Spliced feed for The Science Network |
| Doping at the Olympic Games [SciScoop Science Blog] Posted: The Olympic Games are approaching, but can the anti-doping agencies ensure, through testing, that sporting events will be drug-free? Science is the answer according to an article in today's Nature with the strapline - "The processes used to charge athletes with cheating are often based on flawed statistics and flawed logic." |
| Quantum Mechanics Accelerates PageRank [SciScoop Science Blog] Posted: Google PageRank (PR) is apparently an important measure of a website's worth, how the Google algorithm actually calculates PR is open to debate and how it impacts on a particular website varies. Now, physicists have turned to quantum mechanics to help them figure out a Schroedinger type pagerank equation for search engines. |
| Body Mass Hacks [SciScoop Science Blog] Posted: Want to lose weight? First, ask yourself why. If there's a valid clinical reason for doing so, then check out the following 8 body mass hacks that will help you reduce your overall calorie intake, and don't forget to exercise well, drink plenty of water, and stop smoking! |
| Why Sports and Career are Matters of Life and Death [SciScoop Science Blog] Posted: Why do men care more about sports and career then women? Sure women care too, but for many men it seems they can't live without it. Why do so many men watch and compete in sporting games every day? Why do they pursue earning money long after they have satisfied every basic need? |
| Solar Energy Turning Point [SciScoop Science Blog] Posted: Solar power is set to come out of the dark and enter the mainstream as an alternative energy source, according to US researchers. They have overcome the last major obstacle to large-scale solar power - how to store energy when the sun don't shine. |
| GE shows a glimpse into the future of lighting [OLEDs] [SciScoop Science Blog] Posted: Check out this nice presentation from GE about the future of lighting. It talks about OLEDs - why they are great (environmental, no mercury, innovative) and shows several interesting new designs, one of which is an OLED chandelier - and also lighting for airplanes and bikes. |
| Japanese Nobel Prize Winner [SciScoop Science Blog] Posted: Canadian biologist Anthony Pawson has been awarded the 'Japanese Nobel Prize' for research that lead to new cancer treatments. Molecular biologist Dr. Anthony Pawson is among this year's winners of the Kyoto Prize, an international award given annually by Japan's Inamori Foundation to "honor those who have made significant contributions to the scientific, cultural and spiritual development of humanity." |
| Posted: Densitron is a display reseller, and Elijah discusses their OLED products, how they fare against LCDs, what he thinks about the future of those displays, and also their soon-to-be-released 7" panels... |
| Canny Birds Remember Helpful Neighbors [SciScoop Science Blog] Posted: Cooperative behaviours are ubiquitous across the tree of life. Organisms from microbes to humans indulge in behaviours which benefit their neighbours at an apparent cost to themselves. There are numerous explanations of how cooperation can be maintained in the face of considerable incentives to defect and take advantage of the kindness of others. One of these, called reciprocity, relies on individuals following a strategy of tit-for-tat or "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours." Surprisingly, it now seems that birds have the ability to play this seemingly complex game. |
| Joined Up Fuels [Sciencebase Science Blog] Posted: 07 Aug 2008 07:00 AM CDT
Apparently, big cars (4×4s, MPVs, big estates, and anything over 2.1 litre engine capacity, built before 2001, will be exempt from the approximate doubling of vehicle road tax that is imminent. And, that’s certainly a good thing. Not least because our family seven-seater has a 2.3 litre engine and was made in 1998. It all seems to make sense, at first glance. Who could argue with that? Such a tax increase will force drivers of big gas guzzlers to swap their Kensington Tractors for something a little more environment friendly. But, it is not as if CO2 were the only pollutant, it’s not as if global warming were the only issue, and it’s not as if actually building new cars is a green process in itself. All those old-ish MPVs, are going to be sold on and new smaller cars bought, this drives the market, of course, and with an alleged recession pending, that might be a good thing in terms of economies. But, a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation will show that building a new car to replace that suddenly unwanted Kenny Tractor will expend far more energy and waste far more resources than continuing to drive it guzzling gas or not. It seems to me that there is very little joined-up thinking when it comes to environmental issues. No one ever sits back and says, hold on a moment, when plans to potentially scrap millions of potentially serviceable vehicles for the sake of a tax saving comes up in discussion. More to the point, the school-run of supersized vehicles, queuing up and belching out fumes while darling Jocasta and Joshua are delivered obesely to school without having to walk, is to some extend a tabloid a stereotype. Some people rely Karl Hillman and Björn Sandén of the Department of Energy and Environment, at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, seem to recognise this need for complete Life Cycle Assessments (LCA) including so-called Well-to-Wheel studies as they apply to the transport sector in general. They have investigated how well decisions are being made as we strive to reduce pollution and to meet climate-change targets. They suggest that rarely are time and scale related factors given any attention, which I read to coincide with my points about swapping big vehicles for small at least in terms of energy wasted in the process and the splitting of transportation into ever smaller units. Writing in the International Journal of Alternative Propulsion, the Chalmers team discusses how road transportation is currently responsible for 20-25% of world carbon dioxide emissions and is almost entirely (99%) dependent on fossil oil, despite the occasional hybrid siting. To reduce oil dependence and greenhouse gas emissions, different policies are now being implemented to increase the share of motor fuels based on renewable energy. In the short term, the European Union directive on the promotion of the use of biofuels or other renewable fuels for transport forces the member states to set targets for the minimum use of renewable fuels. Perhaps the UK government plans to use the extra tax it raises from gas guzzlers to develop renewables for transport so that it can meet EU and international targets more effectively. Somehow I doubt it, with deficits on every table, state-adopted banks heavily in the red, and a media-inspired recession just round the corner, I suspect every last penny will have been accounted for before you could say rapeseed methyl ester. Hillman, K.M., Sanden, B.A. (2008). Time and scale in Life Cycle Assessment: the case of fuel choice in the transport sector. International Journal of Alternative Propulsion, 2(1), 1. DOI: 10.1504/IJAP.2008.019689 a |
The green morals of UK motorists are currently being held to ransom by the government. The government hopes to increase vehicle taxes based on how much pollution a car produces - it’s a green tax, a carbon tax, call it what you will. Some drivers will end up paying twice as much each year to keep their car on the roads. The bigger the car, the theory goes, the more fuel it will use and so the more polluting it will be in terms of pumping out carbon dioxide and so the more | You are subscribed to email updates from The Science Network To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email Delivery powered by FeedBurner |
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