Flying Car

ScienceDaily (Mar. 24, 2009) — A prototype of what is being touted as the world's first practical flying car took to the air for the first time this month, a milestone in a project started four years ago by students in MIT's Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics.At 7:40 a.m. on March 5, the winged car taxied down a runway in Plattsburgh, N.Y., took off, flew for 37 seconds and landed further down the runway -- a maneuver it would repeat about a half dozen times over the next two days. In the coming months the company, a Woburn-based startup called Terrafugia, will test the plane in a series of ever-longer flights and a variety of maneuvers to learn about its handling characteristics.

Aviation enthusiasts have spent nearly a century pursuing the dream of a flying car, but the broader public has tended to view the idea as something of a novelty. Still, such a vehicle could have more practical appeal now that the Federal Aviation Administration has created a new class of plane -- Light Sport Aircraft -- and a new license category just for pilots of such craft, including Terrafugia's two-seater Transition. The "sport pilot" license required to fly the Transition takes only about 20 hours of training time, about half that required to earn a regular pilot's license.

The street-legal Transition is powered on land and in the air by a recently developed 100 hp Rotax engine that gets 30 mpg on the highway using regular unleaded gasoline. As a plane, its 20-gallon tank gives it a 450-mile range with a 115 mph cruising speed. The pilot can switch from one mode to the other from the driver's seat, simultaneously folding up the wings and shifting the engine power from the rear-mounted propeller to the front wheels in about 30 seconds.

Speaking at a March 18 news conference in which the Transition's first test flight was announced, Terrafugia CEO and co-founder Carl Dietrich '99, SM '03, PhD '07 said the FAA rule change and the Transition could help transform the way people move around the country -- especially in rural areas. "One of the biggest problems pilots have right now is that most of the 5,000 general aviation airports in the U.S. don't have any car rental facilities, or even a cab stand," he said, noting that the Transition could open many of these underused airports to easier, more practical use by private pilots.

The vehicle may also lead to improved safety. "One of the largest causes of accidents is pilots flying in bad weather," he said. With the Transition, a pilot who spotted bad weather ahead could simply land at the nearest airport, fold up the wings, drive through the weather on local roads, and take off from another airport once past the storm.

The first testing of Terrafugia's car-plane concept took place with a one-fifth scale model in MIT's Wright Brothers Wind Tunnel in 2005, while Dietrich and his wife, Anna Mracek Dietrich '04, SM '06, now the company's COO, and VP of Engineering Samuel Schweighart SM '01, PhD '05, were all students here, as were two of the other company principals.

The full-sized version being tested now is a proof-of-concept vehicle, to be followed later this year by a production prototype. The company is taking deposits now and hopes to start delivering its first Transitions -- or "roadable planes," as the company calls them -- in late 2011.

Test pilot Phil Meteer, who was at the controls in Plattsburgh, said that the short and simple first flight was both "remarkably unremarkable" and vitally important: "Ninety percent of the risk in the total program comes in the first flight, and now we're past that."

A retired U.S. Air Force colonel, Meteer said the plane handled so smoothly in the test flights that all of the possible contingencies he had practiced became irrelevant. "You're in a hypervigilant state" during the initial takeoff, he said, but as he saw how smoothly the flight was going he had a "wahoo moment: none of this is happening!"

Today's Science Agenda

• Elite Scientific Advisory Panel Says New Technology is Needed to Verify Emissions Cuts

  JASON--The group's latest report explores the feasibility of using ground monitoring stations, aircraft and satellites to measure CO2, as well as methods to estimate emissions by monitoring a country's energy infrastructure

• Teachers Fail Evolution Education

  Pennsylvania State University--Only a minority of high school teachers are effectively educating students about evolution, with many expressing personal views rather than the assigned curriculum

• African Farmers Beat Back Drought and Climate Change with Trees

  Burkina Faso--Farmers in the western Sahel have achieved success by growing trees along with crops. Scientists say that the mix--a practice called farmer-managed natural regeneration--brings a range of benefits including increased crop yields

• Stone Tools Point to Earlier Exit from Africa

  University of Tubingen et al.—Climatic shifts may have enabled early humans to cross what is now the Red Sea into the Arabian peninsula 125,000 years ago—tens of thousands of years earlier than thought and 75,000 years after Homo sapiens came to be

. The Electric Eye

MIT researchers are developing a microchip that will enable a blind person to recognize faces and navigate a room without assistance, helping the blind to regain partial eyesight. The chip, which is encased in titanium to prevent water damage, will be implanted onto a patient’s eyeball. Users are required to wear special glasses fitted with a small camera that transmits images to the titanium-encased chip, which fires an electrode array under the retina that stimulates the optic nerve. The glasses will help to power the coils surrounding the eyeball.

XM25 Counter Defilade Target Engagement System

The XM25, currently under development for the U.S. military by Alliant Tech systems, allows soldiers to measure the distance to a target using a laser range finder, dials in exactly where the bullet should explode (over or past walls, the corner of buildings) at precise distances. At a cost of $30/round, the bullets are equipped with microchips capable of registering distance according to the number of times they’ve rotated.

The Smart Thermostat

Called one of Time Magazine’s “best new gadgets” and “breakthrough ideas of the year”, the EnergyHub Dashboard is a device that lets you know exactly how much electricity (or gas) you’re using in your home and how much it’s costing you. It also turns appliances on or off and raises or lowers temperatures within your house depending on use. EnergyHub will be available direct to consumers in early 201

Android Phone

The Android has proven itself a force to be reckoned with, offering a legitimate alternative to the all-mighty iPhone. If you haven’t heard, Android is a Google-backed operating system for cell phones. The code is free, open-source and easy to alter. Users can create their own interfaces and control many kinds of hardware, plus it has over 10,000 Android apps.

Electronic Stethoscope

The stethoscope hasn’t undergone many significant breakthroughs until now. 3M’s new stethoscope listens to a patient’s heartbeat, captures the sound for later playback, lets you transmit sounds real-time to your PC, which can then be further analyzed, attached to medical records, or reviewed online with colleagues.

The sound-amplifying 3M Littmann Electronic Stethoscope 3200 will not only be able to catch dangerous murmurs and heart defects but will also eliminate more than eight millionunnecessary echocardiograms and cardiologist visits a year, saving some $9.4 billion

TESLA'S POWER TOWERS

To gather in the latent electricity in the clouds and with the globe itself as a medium of transmission to convey telegraphic messages, power for commercial purposes, or even the sound of the human voice to the utmost confines of the earth is the latest dream of Nikola Tesla.

In an article which appeared recently in The Electrical World Mr. Tesla explains the theories on which the world telegraphy system is founded and what he expects to accomplish by it. His plans involve the establishment of stations for the transmission of messages and power, "preferably near important centers of civilization." Oddly enough, what Mr. Tesla proudly designates as the first of his commercial "world telegraphy" stations has been established at Wardenclyffe, L.I., which is not in any sense an important "center of civilization," but a place described by train hands of the Long Island Railroad as a way station where "a passenger alights occasionally."

The transmitting station is an octagonal tower, pyramidal in shape, and some 180 feet in height. It consists of huge wooden stilts, heavily braced, and reinforced, and surmounted by a cupola of interlaced steel wires, bent so as to form an arc. In the cupola there is a wooden platform occupying its entire width.

Mr. Tesla began work on his transmitting station about eighteen months ago. When he first came there, and it was understood that J. Pierpont Morgan had become interested in his odd enterprise and furnished him with financial assistance, a thrill of vague expectancy ran through the little settlement, The Wardenclyffe Land Company, which owns practically all the available ground in the vicinity, gave the inventor a free grant of some 175 acres of fine land, and then settled down to wait for the day when Wardenclyffe would become the center of the universe.

Some of the farmers who come to Wardenclyffe to send their products to this city look at Mr. Tesla's tower, which is situated directly opposite the railroad station, and shake their heads sadly. They are inclined to take a skeptical view regarding the feasibility of the wireless "world telegraphy" idea, but yet Tesla's transmitting tower as it stands in lonely grandeur and boldly silhouetted against the sky on a wide clearing on the concession is a source or great satisfaction and of some mystification to them all. "It is a mighty fine tower," said one food farmer to a visitor last week. "The breeze up there is something grand of a Summer evening, and you can see the Sound and all the steamers that go by. We are tired, though, trying to figure out why he put it here instead of at Coney Island." While the tower itself is very "stagey" and picturesque, it is the wonders that are supposed to be hidden in the earth underneath it that excite the curiosity of the population in the little settlement. In the center of the wide concrete platform which serves as a base for the structure there is a wooden affair very much like the companionway on an ocean steamer. The tower and the enclosure in which it has been built are being carefully guarded these days, and no one except Mr. Tesla's own men is allowed to approach it. Only they have been allowed as much as the briefest peep down the companionway. Mr. Scherff, the private secretary of the inventor, told an inquirer that the companionway led to a small drainage passage built for the purpose of keeping the ground about the tower dry. But such of the villagers as saw the tower constructed tell a different story. They declare that it leads to a well-like excavation as deep as the tower is high with walls of masonwork and a circular stairway leading to the bottom. From there, they say, tunnels have been built in all directions, until the entire ground below the little plain on which the tower is raised has been honeycombed with subterranean passages. They tell with awe how Mr. Tesla, on his weekly visits to Wardenclyffe, spends as much time in the underground passages as he does on the tower or in the handsome laboratory and workshop erected beside it, and where the power plant for the world telegraph has been installed.

No instruments have been installed as yet in the transmitter, nor has Mr. Tesla vouchsafed any description of what they will be like. But in his article he announces that he will transmit from the tower an electric wave of a total maximum activity of ten million horse power. This, he says, will be possible with a plant of but 100 horse power, by the use of a magnifying transmitter of his own invention and certain artifices which he promises to make known in due course. What he expects to accomplish is summed up in the closing paragraph as follows:

"When the great truth, accidentally revealed and experimentally confirmed, is fully recognized, that this planet, with all its appalling immensity, is to electric currents virtually no more than a small metal ball and that by virtue of this fact many possibilities, each baffling imagination and of incalculable consequence, are rendered absolutely sure of accomplishment; when the first plant is inaugurated and it is shown that a telegraphic message, almost as secret and non-interferable as a thought, can be transmitted to any terrestrial distance, the sound of the human voice, with all its intonations and inflections faithfully and instantly reproduced at any other point of the globe, the energy of a waterfall made available for supplying light, heat or motive power, anywhere--on sea, or land, or high in the air--humanity will be like an antheap stirred up with a stick. See the excitement coming!"

The mother of all inventions

The mother of all inventions

• • NORMAL
  • LARGE
  • EXTRA LARGE

The Science Museum, favourite haunt of aspiring astronauts and eccentric professors, celebrates its centenary this month. To mark the occasion, it is today launching a public vote to choose the most important scientific invention of the past few centuries. Curators have selected 10 objects which they believe to be most significant in the history of science, engineering, technology and medicine and are inviting the public to decide the winner. Voting will take place over the summer for the innovation which they believe has had (or will have) the greatest impact on the past, present or future.

The iconic objects are being organised into a Centenary Journey trail, which will open at the museum later this month. The winning object will be announced in October.

Tim Boon, chief curator of the museum, admitted the idea of scientific “progress” was controversial. “Some of the objects may divide opinion. Would we be better off if some of the “icons”, which have had negative consequences, had not been invented? We are looking forward to a great debate.Some of the museum’s supporters have already made their choice. Trevor Baylis, inventor of the clockwork radio, is voting for the V2 rocket engine: “It’s one of the greatest achievements of our time because it led to space exploration, and then satellite development, which then led to mobile phones and the astounding communication services we enjoy today.”

Musician Nitin Sawhney chooses penicillin: “As an asthmatic recovering from a debilitating bout of pneumonia, I am painfully aware of how important a role penicillin has played in curing my lung infection. In this regard I’m hardly alone.”

Television presenter and biologist Alice Roberts’s vote is going elsewhere:

“As a doctor and anatomist, I’m championing the X-ray machine. X-rays provided the first possibility of looking inside someone’s body without cutting them open.”

Television presenter James May votes for the Apollo 10, “as it represents the furthest reach to date of manned exploration.” Broadcaster Adam Hart-Davis believes the steam engine to be “the most important step forward in technology of all time.”

KNUST freshmen can manufacture helicopters

KNUST freshmen can manufacture helicopters

The Vice Chancellor of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Prof Kwesi Andam, has taken a swipe at the technological inventions of the leader of the Kristo Asafo Mission, Apostle Dr Kwadwo Safo, describing them as “nonsensical”. 

He said the nation’s priority should be to use science and technology to advance development and not the manufacturing of helicopters and machines to produce cement blocks.

Prof Andam said this in apparent reference to the latest technological claims by Apostle Safo that he has manufactured helicopter, television and roofing tiles mahine among others.

According to Prof Andam, even freshmen of the KNUST could manufacture helicopters within some few months but said that was not the priority of the university.

“The university should be allowed to do what it is supposed to do and not the kind of nonsensical things going on”, he said.

Prof Andam was responding to a comment by a participant after delivering a lecture on the topic; “Science and Technology for National Development”, at the 57th Annual New Year School at the University of Ghana, Legon, yesterday.
A participant suggested that the authorities at the KNUST should liaise with Apostle Dr Safo to tap into his expertise and, if possible, invite him to give lectures at the university.

Prof Andam reacted angrily to that suggestion and appeared emotional at certain stages as he used the words “nonsense” and “nonsensical” in a stern voice in reference to Apostle Dr Safo’s claims.
There were mixed reactions to the ViceChancellor’s response. While some people applauded him, others expressed disapproval, especially at his use of the words “nonsense” and “nonsensical”.
Apostle Safo has gained popularity for his technological inventions. In recognition of that the University of Ghana awarded him an honorary doctorate degree, while the University of Education, Winneba, has offered to document all his inventions.
Recently, there has been some media exchanges between Apostle Dr Safo and the authorities of KNUST. The Apostle was reported to have criticised some graduates of the university who worked with him for not being able to cope with the practical aspect of his technologal works but the university authorities reacted to the Apostle’s criticism, describing it as false.
Prof Andam said it was important for the nation to understand that KNUST was established to train a core of highly skilled technical professionals who would work in key sectors to advance the development of the nation.
He said about 95 per cent of engineers at the Volta River Authority (VRA), as well as majority of the engineers at the Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL) and the Volta Aluminium Company (VALCO), were all products of KNUST and wondered what would happen to the nation if the Akosombo Dam, for instance, was shut for a few days.
Prof Andam said there was no need to engage in a debate over the inventions of Apostle Dr Safo and the capabilities of graduates from the university, adding that the priority of the university was not re-engineering but engineering.
Moving away from Apostle Safo’s inventions, the KNUST ViceChancellor announced that the university would introduce distance education programmes in Mathematics, Building Technology and Computer Engineering, next academic year.
He noted that distance education in science and technology programmes was very expensive and so there was the need to establish laboratories and other facilities for such purposes.
Delivering the main lecture, Prof Andam underlined the need for the nation to invest more in science and technology education, which, he said, was the key to development.
He said there was also the need to increase access to education, especially at the higher level, since there was a corrrlation between education and wealth creation.
The Chief Executive Officer of the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, Prof Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, who chaired the function, said it was unfortunate that African countries spent about $40 billion annually to pay about 100,000 expatriates, although there were many Africans with the same qualification who worked abroad.
“Many years ago, the Chinese built the Great Wall of China without any help from the World Bank. But we can’t build a drainage without World Bank support”, he remarked.
Prof Frimpong-Boateng said development projects were not the construction of roads but projects that would ensure less dependence on foreign capital and influence.
He said he was startled by statistics on the dropout rate, particularly at the basic education level, pointing out that, “We are at the point of doom. We are committing suicide”

Inventions Ever - Chill Out

The driest place in the world

The driest place in the world – Atacama Desert. Atacama desert is located in South America between Andes mountains and the Pacific Ocean in northern Chile. It is made of salt basins, lava flows and sand. It is over 20 million years old. Atacama desert is almost sterile because Andes blocked all moisture pass to Atacama. On some places in Atacama wheather station never received rain. By the evidence in Atacama there was no more important rainfall from 1570 to 1971. Even Mountains that reaches over 6500 meters are glacier free.

Some regions in Atacama gets some marine fog which is sufficient to support some algaes, lichens and cacti, but other dry parts are compared to Mars (Atacama is used for filming some Mars Scenes for movies). In 2003 in Science Magazine scientist published tests used by Viking 1 and Viking 2 Mars landers for life detection, and they were unable to detect any signs of life in Atacama soil. In the middle of desert there is oasis, at about 2000 m above sea level. Oasis is home for village San Pedro de Atacama which is very popular tourist destination. Because of high altitude, and nearly non existent clouds, lack of light polution and radio interference Atacama is one of the best places for astronomical observations. Atacama desert has world largest natural supply of Sodium Nitrate which was mined at enormous ammounts until early 1940s. Now across the desert there is more then 170 abandoned nitrate mining towns, because of invention of synthetic nitrate in Germany. Some of ghost towns are Chacabuco, Humberstone, Puelma, Santa Laura… Across the desert runs Pan American highway.

information about dinosaurs

Hello and good day to you! I’m Pterry and this is Pterry’s True Science. I’ll be stopping by the blog from time to time to share news and information about dinosaurs like me and my pals.
Today I’ve come to tell you about a scientist that is working on creating dinosaurs by manipulating genetics. Hans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at Montreal’s McGill University wants to develop dinosaur traits that disappeared through evolution into birds.
It’s not as hard as you might think, birds are essentially dinosaurs and they have a lot of the same genes that dinosaurs did. It’s a matter of turning the right ones on to make them a dinosaur. There is a splendid video with the famous Jack Horner discussing this on the Discovery Channel video page called “The Futurist: Engineering Dinosaurs.”
Well thanks for your time, I have a new invention I’m whipping up and need to get back to!

LATEST SCIENCE INVENSTION

Eurekasaurus! Paleontologists have just discovered a large group of crocodiles in the Saharan desert in Africa. They have found many new species of ancient crocodiles that challenge the way people think of crocs today. They have been given colorful nicknames such as PancakeCroc, DuckCroc, RatCroc, BoarCroc and DogCroc.
Each of them show strange characteristics of crocodiles. PancakeCroc had a long, wide mouth that probably ate medium sized dinosaurs. Some of these fossils show that a few species could stand upright and run down dinosaurs! Yuckasaurus! Good thing I can fly.
Others such as BoarCroc sported large tusks that came out of their mouth. The new crocodiles also had brains that were different from modern ones, suggesting that they could have been much smarter.
One last important thing about this discovery is the kind of area they found these fossils in. The Saharan desert is now dry and harsh but these fossils show it was once a swampy, marshland with lots of water. Strange how the Earth changes over the years…. millions of years!

LATEST SCIENCE INVENSTION

EUREKASAURUS! Pterry here with another edition of Pterry’s True Science! This week we have a particularly incredible discovery that I had to share with you. Rex had stated before in a Daily Dino Fact that humans didn’t know anything about the color of dinosaurs. They didn’t, until now!
For the first time ever in the history of paleontology, humans have solid evidence of dinosaur color. The evidence comes from a recent discovery of a dinosaur called Sinosauropteryx that was found in China. A reddish-orange color was found in the tail feathers of a recent specimen, giving scientists their first proof about pigment in dinosaurs. Artists renditions of dinosaurs have been around for a while but up until now the coloring has always been made up completely by the artist.
Sinosauropteryx was a smallish theropod who relied on eating fast little creatures (maybe rodents) for their meals. They existed during the Early Cretaceous and may have been a close relative of the Compy. This is such an exciting discovery, I wonder what they will find out next?

True Science

Good day dino friends! Pterry here with some extremely exciting news for my feature column, “Pterry’s true Science.” Sometimes Rex let’s me stop by the blog to tell you about new information coming out in the world of paleontology and prehistory. This is a big one. The biggest one so far.
Recently a group of 41 paleontologists and scientists made a decision on what really caused the extinction of the dinosaurs. We’ve discussed this on the blog before and it has been one of the biggest debates about dinosaurs ever. Now it is put to rest as the universally accepted explanation for the extinction of the dinosaurs.
Their decision had a lot to do with the Chicxulub crate in Mexico and the strange iridium layer between Cretaceous and Tertiary aged rocks. The asteroid that wiped out the dinos measures abotu 7.5 miles wide and had the destructive power of a nuclear bomb (times 1 billion, literally).
Well with that debate back to rest, scientists can go back to arguing about whether or not dinos were warm blooded or cold blooded.As for me on the other hand, I’ll be arguing with Horns about who the smarter dino is. That should be an obvious one!

LATEST SCIENCE INVENSTION

Eurekasaurus! Pterry here. I was getting ready for the big 4th of July party this Sunday when I came across this magnificent new finding! In the modern age, most animals you see are miniature compared to ancient creatures. Even modern day birds don’t even come close to my size and wingspan! With the exception of the blue whale, the largest animal ever known, ancient animals were beasts.

The latest find by paleontologists is no exception. Recently they uncovered the remains of Leviathan melvillei, one of the biggest predators ever measuring over 50 ft (15.2 cm) long! Their teeth alone were about 15 inches (36 cm) long and 5 in (12.7 cm) thick. My, those are giant teeth. They were situated perfectly to grab prey and rip the flesh right from their bodies with powerful jaw muscles. Not to mention that the mouth itself was 9 feet (2.7 m) long and 7 feet (2.1 m) wide. Yes, it could swallow you humans in one bite.

These giants beasts were the ancestors of the modern day killer whale, living about 12 to 13 million years ago in the Neogene time period. This means they likely would have competed with the ferocious Megalodon. There is no fossil evidence to support this, but I’m sure they did battle from time to time. What do you think?

For now I’m signing out, see you at the party!

LATEST SCIENCE INVENTION

EUREKASAURUS! It’s time again for another edition of Pterry’s True Science!
As we learned a few months back, the debate over the cause of the extinction of the dinosaurs has finally come to a close. A group of 41 paleontologists and scientists concluded that a giant asteroid slamming into the Earth is now the universally accepted explanation.
However, new evidence has come to light that suggests that two asteroid crashes may have been responsible for the extinction. The Chicxulub Crater in the Gulf of Mexico was the site of the originally discovered asteroid crash. A second site, the newly discovered Boltysh Crater in Ukraine, may prove that multiple asteroids crashes led to the extinction of the dinosaurs. Yikes!
The impacts at the Chicxulub Crater and Boltysh Crater took place thousands of years apart from one another, but still close enough together to raise some questions. Some scientists speculate that an entire shower of asteroids may have struck Earth around 65 million years ago. If that’s the case, expect to hear about more impact sites in the future!
 Such a fascinating discovery, but now it’s time for me to get back to my research!