature of the mind and the ethics of creating artificial beings, issues which have been addressed by myth, fiction and philosophy since antiquity.[6] Artificial intelligence has been the subject of optimism,[7] but has also sufferedsetbacks[8] and, today, has become an essential part of the technology industry, providing the heavy lifting for many of the most difficult problems in computer science.[9]

AI research is highly technical and specialized, deeply divided into subfields that often fail in the task of communicating with each other.[10] Subfields have grown up around particular institutions, the work of individual researchers, and the solution of specific problems, resulting in longstanding differences of opinion about how AI should be done and the application of widely differing tools. The central problems of AI include such traits as reasoning, knowledge, planning, learning, communication, perception and the ability to move and manipulate objects.[11] General intelligence (or "strong AI") is still among the field's long term goals

 

Metropol Parasol : Largest Wood Structure in the World

A waffle like structure in the middle of Seville, Spain. Looks strange and alien like at first glance - but I think it's pretty awesome. The amount of work that went into creating it and designing it must have been insane!

Project : Metropol Parasol
... Redevelopment of Plaza de la Encarnacion, Seville, Spain

Function : archeological site, farmers market, elevated plaza, multiple bars and restaurants

Site area : 18,000 square meters

Building area : 5,000 square meters

Total floor Area : 12,670 square meters

Number of floors : 4

Height of the building : 28.50 meters

Structure : concrete, timber and steel

Principal Exterior : timber and granite

Principal interior material : concrete, granite and steel

Designing period : 2004-2005

Construction period : 2005-2011See More

                     Found this Rare photo of Titanic's Ticket .....

>"DNA Origami"
Robots Target
Cancer Cells<

Using a technique called "DNA
... origami", US scientists have
made programmable
molecule-transporting
nanorobots that can seek out
particular cell targets and deliver specific instructions for
them to follow. One example
of such use could be to tell cancer cells to destroy themselves

Education –
Introduction to
the Optocoupler

It is a small device that allows
... the transmission of a signal
between parts of a circuit
while keeping those two
parts electrically isolated. How
is this so? Inside our typical optocoupler are two things –
an LED and a phototransistor.
When a current runs through
the LED, it switches on - at
which point the
phototransitor detects the light and allows another
current to flow through it.
And then when the LED is off,
current cannot flow through
the phototransistor. All the
while the two currents are completely electrically isolated
(when operated within their
stated parameters!)

                                  >Langeled Pipeline<


The Langeled Pipeline is the longest underwater pipeline, measuring 746 miles (1,200 km) long from Norway to the U.K. Costing 10 million USD to develop.
It was constructed for Norwegian Hydro to carry 70 million cubic yards (45 million m3) of gas to heat homes in the United Kingdom. The Langeled project will provide 20 percent of overall gas supple to United Kingdom. Lead by... Ormen Lange, the project was completed in 2006; nine years after Norwegian Hydro first discovered an oil field 2,953 feet (900 m) below the earth’s surface in the sea. A total of 3,000 workers involved in the construction of this pipeline under the sea using special equipment.

Tiger’s Nest Monastery - Bhutan
amazing temple !!!!

>>>wireless charging<<<

Wireless charging is any of
several methods of
charging batteries without
... the use of cables or device-
specific AC adaptors.
Wireless charging can be used for a wide variety of
devices including cell
phones, laptop computers and MP3 players as well as
larger objects, such as robots and electric cars. There are three methods of
wireless charging:
>inductive charging
>radio charging and
>resonance charging.

Inductive charging is used
for charging mid-sized
items such as cell phones,
MP3 players and PDAs. In inductive charging, an
adapter equipped with
contact points is attached to the device's back plate.
When the device requires a
charge, it is placed on a
conductive charging pad,
which is plugged into a
socket.

Radio charging is used for
charging items with small
batteries and low power
requirements, such as
watches, hearing aids,
medical implants, cell phones, MP3 players and
wireless keyboard and
mice. Radio waves are
already in use to transmit
and receive cellular telephone, television, radio
and Wi-Fi signals. Wireless radio charging works
similarly. A transmitter,
plugged into a socket,
generates radio waves.
When the receiver attached
to the device is set to the same frequency as the transmitter, it will charge
the device's battery.

Resonance charging is used
for items that require large
amounts of power, such as
an electric car, robot,
vacuum cleaner or laptop
computer. In resonance charging, a copper coil
attached to a power source
is the sending unit.
Another coil, attached to
the device to be charged, is
the receiver. Both coils are tuned to the same
electromagnetic frequency,
which makes it possible for
energy to be transferred
from one to the other.The
method works over short distances (3-5 meters).

The idea of wireless power
transmission is not new. In
1899, Nikola Tesla wirelessly transmitted 100
million volts of electricity 26 miles to light 200 bulbs
and run an electric motor.
However, at that time
direct current ( DC, which is the wired method) and
alternating current (AC)
were competing
technologies. DC, backed
strenuously by Thomas
Edison, emerged the winner.

           >>>CCTV Headquarters in China<<<


A very complex piece of architecture this CCTV Tower is in Beijing, China . It was built as two towers, which were later joined in the middle. In order not to lock in structural differentials this connection was scheduled in the early morning when the steel in the two towers cooled to the same temperature. This was extremely difficult to achieve as the building itself is in seismiczone.

Some failed experiment(pmm)

¤Simanek's Silly Slinky Device¤

Two identical gear wheels (A and B) are connected by a frictionless chain drive (C). Obtain a Slinky (TM) toy or two, and make a chain of them to wrap around the outside of these wheels as shown. The coils of the spring engage in the gear teeth, which prevent the coils slipping on the pulleys.
... The design allows either one or two coils to fit in the gaps between the teeth. we show two coils per gap at the bottom, and one coil per gap at the top.

We have arranged things so that the coils are closer together on the right than on the left. We show a compression ratio of 2, but it can be anything you want. The chain drive (C) with ratio 2:1 keeps the lower pulley rotating half as fast as the upper one, maintaining the chosen compression ratio.

The
internal
forces are clearly
balanced,
so we need not consider
them.
Obviously
the
system is heavier in the right, since there are twice as many spring coils, so we expect the slinky and upwer wheel to rotate clockwise. As it turns, the compression ratio will be mainatained, and the unbalance maintained continually. The coils are expanded as they go around the top pulley, and compressed as they go around the bottom pulley, as indicated.

Of course, good engineering design will require two locked coaxial gears at the top and also at the bottom, to provide for proper tracking to give the spring lateral stability, otherwise it would fall off the gears. If you actually build one, its friction will prevent its motion. But it does move freely if either pulley is driven by hand, and it does does maintain the condition of overbalance no matter how far you rotate it. Now reduce the friction to zero and watch it go!

>120-Year-Old Photos of the Famous London Tower Bridge are Found by Accident<


"These photographs of Tower Bridge being constructed have been unveiled after a stash of hundred-year-old photos were found in a skip. The 50 sepia pictures, the most recent of which date back to 1892 , reveal in incredible detail the ingenuity behind one of the capital's most popular tourist destinations

>A High Traffic Building - Gate Tower, Japan<



This is a 16-story building in the heart of Osaka, Japan - but this isn't your average business tower, this one has a high traffic highway passing right through it. Many in Japan refer to it as the "beehive" due to its appearance and how busy it usually looks.
... This is a very rare case, even for Japan since most of their highway system is laid out underground. This is also the first building in Japan to have this sort of design.

We are moving from top-
down hierarchy to
networked heterarchy
between equals. The
Internet is the greatest tool
... for peace and prosperity ever, if we will just get out
of the way of its growth
and interoperability

                         >World's Most Powerful Lasers !<


This 500 trillion watt laser at the National Ignition Facility in Livermore, California [was] built with the aim to create nuclear fusion on earth, effectively creating a mini-sta

 

>Masjid al-Haram, Mecca, Saudi Arabia<


Masjid al-Haram is the largest mosque in the world. Located in the city of Mecca, it surrounds the Kaaba, the place which Muslims worldwide turn towards while offering daily prayers and is Islam’s holiest place. The mosque is also known as the Grand Mosque. The current structure covers an area of 4,008,020 square metres (990.40 acres) including the outdoor ...and indoor praying spaces and can accommodate up to four million Muslim worshippers during the Hajj period, one of the largest annual gatherings of people in the world

                  >Alternative Car Park Tower / Mozhao Studio<


Winning the Hong Kong Alternative Car Park Tower Competition, the proposal attempts to integrate the Hong Kong City hall, the second-floor pedestrian system and the streets on the second floor. It provides a network of public spaces with atriums and multifunctional areas placed atthe top floor, along with great views of the Victoria Harbor and Kowloon.... Designed by Mozhao Studio, the Car Park Tower is a public building, transforming the typical parking facility into an urban landmark.
The automated parking is located above the multi-functional area, forming an 80 meter high outdoor atrium. Cars are transported from the ground floor to parking spots by the spiral car-lifts and the horizontal rails. The atrium which varies with movement of mechanism of the fully automated parking provides themulti-functional area with a distinctive atmosphere.

                               >Floating Green Echo Cities<


Lilypad Project is the most amazing green wonders and certainly the extreme from being built but, it is an amazing concept. The idea is to create several floating independent maritime eco-city islands. Each one would be able to provide accommodation to more than 50,000 residents and would support a great deal of biodiversity. It has collecting pools at its centers wh...ich assembles water and filter itfor use. Two applications of solar type are used. The first one is a semi-transparent solar window is used, facing the open-air, inner vortex; and the second is a glass witha printed array of solar cells spaced to create partial shading, used as a solar roof material. In addition, when the structure is anchor and as thrusters for force when Gyre is under way underwater nacelle’s function both as tidal producer. The structure manages undersea pressures and reduces stress due to its shape. Rainwater is harvested in the inner vortex and gravity fed to the water purification system at the base of the Gyre. Mechanical systems and emergency freshwater storage is the deepest portion of the structure.

>Top Strange Holes in the World<


These top strange holes are geographical phenomena and most astounding sites in the world. Some hole are made occasionally by nature but some by the man in search for the mining wealth.

... 1. Darvaza Gas Crater – Turkmenistan (The Door to Hell):

In the heart of the Karakum desert of Turkmenistan the Darvaza Gas Crater or The Burning Gates give off a glow that can be seen from miles away during the dark night. The large crater is a result of a Soviet gas exploration accident in the 1950’s. It was created when a Soviet drilling rig was drilling for natural gas fell into an underground cavern resulting in a crater which today measures roughly 60 meters in diameter and 20 meters deep. The huge crater was set alight shortly afterbeing discovered and has been burning ever sinse. The smell of burning sulfur can be detected from a distance and becomes quite strong as you near the hot edge of the crate

 

Smallest Poisonous Frog In the World<

The frogs, among the most poisonous amphibians on the planet, are found only in the wild on the western slopes of the Andesin Ecuador, South America. But now dozens of the rare species have been bred at the Blue Reef Aquarium in Portsmouth, Hampshire. When adult, they turn bright red with three usually greenish fluorescent stripes, but grow to only a centimeter in length. He is less than a centimeter long and is gripping for all its worth to the tip of a pencil. But don't be fooled by the size of this baby ‘poison dart' frog, its skin is 200 times more toxic than morphine.
 

                              >Most Dangerous Road In The World<

 

10 Things You Didn't Know About...

>The Periodic Table<

... *1 You may remember the Periodic Table of the Elements as a dreary chart on your classroom wall. If so, you never guessed its real purpose: It’s a giant cheat sheet.


*2 The table has served chemistry students since 1869, when it was created by Dmitry Mendeleyev , a cranky professor at the University of St. Petersburg.


*3 With a publisher’s deadline looming, Mendeleyev didn’t have time to describe all 63 then-known elements. So he turned to a data set of atomic weights meticulously gathered by others.


*4 To determine those weights, scientists had passed currents through various solutions to break them up into their constituent atoms. Responding to a battery’s polarity, the atoms of one element would go thisaway, the atoms of another thataway. The atoms were collected in separate containers and then weighed.


*5 From this process, chemists determined relative weights—which were all Mendeleyev needed to establish a useful ranking.


*6 Fond of card games, he wrote the weight for each element on a separate index card and sorted them as in solitaire. Elements with similar properties formed a “suit” thathe placed in columns ordered by ascending atomic weight.


*7 Now he had a new Periodic Law (“Elements arranged according to the valueof their atomic weights present a clear periodicity of properties”) that described one pattern for all 63 elements.


*8 Where Mendeleyev’s table had blank spaces, he correctly predicted the weights and chemical behaviors of some missing elements—gallium, scandium, and germanium.


*9 But when argon was discovered in 1894, it didn’t fit into any of Mendeleyev’s columns, so he denied its existence—as he did for helium, neon, krypton, xenon, and radon.


*10 In 1902 he acknowledged he had not anticipated the existence of these overlooked, incredibly unreactive elements—the noble gases —which now constitute the entire eighth group of the table

86 Years of Marriage

86 Years of Marriage~♥ 104 and 101 years old! ♥
Zelmyra is 101 years old and Herbert is 104
Meet Herbert and Zelmyra Fisher of North Carolina. They have been married 86 years and hold the Guinness World Record for the longest marriage of a living couple. Zelmyra is 101 years old and Herbert is 104!>

>Most Amazing Structures in the world<
> Aqua, USA<
Aqua is sure enough deserves to be on the no.1 position. With attractive design and advanced concept Aqua surely manages to be the biggest show stealer of all time. The liquid contour of Aqua's exterior makes distinctive floor plans with most residenceshaving their own unique balcony design. Aqua's balconies not only create the impressive exterior shape of the building, they bring identity to each home. With no two balconies alike, and now each unique owner has a unique condyou gotta hold your breath as f. Floor to ceiling buildings will take your breath away with that beautiful view right outside.

                                    >Who invented medicine?<

The invention of medicines dates back to centuries. It was in around 3000 B. C. that the Egyptians used remedies to fight diseases and they also performed basic surgeries by general examination of the patient and mainly the guess work and magic worked. In Greece Hippocrates was considered as the father of the medicine. He was the one to classify diseases and the first to ...perform the chest surgery. He is wellknown for the Hippocratic Oath as the doctors till date, take this oath. The Romans were the one who marked the science of surgical instruments; they used the instruments and developed the cataract operations.
Later in the medieval period the medicines field faced a period of downfall. People had more faith in magic and witchcraft. Then again the knowledge of medicine rekindled with researchers such as Vesalius, Thomas Brown and Servetus etc. who were the strong believers of medicines and totally against the superstitions.
The history of medicine faced renewal in 1865 when Joseph Lister brought the importance of antiseptics to the public. And then one by one people like Gregor Mendel with Mendel’s law, Louis Pasteur along with Charles had theories of germs, developmentof X-Ray’s and ECG’s, antibiotics and penicillin, Crick and Watson with DNA, ailments for cancer, heart and kidney diseases all contributed to the history of medicines.
The continual changes in the history of medicines seem to be so promising so as to eradicate the diseases in the times to come.

Too much texting dangerous for health.!!

... 
Obsessed with SMS? It's going to
give you more than just a long
phone bill.
The latest in a list of cyber
ailments hitting the techno-savvy
frat is a 'pain in the neck', pun
intended of course. It's called the
'texter's neck'. This new affliction
is hitting an increasing number
of gadget addicts who suffer
neck pain from spending too
much time hunched over their
phones and computers.

"The most merciful thing in
the world, I think, is the
inability of the human mind
to correlate all its contents.
We live on a placid island of
... ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it
was not meant that we
should voyage far. The
sciences, each straining in
its own direction, have
hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing
together of dissociated
knowledge will open up
such terrifying vistas of
reality, and of our frightful
position therein, that we shall either go mad from the
revelation or flee from the
light into the peace and
safety of a new dark age." -
H. P. Lovecraft

Do you ever get this sick
feeling of panic, and
wonder why there is
something rather than
absolutely nothing?

Doesn't it freak you out just
a little that there could have
been nothing, forever and
ever?

Do you understand the Big
Bang theory?

Doesn't it seem a little
strange that no one
worries about another Big
Bang just popping up and
destroying everything we
know?
_Alex Lightman

>Animal world-Glass frog<
The glass frog is an endangered species. And absolutely stunning, so it would be a shame if we let it die out. Note the visible organs in this beautiful specimen. Unfortunately, with tropical rain forests in Central and South America threatened, the glass frog may go extinct.

Fog display

A fog display or fog screen is a system that uses haze machines to create a semi-transparent wall, or
"curtain" of suspended particles which are illuminated by a projector, in order to produce a display
whose images seem to float
... in mid air. Several
commercial such systems
exist, such as FogScreen and Heliodisplay. This system can be expanded
using multiple projectors to
create a three-dimensional
image, thus becoming a volumetric 3D display

 

>The Largest Model Airport in the World<

This world's largest model airport is named as Knuffingen Airport,This world's largest model airport is open in Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg.This is made and design with in 6years.The expense which are use to make it are 3.5 million euros.

>Scariest Bridges in the World<

Hussaini Hanging Bridge(Pakistan)
The bridges very old, missing planks, extremely narrow, and high above the lake.Crossing this bridge over the rapidly flowing Hunza River is particularly frightening, as the tattered remains of the previous bridge hang by threads next to the one currently in use.
... >Built in: 1421
>Location: In the village of Hussaini in Northern Pakistan, crossing the Hunza River.
>Stats: Floodwaters reportedly submerged the bridge in May 2010. However, due to its draw as a popular adventure-travel activity, the bridge is likely to be rebuilt.

Thomas Edison's last breath was saved in a test tube

The "last breath" of the inventor Thomas Edison can be seen on display in the Henry Ford Museum. According to legend, Thomas Edison's son, Charles, approached his father on his death be...d and placed a test tube over his father's mouth as he breathed his last breath. He then sealed the test tube with a cork and sent it to Henry Ford, a good fri...end of his father. Ford kept the test tube, believing it to contain his friend's soul..
If this seems too good to be true, that's because it is. However, it was years before anyone found out what the mysterious test tube actually was..
-- Here's the real story --
Henry Ford kept some of Thomas Edison's personal items after his death, including his hat, his shoes, and a sealed test tube. After Henry Ford died, the Henry Ford museum put Ford's possessions on display, including the mementos from Thomas Edison..
In 1978, Thomas Edison's personal effects were discovered, along with a cardboard mailing tube containing a sealed test tube and a note that stated"This is the test tube you requested from my father's bedroom." The test tube was then put on display in the Henry Ford Museum with a label suggesting that it may be the dying breath of Thomas Edison..
It wasn't until the late 1980s that we were able to find out the truth. The museum got a hold of a letter that Charles Edison had written to a radio commentator, explaining the origin of the test tube. It turns out that, in addition to being an inventor, Thomas Edison was also a fan of chemistry. He used to keep 8 empty test tubes by his bed, even when he was dying! His son, Charles, asked the doctor to seal the test tubes after he died, and he then gave one to Henry Ford, to remember him by..
Neither Charles Edison nor Henry Ford ever referred to the test tube as containing Thomas Edison's last breath. Still, this legend was so fascinating thateven "The Straight Dope" (a column that is otherwise a very reliable source for OMG Facts) got it wrong..

 

Ever seen an ICEBERG from top to bottom..?

This is really a beautiful photo..
Now you know why the Titanic sank. This photograph came from a Rig manager for Global Marine Drilling in St. John, Newfoundland.
They actually have to divert th...e path of these things away from the rig by towing them with ships. In this particular case the water was calm and the sun was almost directly overhead so that the diver was able to get into the water and click this picture..
They estimated the weight at 300,000,000 tons.

What is GPS?

The Global Positioning System (GPS) is a satellite-based navigation system made up of a network of 24 satellites placed into orbit by the U.S. Department of Defense. GPS was originally intended for military applications, but in the 1980s, the government made the system available for civilian use. GPS works in any weather conditions, anywhere in the world, 24 hours a day. There are no... subscription fees or setup charges to use GPS.

How it works?

GPS satellites circle the earth twice a day in a very precise orbit and transmit signal information to earth. GPS receivers take this information and use triangulation to calculate the user's exact location. Essentially, the GPS receiver compares the time a signal was transmitted by a satellite with the time it was received. The time difference tells the GPS receiver how far away the satellite is. Now, with distance measurements from a few more satellites, the receiver can determine the user's position and display it on the unit's electronic map.

How accurate is GPS?

Today's GPS receivers are extremely accurate, thanks to their parallel multi-channel design. Garmin's 12 parallel channel receivers are quick to lock onto satellites when first turned on and they maintain strong locks, even in dense foliage or urban settings with tall buildings. Certain atmospheric factors and other sources of error can affect the accuracy of GPS receivers.

Who Knew? Fruit Flies Get Kidney Stones Too???

Research on kidney stones in fruit flies may hold the key to developing a treatment that could someday stop the formation of kidney stones in humans.

What Do Astronauts Eat in Space?

astronauts on the space shuttle eat food in much the same way as they do here on Earth.

In a low- gravity environment, food and drinks would simply float away if they weren't handled correctly. To combat this problem, food is carefully contained and drinks are packaged as dehydrated powders. The astronauts add water to beverages through a special tube before drin...king.

Foods are either partially or completely dehydrated to prevent them from spoiling. Meats are exposed to radiation before they are put onboard the shuttle to give them a longer shelf life.

Astronauts eat three meals a day (plus periodic snacks), just as they do on Earth. Meals are organized by the order in which astronauts are going to eat them, and stored in locker trays held by a net so they won't float away. When mealtime rolls around, astronauts go into the galley area in the shuttle's middeck. There they add water to freeze-dried foods and dehydrated drinks from a rehydration station that dispenses both hot and cold water. They heat foods in a forced-air convection oven that's kept between 160 and 170 degrees Fahrenheit. It takes about 20 to 30 minutes to rehydrate and heat an average meal.

>Worlds Longest Sea Bridge Unvieled<
China has unveiled the world’s longest sea bridge, which stretches a massive 26.4 miles! The road bridge, which took four years and cost a cool £5.5billion to build, willbe open for use in the New Year and is almost three miles longer than the previousrecord-holder, the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway in Louisiana.
With an overall length of 42.58km, the routebetween Qingdao and Huangdao will be shortened by 30km, cutting the travel time by about 20 minutes.
However, the colossal construction is set to hold the record as the longest sea bridge only for a few years – and it will be betteredby another Chinese bridge in the next decade

 

>Yas Viceroy Hotel, Abu Dhabi<

The first hotel to be built over an F1 race circuit, Yas Viceroy Hotel in Dubai is an architectural marvel. It is built next to the space that houses the famous Formula 1 circuit. The two parts of the hotel are held together and connected by a sculpted one-piece of steel, which directly becomes bridge and window on a stretch of the track.
The glance is impressive ev...en in daylight. The sumptuous Yas Viceroy Hotel, however, reveals its spectacular peculiarity when the night comes. A structure of 85,000 square meters, which houses 500 rooms, entirely covered with lights.
Designed by Asymptote Architecture, the hotel is covered by a sort of metallic shell illuminated thanks to the work of Arup Lighting, which worked to manage the automation of the lights. The LEDs change color, the intermittency frequency, light progressively with preset patterns and make the Yas Hotel a kind of huge and bright.

The Law Of The Wild says kill only when you are hungry..
Photographer Michel Denis captured these amazing pictures on safari in Kenya.
He was astounded by what he saw: "These brothers (cheetahs) have been living together since they left their mother at about 18 months old, On the morning he saw them, they seemed not to be hun...gry walking quickly but stopping sometimes to play together. 'At one point, they met a group of impalawho ran away.. But one youngster was not quick enough and the brothers caught it easily'."
Then extraordinary scenes followed; they just walked away without hurting him.
Life is short... forgive quickly, love truly, laugh uncontrollably. ..and never regretany thing that made you smile.

>Interface The Music: An Introduction to Electronic Instrument Control<
An introduction to electronic instrument control Sound System Here, the MIDI hardware setup recommended to run the author’s demo code. Vin Marshall
I’m no musician, but lately I’ve been experimenting with MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) in my projects. MIDI is a standard for controlling instruments that works by pa...ssing messages between pieces of connected equipment. The messages aren’t actual music in the same way as, say, an MP3 is. Instead, they are commands for making music—“Play middle C on an electric piano,” for example. Messages consist of achannel number (1 through 16) followed by a status byte, which indicates the type of message (such as Note On or Note Off) and, where needed, data (such as the note to be played). MIDI devices known as controllers create the messages, and MIDI synthesizers receive them, with the resultusually being musical sounds (although I’ve also built projects that map notes to relays that control Christmas lights and fireballs).
A basic MIDI setup might include a microcontroller, such as an Arduino, along with a MIDI Shield ($20; sparkfun.com) to provide the physical interface, and the Arduino MIDI library (free; arduino.cc) to communicate using MIDI messages. The last part is the software. I’ve written some starter code to demonstrate simple functions like Control Change messages, which adjust aspects ofthe sounds, including volume and sustain. Things get really interesting with Real Time System Exclusive messages, which go beyond music-creation projects with advanced functions like MIDI Timecode, Show Control and Machine Control. Those give MIDI the ability to synchronize whole stage acts with music and preprogrammed cues, control recording-studio equipment, and more.

20 Things You Didn't Know About...

*Clouds*

Some are visible only after sunset, none arecreated by seeding, and one chewed on a fighter pilot for half an hour before spitting him out, alive.
Courtesy: NASA
1)When moist, warm air rises to a cooler elevation, water condenses onto microscopic “seeds” like dust, ash, or bacteria. Water + seeds + updraft = clouds.
...
2)If there’s more water vapor than places for it to condense, already-formed ice crystals can also serve as seeds. As the crystals take on moisture, they may become too heavy for updrafts to support. Time for the umbrella.
3)It makes sense, then, that adding seeds to thin clouds should make them rain out. Believing the theory, 37,000 Chinese peasants shot rockets filled with silver iodide (a widely used seeding agent) into clouds.

4 . So much for People Power. After reviewing 40 years of cloud-seeding effortsin an area north of Israel.
5)Super-seeding: A team led by Stephen Salter of the University of Edinburgh has proposed using 1,500 oceangoing ships to spray saltwater into stratocumulus clouds in order to increase our planet’s cloud cover.
6)They want to accomplish goals set out in 1990 by John Latham of the National Centerfor Atmospheric Research. He suggested that saturating the air with salt crystal seeds would create a haze of water droplets so small that they would never rain out. The intended result: A permanent, low-hanging cloud cover that would deflect sunlight and, in theory, reverse global warming.
7)But excess cloud cover might actually warm the planet by trapping heat.
8)In fact, a 2009 Stanford University study claims that clouds created by aircraft emissions triggered an overall rise in surface temperatures of 0.03 to 0.06 degree Celsius worldwide. That would account for 4 to 8 percent of the warming that has occurred since record keeping began in 1850.
9)Nacreous clouds , or “mother of pearl” clouds, appear iridescent because of their ultrafine ice crystals, which form 10 to 15 miles up in the stratosphere.
10)Unfortunately, nacreous clouds also support chemical reactions that convert benign chlorine-containing molecules into aform that destroys Earth’s ozone layer.
11) Roll clouds form when updrafts and downdrafts churn clouds into a long, spinning cylinder. They look spectacular, but they often herald an approaching stormfront.
12)Highest of them all: 50 miles up, noctilucent, or “night shining,” clouds glow an eerie bluish white. They are invisible by day, but after sunset they catch solar rays shining from far below the horizon.
13)Noctilucent clouds seemed to first appear after the 1883 eruption of Krakatoaand are now a common sight.
14)A June 2010 hailstorm in South Dakota dropped the largest hailstone in U.S. history . It was nearly as large as a soccer ball and weighed two pounds.
15)Bad weather likes workdays. An Israeli-American team correlated 15 years of pollution records with the National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center’s records on storms. They found that hailstorms over the eastern United States peak in the middle of the week , when summertime air pollution is at its worst.
16)Cumulonimbus clouds are the ones that make your flight late. Their winds are so intense and unpredictable that pilots never go through them.
17 )not “through” but sometimes over.
18)In 1959 Lt. Col. William Rankin was flyinghis F-8 fighter jet over a cumulonimbus when the engine failed. He parachuted out and spent the next 30 minutes bounced around inside the storm. Amazingly, he survived.
19)In 2007 German paragliding champion Ewa Wisnierska experienced “ cloud suck .” While gliding under a cumulonimbus, she was pulled upward to 32,000 feet. She blacked out due to lack of oxygen but regained consciousness at roughly 23,000 feet.
20)Referring to the dark clouds on the horizon, Wisnierska said, “Usually there is no problem.”

>Rotating Tower, Dubai, UAE<

>Location: Dubai, United Arab Emirates

>Architect: Dr. David Fisher

>Purpose: multipurpose (offices, hotel, residential apartments)

>More info:

... The Dynamic Tower in Dubai will be 1,380 feet (420 meters) tall, 80 floors, apartmentswill range in size from 1,330 square feet (124 square meters), to Villas of 12,900 square feet (1,200 square meters) completewith a parking space inside the apartment. It will consist of offices, a luxury hotel, residential apartments, and the top 10 floors will be for luxury villas located in a prime location in Dubai.
The Dynamic Tower in Dubai will be the firstskyscraper to be entirely constructed in a factory from prefabricated parts. So insteadof some 2000 workers, only 680 will be sufficient.

LOOK at the camels first and then read the message below. :)

This is a picture taken from directly above these camels in the desert at sunset. It is considered to be one of the best pictures of the year. When you look closely, you can see that the camels are the little white linesin the picture.
The black images you see are just the shadows! :D
LOOK ONCE MORE. YOU CANNOT BELIEVE IT, RIGHT? Amazing !

>Images of the Week, March 19-23, 2012<

@The Titanic, 100 Years Later@
The April 2012 issue of National Geographic has a cover story with incredible photos of the sunken Titanic , a hundred years after the wreck. Only the newest imaging technology has made these pictures possible.

 

WORLD"S MOST COMPLICATED RAILWAY LINE:-

This complicated Railway Line is located in Frankfurt, Germany. In spite of being such a complicated Railway network, we never hear about any accidents here !!!

 

 

>Laser Fibers Could Be Woven Together to Make 3-D Display Screens<

The Future of 3-D A new kind of fiber technology can emit light variably in different directions, creating the potentialfor woven 3-D displays that can send two slightly different images to a viewer's right and left eyes, creating a three-dimensional effect. Greg Hren via MIT News
The trick to any good 3-D tech is creating a syste...m in which the viewer’s eyes receive two slightly different images, creating the kind of dual perspective that gives imagery depth--and hence the illusion of three-dimensions even within aflat space like a television display. With most light emitters, which look the same when viewed from any angle, this can prove difficult. But a new kind of fiber developed at MIT that can emit light variably in different directions along its entire length can present light at differentintensities to two different viewers, and it could lead to woven 3-D displays that project different visual information to a viewer’s left and right eyes.
The fiber has a hollow core surrounded by layers of materials with various optical properties. That hollow core contains a droplet of liquid that can be moved up anddown the fiber, and when “pumped” with a laser this droplet emits light. That light bounces around in those layers of optical materials, emitting a 360-degree laser beam.
But that emitted beam itself is also manipulable. Surrounding the hollow core are channels filled with liquid crystals, each of which can alter the emitted light. That means the fiber can emit light of onebrightness in one direction, and light of a completely different brightness in another direction.
Currently the number of liquid crystal channels in the fiber numbers only four, but the researchers say they can build as many of these light-manipulating channels as they want around the central core, making for extremely nuanced control of the light being emitted in different directions. All that, and the fiber still remains around 400 micrometers across, or a few times larger than a human hair.

THE INFOSYS AT KUWAIT

Design of Infosys Building in Kuwait

 

>>How 4G Technology Works<<

As the need for communication rather fastest communication is the foremost priority of present era also the need of quick data transfer. Distant business correspondence by sharing data becomes very important. Ever growing technology is the example of one such step towards the fastest transmission of data. 4G stands for Fourth Generation is the latest technology with hi...gh speed transferability of data with security measurements. It is coming with wireless broadband for the instant download.
Talking about the standard of 4G technology , still not defined as set standard, two technologies are supposed to be the based features of 4G .
*.
WiMAX
*.
LTE
ITU promotes the technologies against the defragmentation and incompatibilities in 4G technologies .
WiMAX stands for Worldwide Interoperability of Microwave Access previously worked as fixed wireless facility under the 802.16e band. Now the modified standard 802.16m has been developed with the properties of speed, wide spectrum, and increase band.
4G has an advantage of having the WiMAX as a product because IEEE introduces and releases it already therefore economic as no need to pay for its manufacturing price. 4G supports two basic equipments;
*.
WiMAX Network system (network infrastructure)
*.
mobile phone set
Smartphones with Wireless Access are going to be introduced in the market are the model 4G mobiles. These smartphone are equipped with the wireless internet accessibility and no fear of losing connection while travel from one tower to another tower range.
Based on the IP wireless connectivity, it increases the optimization for the internet.It manages the voice through packet-switching instead of circuit switching. Internet connectivity with specific IP not only increases the speed but also reliabilityof the sending and receiving of data.
During a phone call when caller send the information by connecting to WiMAX network, this information first processed to the internet home and then spread widely. Most of the time this transmission happens very fast problems arise in case ofspectrum, bandwidth and data. In case spectrum is not wide, shorten bandwidth and specific data carries through the internet. Arrival of 4G has diminished all the fears of lower bandwidth, narrow spectrum and amount of data send / receive. This WiMAX technology has a high speed of data transfer rate with additional capacity for the subscribers and ready to carry big amount of data. Previous generations were suffering because of low speed which ultimately covered in the 4G.
Parallel to WiMAX, LTE ( Long Term Evolution ) is introduced by Verizon. LTE is considered to be promising high data transfer speed. LTE is supposed to provide internet facility using both systems. It has the ability of transition from one mode to another. LTE is developed on radio waves technology. This not only increases the speed but also the amount of data allowed through the same bandwidth and results into lower cost.
As LTE is compatible with 3G technology so it not only increases the speed but also prevents the need of new network and canwork through the same infrastructure. LTE will not only support the functions of 3G but also incorporate some newer ones. LTE is using MIMO (Multiple input multiple output) able to send and receive huge datanegative in the sense that it will overload the base stations networks.
While seeing the working methodologies of both technologies considered to be the standards of 4G , the future is of mobile business.

>Liquid-like materials may pave way for new thermoelectric devices<

In the continual quest for better thermoelectric materials -- which convert heat into electricity and vice versa -- researchers have identified a liquid-like compound whose properties give it the potential to be even more efficient than traditional thermoelectrics. Thermoelectric materials have been used to power spacecraft rangi...ng from Apollo to the Curiosity rover now headed for Mars. Recently, however, scientists and engineershave been turning to these materials to usewasted heat -- released from automobiles or industrial machinery, for instance -- as an efficient energy source. They have also proposed using these materials to create more efficient heating systems in electric cars or even as new ways to exploit solar power.
In identifying this new type of thermoelectric material, the researchers studied a material made from copper and selenium. Although it is physically a solid, it exhibits liquid-like behaviors due to the way its copper atoms flow through the selenium's crystal lattice.
"It's like a wet sponge," explains Jeff Snyder, a faculty associate in applied physics and materials science in the Division of Engineering and Applied Science at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and a member of the research team. "If you have a sponge with very fine pores in it, it looks and acts like a solid. But inside, the water molecules are diffusing just as fast as they would if they were a regular liquid. That's how I imagine this material works. It has a solid framework of selenium atoms, but the copper atoms are diffusing around as fast as they would in a liquid."
The research, led by scientists from the Chinese Academy of Science's Shanghai Institute of Ceramics in collaboration with researchers from Brookhaven National Laboratory and the University of Michigan, as well as from Caltech, is described in a paper recently published in the journal

>Human Brain Is Too Efficient<

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are witren, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghitpclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

WHO INVENTED SIGN LANGUAGE ?


It was long ago that early man used gestures to express himself. He was the first to use sign language. In 1620 Juan Pablo de Bonet was the one to write a book which had the first alphabet system known to man. He used different signs through hand shapes to represent different sounds of speech. People do believe that Martha’s Vineyard inhabitants have contributed to t ...he invention of sign language. Martha’s Vineyard is off the coast of Massachusetts and this was here that deaf people made use of the sign language because deafness was hereditary and quite common in the 17 th century. Though it came after Bonet’s book but still it was the main cause for the development of deaf schools.
In 1771 Abbe Charles Michel de L’Epee found the first school for the deaf in Paris and through the standard sign language createdby him, he used to teach them. He got students from all around the country, he picked up signs used by them and created asign language which eventually became theFrench sign language and came in wide use.
Laurent Clerc and Thomas Hopkins Gallaudetstarted the first American school for the deaf in 1817 and were believed to be the inventors for the American Sign Language. Though Laurent was a European and taught French Sign Language but Thomas brought him to America to take his help in the school. The result shows that invention of the American Sign Language was a joint venture of home made signs and French Sign language.