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How to find and buy cheap designer handbags Fashion Designer

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Goyard Handbags

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Shoulder bag which leaves each hands free of charge is now by far the most broadly utilised types in 2011. It is really normally helpful, usable, and light-weight, it may well be equally playful and chic. Varied variants for each flavor along with features make this bag a must-have for every lady. Shoulder handbag isn’t an innovation though recently it appeared on podiums throughout the entire world. Trend designers recollected that an accessory is often cozy and also a bag on the strap which could be worn through the shoulder is becoming top notch style. It leaves hands zero cost and this tends to create shoulder handbag appealing for operating ladies. Nevertheless quite often there’s also a trouble of introducing a handbag into your picture. Shoulder handbag is typical for nothing, casual model, nevertheless, you can actually wonder if this sort of handbag can be quite a element of classy picture, chic type. Designer collections 2011 showed all people that it could possibly.

Shoulder handbags can be utilized in Day picture For just about anyone that is a useful lady and take pleasure in comfort and ease about the primary put, then you certainly should certainly buy a casual shoulder handbag. Designer handbag of discreet structure is frequently simply coupled with jeans and trench. Just in case you select inventiveness in design, then you definitely can choose a bigger shoulder handbag as accessory for weekends. There are actually alslo Night variants of shoulder designer leather handbags. Clutch as an night handbag in the slightest degree occasions was an exceptionally attractive design. This minor handbag with out a deal with was produced to get effortlessly carried from the hand. This also explained a little dimensions that’s not regularly snug. In like designer handbag you might not set all fundamental things, but when a bag includes a strap, it would make your hands totally free. So shoulder girls handbag is generally very much greater. Choosing an night handbag try out to seek out a golden signify: the women handbag needs to be comfy but not as well sizeable. For anyone who chosen a quite huge shoulder designer handbag make an accent on style components: major earrings to not mention necklaces will search amazing with it. But the way to opt for a shoulder bag A shoulder bag that you simply are about to implement really need to correlate along with your type of lifestyle. Just in case you happen to be operating, usually hectic and bustling, then you certainly will really need to buy a comfy shoulder designer handbag of massive dimensions. You’ll find it safer to select a designer handbag using a smaller amount of decorating specifics. However if, in contrast, you aren’t so energetic, however you have a preference for to glimpse wonderful with the night, in that situation it truly is endorsed to decide on a product that is certainly both equally practical and chic. A black shoulder handbag may be appropriate in your case. In truth, shoulder designer leather handbags are prime trend now. Style designers give an awesome diversity of these handbags in these days, so everyone can opt for a little something for his or her type and flavor. With out doubt, it will be actually much better to get a quite a few shoulder handbags for diverse occasions and costumes. Currently being fundamental accessory handbag will constantly produce the picture, so pay out focus to its option. Remeber, designer leather handbags often emphasize the ideal model and flavor with the proprietors. For this reason a women handbag you eventually decide should not simply be comfy and beneficial, but additionally trendy and fashionable.

Shoulder Leahter Handbags – Wnderful For almost any Model Women's Leather Handbag On Sale

Hermes Handbag Popular Handbags For Gals Cheap Fashion Handbags Discount

Is Your Hermes Handbag Genuine or Not?Hermes handbags are famed in the style earth. They seem uncomplicated yet still exquisite. A Hermes handbag is amongst the favourite handbags for women. If you’re preparation to acquire a fresh Hermes handbag, you will need to spend focus to each and every detail. You will find too many fake Hermes handbags while in the industry nowadays. Even so, with some guides you’ll be able to distinguish an authentic Hermes handbag from a fake one. The followings are only for you for anyone who is gonna acquire a Hermes handbag.

An genuine Hermes handbag seems to be clearly from every single facet for instance the proportion. Fantastic proportion is definitely the most exceptional characteristic of a Hermes handbag. The manage is a further detail for you to spend attention to as a Hermes handbag and that is fully centered in tackle is often a true a person. If not, don’t take into account this handbag since it is a fake one. Go through extra content articles Charming handbags, replica handbags wholesale Wholesale Replica Handbags Retail outlet – Finerreplica.com Just about the most Favorite Trend Accessory: Replica Handbags Is buying replica handbags waste of cash?

The quality of a authentic Hermes handbag is unquestionably very good. You can actually test regardless of whether it’s in superior good quality or not by viewing the hardware of the handbag. It will be rather easy for persons to notify if a Hermes handbag is serious or not by checking the hardware.

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Hermes handbags are high-end handbag with the market. These kinds of a handbag will need to be stored perfectly. In advance of deciding which Hermes handbag to order, do recall to verify no matter whether it is an authentic or not like a authentic an individual is a good investment. However a fake Hermes handbag is nothing.

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Hermes Handbag Popular Handbags For Gals Cheap Fashion Handbags Discount

Hot, Vintage-y Momma Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Miranda Kerr was able to bring back her Victoria’s Secret body in no time at all. Looking at this picture, it’s hard to believe this woman carried a baby. I mean, look at that itty-bitty waistline! Her post-pregnancy body is just to die for.

Miranda went for vintage chic while shopping in West Hollywood. Aside from the sexy black pencil skirt, I am also loving her sophisticated arm candy. The Lanvin Happy Partage looks like Chanel Reissue’s younger, happier sister. It features a detachable chain strap, vintage gold hardware and the signature Lanvin bow. It can be yours for $2,290.

 

Hot, Vintage-y Momma Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Hot, Vintage-y Momma Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Miranda Kerr was able to bring back her Victoria’s Secret body in no time at all. Looking at this picture, it’s hard to believe this woman carried a baby. I mean, look at that itty-bitty waistline! Her post-pregnancy body is just to die for.

Miranda went for vintage chic while shopping in West Hollywood. Aside from the sexy black pencil skirt, I am also loving her sophisticated arm candy. The Lanvin Happy Partage looks like Chanel Reissue’s younger, happier sister. It features a detachable chain strap, vintage gold hardware and the signature Lanvin bow. It can be yours for $2,290.

 

Hot, Vintage-y Momma Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

UC Davis, Tektronix Tektronix and UC Davis form millimeter research center

MANHASSET, NY -- Agilent Technologies and the University of California, Davis, will establish the Davis Millimeter Wave Research Center to focus on millimeter wave and THz systems.

The technologies are to be used in radar, imaging systems, sensors, communications and integrated passive devices found in electromagnetic metamaterials and antennae.

The vertically integrated DMRC research will  involve devices, integrated circuits, packaging, metamaterials and defected ground integrated passives, imaging systems, THz vacuum electronics, THz micro-machined devices, nonlinear modeling, nanomaterials and wireless implantable devices.

These devices and systems are found in commercial products such as medical imaging systems, security scanners, gigabit wireless communications devices and sensors, as well as defense usages such as radar and active denial systems.

A center will serve as a core test facility for measurement capabilities provided, among others,   Agilent nonlinear vector network and spectrum analysis test equipment up to 325 GHz. These facilities will support gigabit wireless communications at 60 GHz and 80 GHz, as well as the imaging, radar and active denial systems to 325 GHz. 

“In launching the DMRC, our goal is to become a premier millimeter-wave research center nationally and internationally,” said Linda P.B. Katehi, chancellor of UC Davis, in a statement.

UC Davis is a 100-year learning center that has an annual research budget exceeding $678 million.
UC Davis, Tektronix Tektronix and UC Davis form millimeter research center

RIM launches five new BlackBerry smartphones

Sales representatives help customers on the first day the BlackBerry Torch hits the shelves in 2010. Canada's Research in Motion on Wednesday announced plans for five new BlackBerry smartphones, the largest global product launch in the company's history.

Canada's Research in Motion on Wednesday announced plans for five new BlackBerry smartphones, the largest global product launch in the company's history.

RIM, which has seen its stock price slump as it faces tough competition from Apple's iPhone and others, said it would introduce two new "BlackBerry Bold" models and three of its "BlackBerry Torch," all of which use the new BlackBerry 7 operating system.

"The launch of this family of handsets will be RIM’s largest global launch ever and more than 225 carriers and distribution partners have already commenced or completed over 500 certification programs for these five new handsets," the Waterloo, Ontario-based company said in a statement.

The BlackBerry Bold 9900 and 9930 are RIM's "thinnest smartphones ever," the company said, each with a large keyboard and touch display.

The new BlackBerry Torch 9810 combines a large touch display with a slide-out keyboard while the Torch 9850 and 9860 introduce an all-touch design "featuring the largest display on a BlackBerry smartphone to date."

"This is the largest global launch of BlackBerry smartphones in our history," said RIM president and co-chief executive Mike Lazaridis.

"The BlackBerry solution offers a best-in-class mobile communications experience that customers love and we think they will be thrilled by the faster performance, enhanced browsing and richer multimedia delivered by these powerful new BlackBerry Bold and BlackBerry Torch smartphones."

The new products seek to claw back market share from Apple, whose iPhone has now overtaken the BlackBerry in the US market, according to the research firm comScore, which says the BlackBerry is only the third most popular smartphone, also behind those using the Google Android operating system.

Last month, RIM announced it was cutting 2,000 jobs and that its ailing chief operating officer planned to retire.

The job cuts amount to just over 10 percent of the global workforce of the company.

RIM said the financial impact of the job cuts would be disclosed when the company announces its second quarter results on September 15.

(c) 2011 AFP

RIM launches five new BlackBerry smartphones

United Microelectronics Corp., UMC, Capacity, 28nm, 40nm, Fabs UMC predicts declines in revenues, fab use

SAN JOSE, Calif. – United Microelectronics Corp. reported flat sales and declining profits for its second quarter and forecasted revenue will fall 10-12 percent in the coming quarter. The company expects monthly declines over the next three months, but did not forecast the fourth quarter.

UMC expects capacity usage to decline to less than 75 percent amid global economic conditions that are depressing demand. In the second quarter fab utilization slipped to 87 percent from 90 percent in the prior quarter and 100 percent a year ago.

"European and U.S. debt and emerging market inflation have led to unfavorable business conditions leading customers to take a conservative outlook," said Shih-Wei Sun, chief executive of UMC. "We anticipate UMC's business performance may reflect these weak conditions into the third quarter," he added.

Sun also pointed to customers reducing inventory after overstocking in the aftermath of the Japan earthquake. Communications, including mobile chips, are especially impacted by the slowdown, he said.

UMC reported sales of NT$28.150 billion nearly flat with the prior quarter and below NT$29.745 billion a year ago. Profits slipped from $4.483 billion in the prior quarter down to NT$3.192.

The company shipped 1.145 million eight-inch equivalent wafers in its second quarter. That's up slightly from 1.120 million in the prior quarter but down from 1.156 a year ago.

The company maintains plans to spend US$1.8 billion in capital spending in 2011. The spending will support the ramp of its 40nm process that is expected to contribute to 10 percent or revenues in 2011.

UMC also expects to start making its first 28nm products in the fall. UMC will use a single process at 28nm process, converging separate low power and high performance processes at 40nm.

The company will develop an enhanced version of a 28nm process and is working with partners to assemble a suite of 28nm IP blocks. "90nm is our weak node now [because] many customers are jumping from 130nm to 65nm," said Sun.

United Microelectronics Corp., UMC, Capacity, 28nm, 40nm, Fabs UMC predicts declines in revenues, fab use

Gaterocket, FPGA, Tool, Vendor FPGA tool vendor GateRocket folds

SAN FRANCISCO—FPGA verification and debug software vendor GateRocket Inc. has apparently ceased operations.

EE Times blogger Brian Bailey reported earlier Wednesday (Aug. 3) that GateRocket shut its doors last month. Company representatives did not immediately respond to request for confirmation. GateRocket's website has been stripped of most information.

GateRocket was founded in 2004 to create and market tools for making FPGA design easier. The company marketed RocketDrive, developed to solve debugging problems with the traditional FPGA design process. The device is said to bridge the gap between the RTL/abstract-level software simulation domain and the physical FPGA.


Gaterocket, FPGA, Tool, Vendor FPGA tool vendor GateRocket folds

Six million years of savanna: Grasslands, wooded grasslands accompanied human evolution

ScienceDaily (Aug. 3, 2011) — University of Utah scientists used chemical isotopes in ancient soil to measure prehistoric tree cover -- in effect, shade -- and found that grassy, tree-dotted savannas prevailed at most East African sites where human ancestors and their ape relatives evolved during the past 6 million years.

"We've been able to quantify how much shade was available in the geological past," says geochemist Thure Cerling, senior author of a study of the new method in the journal Nature. "And it shows there have been open habitats for all of the last 6 million years in the environments in eastern Africa where some of the most significant early human fossils were found."

"Wherever we find human ancestors, we find evidence for open habitats similar to savannas -- much more open and savanna-like than forested," adds Cerling, a University of Utah distinguished professor of geology and geophysics, and biology.

Fossils of early humans and their ancestors and extinct relatives have been found in both wooded and open environments in East Africa. Even 4.3-million-year-old Ardipithecus -- which lived in the woods, according to its discoverers -- had a small component of tropical grasses in its diet, Cerling says.

"The fact it had some means it was going into the savanna, unless it was eating takeout food," he says.

Scientists have spent a century debating the significance of savanna landscape in human evolution, including the development of upright walking, increased brain size and tool use.

Part of the problem has been a fuzzy definition of "savanna," which has been used to describe "virtually everything between completely open grasslands and anything except a dense forest," Cerling says. He adds the most common definition is a fairly open, grassy environment with a lot of scattered trees -- a grassland or wooded grassland.

Open Landscapes throughout the Evolution of Humans and Their Relatives

In the new study, Cerling says he and colleagues developed "a new way to quantify the openness of tropical landscapes. This is the first method to actually quantify the amount of canopy cover, which is the basis for deciding if something is savanna."

Cerling does not dispute that East African savannas became more expansive within the past 2 million years, or that human ancestors and relatives likely spent time in narrow "gallery forests" along river corridors.

But he says the new method shows grasslands and wooded grasslands -- in other words, savannas -- have prevailed for more than 6 million years in the cradle of humanity, with tree cover less than about 40 percent at most sites. By definition, woodland has more than 40 percent tree cover, and a forest has more than 80 percent tree cover.

"In some periods, it was more bushy, and other times it was less bushy," he says. "Hardly anything could have been called a dense forest, but we can show some periods where certain environments were consistently more wooded than others. We find hominins (early humans, pre-humans and chimp and gorilla relatives) in both places. How early hominins partitioned their time between 'more open' and 'more closed' habitats is still an open question."

Cerling says even sparse woody canopy provided hominins with shade, some foods and refuge from predators.

Fossil evidence of hominins -- humans, their ancestors and early relatives such as chimps and gorillas -- date back to 4.3 million years and possibly 6 million years, Cerling says. The new method was used to look for and find savanna up to 7.4 million years ago.

"Currently, many scientists think that before 2 million years ago, things were forested [in East Africa] and savanna conditions have been present only for the past 2 million years," Cerling says. "This study shows that during the development of bipedalism [about 4 million years ago] open conditions were present," even predominant.

Cerling conducted the study with biologists Samuel Andanje and David Kimutai Korir of the Kenya Wildlife Service; geologist Michael Bird of James Cook University, Cairns, Australia; University of Utah graduate students William Mace of geology, Anthony Macharia of geography and Christopher Remien of mathematics; and former Utah geology graduate students Jonathan Wynn of the University of South Florida, Naomi Levin of Johns Hopkins University and Jay Quade of the University of Arizona.

The National Science Foundation and the Leakey Foundation funded the study.

Deducing Prehistoric Tree Cover from Soil Isotopes

The new method was developed by correlating carbon isotope ratios in 3,000 modern soil samples with satellite photos of tree and vegetation cover at 75 tropical sites worldwide -- half in Africa -- representing everything from closed forest to open grassland. That allowed scientists to determine the percent of tree and woody shrub cover millions of years ago based on carbon isotope ratios in fossil soils known as paleosols.

"This study is based on the geological axiom that the present is the key to the past," says Cerling. "We assume soils in the past had similar relationships to vegetation as what we observe today."

The researchers collected soil samples at Kenyan and Ethiopian sites and used published data on soil samples collected by others during the past decade at the other sites throughout the tropics. Modern soil samples came from national parks and reserves and non-agricultural areas so that carbon isotope rations reflected natural vegetation.

The ratio of rare carbon-13 to common carbon-12 in decayed plant material in soils reveals the extent to which the landscape was covered by plants that use what is known as the C3 pathway of photosynthesis versus plants that use C4 photosynthesis.

Trees, shrubs, herbs, forbs and cool-season grasses are C3 plants, which include beans and most vegetables. C4 plants are warm-season or tropical grasses that dominate savannas, and plants called sedges. C4 plants have a higher ratio of carbon-13 than C3 plants.

The isotope composition of fossil soil gives a measure of the total makeup of the ecosystem in terms of how much canopy versus how much open landscape, Cerling says. So in a forest, even soil from open gaps shows the C3 signature because of non-woody C3 plants growing there, while on a savanna, soil from under a C3 tree will show the C4 signature because of grasses growing under the tree.

The Findings: A History of Savanna

Cerling and colleagues used the new method to analyze fossil soils and infer plant cover back to 7.4 million years ago, a period that includes when human ancestors and apes split from a common ancestor.

Their analysis of 1,300 fossil soil samples from sites at or near where human ancestors and their relatives evolved shows that more than 70 percent of the sites had less than 40 percent woody cover, meaning they were wooded grasslands or grasslands. Less than 1 percent of the samples reflected sites where tree cover exceeded 70 percent.

"Therefore, 'closed' forests (more than 80 percent woody cover) represent a very small fraction of the environments represented by these paleosols," the researchers write.

"We conclude there have been open savannas all the time for which we have hominin fossils in the environments where the fossils were found during the past 4.3 million years" -- the oldest fossils now accepted as human ancestors, Cerling says.

The researchers also created vegetation chronologies of the Awash Valley of Ethiopia and the Omo-Turkana Basin of Ethiopia and Kenya -- home to many fossils of human ancestors, including Ardipithecus, Australopithecus, Paranthropus and our own genus, Homo.

They found that during the past 7.4 million years, woody cover ranged from 75 percent (closed woodlands) down to 5 percent or less (open grasslands), but significant areas with woody cover below 40 percent (savanna woodlands to savanna grasslands) were consistently present.

Six million years of savanna: Grasslands, wooded grasslands accompanied human evolution

What steers vampire bats to blood: Heat-detecting molecules on noses discovered

ScienceDaily (Aug. 3, 2011) — Scientists have known for years that when vampire bats tear through an animal's skin with their razor-sharp teeth, their noses guide them to the best spots -- where a precise bite will strike a vein and spill forth nourishing blood. But nobody knew exactly how bats knew where to bite.

By investigating wild vampire bats in South America, researchers at the University of California, San Francisco and Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Científicas in Caracas, Venezuela have discovered their secret: a sensitive, heat-detecting molecule covering nerve endings on their noses called TRPV1. A number of pharmaceutical and biotech companies are working on developing new pain medications that target molecules like TRPV1.

"Vampire bats feed on blood, and it's useful for them to have an infrared detector to be able to find the circulation," said David Julius, PhD, the Morris Herzstein Chair in Molecular Biology & Medicine at UCSF, who led the research.

Similar TRPV1 molecules can be found on pain sensing nerve fibers in human tongue, skin or eyes. They allow people to detect the chemical capsaicin in chili peppers and experience the burning tinge of spicy food.

Described in the journal Nature, the discovery highlights how small changes to genes in the genome of a species can contribute to major evolutionary adaptations over time -- in this case, allowing the vampire bat to detect infrared heat from their prey, helping them efficiently find and feed on blood.

The work also adds a piece to a larger puzzle related to human health and drug design because these same molecules are involved in pain sensation, such as that associated with touching a hot object, or hypersensitivity to heat after injury and inflammation -- as occurs with sunburn.

"There is a double-edged sword with pain," Julius said. "Pain is necessary as a warning system to let us know when we are in danger of injury but, at the same time, pain can outlive its usefulness as a warning system when it fails to resolve and becomes chronic and debilitating."

Sensory Nerves -- How the Brain Experiences the World

The human brain does not connect directly with the world but instead floats secluded in a protective bubble of cerebrospinal fluid within the skull. All the information the brain receives about Earthly sights, smells, textures, and tastes comes through long nerve fibers that make up the body's sensory system, which connect the brain with our eyes, noses, fingers and tongues.

At the ends of these nerve fibers, cues that give life to our perception of the world are collected. Tiny molecular channels covering these nerve endings can alternatively open or close if they perceive the proper stimulus from a chemical, heat, cold or the pressure of touch. When they do, and when the right balance of openings and closings occurs all over a nerve ending, that nerve will fire, sending a signal to the brain that says "hot" or "cold" or "hard" or "bitter" or "pretty"? (something for taste and sight) depending on the type of stimulus.

This basic physiology informs our awareness and also warns our brains about noxious dangers of the world. Painful stimuli signal danger to the brain and cause us to wince, squint, gasp or otherwise pull away to protect ourselves.

"There is a lot of stuff in our environment that we want to stay away from," Julius said.

TRPV1, one of these sensory system channels, does belong to a large family of similar molecules common to many types of animals but they differ slightly from animal to animal -- both in terms of their DNA and in terms of where they appear in the body.

Subtle changes to these molecules contribute to highly specialized physiologies for sensing the world. Many animals have highly specialized adaptations allowing them to see, feel, hear or taste in special ways. The heat-sensing molecules within vampire bat noses is one example.

Vampire Bats Run like Horses and Feed on Cows

In appearance, the furry, bean-shaped bat with its rodent-like face resembles a rat with wings, but bats are actually more closely related in evolution to dogs and horses. In fact, vampire bats in the wild will gallop and leap across the ground much in the same way that horses do.

In South American where they are common, vampire bats approach their prey on the ground, galloping quickly and quietly as they sneak up on, bite, and drink the blood from sleeping cows, goats and birds.

Vampire bats are the only known mammal that survives solely on blood, and they need to drink it pretty much every day to survive. They support this need through a number of evolutionary adaptations.

Like other bats, they feed only at night, and they have excellent eyesight enhanced by acute hearing and an ability to emit high-pitched sounds that help them navigate. Their teeth lack enamel, which keeps them constantly razor sharp and allows them to delicately tear through the hide of a sleeping animal without waking it. Grooves in their tongue draw up the blood seeping through the open wound through capillary action, and they have anticoagulation chemicals inside their saliva to keep it flowing.

Within minutes of sinking its teeth in an animal's flesh, an adult vampire bat can drink half its body weight in blood. But first they must find a vein, helped by it's a major adaptations: heat-sensing ability, which allows them to "see" a vein at night.

Researchers have known for years that pits on vampire bats' noses allow them to detect blood vessels because they radiate heat. But no one knew exactly how this occurred.

Working with three researchers in South America, Julius' postdoctoral fellows Elena Gracheva, PhD and Julio Cordero-Morales, PhD, together with UCSF colleagues Nicholas Ingolia, PhD and Jonathan Weissman, PhD, sequenced genes from samples of nose tissue from wild vampire bats in Venezuela, determining that TRPV1 is the molecule responsible for their ability to detect heat.

They also determined that it was not just TRPV1 but an evolutionary genetic variation of it that allows vampire bats to detect low temperature heat. Through a mechanism known as "alternative splicing" a special form of the molecule emerged in the noses of the bats, becoming a sensitive detector for finding the hottest spots.

This work was supported by funding from the National Institutes of Health and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Additional support was provided by a Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award and a Pathway to Independence Fellowship from the UCSF Cardiovascular Research Institute. David Julius is on the advisory board of Hydra Biosciences, Inc., which is investigating potential drugs that target molecules like TRPV1.

What steers vampire bats to blood: Heat-detecting molecules on noses discovered

'Big splat' may explain the moon's mountainous far side

The striking differences between the near and far sides of the moon have been a longstanding puzzle. The near side is relatively low and flat, while the topography of the far side is high and mountainous, with a much thicker crust. The new study, published in the August 4 issue of Nature, builds on the "giant impact" model for the origin of the moon, in which a Mars-sized object collided with Earth early in the history of the solar system and ejected debris that coalesced to form the moon. The study suggests that this giant impact also created another, smaller body, initially sharing an orbit with the moon, that eventually fell back onto the moon and coated one side with an extra layer of solid crust tens of kilometers thick.

"Our model works well with models of the moon-forming giant impact, which predict there should be massive debris left in orbit about the Earth, besides the moon itself. It agrees with what is known about the dynamical stability of such a system, the timing of the cooling of the moon, and the ages of lunar rocks," said Erik Asphaug, professor of Earth and planetary sciences at UC Santa Cruz.

Asphaug, who coauthored the paper with UCSC postdoctoral researcher Martin Jutzi, has previously done computer simulations of the moon-forming giant impact. He said companion moons are a common outcome of such simulations.

In the new study, he and Jutzi used computer simulations of an impact between the moon and a smaller companion (about one-thirtieth the mass of the moon) to study the dynamics of the collision and track the evolution and distribution of lunar material in its aftermath. In such a low-velocity collision, the impact does not form a crater and does not cause much melting. Instead, most of the colliding material is piled onto the impacted hemisphere as a thick new layer of solid crust, forming a mountainous region comparable in extent to the lunar farside highlands.

"Of course, impact modelers try to explain everything with collisions. In this case, it requires an odd collision: being slow, it does not form a crater, but splats material onto one side," Asphaug said. "It is something new to think about."

He and Jutzi hypothesize that the companion moon was initially trapped at one of the gravitationally stable "Trojan points" sharing the moon's orbit, and became destabilized after the moon's orbit had expanded far from Earth. "The collision could have happened anywhere on the moon," Jutzi said. "The final body is lopsided and would reorient so that one side faces Earth."

The model may also explain variations in the composition of the moon's crust, which is dominated on the near side by terrain comparatively rich in potassium, rare-earth elements, and phosphorus (KREEP). These elements, as well as thorium and uranium, are believed to have been concentrated in the magma ocean that remained as molten rock solidified under the moon's thickening crust. In the simulations, the collision squishes this KREEP-rich layer onto the opposite hemisphere, setting the stage for the geology now seen on the near side of the moon.

Other models have been proposed to explain the formation of the highlands, including one published last year in Science by Jutzi and Asphaug's colleagues at UC Santa Cruz, Ian Garrick-Bethell and Francis Nimmo. Their analysis suggested that tidal forces, rather than an impact, were responsible for shaping the thickness of the moon's crust.

"The fact that the near side of the moon looks so different to the far side has been a puzzle since the dawn of the space age, perhaps second only to the origin of the moon itself," said Nimmo, a professor of Earth and planetary sciences. "One of the elegant aspects of Erik's article is that it links these two puzzles together: perhaps the giant collision that formed the moon also spalled off some smaller bodies, one of which later fell back to the Moon to cause the dichotomy that we see today."

For now, he said, there is not enough data to say which of the alternative models offers the best explanation for the lunar dichotomy. "As further spacecraft data (and, hopefully, lunar samples) are obtained, which of these two hypotheses is more nearly correct will become clear," Nimmo said.

The new study was supported by NASA's Planetary Geology and Geophysics Program. Simulations were run on the NSF-sponsored UC Santa Cruz astrophysics supercomputer pleiades.

'Big splat' may explain the moon's mountainous far side

Slowing climate change by targeting gases other than carbon dioxide

Discussions with colleagues around the time of the 2009 United Nations' climate conference in Copenhagen inspired three NOAA scientists -- Stephen Montzka, Ed Dlugokencky and James Butler of NOAA's Earth System Research Laboratory in Boulder, Colo. -- to review the sources of non-carbon dioxide (CO₂) greenhouse gases and explore the potential climate benefits of cutting their emissions.

Like CO₂, other greenhouse gases trap heat in Earth's atmosphere. Some of these chemicals have shorter lifetimes than CO₂ in the atmosphere. Therefore cutting emissions would quickly reduce their direct radiative forcing -- a measure of warming influence.

"We know that recent climate change is primarily driven by carbon dioxide emitted during fossil-fuel combustion, and we know that this problem is going to be with us a long-time because carbon dioxide is so persistent in the atmosphere," Montzka said. "But lowering emissions of greenhouse gases other than carbon dioxide could lead to some rapid changes for the better."

Scientists know that stabilizing the warming effect of CO₂ in the atmosphere would require a decrease of about 80 percent in human-caused CO₂ emissions -- in part because some of the carbon dioxide emitted today will remain in the atmosphere for thousands of years. In contrast, cutting all long-lived non-CO₂ greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent could diminish their climate warming effect substantially within a couple of decades. Cutting both CO₂ and non-CO₂ greenhouse gas emissions to this extent could result in a decrease in the total warming effect from these greenhouse gases this century, the new paper shows.

For the new analysis, the researchers considered methane; nitrous oxide; a group of chemicals regulated by an international treaty to protect Earth's ozone layer; and a few other extremely long-lived greenhouse gases currently present at very low concentrations.

The new review paper describes the major human activities responsible for these emissions, and notes that steep cuts (such as 80 percent) would be difficult. Without substantial changes to human behavior, emissions of the non-CO₂ greenhouse gases are expected to continue to increase.

The climate-related benefits of reductions in non-CO₂ greenhouse gases have limits, Montzka and his colleagues showed. Even if all human-related, non-CO₂ greenhouse gas emissions could be eliminated today, it would not be enough to stabilize the warming influence from all greenhouse gases over the next 40 years -- unless CO₂ emissions were also cut significantly.

The scientists also noted in the paper the complicated connections between climate and greenhouse gases, some of which are not yet fully understood. The non-CO₂ gases studied have natural sources as well as human emissions, and climate change could amplify or dampen some of those natural processes, Dlugokencky said. Increasingly warm and dry conditions in the Arctic, for example, could thaw permafrost and increase the frequency of wildfires, both of which would send more methane and carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

"The long-term necessity of cutting carbon dioxide emissions shouldn't diminish the effectiveness of short-term action. This paper shows there are other opportunities to influence the trajectory of climate change," Butler said. "Managing emissions of non-carbon dioxide gases is clearly an opportunity to make additional contributions."

Slowing climate change by targeting gases other than carbon dioxide

Smartphone test platform in reduced footprint

A test system that claims to revolutionize the waymulti-radio devices such as smartphones and USB dongles are designed, tested,and verified has been developed by OctoScope.

The octoBox provides accurate over-the-air (OTA) testing ofconventional and MIMO wireless devices in a customizable refrigerator sizedanechoic (non-echoing) enclosure.

An OTA test setup has to couple a 3-dimensionalelectromagnetic energy field into the test instrumentation, which isconsiderably more challenging to do in a controlled and repeatable manner.

A single unit enables simultaneous parallel testing of eightor more fully assembled smartphones through their antennas.

It also enables seamless RF technology validation duringdevelopment cycles and production and provides stable far-field conditions withadvantages for OTA measurement accuracy, sensitivity, and repeatability. Itsdual-chamber architecture, allows test instrumentation and the DUT to reside inthe same enclosure, as a complete self-contained test station isolated from theinterference of neighboring stations.

In addition to measuring a DUT's 3D antenna pattern, octoBoxcan integrate test equipment, including a MIMO channel emulator, interferencegenerators, RF sensors, data monitors, and other instruments.

It supports a frequency range from 700 MHz to 6 GHz and canbe used for testing multi-radio smartphones, with radios that include cellular,3G/4G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPS, all operating in different regions of thespectrum.

The top chamber typically houses test equipment or a partnerdevice transmitting to and receiving from the DUT. The DUT chamber houses theDUT and the test antennas and features:

- Far-field coupling between the DUT antennas and the testantennas

-  Uniform antennafield between the DUT antennas and the test antennas

Optimizing the octoBox for the antenna patterns of each DUTis a natural extension of octoScope's RF and wireless consulting services. Inaddition to measuring and accommodating the DUT's 3D antenna pattern, octoScopecan integrate test equipment, including multipath fading channel emulation,interference generators, RF sensors, data monitors and other instrumentation.

The octoBox is available from $29,800.

This story was originally posted by EE Times.

Smartphone test platform in reduced footprint

Intel Capital, Intel, Bloomberg, Chinese Intel invests $22M in three Chinese firms

SAN FRANCISCO—Intel Corp. said Wednesday (Aug. 3) it invested about $22 million in three Chinese high-tech companies through its venture capital arm, according to multiple reports stemming from a press event in Beijing.  

Intel said its latest Intel Capital investments were made in 6DXchange Inc., an online retailer; Beijing JoySee Technology Co., a TV maker; and Bocom Intelligent Network Technologies Co., a digital surveillance company. As is typical, Intel did not break out how much it invested in each firm.

According to a report by the Bloomberg news service, Intel Capital has now invested a total of $45 million in six Chinese companies so far in 2011. In a separate report, Bloomberg reported that Intel Capital President Arvind Sodhani said the company hopes to invest in a total of 12 Chinese companies in 2011.

In a third report, Bloomberg reported that Sodhani said Intel Capital intends to invest a total of $500 million this year globally, up from $327 million in 2010.

Intel Capital, Intel, Bloomberg, Chinese Intel invests $22M in three Chinese firms

LEDs Philips L-Prize DOE $10M L Prize goes to Philips for 60W replacement LED bulb

Philips Lighting North America has won the first award under the Department of Energy’s L-Prize competition. Philips submitted its entry in 2009 and the DOE has been field testing the bulbs for the past 18 months. The bulbs had to meet or exceed these requirements: greater than 900lm at 10W or less for an efficacy of greater than 90W/lm at a color-corrected temperature (CCT) of 2700-3000K and a color rendering index (CRI) of at least 90. The Philips bulb exceeded all these requirements during the 18 month trial.

In the announcement of the award, no mention was made of pricing; However, the original requirements called for a target retail price of $22 for the first year it was offered for sale, $15 for the second year, and $8 in the third year. Philips has said it plans to offer the bulb for retail sale as soon as early 2012.

Philips will receive a $10 million cash prize as well as L Prize partner promotions and incentives. To date, 31 utilities and energy efficiency program partners stand ready to promote and develop markets for the winning product. Up to two additional entrants in this category may be eligible for program partner promotions – in effect increasing the number of possible qualifying products to three.

 

The bulb uses a clever remote phosphor system to gain a spherical distribution of light, unlike earlier sno-cone LED bulbs. For a tear-down of a similar Philips bulb, visit:
Remote Phosphors: Philips LED bulb, Tear-down.

LEDs Philips L-Prize DOE $10M L Prize goes to Philips for 60W replacement LED bulb

Renesas, Naka, Earthquake, Fab Image gallery: Recovering Renesas' Naka fab

The Great Tohoku/Kanto earthquake on March 11 was the most horrendous earthquake to ever hit Renesas Electronics. The degree of damage done to the Naka fab of the Japan’s microcontroller giant was virtually unknown. There had been no visuals until now. It was even harder to assess how Renesas’ employees picked up the pieces, rebuilt the fab and resumed operation. 

Mystery lingered because no outsider ever got to see photos of those who actually worked at Renesa as they devoted themselves to the recovery of their company.  Their tireless efforts—involving 2,500 people a day at its peak, according to Renesas, all working shifts around the clock, running a thousand different tasks in parallel—have made it possible for them to bring the Naka fab back online—by early June, three months earlier than anyone had expected.

See the following photos, and meet the Renesas guys in Japan who were responsible for this tremendous effort. And watch the video, which tells us a story that rebuilding Renesas, after the quake, literally took the whole industry – including employees, customers, suppliers, contractors and even competitors.


Renesas, Naka, Earthquake, Fab Image gallery: Recovering Renesas' Naka fab

Intel, ISTC, Carnegie Mellon, Research Intel tips more university research centers

SAN FRANCISCO—Intel Corp. Wednesday (Aug. 3) announced that it would open two more Intel Science and Technology Centers (ISTC), both to be headquartered at Carnie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.

Intel (Santa Clara, Calif.) said the two newest ISTCs would focus on cloud computing research and embedded computing, respectively. Intel said the company would invest $30 million in the new ISTCs.

Intel's ISTCs—part of a commitment by the world's biggest chip maker to pump $100 million into U.S. university research over the next five years—aim to increase university research and accelerate innovation in a handful of key areas. The company previously announced an ISTC focused on secure computing at the University of California- Berkeley and another focused on visual computing at Stanford University.

"These new ISTCs are expected to open amazing possibilities," said Justin Rattner, Intel's chief technology officer, in a statement. "Imagine, for example, future cars equipped with embedded sensors and microprocessors to constantly collect and analyze traffic and weather data. That information could be shared and analyzed in the cloud so that drivers could be provided with suggestions for quicker and safer routes."

The cloud computing ISTC broadens combines top researchers from Intel, Carnegie Mellon, Georgia Institute of Technology, UC-Berkeley, Princeton University, the company said. The researchers will explore technology that will have has important future implications for the cloud, including built-in application optimization, more efficient and effective support of big data analytics on massive amounts of online data, and making the cloud more distributed and localized by extending cloud capabilities to the network edge and even to client devices, Intel said.

The ISTC for embedded computing taps into the expertise of leading researchers from Intel, Carnegie Mellon University, Cornell University, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, University of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania State University, Georgia Institute of Technology and UC Berkeley, Intel said. The aim of the ISTC is to form a new collaborative community to drive research to transform experiences in the home, car and retail environment of the future, Intel said.

Also Wednesday, Intel said it expanded the ISTC program by openly inviting researchers from across the U.S. academic community to submit information to be considered in the process to define additional ISTCs.

Intel, ISTC, Carnegie Mellon, Research Intel tips more university research centers

Breeding crops with deeper roots could 'slash CO2 levels'

ScienceDaily (Aug. 3, 2011) — Breeding crops with roots a metre deeper in the ground could lower atmospheric CO₂ levels dramatically, with significant environmental benefits, according to research by a leading University of Manchester scientist.

Writing in the Annals of Botany, Professor Douglas Kell argues that developing crops that produce roots more deeply in the ground could harvest more carbon from the air, and make crops more drought resistant, while dramatically reducing carbon levels.

In principle, any crops could be treated in this way, giving more productive yields while also being better for the environment.

Although the amount of carbon presently sequestered in the soil in the natural environment and using existing crops and grasses has been known for some time, Professor Kell's new analysis is the first to reveal the benefits to the environment that might come from breeding novel crops with root traits designed to enhance carbon sequestration.

Professor Kell, Professor of Bioanalytical Science at the University as well as Chief Executive of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), has also devised a carbon calculator that can show the potential benefits of crops that burrow more deeply in the ground.

With this, he has calculated that -- depending on the time it takes them to break down -breeding crops that could cover present cropland areas but that had roots a metre deeper in the soil could double the amount of carbon captured from the environment. This could be a significant weapon in the fight against climate change.

The soil represents a reservoir that contains at least twice as much carbon as does the atmosphere, yet mainly just the above-ground plant biomass is harvested in agriculture, and plant photosynthesis represents the effective origin of the overwhelming bulk of soil carbon.

Breeding crop plants with deeper and bushy root ecosystems could simultaneously improve both the soil structure and its steady-state carbon, water and nutrient retention, as well as sustainable plant yields.

Professor Kell argues that widespread changes in agricultural practice are needed, in an environment in which edible crop yields also need to increase substantially and sustainably, and where transport fuels and organic chemicals will need to come from modern (rather than fossil) photosynthesis.

It is known that massive CO₂ reductions in the atmosphere over geological time have happened because of the rise of deep-rooted trees and flowering plants.

Most cultivated agricultural crops have root depths that do not extend much beyond one metre. Doubling this, Professor Kell argues, would dramatically reduce CO₂ levels.

Existing studies, which have doubted the benefits of deep roots in carbon sequestration, do not make soil measurements much below a metre, and the kinds of root depths proposed by Professor Kell would more than double that.

He said: "This doubling of root biomass from a nominal 1m to a nominal 2m is really the key issue, together with the longevity of the roots and carbon they secrete and sequester below-ground.

"What matters is not so much what is happening now as what might be achieved with suitable breeding of plants with deep and reasonably long-lived roots. Many such plants exist, but have not been bred for agriculture.

"In addition to the simple carbon sequestration that this breeding could imply -- possibly double that of common annual grain crops -- such plants seem to mobilise and retain nutrients and water very effectively over extended periods, thus providing resistance to drought, flooding and other challenges we shall face from climate change.

"While there is a way to go before such crops might have, for example, the grain yields of present day cereals, their breeding and deployment seems a very promising avenue for sustainable agriculture."

The carbon sequestration calculator is at http://dbkgroup.org/carbonsequestration/rootsystem.html

Breeding crops with deeper roots could 'slash CO₂ levels'

Lifestyles of the old and healthy defy expectations

Their findings, published August 3 in the online edition of Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, suggests that "nature" (in the form of protective longevity genes) may be more important than "nurture" (lifestyle behaviors) when it comes to living an exceptionally long life. Nir Barzilai, M.D., the Ingeborg and Ira Leon Rennert Chair of Aging Research and director of the Institute for Aging Research at Einstein, was the senior author of the study.

Dr. Barzilai and his Einstein colleagues interviewed 477 Ashkenazi Jews who were living independently and were 95 and older (95-112, 75 percent of them women). They were enrolled in Einstein's Longevity Genes Project, an ongoing study that seeks to understand why centenarians live as long as they do. (Descended from a small founder group, Ashkenazi Jews are more genetically uniform than other populations, making it easier to spot gene differences that are present.)

The elderly participants were asked about their lifestyles at age 70, considered representative of the lifestyle they'd followed for most of their adult lives. They answered questions about their weight and height so that their body mass index (BMI) could be calculated. They also provided information about their alcohol consumption, smoking habits, physical activity, and whether they ate a low-calorie, low-fat or low-salt diet.

To compare these long-lived individuals with the general population, the researchers used data from 3,164 people who had been born around the same time as the centenarians and were examined between 1971 and 1975 while participating in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES I).

Overall, people with exceptional longevity did not have healthier habits than the comparison group in terms of BMI, smoking, physical activity, or diet. For example, 27 percent of the elderly women and an equal percentage of women in the general population attempted to eat a low-calorie diet. Among long-living men, 24 percent consumed alcohol daily, compared with 22 percent of the general population. And only 43 percent of male centenarians reported engaging in regular exercise of moderate intensity, compared with 57 percent of men in the comparison group.

"In previous studies of our centenarians, we've identified gene variants that exert particular physiology effects, such as causing significantly elevated levels of HDL or 'good' cholesterol," said Dr. Barzilai, who is also professor of medicine and of genetics at Einstein. "This study suggests that centenarians may possess additional longevity genes that help to buffer them against the harmful effects of an unhealthy lifestyle."

The research did find, however, that overweight centenarians tended to have lower rates of obesity than the control group. Although male and female centenarians were just as likely to be overweight as their counterparts in the general population, the centenarians were significantly less likely to become obese: only 4.5 percent of male centenarians were obese vs. 12.1 percent of controls; and for women, 9.6 percent of centenarians were obese versus 16.2 percent of controls. Both of these differences are statistically significant.

While longevity genes may protect centenarians from bad habits, healthy lifestyle choices remain critical for the vast majority of the population. The U.S. Census Bureau estimates there were nearly 425,000 people aged 95 and older living in the U.S. in 2010 − a fraction (.01) of the 40 million U.S. adults 65 and over.

"Although this study demonstrates that centenarians can be obese, smoke and avoid exercise, those lifestyle habits are not good choices for most of us who do not have a family history of longevity," said Dr. Barzilai. "We should watch our weight, avoid smoking and be sure to exercise, since these activities have been shown to have great health benefits for the general population, including a longer lifespan."

Researchers also asked study participants why they believed they had lived so long. Most did not attribute their advanced age to lifestyle factors. One-third reported a history of family longevity, while 20 percent believed that physical activity also played a role in their lifespan. Other factors included positive attitude (19 percent), busy or active life (12 percent), less smoking and drinking (15 percent), good luck (8 percent), and religion or spirituality (6 percent).

Lifestyles of the old and healthy defy expectations

Ninety-six star clusters discovered hidden behind dust of Milky Way

ScienceDaily (Aug. 3, 2011) — This result comes just one year after the start of the VISTA Variables in the Via Lactea programme (VVV)*, one of the six public surveys on the new telescope. The results will appear in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

"This discovery highlights the potential of VISTA and the VVV survey for finding star clusters, especially those hiding in dusty star-forming regions in the Milky Way's disc. VVV goes much deeper than other surveys," says Jura Borissova, lead author of the study.

The majority of stars with more than half of the mass of our Sun form in groups, called open clusters. These clusters are the building blocks of galaxies and vital for the formation and evolution of galaxies such as our own. However, stellar clusters form in very dusty regions that diffuse and absorb most of the visible light that the young stars emit, making them invisible to most sky surveys, but not to the 4.1-m infrared VISTA telescope.

"In order to trace the youngest star cluster formation we concentrated our search towards known star-forming areas. In regions that looked empty in previous visible-light surveys, the sensitive VISTA infrared detectors uncovered many new objects," adds Dante Minniti, lead scientist of the VVV survey.

By using carefully tuned computer software, the team was able to remove the foreground stars appearing in front of each cluster in order to count the genuine cluster members. Afterwards, they made visual inspections of the images to measure the cluster sizes, and for the more populous clusters they made other measurements such as distance, age, and the amount of reddening of their starlight caused by interstellar dust between them and us.

"We found that most of the clusters are very small and only have about 10-20 stars. Compared to typical open clusters, these are very faint and compact objects -- the dust in front of these clusters makes them appear 10 000 to 100 million times fainter in visible light. It's no wonder they were hidden," explains Radostin Kurtev, another member of the team.

Since antiquity only 2500 open clusters have been found in the Milky Way, but astronomers estimate there might be as many as 30 000 still hiding behind the dust and gas. While bright and large open clusters are easily spotted, this is the first time that so many faint and small clusters have been found at once.

Furthermore, these new 96 open clusters could be only the tip of the iceberg. "We've just started to use more sophisticated automatic software to search for less concentrated and older clusters. I am confident that many more are coming soon," adds Borissova.

*Since 2010, the VISTA Variables in the Via Lactea programme (VVV) has been scanning the central parts of the Milky Way and the southern plane of the galactic disc in infrared light. This program was granted a total of 1929 hours of observing time over a five year period. Via Lactea is the Latin name for the Milky Way.

Ninety-six star clusters discovered hidden behind dust of Milky Way

Applications Processors, Mobile Processors, Quad Core, Snapdragon, Qualcomm, Mobile, Nvidia, Tegra, Omap Qualcomm renames SoCs, quad-core on track

SAN JOSE, Calif. – Qualcomm rebranded its Snapdragon processors and indicated some of its 28nm chips are now sampling. The company now places its integrated applications processors with names like the MSM7225 into four broad buckets, organized by performance and feature sets.

The Snapdragon S1 chips are made in a 65nm process, deliver up to 1 GHz data rates and use up to a 200 MHz Adreno graphics core. They include some low-end apps processors not previously classified as Snapdragon chips but capable of running a smartphone operating system.

The S2 chips are made in a 45nm process, run at up to 1.4 GHz and support 1024x768 displays at up to 720-progressive resolution including support for stereoscopic 3-D. The S3 chips are also made in 45nm technology, run at up to 1.5 GHz, offer dual-core options and support up to 1,440 x 900 resolution displays.

Several members of the S1, S2 and S3 families are already shipping in commercial products. For example the HP TouchPad tablet and HTC Evo 3D smartphone use S3-class processors.

Qualcomm's next-generation processors, now called the S4, will be made in 28nm technology, run at up to 2.5 GHz, and support dual and quad-core options. They will also use a next-generation Adreno graphics core and support 3G and LTE networks.

The company is now sampling single-core S4 chips and aims to sample quad-core versions early next year. They include the MSM8930 for mainstream smartphones, the dual-core MSM8960 for high-end smartphones and tablets and the quad-core APQ8064 for high-end consumer devices.

Qualcomm first announced the 28nm chips at the Mobile World Congress in February. At the same event, rival Nvdia showed working versions of its quad-core Kal-El chips running in a tablet. Texas Instruments aims to leapfrog both competitors with its Omap 5 based on the new ARM Cortex A15 core described in July.

The rebranding exercise aims to simplify the Qualcomm road map that "tends to be a bit confusing—it's really hard to identify the latest and greatest chips," said Michelle Leyden Li, senior director of marketing at Qualcomm.

The company has 125 announced design wins for its Snapdragon chips and 250 more in the works, she said. Twenty companies are designing tablets with Snapdragon, she added.

The graphic below lays out the details of the new S-brand approach.

Applications Processors, Mobile Processors, Quad Core, Snapdragon, Qualcomm, Mobile, Nvidia, Tegra, Omap Qualcomm renames SoCs, quad-core on track

Is our universe inside a bubble? First observational test of the 'multiverse'

ScienceDaily (Aug. 3, 2011) — The theory that our universe is contained inside a bubble, and that multiple alternative universes exist inside their own bubbles -- making up the 'multiverse' -- is, for the first time, being tested by physicists.

Two research papers published in Physical Review Letters and Physical Review D are the first to detail how to search for signatures of other universes. Physicists are now searching for disk-like patterns in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation -- relic heat radiation left over from the Big Bang -- which could provide tell-tale evidence of collisions between other universes and our own.

Many modern theories of fundamental physics predict that our universe is contained inside a bubble. In addition to our bubble, this `multiverse' will contain others, each of which can be thought of as containing a universe. In the other 'pocket universes' the fundamental constants, and even the basic laws of nature, might be different.

Until now, nobody had been able to find a way to efficiently search for signs of bubble universe collisions -- and therefore proof of the multiverse -- in the CMB radiation, as the disc-like patterns in the radiation could be located anywhere in the sky. Additionally, physicists needed to be able to test whether any patterns they detected were the result of collisions or just random patterns in the noisy data.

A team of cosmologists based at University College London (UCL), Imperial College London and the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics has now tackled this problem.

"It's a very hard statistical and computational problem to search for all possible radii of the collision imprints at any possible place in the sky," says Dr Hiranya Peiris, co-author of the research from the UCL Department of Physics and Astronomy. "But that's what pricked my curiosity."

The team ran simulations of what the sky would look like with and without cosmic collisions and developed a ground-breaking algorithm to determine which fit better with the wealth of CMB data from NASA's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP). They put the first observational upper limit on how many bubble collision signatures there could be in the CMB sky.

Stephen Feeney, a PhD student at UCL who created the powerful computer algorithm to search for the tell-tale signatures of collisions between "bubble universes," and co-author of the research papers, said: "The work represents an opportunity to test a theory that is truly mind-blowing: that we exist within a vast multiverse, where other universes are constantly popping into existence."

One of many dilemmas facing physicists is that humans are very good at cherry-picking patterns in the data that may just be coincidence. However, the team's algorithm is much harder to fool, imposing very strict rules on whether the data fits a pattern or whether the pattern is down to chance.

Dr Daniel Mortlock, a co-author from the Department of Physics at Imperial College London, said: "It's all too easy to over-interpret interesting patterns in random data (like the 'face on Mars' that, when viewed more closely, turned out to just a normal mountain), so we took great care to assess how likely it was that the possible bubble collision signatures we found could have arisen by chance."

The authors stress that these first results are not conclusive enough either to rule out the multiverse or to definitively detect the imprint of a bubble collision. However, WMAP is not the last word: new data currently coming in from the European Space Agency's Planck satellite should help solve the puzzle.

Is our universe inside a bubble? First observational test of the 'multiverse'

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球员工会揭秘密 曝斯特恩收入仅次于科比 - NBA新闻

　　谈判再次破裂之后，斯特恩对工会的态度颇为不满，并说出了"我不认为劳方会积极地推动谈判的进展"的牢骚话，这引起了美国媒体的强烈不满，并将炮口对准了这位NBA的掌门人。

　　美国媒体表示，NBA球员们的工资基本上都被媒体公开了，但是总裁斯特恩的工资却是一个秘密，这很神奇。据美国篮球专家猜测，斯特恩的工资大约在每年2000万到2300万美元之间，但是没有人能够确认。雅虎专家阿尔德里奇称，这是个非常敏感的话题，很奇怪，球员工会从来没有勇气去揭露斯特恩的薪水之谜，甚至多数球队老板也不知道。一位球队老板称，只有三个或更少的人知道这个数字。

　　这个工资是什么概念呢？如果斯特恩的工资是2300万美元的话，那么他的薪水在NBA中仅次于一个人，这个人就是洛杉矶湖人队的超级巨星科比。2011-12赛季，全联盟只有科比一人年薪超过2500万美元(2524.4万)，其余多达400多位NBA球员的薪酬都不如斯特恩。下赛季薪酬分列第二、第三和第四位的分别是拉沙德·刘易斯、蒂姆·邓肯和凯文·加内特，但是他们的薪酬距离斯特恩的2300万年薪仍有差距，其他球员就更不用说了。不上场打球的斯特恩领着这么高的年薪，却要求NBA球员集体降薪，这没有说服力。一位NBA球员直言不讳："要想降我们的薪酬，总裁自己请先带个头。"


球员工会揭秘密 曝斯特恩收入仅次于科比 - NBA新闻

Intel acquisition points to cloud networking trends Electronics News

INTEL will acquire Fulcrum Microsystems, a fabless semiconductor firm which designs Ethernet switch silicon for data centre network providers.

According to Intel, this move gels with its current strategy, which is to transform from a server technology company to a comprehensive data centre provider which offers computing, storage and networking building blocks.

Intel says Fulcrum Microsystems’ switch silicon, is recognized for its high performance and low latency.

The products from Fulcrum will complement Intel’s processors and Ethernet controllers, resulting in new levels of performance and energy efficiency, boosting the economy of cloud services.

The move by Intel fits into the trend which is seeing very fast growth for 10 Gigabit Ethernet networks, especially for data centres. Fulcrum Microsystems designs integrated, standards-based 10GbE and 40 Gigabit Ethernet (40GbE) switch silicon that have low latency and workload balancing capabilities while helping provide superior network speeds.

This will help cater to increasing demand for data, supporting the continuing evolution of cloud architectures and enterprise converged networks.

Intel says cloud computing is driving the convergence of server, storage and network technologies and solutions based around Intel Xeon processor solutions. The acquisition will fulfil an important component in Intel’s strategy to deliver comprehensive data centre building blocks, from server processors and technologies to storage and networking.

 
Intel acquisition points to cloud networking trends Electronics News

Mobile recycling fails Electronics News

Two recent reports by the mobile phone industry and a survey conducted by the Total Environment Centre revealed the 'Mobile Muster' scheme as seriously flawed. The industry has achieved a paltry 3% recovery rate and, in the meantime, a mountain of toxic mobiles is waiting to be dumped, Total Environment Centre said."After seven years in the game, all the industry can claim is a pathetic 3% recycling rate, despite collecting a levy on every new phone sold. Mobile Muster is all spin and no substance,” said Jeff Angel, director of the Total Environment Centre."The Australian Mobile Telecommunications Association (AMTA) in two reports to the NSW Government showed only a few percent of the mobiles sold have been recycled. AMTA likes to selectively play with figures but they can't hide their hopeless program.”"They also claim that most people don't dump their phones, preferring to keep them. But this is a temporary situation. Once the phone is technologically redundant, neither the original owner, nor the person they may have passed the phone onto, is going to keep it."Voluntary measures alone are proving insufficient. The toxic time bomb is ticking,” said Mr Angel."It's time environment ministers imposed a regulated Extended Producer Responsibility scheme with clear targets, and make industry responsible and accountable for the waste it creates. A refundable deposit or a pre-paid return envelope with the phones would be a great incentive to get those phones out of cupboards and bins and recycled,” said Mr. Angel.
Mobile recycling fails Electronics News

Engineer's Perspective: What limits distributed renewable energy uptake? (Part 2) Electronics News

This is part 2 of two posts dealing with distributed renewable energy. For part 1, see here.Last week we looked at the economic and political factors preventing uptake of alternative energy sources in the grid. This includes distributed sources such as rooftop solar photovoltaic.

The real problem begins to bite when the percentage of the base load supplied by the alternative sources starts to become a significant percentage of the total power level. The actual percentage will vary depending on the local electrical grid an how it is managed. But for the existing electricity grids, there comes appoint where they just can’t handle the fluctuations.

For wind and solar, we have the issue that the energy output fluctuates over both short and long intervals during any 24 hour cycle. Solar goes completely away at night and varies during the day due to clouding, shading and the angle of the sun to the panels. Wind varies due to gusts and average wind speed but it still blows at night.

And of course, the energy put back into the grid is happening on the downstream side of the low end distribution transformers. So we have 2 separate problems here.

Reverse power flow

The first is that the control systems and distribution infrastructure for the electrical grid were designed with the idea that the generators would create the power and it would be distributed outward from them and into the grid. When we add many widely distributed energy sources to the grid, the are not operating according to this principle and we don’t have as a good a control of the grid as we used to. While the level of renewable energy sources is a very low percentage of the grid power level, this is not a big problem. But if we want renewable sources like wind and solar to provide a significant proportion of the total power then we have a big problem. The current infrastructure can’t handle that level of power flowing the wrong way.  This is one of the reasons for limiting the solar power level you can install on your roof. Even if you had a very large roof and could fit 100KW of solar panels, you would not get permission to do so because the local distribution transformer couldn’t handle the reverse power flow.

So part 1 of the problem require an infrastructure rethink and quite a bit of equipment might need to be swapped out of service well before its projected operating life is up.

Controlling power

Part 2 gets even more interesting. Assuming we can now feed a large amount of power back into the grid from distributed fluctuating power sources, no-one knows how to control this! So there is a multi-billion dollar problem waiting to be solved. I can see quite a few PHDs and start-ups getting rich when they do solve it.

As a digression, this could be an excellent opportunity for “Open Innovation”. This is the new buzz term for companies going outside their 4 walls for new ideas and includes a well developed framework for how to go about it so that everyone wins. A big problem in Australia is harnessing the resources of the academic world, the research world and the commercial world to come up with solutions for problems like this. What we tend to do is to set up a PHD there, a CRC here, an internal project there and make very little progress toward a commercially viable and implementable solution. An overseas investor notices and reaps the commercial outcome because they do know how to do the commercialisation. What is really needed is large scale collaboration which meets the needs of all the stakeholders. Dr. Sarah Pearson at ANU is spearheading Australian efforts to establish this collaborative framework in Australia. It has taken off in the northern hemisphere for good reason – it makes companies more profitable.

So back to part 2, how do we handle a significant proportion of the grid power being distributed, unpredictably fluctuating energy sources?

The European approach to this problem is to have smart meters (real ones) that can be told by the grid to dial back PV output to match the grid demand. So the idea here is to dynamically throttle the fluctuating sources to limit the level of fluctuation. This seems both overly complex and unlikely to be an ultimate solution. In Victoria, the real purpose of smart meters will be to implement ‘time of use’ billing where you pay more for power that is used during the higher demand periods. This will help flatten the peak usage profile but only if the cost differential is large and the usage made conspicuous to the user at the time of use. I’m thinking ‘In Home Display’ of the smart meter tariffs as they are being charged.

Microgrids is another idea that tries to generate the local energy locally and only import the shortfall. This attempts to solve the problem by keeping it local rather than impacting the whole grid. This seems unlikely to have the same efficiencies a large scale grid has and is more likely to be an interim measure.

One American approach is to add damping to the grid to absorb the fluctuations. A good example was recently covered on IEEE Energy looking at flywheels as a stability source. The best measure of grid stability is control of the frequency of the grid. As load goes up. Generators must either increase power output or slow down. And the reverse is also true where falling load leads to reduction in generator capacity or increasing frequency. The flywheels act as short terms energy sources when the frequency tries to drop and absorb energy when it tries to speed up. The real problem with electricity is storing it efficiently so it can be supplied on demand and the emerging flywheel industry is one approach to solving that problem. So this is much more likely technology direction than just throwing away the energy capacity.

What is needed in the long term is:

• a better control system strategy for managing the grid with fluctuating loads and distributed fluctuating energy sources
• efficient and clean large scale energy storage mechanisms
• cleaner base load energy generation
• reduced energy use and wastage
• make energy use and cost conspicuous to the user at the time of use

Engineer's Perspective is a column written by Ray Keefe, who has been developing high quality and market leading electronics products in Australia for nearly 30 years. For more information go to his LinkedInprofile. This post was written for Electronics News but is copyright Successful Endeavours Pty Ltd.
Engineer's Perspective: What limits distributed renewable energy uptake? (Part 2) Electronics News

测试一下

测试一下

Of Red Heads and Leopard Prints Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Celebs who go to Philippe Chow expect more than just a good meal, they want some free press too. Rihanna knows there will be dozens of paparazzi snapping away, so she makes sure she is photo-ready.

RiRi steps out of the popular restaurant armed with a Givenchy Leopard Print Flap bag. This uber-chic piece is priced at roughly $3,500 and features a spicy fold-over flap design and ultra-soft calfhair with a nicely done leopard print. I’m not a big fan of single top handle bags though. I think it looks a little awkward when carried around, especially if you’ve got some heavy things inside.

Of Red Heads and Leopard Prints Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

SJP with a Major Fendi Arm Candy Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Vintage is so hot this season. It just never goes out of style and year after year, we see collection after collection with vintage-infused details. Sarah Jessica Parker is carrying a major piece of arm candy while walking around New York.

The Fendi Silvana Tote, priced at $7,140, showcases the perfect union of vintage chic and modern sensibility. It has clean lines, a classic structure and some subtle colorblocking. The bag is named after 70′s Italian bombshell Silvana Mangano. This is by far, one of the most delectable Fendi pieces I’ve seen, thanks to the croc flap and soft calfskin leather. De-lish!

 

SJP with a Major Fendi Arm Candy Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

SJP with a Major Fendi Arm Candy Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Vintage is so hot this season. It just never goes out of style and year after year, we see collection after collection with vintage-infused details. Sarah Jessica Parker is carrying a major piece of arm candy while walking around New York.

The Fendi Silvana Tote, priced at $7,140, showcases the perfect union of vintage chic and modern sensibility. It has clean lines, a classic structure and some subtle colorblocking. The bag is named after 70′s Italian bombshell Silvana Mangano. This is by far, one of the most delectable Fendi pieces I’ve seen, thanks to the croc flap and soft calfskin leather. De-lish!

 

SJP with a Major Fendi Arm Candy Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Of Red Heads and Leopard Prints Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Celebs who go to Philippe Chow expect more than just a good meal, they want some free press too. Rihanna knows there will be dozens of paparazzi snapping away, so she makes sure she is photo-ready.

RiRi steps out of the popular restaurant armed with a Givenchy Leopard Print Flap bag. This uber-chic piece is priced at roughly $3,500 and features a spicy fold-over flap design and ultra-soft calfhair with a nicely done leopard print. I’m not a big fan of single top handle bags though. I think it looks a little awkward when carried around, especially if you’ve got some heavy things inside.

Of Red Heads and Leopard Prints Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Of Red Heads and Leopard Prints Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Celebs who go to Philippe Chow expect more than just a good meal, they want some free press too. Rihanna knows there will be dozens of paparazzi snapping away, so she makes sure she is photo-ready.

RiRi steps out of the popular restaurant armed with a Givenchy Leopard Print Flap bag. This uber-chic piece is priced at roughly $3,500 and features a spicy fold-over flap design and ultra-soft calfhair with a nicely done leopard print. I’m not a big fan of single top handle bags though. I think it looks a little awkward when carried around, especially if you’ve got some heavy things inside.

Of Red Heads and Leopard Prints Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Hot, Vintage-y Momma Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Miranda Kerr was able to bring back her Victoria’s Secret body in no time at all. Looking at this picture, it’s hard to believe this woman carried a baby. I mean, look at that itty-bitty waistline! Her post-pregnancy body is just to die for.

Miranda went for vintage chic while shopping in West Hollywood. Aside from the sexy black pencil skirt, I am also loving her sophisticated arm candy. The Lanvin Happy Partage looks like Chanel Reissue’s younger, happier sister. It features a detachable chain strap, vintage gold hardware and the signature Lanvin bow. It can be yours for $2,290.

 

Hot, Vintage-y Momma Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Hot, Vintage-y Momma Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Miranda Kerr was able to bring back her Victoria’s Secret body in no time at all. Looking at this picture, it’s hard to believe this woman carried a baby. I mean, look at that itty-bitty waistline! Her post-pregnancy body is just to die for.

Miranda went for vintage chic while shopping in West Hollywood. Aside from the sexy black pencil skirt, I am also loving her sophisticated arm candy. The Lanvin Happy Partage looks like Chanel Reissue’s younger, happier sister. It features a detachable chain strap, vintage gold hardware and the signature Lanvin bow. It can be yours for $2,290.

 

Hot, Vintage-y Momma Replica louis vuitton, replica handbags and replica bags

Andy Bryant, Intel, Chairman, Otellini Former CFO to become Intel's next chairman

SAN FRANCISCO—Intel Corp. said Tuesday (July 26) that Andy Bryant, Intel's chief administrative officer, was elected to the new position of vice chairman of the board of directors in preparation for him to be elected the company's next chairman following Intel's annual stockholder meeting in May 2012.

Bryant will serve alongside Intel's current chairman, Jane Shaw, until she retires from the board in May, Intel said. Intel's board was temporarily expanded to 11 members from 10 members until Shaw's retirement, Intel said.

Bryant joined Intel in 1981 and served as the company's chief financial officer from 1994 to 2007. Bryant becomes the second Intel executive to serve on the company's current board, joining Intel President and CEO Paul Otellini.

When Bryant becomes executive chairman, the board will re-establish the position of lead director to be held by an independent, non-employee director, Intel said. Bryant will transition out of his role as chief administrative officer next May as he takes on the full-time chairman responsibilities, Intel said.

"The board welcomes the addition of Andy Bryant to its ranks and looks forward to his service as the next chairman," Shaw said through a statement. "His deep knowledge of Intel and his unmatched wisdom will serve the company well."

Intel said the election of Bryant follows a long corporate practice of senior officer and board succession planning in which the board seeks to identify a person with the particular skills and experience considered most appropriate at the time.

"I am excited about this new position for Andy and look forward to continuing to work closely with him as he assumes his new responsibilities," Otellini said.

Andy Bryant is currently a member of the board of McKesson Corp., the leading healthcare distributor in the U.S., and is also a director at Columbia Sportswear Co. and Kryptiq Inc.


Andy Bryant, Intel, Chairman, Otellini Former CFO to become Intel's next chairman

TI, PowerStack, 3-D, Packaging TI touts 3-D packaging technology

SAN FRANCISCO—Texas Instruments Inc. said Wednesday it has shipped more than 30 million power management devices featuring its PowerStack 3-D packaging technology, which the company says offers performance, thermal, power consumption and board space advantages compared with conventional packaging technologies.   

Matt Romig, analog packaging product manager at TI, said the PowerStack technology is the first 3-D packaging technology to stack high-side vertical mosfets. PowerStack  combines both high-side and low-side mosfets held in place by copper clips and uses a ground potential exposed pad to provide thermal optimization, Romig said.

TI has been shipping power management devices with PowerStack for about a year, Romig said. So far, most of the adoption has been in applications that require very high performance such as telecomm equipment and servers. "This isn't something you are going to see in a cellphone or a tablet," Romig said.


PowerStack's combination of stacking and clipping techniques provide significant benefits over traditional side-by-side discrete mosfets, according to Texas Instruments.

TI, PowerStack, 3-D, Packaging TI touts 3-D packaging technology