Daily Archives: July 5, 2017

Masdar nanotech promises to bring on the rain! – Green Prophet

Posted: July 5, 2017 at 11:24 pm

Dr. Linda Zou is leading the project. A professor of chemical and environmental engineering, she is one of the first scientists to explore nanotechnology to enhance a cloud seeding materials ability to produce rain. By filing a patent, the team is paving a way to commercialize their discovery, and aligning with Masdar Institutes aim to position the UAE as a world leader in science and tech, specifically in the realm of environmental sustainability.

It is a significant step towards achieving greater water security in the UAE. Rainfall enhancement via cloud seeding can potentially increase precipitation by 10% to 30%, helping to refresh groundwater reserves, boost agricultural production, and reduce the countrys heavy reliance on water produced by energy-intensive seawater desalination.

Using nanotechnology to accelerate water droplet formation on a typical cloud seeding material has never been researched before. It is a new approach that could revolutionize the development of cloud seeding materials and make them significantly more efficient and effective, said Dr. Zou.

Rain enhancement leverages cloud physics, atmosphere physics, and topographical studies to stimulate clouds to produce rain. Zou and her team complement such work through their focus on the cloud seeding material itself.

Conventional cloud seeding materials are tiny particles such as salt crystals, dry ice and silver iodide. A few microns (one-thousandth of a millimeter) in size, these act as the core around which cloud water condenses, stimulating water droplet growth. Once the air in the cloud reaches a certain level of saturation, it can no longer hold in that moisture, and rain falls. Cloud seeding essentially mimics what naturally occurs in clouds, but enhances the process by adding particles that can stimulate and accelerate the condensation process.

According to a Masdar Institute press release, Dr. Zou (pictured above, left) and her collaborators, Dr. Mustapha Jouiad, Principal Research Scientist in Mechanical and Materials Engineering Department, postdoctoral researcher Dr. Nabil El Hadri and PhD student Haoran Liang, explored ways to improve the process of condensation on a pure salt crystal by layering it with a thin coating of titanium dioxide.

The coating measures around 50 nanometers, more than one thousand times thinner than a human hair. Miniscule in size, the coating has a massive effect on the salts condensation efficiency. Titanium dioxide is a hydrophilic photocatalyst, which means that when in contact with water vapor in the cloud, it helps to initiate and sustain the water vapor condensation on the nanoparticles surface, accelerating formation of large water droplets hence, rain.

Zous team found that their coating improved salts ability to absorb and condense water vapor by a hyndredfold compared to an uncoated salt crystal. Armed with the materials to increase in condensation efficiency, research will now move on to field testing.

The team was one of the inaugural recipients of a US$5 MIL grant from the UAE Research Program for Rain Enhancement Science last year, a program established to increase rain enhancement research in the UAE and arid and semi-arid regions across the world. That grant will fund another two years of research.

Awardees of the Programs Second Cycle grant of US$ 5 million were announced Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week 2017, and include teams from the University of Reading (UK), the Finnish Meteorological Institute, and the American firm Spec Inc.

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Masdar nanotech promises to bring on the rain! - Green Prophet

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Duke Neuroscientist: Brain Augmentation Will Allow Us to Make a New Kind of Human – Futurism

Posted: at 11:21 pm

Believe The Hype?

Brain augmentation is a hot topic; from nootropics, to brain-computer interfaces (BCIs), and even implants designed to restore movement to those with paralysis. But how much of the buzz is just hype? To find out, Edd Gent of SingularityHub interviewed Duke University neuroscientist Mikhail Lebedev, who works on brain-machine interfaces (BMIs) and has recently won a $100,000 prize for his work in brain augmentation.

Lebedev thinks we will see both realistic visual prostheses and technologies for the rehabilitation of patients withspinal cord injury and stroke within the next 10 years. Further advances like the ability to type directly from your brain to a screen using implanted electrodes will take more time perhaps 20 years. And Lebedev thinks itll take much longer before were decoding brain activity or free-floating thoughts.

When it comes to augmenting brain function, almost anything is potentially possible. Sensors can be added to the brain, interacting with sensory functions. Lebedev cites adding a sensor of electromagnetic fields or visual sensors around the heads perimeter for panoramic vision as examples.

Current research into micro-stimulation of the brain seems to show that its possible to suppress some processing steps not really to enhance function, Lebedev points out. However, he also points out that suppression can itself be helpful, like when the brain is producing biased responses rather than useful solutions.

There are several basic areas of brain augmentation work currently happening: non-invasive tactics such as electroencephalogram (EEG) systems, transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), and functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIR); invasive approaches such as BCIs, implants, and BMIs; pharmacological approaches such as nootropics and molecular drug treatments; and genetic approaches such as optogenetics and implanted neurons. There is sometimes even significant overlap between some of these areas, and as technologies advance, we may see these categories bleeding together even more.

While access to technology is always a concern, Lebedev points out that continued discovery will always help the problem. Further development tends to make technologies cheaper and more accessible to everyone. (We can see an example of this happening as blockchain and access to cell phones is fostering opportunities in developing countries where infrastructure for landlines was never created.)

And while there are risks that will come with more advanced brain augmentation technologies as there are with any breakthrough tech Lebedev has a positive outlook on what the future may hold, Im optimistic, so I see mostly upsides. We really want to improve; we want to become less primitive people.

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Dreamstate SoCal Lineup Revealed [Updated Daily] – EDM Sauce

Posted: at 11:21 pm

It is no secret that Insomniac has been busy keeping the trance family happy with their wildly successful Dreamstate brand. Since its launch in 2015, Dreamstate has grown immensely in popularity and size, branching out of the festival crowds and into clubs in cities around the world.

This week, the flagship festival, Dreamstate Southern California will begin announcing their artist lineup for the fall event. Being revealed on social media, the all-trance rave is sure to include the biggest names in trance, psytrance, melodic and progressive.

After a cryptic online video was published, many fans believed to have seen the blurred out image of cloak-wearing duo, GAIA. On July 4, fans of the duo comprised of Armin van Buuren and Benno de Goeij had their doubts erased as Dreamstate affirmed that GAIA will be performing at the NOS Events Center come autumn.

On Wednesday, July 5, a slew of trance artists were exposed, ranging from classic trance to progressive and psytrance DJs. Andrew Rayel, Paul Oakenfold, Sunny Lax, a classics set by Judge Jules, Key 4050 Presented by John O'Callaghan and Bryan Kearney and Hyrda presented by The Thrillseekers are a few of the highlights of the mid-week announcement.

Keep checking back for the latest announcements out of Dreamstate, your trance destination.

Dreamstate SoCal will take place November 24-25 at the National Orange Show Events Center in San Bernardino, California. Tickets (including payment options) will go on sale next Tuesday, July 11th.

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Indra to Replatform Its Leading TMS Solutions for Hotels Onto SAP S … – Hospitality Technology

Posted: at 11:20 pm

| July 05, 2017

Indra said it replatformed its Travel Management Suite (TMS) onto SAPs cloud platform S/4HANA. It allows operating as a real-time enterprise with a single view of each guest. TMS will provide global, multi-property enterprises a single source of truth and visibility. SAP S/4HANA is an in-memory, fast relational database management system and it provides a platform that enables accelerated innovation and predictive experiences for hospitality. SAP S/4HANA is an intelligent ERP suite designed specifically for in-memory computing. It is the digital core that connects a hotel enterprise with customers, business networks, the Internet of things, big data, and more. Through this migration, Indra is capable of enabling the worlds largest and most complex hotel enterprises to take control and run a live business with Indras TMS solutions on SAP S/4HANA. With SAP S/4Hana, Indra will offer hotel enterprises the ability to:

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The Guardian view on Test Match Special: 60 years of tacit pleasure – The Guardian

Posted: at 11:20 pm

Sound of the summer: Test Match Specials Michael Vaughan and Jonathan Agnew. Photograph: Gareth Copley/Getty Images

It is 19 years since BBC television ceased broadcasting live Test cricket and 12 since Channel 4 drew stumps on its own free-to-air coverage. Since then, Sky has had the monopoly of rights to what was once the national summer game. This will change a bit in 2020, when the BBC will start showing highlights, and some live T20 games, with Sky retaining the bulk of the rights.

Yet for many, free-to-air cricket coverage is now synonymous with radios Test Match Special. On Thursday, as Test cricket resumes for the first time in this English summer, TMS marks its 60th year of ball-by-ball radio commentaries. This deserves salute from the paper of John Arlott, even while recognising that TMS is a Marmite taste that some adore and others dislike.

Many are devoted to TMSs gentle rhythms in spite of the male public school tone that still lingers. Others want it to converse better with todays Britain. The tension between tradition and innovation will always shape responses to TMS and cricket itself.

In a Wisden survey of TMSs role in the game, Matthew Engel this year highlighted an important truth. While televised sports relentless underlying dogma, especially in Skys treatment, is always that this is thrilling and it really matters, he wrote, radios values are subtler. On radio, there is a tacit pact with the listener, who will be registering the cricket as an agreeable extra in their own daily routine. Exactly so. Just as there is more to life than politics, so there is also more to life than cricket. But its good to welcome TMS back for the summer.

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What is NIT? Neurotechnology Innovations Translator

Posted: at 11:19 pm

NIT started with a clean slate, asking a simple question: How can neurotech companies pioneer these innovations in todays medtech world? The result? Neurotech development, completely reimagined.

NIT is a cutting-edge translational center--a private, for-profit company, formed in collaboration with over a dozen Partners, with a mission to develop and commercialize pioneering neurotechnology solutions to improve patient well-being.Built with the vision of developing a select number of high-quality, commercially-oriented companies, NIT brings together the vision, leadership, expertise,network, resources, personnel and capital to create the pre-eminent development ecosystem in the compelling frontier of neuroscience. NIT's translational approach substantially reduces risk and required capital for companies and their investors by accelerating the development cycle, avoiding pitfalls, and propelling companies through development to commercial success.NIT will create or attract multiple companies sourced from a global pipeline of innovation.Whether an idea on a napkin, or a more mature neurotech company that is further along in the development pathway, NIT will invest in, and engage with, a select number of attractive neurotechnology companies that will benefit from NITs resources and model to accelerate their success.

NIT is not an incubator; not a venture capital firm; not a contract manufacturing house; not a clinical trialing organization...per se.Instead, NIT brings the best of what each of these other entities has tried to deliver, comprehensively, under one translational center, borrowing their best attributes, but transforming them into an entity that provides a cocoon for your companys success in todays challenging landscape.The result: far more than just capital or seasoned advice--a comprehensive solution, providing the expertise, resources, and capital to propel your company from concept-to-clinic, and subsequently to commercial success.

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CF timber program holds inaugural completion ceremony … – Cedar Key Beacon

Posted: at 11:18 pm

Six pioneering students were recognized at the College of Central Floridas first-ever Timber Harvesting Equipment Program Completion Ceremony last Friday in Chiefland.

The new non-credit program is aimed at preparing students for jobs in the field of logging and timber, an expanding industry in North Central Florida.

Students went through five weeks of classroom instruction and three weeks of hands-on field experience. Upon completion, they received Master Logger Certification, OSHA 10-hour Certification and CPR Certification.

The six students receiving certificates of completion at the Haven Hospice Community Center included: Guy Bowers; Garrett Bowker; Thomas Conrad; Hunter Matus; Charles McCullar; and Joshua Randolph. CF Levy Campus provost Dr. Rayanne Giddis delivered opening and closing remarks, while Levy Campus manager Holly McGlashan and program instructor and consultant Bryan Olmert also spoke and issued certificates.

This has been an incredible experience, McGlashan said. Im so incredibly proud of these six gentlemen. Some of them have overcome some extra barriers and have powered through.

The course includes an introduction to the forest industry and instruction on basic forest management, timber harvesting operations, wildlife management, and safety and equipment operations.

This program is the first of its kind in Florida,Giddis said. It was a difficult path, but these six graduates have done an exceptional job.

Giddis thanked individuals and companies who helped support the program, including Ken and Lynetta Griner and Eric Handley of Usher Land and Timber, the Florida Forest Service, the Florida Forest Association, and Gary Beauchamp, who developed the curriculum for the program.

She noted the material support from places such as Deer Equipment, Ring Power, Tidewater Equipment, Tri-County Oil, Lyme Timber and Prep, The Conservation Fund, Suwannee Timber and Ward Timber as well as support from the CF Forest Advisory Committee and Career Source.

Of Olmert, she said, hes our most valuable player. He was sent from heaven to be our instructor for this program. He was more than an instructor, I think he was a guide and a leader for these students.

Olmert thanked Giddis and McGlashan and his students.

All of these names made my job very easy because the logistics of putting something like this together getting fuel, getting equipment, getting everything to flow was made possible by all those people Rayanne mentioned, he said. The curriculum was so well laid out that it was not an issue for me.

I really have six great guys. They all gave me an awful lot of themselves. Theyve got some learning ahead of them, but theyve got the basics.

I couldnt be prouder of all of them. I think they all have a bright future.

Some of the programs graduates have family that are linked to the timber industry, while others entered out of curiousity for the industry and a potential career.

My teacher in high school told me it might be a good program for me because Im more hands on, Matus said. Coming out of it, I think I have a better perspective on the industry.

I was already going to the school and (Levy CF adult education coordinator) Ms. (Leah) Gamble had told me and my wife about the program and I decided Id see what its about, take it for a spin, and it turned out to be pretty good, Randolph said. I learned a lot.

Bowers was also a student at CF when he learned about the program.

My family has been in the logging business for a long time, he said. So I figured if I go in I better get all the requirements I need.

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Is It Time to go for CF Industries Holdings, Inc. (CF), Newmont Mining Corporation (NEM)? – StockNewsJournal

Posted: at 11:18 pm


Finance News Daily
Is It Time to go for CF Industries Holdings, Inc. (CF), Newmont Mining Corporation (NEM)?
StockNewsJournal
CF Industries Holdings, Inc. (CF) have shown a high EPS growth of -17.80% in the last 5 years and has earnings decline of -140.10% yoy. Analysts have a mean recommendation of 2.50 on this stock (A rating of less than 2 means buy, hold within the 3 ...
Newmont Mining Corporation - NEM - Stock Price Today - ZacksZacks Investment Research

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Caf staff booked for cloning cards – The Hindu – The Hindu

Posted: at 11:16 pm


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Caf staff booked for cloning cards - The Hindu
The Hindu
An employee of Farzi Caf in Connaught Place (CP) has been booked for allegedly cloning credit and debit cards of customers, and misusing them to the tune of ...

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Alan Liere: A camping evolution – The Spokesman-Review

Posted: at 11:16 pm

Wed., July 5, 2017, 7 p.m.

When I was a kid, my Uncle Pat and Aunt Molly would gather up nieces and nephews for a camping/fishing extravaganza to the San Poil River right after school let out for the summer. We would arrive early, erect a huge canvas tent, roll out the goose down sleeping bags and go fishing.

Afterwards, we would build a fire and Aunt Molly would cook the small trout for dinner. The adventure was completed with marshmallows roasted on willow sticks before crawling, sticky fingers and all, into our beds.

I loved camping back then, and would continue the tradition years later with my own family. My grown children still talk about these excursions the day we saw a bear, the day Jennifer caught the enormous sucker, the day Dad lost his bathing suit in a poetic cartwheel off a slalom ski on Priest Lake.

Sadly, when my children hit their teens they decided Mom and Dad werent cool, and slumber parties with their friends replaced family camping trips. Without their enthusiastic presence, camping wasnt as fun anymore.

I thus went many years without it, but in my 50s, I bought a camper for my pickup. There were still a lot of places I needed to explore that werent close to a motel and a caf, and it seemed logical I should be able to carry my bed and groceries with me.

I used the camper solely for these hunting and fishing and gathering adventures until recently, when a lady friend mentioned she would enjoy a real camping trip.

Real camping? I questioned.

Yes, real camping, she answered sweetly. Wood smoke. Sleeping under the stars. A pine-scented forest. The songs of crickets and frogs. Water over polished pebbles and the wind in the trees. I think she had been taking a poetry workshop at the community college.

I told her she could look out the window of my camper if she wanted to see the stars. And though it went against all my instincts to be camping just for the sake of camping, I knew a spot by a river not too far from home that would offer all the natural wonders she craved from the comfort of my camper. It was a poor compromise, she said, but she signed on.

That night I grilled salmon on a hardwood fire alongside the river. We had wine and chocolate very romantic. Then, the mosquitoes and black flies came out hungry hordes which hadnt fed in months They landed anywhere there was exposed flesh. I got out the bug dope and doused us with a bitter-tasting chemical, but the evening was ruined and we retreated to the camper reeking of insect repellant.

The lady pulled the sheet over her head, and was soon breathing deeply. I, on the other hand, was swatting at the 10,000 shrilly whining mosquitoes that had found their way in.

When I started the truck at midnight, the lady awoke. I take it this means no morning coffee over a wood fire, she whined as I shoved the grill back into the camper and told her we were leaving.

That is correct I said kindly. If we were fishing or hunting or picking mushrooms or huckleberries tomorrow, Id tolerate the bugs. But not just so we can say we went camping. When we get back to my place, Ill park down by the creek in the meadow. You can stay there as long as you want. Build a fire if you so desire. If you need anything, Ill be in the house.

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