Infosense

Following our initial moments of genius article which profiled the likes of Isaac Newtown and Archimedes, it dawned on us that they have been other similar moments of genius. Though not as celebrated falling of an apple kind of eureka moments the following moments of genius brought solutions or answers that have had a profound impact in this world.  As previously mentioned, an eureka moment is simply the culmination point following a series of experiments, discussions or study. The length of time that took one to reach this point varies, from idea to idea. Some took a few months other several year while other took decades. Such was the case with Dmitri Mendeleev.

Dmitri Mendeleev,

Dmitri Mendeleev was a Russian aristocrat and academic with a vested interest in the basic elements of the universe that combine in all manner of forms to make up physical matter.

Mendeleev could not comprehend or explain the seemingly random properties of these building blocks. That is; until one day whilst vacationing with his family he took a nap.

Mendeleev had been listening to his family struggle to play chamber music. He grew tired and, upon excusing himself, went to bed and drifted off to sleep listening to the music.

Mendeleev dreamed a vision of the basic elements of the universe flowing together in a manner akin to the progression of a musical sequence; orderly and beautiful. He awoke and outlined from his dream every element in order. This sequence became known in all chemistry texts as the Periodic Table of Elements.

Neils Bohr

Dutch physicist, Niels Bohr was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1922.

Upon successfully completing his doctorate in physics, Bohr gained notoriety in the physics fraternity almost overnight. This was due to his knack of being able to decipher complex problems that for much time had frustrated his peers and colleagues.

In due course, Bohr turned his attention to atoms and their structure. He designed many varying frameworks as to the configuration but none seemed to fit.

One evening Bohr retired to bed and began dreaming about atoms. Bohr’s stated that he saw the nucleus of the atom with the electronis spinning around it, just as the planets do around the sun.

The dream spurred Bohr to promptly attend his lab and begin seeking confirmation of his dream. Testing confirmed the vision he had received. Bohr later said that immediately upon awakening, he knew the dream was correct; that he felt it was true and as such always attributed his finding to the slept vision.

Elias Howe

Inventor Elias Howe had a great idea about a machine that could be used for sewing. His concept consisted of a needle attached to a machine that would go through material. Initially, Howe tried using a needle with a sharp point at both ends and an eye in the middle, but it failed.

Howe couldn’t quite link the entire project into a working model until one night he had a dream. In the dream Howe saw himself being taken prisoner by a group of savages. He watched as these men danced around him with spears and noticed that each native’s spear had a hole near the tip.

Upon awaking, Howe instantly recognised the dream had solved the problem to his proposed sewing machine. That is, via placing a hole at the tip of the needle, the thread could be caught after piercing the material. He instantly set about changing the design of his machine and after making the necessary alterations, discovered it worked!

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The Russian scientists drilling into ancient buried Antarctic Lake Vostok have reached their destination, the Russian news agency Ria Novosti reported today. The team is apparently alive and well despite a week of suspicious radio silence, but more details are to come about what they''ve found buried under two miles of ice.

Approximately one third of stroke patients experience another stroke while they''re still in the hospital. Nurses therefore keep a close eye on them, and arrange for them to be taken for tests if a subsequent stroke is suspected. Unfortunately these tests can be invasive, and in some cases are even potentially harmful to the patient. A new device being developed at the Mayo Clinic in Florida, however, could watch for strokes simply by shining light onto a patient''s forehead.

The United States successfully test-fires its first Titan I intercontinental ballistic missile. The threat of global nuclear holocaust moves from the plausible to the likely.

I have written previously about the fact that more S&P 500 CEO’s are engineering majors than any other discipline. The group putting out those studies have stopped doing so, unfortunately. There is a new study based on mining Facebook data and the results again show engineers doing very well.

I wish they provided data for the larger companies, but they don’t. They show a breakdown of 9,461 (CEO or founders) with a business undergraduate major and 9,334 with an engineering degree. For those with advanced degrees 3,337 have an engineering master’s or doctorate and 1,016 have an MBA.

In the latest (2008) data I have for S&P 500 CEO’s 22% were engineers. Engineers seem to make up under 5% of college graduates (based on my eyeballing of this Dept. of Education data). Business meanwhile seems to make up about 20% of the majors.

See more posts looking at science and engineering careers: Future Prospects for Engineers – Engineering Again Dominates The Highest Paying College Majors – Science and Engineering in Global Economics – Career Prospect for Engineers Continues to Look Positive

At the nano level, researchers have discovered a new way to weld together meshes of tiny wires. Their work could lead to exciting new electronics and solar applications. To succeed, they called upon plasmonics.

From 1981 to 1984 RCA marketed the CED VideoDisc system. It never had a chance.

Astronomers at the Paranal observatory combine four telescope to create the world''s largest virtual device with a 130m-mirror.

A spider web''s ability to adapt to different levels of stress is the key to its remarkable stability, say scientists.

Publication year: 2012Source: Energy, Available online 3 February 2012Hongwen?He, Xiaowei?Zhang, Rui?Xiong, Yongli?Xu, Hongqiang?GuoThis paper presents a method to estimate the state-of-charge (SOC) of a lithium-ion battery, based on an online identification of its open-circuit voltage (OCV), according to the battery's intrinsic relationship between the SOC and the OCV for application in electric vehicles. Firstly an equivalent circuit model withnRC networks is employed modeling the polarization characteristic and the dynamic behavior of the lithium-ion battery, the corresponding equations are built to describe its electric behavior and a recursive function is deduced for the online identification of the OCV, which is implemented by a recursive least squares (RLS) algorithm with an optimal forgetting factor. The models with different RC networks are evaluated based on the terminal voltage comparisons between the model-based simulation and the experiment. Then the OCV-SOC lookup table is built based on the experimental data performed by a linear interpolation of the battery voltages at the same SOC during two consecutive discharge and charge cycles. Finally a verifying experiment is carried out based on nine Urban Dynamometer Driving Schedules. It indicates that the proposed method can ensure an acceptable accuracy of SOC estimation for online application with a maximum error being less than 5.0%.Highlights? An equivalent circuit model withnRC networks is built for lithium-ion batteries. ? A recursive function is deduced for the online estimation of the model parameters like OCV andRO. ? The relationship between SOC and OCV is built with a linear interpolation method by experiments. ? The experiments show the online model-based SOC estimation is reasonable with enough accuracy.

Publication year: 2012Source: Energy, Available online 4 February 2012M.K.?Padhy, R.P.?SainiIn the present study, an experiment was carried out to investigate the mechanism of erosion of a small scale Pelton turbine, under actual flow conditions. Samples of silt were collected from the head work of one of the most silt affected hydro power station in India. Silt parameters (silt particle size and silt concentration) were considered to investigate the mechanism of silt erosion on Pelton turbine buckets for different silt sizes. In the first part of the experimentation, hot spots (spots which are more prone to erosion) were identified under a high silt concentration. Second part of the experimentation was carried out to study the erosion mechanism for small specimens of metal which were fixed at the marked hot spots.Based on the investigation, it has been found that silt size is a strong parameter to produce erosion and the material removal from the surface is due to plastic deformation and ploughing of surface.Highlights? The sediment present in the water exerts force on the turbine components; as a result the turbine components get deformed. ? The mechanism of erosion is different in different parts of a Pelton turbine bucket. ? The present study is undertaken to investigate the mechanism of erosion in the highly eroded parts of Pelton turbine buckets.

Publication year: 2012Source: Energy, Available online 3 February 2012Ahmad T.?Mayyas, Ala?Qattawi, Abdel Raouf?Mayyas, Mohammed A.?OmarNowadays life cycle tools namely; Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), Life Cycle Costing (LCC), and Life Cycle Optimization (LCO) are being used to assess new vehicular structures from sustainability and design for the environment perspectives. This manuscript implements a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) based design approach to assess the performance of vehicular Body-In-White's (BIW) through its complete life cycle. The proposed LCA model will aid in the early design stages (i.e. conceptual design stage) serving as an eco-design decision-making support tool. This study provides a complete life cycle assessment covering the extraction and the processing of virgin materials, the manufacturing, the use and maintenance stage, the end-of-life stage, in addition to the fuel extraction and production stages. Traditional LCA studies do not usually consider the latter stages which accounts for a significant portion of the energy consumed and the generated CO2emissions. This study results show that the material selection for vehicular applications is a sensitive process not only to the vehicle lifetime (as expressed in traveled miles), but also to the environmental burdens from the extraction stage and recyclability efforts. Additionally, the proposed study shows the effect of the different materials choices on the vehicle structure functionality.Highlights? It proposes an eco-design using LCA for vehicular structural materials. ? It proposes the inclusion of the fuel extraction and production stages into LCA. ? Investigates the sensitivities of LCA to the material selection process and the vehicle lifetime.

Publication year: 2012Source: Energy, Available online 4 February 2012Pi-qiang?Tan, Zhi-yuan?Hu, Di-ming?Lou, Zhi-jun?LiIn this study, regulated and unregulated exhaust emissions with petroleum diesel fuel and Jatropha-based biodiesel blends at proportions of 5%, 10%, 20%, 50% and 100% (v/v) have been investigated. This study examines four regulated emissions: nitrogen oxide, carbon monoxide, unburned hydrocarbon and smoke, and four typical unregulated emissions: formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, acetone and toluene. The biodiesel shows no obvious NOx emission difference from the pure diesel fuel at low and medium engine loads. Biodiesel blend ratios have little effect on the NO/NOx ratio at medium and high engine loads. The CO emission of biodiesel increases at low engine loads. The HC emissions show a continuous reduction with increasing biodiesel blend ratios. There is a good correlation between smoke reduction and the ratio of the biodiesel blends. The addition of biodiesel fuel increases formaldehyde emission. Compared to the pure diesel fuel, the acetaldehyde emission of B5 fuel is higher. The acetaldehyde emission of the B100 fuel is lower than the pure diesel fuel at low and middle engine loads. The acetone emission of biodiesel, from B5 to B100, is higher than the pure diesel fuel. The higher biodiesel blend ratio the fuel has, the lower toluene emission the engine has.Highlights? Regulated and unregulated emissions from a diesel engine with diesel fuel and Jatropha biodiesel blends were studied. ? HC and smoke emissions show a continuous reduction with increasing biodiesel blend ratios. ? CO emission of biodiesel increases at low engine loads. ? Biodiesel increases carbonyl compound emissions at most engine operating conditions. ? Biodiesel reduces light aromatic hydrocarbon emissions of diesel engines.

Publication year: 2012Source: Energy, Available online 4 February 2012H.S.?Hamut, I.?Dincer, G.F.?NatererThis paper examines a TMS (thermal management system) of a range-extended EV (electric vehicle), which operates on its battery before the gasoline engine engages. In this period of independence of the ICE (internal combustion engine), the vehicle performance characteristics such as range, power for acceleration, fuel economy and emissions depend solely on the battery performance. Since the magnitude and uniformity of temperature in battery packs has significant impact on their performance, it is imperative to keep the battery temperature within optimal performance levels through a capable TMS that can efficiently transfer heat within the vehicle. The objective of this paper is to analyze the refrigerant and coolant circuits in the vehicle for cooling during high ambient temperatures and determine the irreversibilities and areas for improvement within these circuits. A second law analysis is used to examine the areas of low exergy efficiency in the system and minimize the entropy generation. Based on the analysis, the energetic COP (coefficient of performance) ranges of 1.8-2.4 and exergetic COP ranges of 0.26-0.39 are calculated for the system. Various parametric studies have been conducted and the most significant impact on the overall exergetic COP is found to be the ambient temperature.Highlights? Development of an exergy model for analysis of liquid thermal management systems in electric vehicles. ? Determination of exergy destructions/losses. ? Performance assessment of the systems through energetic and exergetic COPs. ? Parametric studies to investigate how the performance is affected by changing operating conditions.

Publication year: 2012Source: Biosensors and Bioelectronics, Available online 4 February 2012Hua?Zhang, Ying?Sun, Jing?Wang, Jia?Zhang, Hanqi?Zhang, ...A novel nanocomposite Fe3O4-Au nanorod (AuNR) was prepared and used as the substrate in the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) biosensor to detect goat IgM. Fe3O4-AuNR nanocomposites were synthesized by a method of seed-mediated growth, and further characterized by molecular absorption spectroscopy, transmission electronic microscopy (TEM), energy-dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The nanocomposites exhibit both magnetic property and exceptional optical property, which are beneficial to the antibody immobilization and the sensitivity of detection. The sensing membrane can be regenerated easily and the experimental procedure is simplified. Moreover, the Au nanorods show two plasmon resonance wavelengths defined as transverse mode and longitudinal mode, and the longitudinal plasmon wavelengths are more sensitive to the changes in the dielectric properties of the surroundings. Fe3O4-AuNR nanocomposites got a high sensitivity in detection of antibody-antigen immunoassay. In the optimal conditions, the biosensor based on Fe3O4-AuNR nanocomposites exhibits a satisfactory response to goat IgM in the concentration range of 0.15-40.00??g?mL. However, the biosensor without Fe3O4-AuNR nanocomposites shows a response to goat IgM in the concentration range of 1.25-40.00??g?mL. As a result, the sensitivity of the biosensor based on Fe3O4-AuNR nanocomposites is enhanced significantly.Highlights? A novel nanocomposite Fe3O4-Au nanorod (AuNR) was prepared and applied to the surface plasmon resonance biosensor. ? The Fe3O4-AuNR nanocomposites could be easily immobilized on the surface of Au film with a magnetic pillar. ? The biosensor based on Fe3O4-AuNR nanocomposites was easy to be regenerated. ? The limit of quantification (LOQ) obtained with the Fe3O4-AuNR nanocomposites is 8 times lower than that obtained with unmodified biosensor film.

The design platform is built around microsemi''s SmartFusion FPGA evaluation kit and Germany-based Trinamic''s motor control daughter board kit

Achieving CEI-25G-LR compliance it is intended for Asic design in data networking applications and supports the push for 100G Ethernet infrastructure

The report predicts that the rapid uptake of LED lighting will result in a potential market of four billion power supply units by 2016, worth $10bn

A new class of DCDC converter, the PowerSoC, provides the efficiency of a switch-mode DCDC converter, but has the solution footprint and noise characteristics of a linear regulator.View the full article HERE.

The VLMx1300 series from Vishay touts 130° viewing angle and a maximum forward voltage of 3.8V.

The HV2801 and HV2901 claim to offer robust latch up protection and quiescent current of less than 10uA to yield hi-res medical ultrasound images.