Posted by Mike on June 12th, 2008 in material

https://publicaffairs.llnl.gov/news/news_releases/2008/NR-08-06-03.htm l

Every once in a while a piece of research sneaks in that gives a glimmer of hope to an impending crisis, and by the way the above website has a GREAT animation of how this thing works. While we are all mostly worried about the price of fueling up our Hummers, probably the greatest, most immediate threat to life as we know it is the fresh water shortage. That doesn’t mean that I think that many in this country will suffer greatly in the short term, unless by suffering you mean that some will be deprived of our plush yards. What I do mean is that the vast numbers of “others” of our species in the Far East, Africa, even the Middle East will suffer starvation, disease and a precarious existence in the future because of this expanding shortage.

Enter the folks from Laurence Livermore Labs with their revelation on the use of carbon nanotubes for the filtration of water. They found that these tubes have the ability to flow water molecules through them in a surprisingly rapid way. Mind you that these tubes are 100 times smaller than a human hair, so the fact that water flows relatively unimpeded through them is pretty weird, but it is the potential for filtration that is what has everyone so excited.

The researchers found that for some reason, and they think that it is because of the atomic characteristics of the end of the tubes, salt water or specifically the ion of NaCl that is attached to the water molecule is rejected by the tube, the ion split off and the newly freed fresh water passes through.

This, of course, suggests a great, low energy desalinization membrane. Next steps include investigating methods of getting the tubes to stack up neatly to create a full membrane.

Here is the concern. For the last 50 years or so, for every crisis we humans have faced, we have trusted our technological genius to bail us out. Super strains of rice to feed more people, more potent fertilizer, betting that virologist will develop an anti-bird flu vaccine before the big outbreak, now super filters to provide fresh water: All of human ills fixed in the last minute of the game, bailing our butts out, thus saving us from our excesses, our inability to control ourselves, our inability to recognize and acknowledge an impending crisis, BEFORE it becomes a crisis.

One of these days, technology will not save us; people in large numbers will die. Maybe we are at the beginning of the die off, maybe Malthus was right after all.

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Posted by Mike on April 11th, 2008 in material, power generation, vibrations, wind

http://www.rdmag.com/ShowPR.aspx?PUBCODE=014&ACCT=1400000100&ISSUE=080 4&RELTYPE=MIC&PRODCODE=0000000&PRODLETT=EI&CommonCount=0

A Zenit-3SL rocket explodes on its floating launch platform—an incident initally described as an “anomaly”—on January 30th. (credit: Sea Launch)

I came across this interesting piece of research about sound and vibrations induced by sounds and while some folks would just blow by it without notice, I could not help but read this and start thinking about the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.

Almost everyone has seen videos of the galloping bridge that destroyed itself in a wind induced, harmonic frenzy. Again, “wind induced” because only the wind was at play in its demise, and “harmonic” because vibrations, then oscillations, then destruction happen because those vibrations added together to produce bigger vibrations, which are amplified into larger and larger oscillation to the point of the bridge tearing itself apart.

What is interesting is that this is just an example of how adding a little bit of energy to a system at just the right point can cause huge consequence. It is like pushing someone on a swing. All you have to do is push with just enough energy to overcome the friction -mechanical and air- in the system and then just a bit more on every push and pretty soon the swing and rider will go over the top. (Do this with someone you don’t like, not your kids, by the way.)

To the point of this: These folks at Georgia Tech found a way to simulate the sonic vibrations (an energy source) as they propagate through the system (of the rocket) accumulate and reinforce themselves to the point of destruction of the system. They were able to isolate the sonic induced, harmonic vibrations, visualize the accumulation and flow patterns and understand how they could cause mechanical failure.

This simulation, in and of itself, is fascinating - at least to me- and really reinforces the interplay between energy and matter; how it is generated and most importantly how it is transmitted, reinforced and absorbed. Think about how energy is transmitted, reinforced and absorbed in and through a solid - like the steel in a bridge, or a fluid, like rocket fuel or air, and you will begin to understand something beautiful, elegant and amazing, the interplay of matter and energy. Look for another article on phonons (right, go Google this) to help tie this vibration thing together. I owe this to you.

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Posted by Mike on April 4th, 2008 in anti aging, biology

How did they know?

http://www.physorg.com/news126417255.html

Research for the cop in all of us! Now it is finally scientifically verified that the cops had it right all along. Coffee and donuts are good for us all, or at least the coffee is good for you if you eat too many donuts.

If you have been reading my blog for more than a few weeks, you would know that inflammation is near and dear to my heart, and brain and well, whatever. Now from the University of North Dakota comes evidence that if you drink coffee with your donuts, the caffeine in the coffee bolsters the blood brain barrier (BBB) to protect your brains from the inflammatory effects of high cholesterol. Somehow, high cholesterol attacks the BBB and renders it “leaky” which makes it more susceptible to blood borne attackers like whatever causes Alzheimer’s, and caffeine fixes the leaks!

Now no one really knows what is the bad actor in Alzheimer’s really is except they think it include prions. Prions are proteins which are really not alive, they are just weirdly folded protein bits which induce some of our brain’s proteins to coagulate into plaques which kills your brain, eventually.

Obviously, if caffeine can keep your BBB from becoming leaky, then the prions can’t get to your brain. At least that the theory. On the other hand, I don’t think that anyone really knows where prions come from, or for that matter what really causes Alzheimer’s EXCEPT that there seems to be a cholesterol connection.

Now, I am not going to tell you to avoid the high cholesterol thing, which would be the most sensible think to do if you were worried about your blood brain barrier, but I will tell you that if you must indulge in high cholesterol, at least drink your coffee with it. And by the way, tell a cop, make their day!

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Posted by Mike on March 25th, 2008 in power generation, power storage, vehicle

http://www.physorg.com/news125666441.html

Well, if we are going to have a hydrogen future, it’s either going to be based on fossil fuel in the form of a fuel cell reformer - the part of fuel cell that takes what ever you feed it and strips out the hydrogen- or it going to be based on some other way of generating hydrogen. The oil companies are of course hoping for a fossil fuel based system, but the plant folk are make great progress on figure out how to split water into its two components via artificial photosynthesis.

The German researchers from Research Centre Jülich working with researchers from Emory University have managed to create an inorganic, Ruthenium - a rare earth, transition metal- catalyst which is the first piece needed for splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen without being destroyed in the process. (Organic “catalysts” work, but are destroyed in the process- some catalyst, huh - they are renewed by being regrown)

Now, they haven’t exactly used sunlight to make the system work yet, claims the “very important paper’, but they have synthesized the inorganic catalyst part.

There are two take aways from this announcement. First, since this catalyst is inorganic, it doesn’t need to be renewed as it would if it were organic. I suppose if your H2 generator were “alive”, you would probably have to maintain a sludge tank on top of your fuel cell car of the future, to contain the renewable photosynthetic system. On the other hand, once they can couple this inorganic catalyst to the sun, all you need is the sun, of course, and the powered catalytic body to peel off the H2 from plain old water.

The second take away is - my what a beautiful horse race this will turn out to be. Big oil vs. big plant. If the plant guys, or for that matter anyone who has a competing system to split water up wins, big oil could be screwed! I know of some other catalytic systems that are in the works as well, so stay tuned. This could turn out to be great grist for the conspiracy mill!

Imagine the headlines “Big Oil gulps the solution to cheap hydrogen!” or “Cargil vs. Exxon - Who passed the big Gas!?” It’s just like the 100 MPG carburetor; you know, the one that works on water! The National Inquirer will have a field day.

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Posted by Mike on March 20th, 2008 in New Product Development

As a trained brain innovator for now over 50 product innovation brainstorming sessions in the past 15 years, I am amazed at the fumbling that goes on AFTER the session is over. Most innovation sessions end up with hundreds of potentially great product ideas, which are then filtered down to maybe a dozen really good, viable new product concepts. The best of course, are based on the application of new technological solutions to the problems at hand.

Immediately after an innovation session is over, most marketing groups run out to test the viability of the concept in the “marketplace” via VoC (Voice Of the Customer) research or focus groups before they even know if the product is technically feasible: They try to get a feel for whether the market will buy it and under what conditions. I have seen way too many products come back from focus groups “good to go”, beloved by the customer, all featured up, before they have been thought through from a technical and engineering standpoint. The marketing group comes back to engineering with a big smile on their face and a big “thumbs up” saying “OK, the customers love it, now go build it.”

If engineers know anything, it is that almost anything can be built, but at what price and what misery. So the marketers and builders of “business cases” ignore at least four of the six significant areas of feasibility in this rush to Market Feasibility testing: They miss Technical (Engineering) Feasibility, obviously; Manufacturing Feasibility -if you don’t know the technology and the engineering, how the heck do you know if and how you can build it; Pricing (part of the Financial Feasibility), like duh, how much can I charge for it or more appropriately, how much will the customer pay for it; and Patent Feasibility - if you don’t know the technology how can you know if you can protect it or, more importantly, are you infringing on someone else patent. (That only leaves Distribution Feasibility- which means do you have channels in which to get this thing to market untouched.)

The most logical approach, an approach that is from my standpoint cheaper, both in time to market and sunk cost, in the long run, is to look into the technological feasibility of the product, BEFORE you start showing wild ass NPD concepts to the market. If you try to build something to test its technological feasibility, to prove that from an engineering standpoint you can build it, you will by default come up with: 1) A notion of how and if you can manufacture it . 2) You will also get a guess at what it might cost along with what the feature set will cost; 3) You will no doubt go to the patent archives to look for ways of solving the problem, since one of the best ways to solve a problem is to find out how people have solved it in the past. So by going straight to the technological feasibility exercise, you will reduce uncertainty (which is what this feasibility thing is all about) much quicker than if you simply go to the market research first.

A lesson in point: after a brainstorming session a customer brought a focus group “annoited” product to us and said “OK, now they want this thing and we want to use this motor on it, the thing is absolutely feasible with this motor at this cost!” We looked at it for a while and snickered back: “It’s really good that you could do this with this motor, but what about the transmission of the power into the device?” They had based their belief about the feasibility of the product on cost of the motor, without looking at how they were going to get the power into the device”. If they had gone down a path to see if the thing could be engineered  and prototyped, to look at its true technical feasibility, they would have more seriously understood where the uncertainty, the risk, was really.

Sometimes, we base our belief about the feasibility of a product on the LEAST important part. If companies would do a little technical feasibility homework BEFORE they take it out for a drive at the church of consumer evaluation, they would save themselves big heartache latter. So remember, GET PHYSICAL FAST!

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Posted by Mike on March 17th, 2008 in earth science, mechanics

Settle down in your bunker and get ready for yet another way for civilization as we know it to be wiped out! Tsunamis are most often the result of tectonic activities which produce  earthquakes. But when you start looking around for the really bad actors, Wiki the term “Sturzstrom” which are long run out earth slides. These are not your average run of the mill earth slides, the tumble to the bottom of the hill and stop kind. No, these monster can “run” 20 times the height of the top of the “land” mass from which they spring or fall or whatever …

The interesting thing about the Struzstrom is that water is not needed for the flow. The mass, be it on dry land or down the side of the sea mount under water, flows on an incompressible layer of fines which acts as a lubricious bearing surface and just keeps the mass moving happily along. While I can’t find a reference for it, I think the term “Sturzstrom” comes from the Swiss, the German part of the Swiss of course, who lost a village in the Alps, from just such a slide.

What is also interesting is when the USGS (Geological Survey) did a mapping study of the sea floor around the Hawaiian island chain they found that when they found a “sliding face” the run out ratio was 20 to 1; i.e. a face who’s face was a mile high, there was evidence of a 20 mile run out of previously fallen face, under water. These “slud” (blame that word on Dizzy Dean) faces are call debris aprons after they slide. And they are EVERYWHERE around the Hawaiian islands. Imagine how much energy was displaced into the water by those slides.

Finally, not only are we still in danger from the Hawaiian islands, the entire Eastern seaboard of the US is threatened by the Canary Islands, who’s volcanic face is aimed roughly at North Carolina. The possibility of a “megatsunami” or iminami is much greater than you think from such an event. It has happened in the past and it will happen in the future. Imagine a 150 ft. wall hitting Myrtle Beach, just about the time for the Master’s, which is coming up in April. I think that Tiger’s jacket will be more than the funny shade of green. Wiki “megatsunami” for more info on this…

1755, 2007 European earthquakes compared from PhysOrg.com

An Italian-led team of seismologists has conducted a study comparing a 2007 earthquake off southwestern Portugal with a similar 1755 earthquake.

[…]

Tsunami that devastated the ancient world could return from PhysOrg.com

“The sea was driven back, and its waters flowed away to such an extent that the deep sea bed was laid bare and many kinds of sea creatures could be seen,” wrote Roman historian Ammianus Marcellus, awed at a tsunami that struck the then-thriving port of Alexandria in 365 AD.

[…]

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Posted by Mike on March 14th, 2008 in Uncategorized

Last time in this forum I was wondering about the relationship between inflammation, O (singlet oxygen), aging and death and promised to “’splain it to you” as best I can. Here goes.

Singlet oxygen has an unpaired electron. It’s like N instead of N2. O instead of O2. These atoms don’t like living alone. The want to hook that unpaired electron up with something, and almost anything will do.

As you might guess, singlet oxygen is produced in huge quantities in lots of biological processes. Our body uses radicals in many way, including killing bugs. Macrophages, for instance attack bugs by injecting them with radicals. This has a tendency to ruin their day by blowing them up. The problem is that they, the radicals, attach to our cellular membranes, including plasma and mitochondrial membrane through a process called lipid peroxydation which attacks unsaturated fatty acids present in membrane phospholipids as well as other membrane proteins. In other words, it wrecks our cellular membranes, makes them rigid, weak and ready for the trash heap.

I guess you are, being quick witted folks, getting where I am going now: The health of the membranes, the packages that all living cells must maintain, is directly related to the process of aging. When your skin gets saggy, loses its elasticity, when the muscles don’t work as well, to what do owe this to? Cellular aging. I suggest that Imre Zs.-Nagy in his (her?) book the “Membrane Hypothesis of Aging” may be on to something. Human death and aging is cellular death, cellular death is caused by membrane death.

Where does inflammation lie in all of this. Inflammation is the result of a huge biochemical cascade response which gets rid of pathogens and “other bad actor” in the body, real or imagined. The biochemical agents are designed among other things to produce a huge multiplication of the cascade of the “compliment system” of the immune response, which includes a complex of chemicals called, interestingly, the Membrane Attack System. The MAS’s job it is to, well, attack membranes, especially cell membranes. It would be nice if the membranes it attacked were bad guy membranes, but alas, it ain’t always the case.

When I said that the bad actors could be real or imagined, I was not being facetious. Auto immune disorders, which include 35 or so really nasty things from Type I diabetes to Myasthenia Gravis (Lou Gehrig’s disease), MS, Crohn’s disease, Lupus, Celiac disease and Rheumatoid arthritis just name a few, hurt and kill people because the immune system imagines a problem that is not real. The immune system kills cells by inflamming and attacking membranes membranes.

Why is it not possible that this is the very mechanism responsible for our aging? Just in the act of protecting ourselves from the bad actors that try to kill us, we kill ourselves. Slowly but surely, day by day we kill ourselves.

Maybe in the act of eating Kermit we save ourselves. I have a whole pond full of the critters. Or are they toads? In any case, take your Ibuprofen and maybe save yourself, inflammation free.

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Posted by Mike on March 12th, 2008 in biology

Anti-aging substance found in bullfrogs: researchers from PhysOrg.com

While it only turns into a handsome prince in fairy tales, the homely bullfrog may harbour a valuable anti-aging substance for humans, South Korean researchers say.

[…]

Well, we knew that frogs had to be good for something besides making big racket on a summer evening and their “tastes like chicken” legs. It turns out that for some reason, there is a water soluble peptide in the skin of the bull frog that has huge anti-oxidant properties. Far beyond red wine in antioxidant properties (active substance is resveratrol, a polyphenol), beyond Alpha-tocopherol or Vitamin E, this substance, being 10% stronger in its antioxidant action than E and water soluble as well, has the potential for being put into everything from soda drinks to SoBe water, maybe as an additive in granola, all to save your life.

So, I guess I have two “I wonders” here. Why is everything in the skin? Skin of the grape, skin of the Frog, skin of the vegetable, skin of fruit? (see for instance doi:10.1016/j.foodchem.2004.04.033 and look up anthocyanins while you’re at it)

And second, just how do antioxidant prevent aging or how does free radical oxygen cause aging? Let me add another one just to keep us all on our toes: Now that NSAID’s (Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs) are all of the rage for the latest anti-aging solution, (http://websites.afar.org/site/PageServer?pagename=IA_feat18)   what is the role of inflammation, free radical oxygen in aging and cell death?

First, the why in the skin function: From what I can glean, plants and fruits do not produce the healing antioxidant found in their skin just for our benefit; they produce these agents for their own repair processes. Probably because they don’t have their own immune systems as we know it, not a blood born system of T cell, Leukocytes, Phagocytes and the like.

Instead, they rely on strong chemical antioxidants to do their healing work. The antioxidants scavenge up the free radical oxygen, or singlet oxygen which prevent the singlet from attacking the cell membranes. The cell membranes don’t become rigid, they do heal and remain functioning. (Ironically, the Phagocytes in our system, like macrophages which gobble up and kill bacterial, do it by injecting free radical oxygen into the bugs!)

The answer to the second I wonder is partially answered above, but the question the relationship between inflammation, O (singlet oxygen), aging and death is really interesting. Check Friday and I will try to ’splain it, Lucy.

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Posted by Mike on March 10th, 2008 in biology

Some Experts Doubt Obesity Epidemic from PhysOrg.com

(AP) — Go on, have another doughnut. According to some experts whose views are public health heresy, the jury is still out on how dangerous it is to be fat. “The obesity epidemic has absolutely been exaggerated,” said Dr. Vincent Marks, emeritus professor of clinical biochemistry at the University of Surrey.

…

Gosh, just when I was getting ready to hit my 6 mile daily run (HA) I came across this great tidbit of comfort. It seems that the brouhaha about being fat may be less brou and more haha. From the article we learn that certain short sighted obesity researchers are now upset that much of the research into the ill effects of obesity have been paid for by “DRUG COMPANIES”. Why, what a surprise! That the good folk at Abbott Laboratories and F. Hoffman La-Roche would be interested in furthering the hysteria about about how fat kills, and might have an interest in promoting the obesity hysteria is such a big ass (sorry) surprise!! Oy, what a revelation!

Having been technically obese a good part of my life, I thought that I was being saved from ruination and slow death by the my Alli pills, Nutrisystems, Slim Fast, the South Beach Diet, Jenny Craig, Nautilus, and even Tony Little only to learn that maybe being a bit chubby is not such a bad thing. Maybe the preoccupation with obesity is just MARKETING! Maybe it is our preoccupation with eternal youth. Maybe it is our preoccupation with Hollywood, Californification, with breast augmentation. Maybe it’s our preoccupation our forlorn, insignificant, humdrum lives, with being someone we are not….

Ok, let’s try to separate the wheat from the chaff. There is no doubt that I should lose weight (a 42 lb lose will get my BMI below 30). But there many more factor in determining what constitutes “health”; more than the BMI, more than what Jenny Craig says and more than what you see on “House Calls” with Dr. Sanjay Gupta. Health is a very personal, very complex phenomenon. Way too complex to just listen to drug companies.

At my body mass index of 35 I am obviously seconds away from a heart attack. I do have Type II diabetes, as did my mother, who died at the age of 72. But, I have no oncogenes, my father is soon to be 87 and could live to be 107, my mother’s obese, sightless sister lived to be 87 and was brilliant until the hospital managed to do her in, and I am a relative happy, moderately intelligent tech wonk, who has 5 kids, 2 grand kids so far (keep going Lulu!) who has been happily married for more than 30 years. What does all that count for? Does that contribute to my health?

Therein lies the lesson these researchers are trying to get across to us. Weight is ONE factor in one health, not all of the factors and certainly not the most important…

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Posted by Mike on March 6th, 2008 in Uncategorized, sensor, user interface

http://www.eurekalert.org/bysubject/technology.php

Magnetic levitation gives computer users sense of touch

Those wily computer geeks at Carnegie Mellon (who for my money, have it all over the MIT ubergeeks) have moved us all closer to a “perfect” machine interface with the development of a maglev feedback mouse. Dr. Ralph Hollis’s affordable mouse uses 6 coils of wire and a powerful PM (Permanent Magnet) to not only provide for 6 axis control but give tactile feedback to the user through one’s control hand.

Ok, let’s see where we can go with this. First, let’s talk about control. What does 6 axis mean to us? Have you ever flown a helicopter? A model helicopter? Have you ever imagined flying a heli? It takes, for a real heli, both hands, both feet, the left arm and wrist and fingers on the right hand to press buttons. The controls go something like this. The cyclic stick, the one between your legs is controlled by your right hand and tilts the chopper- right, left, nose down (forward), nose up (backward); your feet control the yaw of the chopper, nose right or left. The left arm lifts and controls the collective stick (the pitch of the rotor) and the left hand controls the throttle which is on the end of the collective.

Suffice it to say, it is a hell of a lot more complicated that flying a fixed wing a/c. Now imagine grabbing, with one hand, Dr. Hollis’s 6 axis controller, and flying in any direction, with tilt, yaw, role, pitch, slip, forward, backward, up and down, just by moving your hand; move up, down, forward, backward the more you push, the faster you go, twist left or right, tilt for banking, pitch nose up and down, stop and hover! Goodness, nothing could be simpler.

The sensor part is even more fascinating. Now imaging your controller telling you that the air is bumpy (by vibrating), or that the wind is a direct crosswind by forcing your hand sideways, just by resisting or vibrating or making it feel like your moving across a bumpy road.

This is truly a breakthrough device, and not just for interfacing with MS Flight Simulator you couch potato, but eventually for allowing us uncoordinated, would be chopper (boat, space shuttle, cruise ship, semi… you name it) drivers a much more controlled, safer ride. And much more intuitive, safer control over EVERYTHING!

Besides, remember the virtual interface in Minority Report? Well, here is the first alpha version. Don’t tell Bill Gates…

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