Somewhere in the Treasury or thereabouts, 2007.

The STFC Proposal

(Thanks to the Batman Comic generator)

According to Popular Mechanics, some people actually have, and so, if you ever find yourself in a similar situation, perhaps you can too. There are at least thirteen ”confirmed or plausible” cases, one of them being Alan Magee, who was:

. . . blown from his B-17 on a 1943 mission over France. The New Jersey airman, more recently the subject of a MythBusters episode, fell 20,000 feet and crashed into a train station; he was subsequently captured by German troops, who were astonished at his survival.

And so, if you ever find yourself in free-fall, here’s some of what Popular Mechanics suggests that you do:

Keeping your wits about you, you take aim.

But at what? Magee’s landing on the stone floor of that French train station was softened by the skylight he crashed through a moment earlier. Glass hurts, but it gives. So does grass. Haystacks and bushes have cushioned surprised-to-be-alive free-fallers. Trees aren’t bad, though they tend to skewer. Snow? Absolutely. Swamps? With their mucky, plant-covered surface, even more awesome. Hamilton documents one case of a sky diver who, upon total parachute failure, was saved by bouncing off high-tension wires. Contrary to popular belief, water is an awful choice. Like concrete, liquid doesn’t compress. Hitting the ocean is essentially the same as colliding with a sidewalk, Hamilton explains, except that pavement (perhaps unfortunately) won’t “open up and swallow your shattered body.”

For more advice, read the full article here.

Materials science is one of the most quickly emerging sciences, that were formed in relatively recent times. Although materials have since always been a very important part in human life, they become subject of extensive scientific research in the 19. and 20. Read the rest of this entry »

Delivering cutting edge graphics is a shared responsibility. Your power supply pumps in electricity which is put to utilize by a number of components to render and animate impressive 3D graphics. However, there is little consistency to how this workload is distributed. Read the rest of this entry »

David was just telling me a story about a monk, the Yakuza and a physicist. All based on actual events because you just can’t make stuff up like that. Then he casually mentions that he just published a new theory about quasars and stars ever so casually and that oh, it’s mentioned in just about in every single physics theory publication at the moment. I had to read the version for plebians.

Michael Paul Smith is a photographer and model builder who’s combined those passions to create an album of idealized photos from his past:

The telephone pole, stop sign, the white house and the tree are real and are about a block away from the models. The models themselves are sitting on a table.

What started out as an exercise in model building and photography, ended up as a dream-like reconstruction of the town I grew up in. It’s not an exact recreation, but it does capture the mood of my memories.

And like a dream, many of the buildings show up in different configurations throughout the photos. Or sometimes, the buildings stay put and the backgrounds change. Visually, this is heading towards the realm of ART.

NO PHOTOSHOP WAS USED IN THESE PICTURES. IT’S ALL STRAIGHT FROM THE CAMERA.

It’s the oldest trick in the special effects book: line up a model with an appropriate background and shoot. The buildings are 1/24th scale [or 1/2 inch equals a foot]. They are constructed of Gator board, styrene plastic, Sintra [a light flexible plastic that can be carved, and painted] plus numerous found objects; such as jewelery pieces, finishing washers and printed material.

Spend more time in Michael’s history here.  And check out his other sets of model shots– amazing.

As we let our fingers do the walking down memory lane, we might recall that it was on this date in 1959 that Jack Kilby of Texas Instruments filed the first patent for an integrated circuit (U.S. Patent 3,138,743).  In mid-1958, as a newly employed engineer at Texas Instruments, Kilby didn’t yet have the right to a summer vacation.  So he spent the summer working on the problem in circuit design known as the “tyranny of numbers” (how to add more and more components, all soldered to all of the others, to improve performance).  He finally came to the conclusion that manufacturing the circuit components en masse in a single piece of semiconductor material could provide a solution. On September 12, he presented his findings to the management: a piece of germanium with an oscilloscope attached. Kilby pressed a switch, and the oscilloscope showed a continuous sine wave mechanics– proving that his integrated circuit worked and thus that he had solved the problem.  Kilby is generally credited as co-inventor of the integrated circuit, along with Robert Noyce (who independently made a similar circuit a few months later).  Kilby has been honored in many ways for his breakthrough, probably most augustly with the 2000 Nobel Prize in physics theory.

Kilby’s first integrated circuit

Maxwell equations:

• ,
• ,
• ,
• .

Integral form of Maxwell equations:

• ,
• ,
• 
• 

Moments of the field (aka Energy-Momentum(-Pressure) complex of the electromagnetic field):

• Flow of energy (Poynting vector): ,
• Linear momentum of field: ,
• Stress-pressure tensor: .

Material equations: in the case of the weak fields
the polarizable and magnetizable environment yields the linear responses:

• ,
• ,

where the linear coefficients are the permittivity () and the the permeability (), and the polarization and the magnetization of the substance are measured by vector fields and .

When or one can not use the signgle complex of potentials (as used in ordinary electrodynamics), but should add one more complex of potentials . Then:

• ,
• ,
• ,
• .

The source constrainst:

• ,
• .

Life just continues to suck on so many levels.  So, few days ago, Wednesday, I think, I end up missing Spanish because I had to make a quick run to the salon.  Thinking my hair is falling out…more than usual.  I don’t take care of my hair, and the split ends seemed to be the issue, so I decided to get a wash and cut.  My hair doesn’t look thin anymore, probably because all the hair products made my hair follicles stick together and appear as though I was missing hair.  I decided I’m going to let it grow out more naturally, probably way past my shoulders before I do anything drastic.  My hair is like everything to me.  I have to take better care of it.

Anyways, after the salon, since I didn’t get my hair styled, only trimmed, I rushed back home to try to style it.  It was late and I already missed Spanish so I put my hair in two ponytails and left the house.  Weird, how I had many guys trying to hit on me.  I truly don’t get it, there’s really nothing cute about me in pigtails, unless you consider my bravery cute.  I don’t know why guys like them on certain women.  Granted, if I looked like a country bumpkin then I probably wouldn’t have so many prospects.

Moving on to yesterday.  So, like I said, I got a 100% on my 3rd math quiz.  So I was sitting in math class and I look up at the board and I notice this thing staring at me from the bottom corner of my eye.  He was literally staring at me really, really hard for like a minute.  Then I finally decided to look directly at him and he tooootally looked away towards the clock  LOL.  It was hilarious but I’m curious as to why he’d be staring at me, I’ve never seen him before.  And if he thought I was cute, he better think again cause I didn’t think he was cute.  He was really pale and he needed a tan of some sorts.

Speaking of stares, back to Wednesday, so I was walking to lab and all of the sudden this girl passed by me and literally stopped and stared.  I didn’t know what to do but since I was in a rush, I didn’t have time to talk.  She did look familiar, but I can’t put my finger on where or how I know of her.  Anyways, as I was walking past her, I said, “hiii*iiiiii*” really softly so that maybe she hears me but in a hopefully she doesn’t sort of way.

On to today….HORRIBLE only went to one class….physics theory! For the physics theory! exam.  Failed on so many levels.  The exam was easy in some aspects, the problem is that I left my calculator at home (Fail #1).  I went to the party store and bought a basic calculator for $3.49 (Fail #2).  During the exam, the key pad broke (Fail #3).  Then the numbers 1 and 4 on the calculator completely stopped working (Fail #4).  Eventually I gave up and put any answer and left (Win #1?).

Back to Thursday.  So I was at the sandwich shop waiting on one of the best sandwiches in the world.  I was literally waiting for 20 minutes.  Normally the sandwich takes a while to make but I didn’t realize it’d take this long.  Eventually, I got up and asked how much longer the sandwich would be and the girl said that she mistakenly gave it to a guy that said it was his but wasn’t.  Then she complained about him being dishonest.  Anyways, after I finally got my sandwich, I went to class to sit and be happily alone…sort of…there’s this little spy camera they have in the classes,

So that was my day(s).  Thank god it’s Friday because I need a break.  Next week I’m kicking it into high gear…again.  I have 3 more scientific papers to write, physics theory lab report and homework due, finally start studying for ecology, study for next math and spanish quizzes.