Final Reflection

WOW, this was quite a project that we undertook. I have to say that I was a little skeptical at the begining of all of this about how it was related to physics. But as we got further into the project and we received subjects that I had never seen before, I realized that it wasn't just more than just some spare time to work on computers in.

What I would Keep

I think that the project was an extremely good learning experience for all of us, students and teacher alike. We all learned how important it is to communicate and that I you don't, no one knows whats going on or what to do. I did enjoy being on the computer and posting because it gave us experience on the web that we didn't have before.

What I would Change

Although the subjects were very interesting and new to most of us, they really were not related to physics other than that they were science related. I would have done this project again, but with more subjects that were directly related to physics. I also would have giving a little more information to the students about what you wanted and were requiring of them. It really wouldn't be fair to say that the in depth responses should be "long enough" and then take off points for not being "long enough". I'm not saying that happened, or that it was like that; I'm just saying that if you don't put a length requirement, you are going to run into those types of problems. I would try to directly communicate more with eachother on a personal basis. It would have been nice to hear something from Ms. Eder when we had questions other than "READ MY BLOG". I know that the information was on the blog, it would just be nice to be able to talk.

I believe that this Blogger project was a good, tough, and frustating time for alot of us, but it really did us alot of good and we learned life lessons.

New Innovations in Technology

Throughout the recent history of our world, the human race has developed and improved in many ways. Most of those improvements are through technology. In 1752, a man by the name of Benjamin Franklin tied a key to a kite and innovated electricity. Thomas Edison harnessed that electricity and changed it into light. It was through these inventions that the modern world can do all that they can do. Who knows what innovations of this era will be the next electricity. Will it be wireless power, LASIK eye surgery, E85 ethanol to power our vehicles, or will we completely stray away from fossil fuels and use electric cars?

Wireless Power

In the late 19th century, the realization that electricity could be coaxed to light up a bulb prompted a mad dash to determine the best way to distribute it. At the head of the pack was inventor Nikola Tesla, who had a grand scheme to beam elec­tricity around the world. Having difficulty imagining a vast infrastructure of wires extending into every city, building, and room, Tesla figured that wireless was the way to go. He drew up plans for a tower, about 57 meters tall, that he claimed would transmit power to points kilometers away, and even started to build one on Long Island. Though his team did some tests, funding ran out before the tower was completed. The promise of airborne power faded rapidly as the industrial world proved willing to wire up.

Then, a few years ago, Marin Soljacic, an assistant professor of physics at MIT, was dragged out of bed by the insistent beeping of a cell phone. "This one didn't want to stop until you plugged it in for charging," says Soljačić. In his exhausted state, he wished the phone would just begin charging itself as soon as it was brought into the house.

So Soljacic started searching for ways to transmit power wirelessly. Instead of pursuing a long-distance scheme like Tesla's, he decided to look for midrange power transmission methods that could charge--or even power--portabl­e devices such as cell phones, PDAs, and laptops. He eventually landed on the phenome­non of resonant coupling, in which two objects tuned to the same frequency exchange energy strongly but interact only weakly with other objects. A classic example is a set of wine glasses, each filled to a different level so that it vibrates at a different sound frequency. If a singer hits a pitch that matches the frequency of one glass, the glass might absorb so much acoustic energy that it will shatter; the other glasses remain unaffected.

Soljacic found magnetic resonance a promising means of electricity transfer because magnetic fields travel freely through air yet have little effect on the environment or, at the appropriate frequencies, on living beings. He devised a simple setup that wirelessly powered a 60-watt light bulb.

"In today's battery-operated world, there are so many potential applications where this might be useful," he says. "It's a powerful concept."

LASIK

LASIK is used to correct refractive errors. It is eye surgery that reshapes the cornea in order to produce clear vision. The LASIK refractive eye surgery procedure can treat myopia (nearsightedness), hyperopia (farsightedness), and astigmatism, and reduce patients’ dependency on contact lenses and glasses. Because refractive errors impede the focusing ability of the eye, patients who suffer from these conditions experience blurred vision. LASIK eye surgery provides these individuals with an effective treatment option, where a predetermined amount of corneal tissue is removed. This reshaping of the cornea improves the eye’s focusing power and enhances patients’ visual acuity.

The traditional LASIK vision correction procedure begins with the creation of a hinged corneal flap. After the eye is anesthetized with topical eye drops, the LASIK eye surgeon creates the flap on the outer surface of the eye to expose the underlying cornea. The flap can be created with a hand-held device (scalpel) or with a computer-guided laser. The cornea is then reshaped using an excimer laser and the flap is replaced.

E85 Ethanol

E85 is an alcohol fuel mixture that typically contains a mixture of up to 85% denatured fuel ethanol and gasoline or other hydrocarbon by volume. On an under natured basis, the ethanol component ranges from 70% to 83%. E85 as a fuel is widely used in Sweden and is becoming increasingly common in the United States, mainly in the Midwest where corn is a major crop and is the primary source material for ethanol fuel production; however as yet, there are about 1500 filling stations selling E85 to the public in the US, and, until recently, only three in Canada.

E-85 ethanol is used in engines modified to accept higher concentrations of ethanol. Such flexible-fuel vehicles (FFV) are designed to run on any mixture of gasoline or ethanol with up to 85% ethanol by volume. There are a few major differences between FFVs and non-FFVs. One is the elimination of bare magnesium, aluminum, and rubber parts in the fuel system. Another is that fuel pumps must be capable of operating with electrically conductive ethanol instead of non-conducting dielectric gasoline fuel. Fuel injection control systems have a wider range of pulse widths to injection approximately 40% more fuel. In some cases, FFVs use acid-neutralizing motor oil. For vehicles with fuel-tank mounted fuel pumps, additional differences to prevent arcing, as well as flame arrestors positioned in the tanks fill pipe, are also sometimes used.

Increasing energy use, climate change, and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil fuels make switching to low-carbon fuels a high priority. Biofuels are a potential low-carbon energy source, but whether biofuels offer carbon savings depends on how they are produced. Converting rainforests, peat lands, savannas, or grasslands to produce food crop–based biofuels in Brazil, Southeast Asia, and the United States creates a "biofuel carbon debt" by releasing 17 to 420 times more CO2 than the annual greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions that these biofuels would provide by displacing fossil fuels. In contrast, biofuels made from waste biomass or from biomass grown on degraded and abandoned agricultural lands planted with perennials incur little or no carbon debt and can offer immediate and sustained GHG advantages

Electric Cars

A new kind of car that is supposed to slash gasoline consumption and reduce greenhouse-gas emissions is finally out. The car is a modified Toyota Prius with an extra battery installed in the spare-tire compartment. Conventional hybrids like the Prius run on an electric motor part of the time, but the electricity they use is generated by a gasoline engine and by capturing energy from braking. In the plug-in version of the car, the extra battery can be recharged from an electrical outlet. The battery stores about 40 miles' worth of electricity; if it's depleted, the car reverts to conventional hybrid mode.

The few plug-in vehicles on the road today are prototypes that, as is being discovered, aren't always reliable. But recent advances in battery technology have attracted the attention of major manufacturers, raising the possibility of a mass-produced plug-in car. General Motors has announced that it is developing plug-in hybrids that use advanced lithium-ion batteries and could be ready within a few years. One of the GM designs--for a car known as the Volt--calls for a gasoline engine that kicks in after 40 miles just to recharge the battery. Toyota also says it is researching lithium-ion batteries and testing plug-in vehicles.

An electric battery with a 40-mile range could nearly eliminate trips to the gas station for many drivers, since Americans drive just over 30 miles a day on average. But unlike earlier, all-electric cars, the new hybrids could handle longer commutes; the Volt is designed to travel 600 miles using its backup gas tank to charge the battery. And electricity from the grid is cheap: the equivalent of a gallon of gas costs less than a dollar.

The environmental arithmetic is also favorable. Generating the electricity to power plug-in cars causes less greenhouse-gas pollution than burning gasoline does, according to a recent study by the Electric Power Research Institute and the National Resources Defense Council. Even in the worst-case scenario, in which a plug-in vehicle got all its electricity from coal-fired plants (in reality, electricity in the United States comes from a mix of sources that on average release less carbon dioxide than coal plants do), it would still be responsible for a third less ­greenhouse-­gas pollution than a conventional car. And though plug-ins and conventional hybrids would account for similar amounts of greenhouse-gas emission in most parts of the country, plug-ins in areas with clean sources of electricity, such as hydroelectric power, would be responsible for about half the carbon dioxide emissions of other hybrids.

Unlike other alternative technologies, such as cars powered by hydrogen fuel cells, plug-ins doesn’t require any significant new infrastructure. Existing gas stations would provide the fuel for long trips, and electrical outlets in garages would provide the power for short commutes. (Eventually, charging stations could be installed for city dwellers.) And plenty of electricity is available, particularly overnight. According to a study from the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, there's already enough excess generating capacity at night to charge 84 percent of the cars, pickups, and SUVs on the road today, if they were all suddenly converted into plug-in hybrids.

It will be through these new developments and innovations in technology and science that the human race will be able to continue on to affect the world in only a positive way.

Holography

I don't know alot about holography other that it makes for one cool picture.

Renewable Energy

Biofuel can be broadly defined as solid, liquid, or gas fuel consisting of, or made from recently dead biological material, most commonly plants. This distinguishes it from fossil fuel, which is derived from long dead biological material. Biofuel can be theoretically produced from any carbon source. The most common by far is plants that capture solar energy. Many different plants and plant-derived materials are used for biofuel manufacture. Biofuels are used globally and biofuel industries are expanding in Europe, Asia and the Americas. The most common use for biofuels is as liquid fuels for automotive transport. The use of renewable biofuels provides increased independence from petroleum and enhances energy security.

There are various current issues with biofuel production and use, which are being discussed in the popular media and scientific journals. These include: the effect of moderating oil prices, the "food vs fuel" debate, carbon emissions levels, sustainable biofuel production, deforestation and soil erosion, impact on water resources, human rights issues, poverty reduction potential, biofuel prices, energy balance and efficiency, and centralized versus decentralized production models.

Solar energy is energy from the Sun in the form of heat and light. This energy drives the climate and weather and supports virtually all life on Earth. Heat and light from the Sun, along with secondary solar resources such as wind and wave power, hydroelectricity and biomass, account for most of the available flow of renewable energy on Earth. Solar energy technologies harness the Sun's heat and light for practical ends such as heating, lighting and electricity. These technologies date from the time of the early Greeks, Native Americans and Chinese, who warmed their buildings by orienting them toward the Sun.

Solar power is used synonymously with solar energy or more specifically to refer to the conversion of sunlight into electricity. This can be done with photovoltaics, concentrating solar thermal devices and various experimental technologies.

Wind power is the conversion of wind energy into useful form, such as electricity, using wind turbines. In windmills, wind energy is directly used to crush grain or to pump water. Wind power is produced in large scale wind farms connected to electrical grids, as well as in individual turbines for providing electricity to isolated locations. Wind energy is plentiful, renewable, widely distributed, clean, and reduces greenhouse gas emissions when it displaces fossil-fuel-derived electricity. The random patterns of wind seldom creates insurmountable problems when using wind power to supply a low proportion of total demand, but it presents extra costs when wind is to be used for a large fraction of demand.

Wave power refers to the energy of ocean surface waves and the capture of that energy to do useful work - including electricity generation and the pumping of water (into reservoirs). Wave power is a form of renewable energy. Though often co-mingled, wave power is distinct from tidal power and the steady gyre of ocean currents. Wave power generation is not a widely employed technology, and no commercial wave farm has yet been established. The north and south temperate zones have the best sites for capturing wave power. The prevailing westerlies in these zones blow strongest in winter.

Exploring the Deep Oceans

The deep sea seems almost to belong to another planet. Bizarre, little understood creatures live there in perpetual darkness and under mountainous pressures — vampire squids, sawtooth eels, sea spiders. They and many others have largely eluded science or appear for a tantalizing moment before the headlamps of submersibles only to vanish again. Despite decades of exploration, less than a tenth of the deep ocean realm has been explored, despite it being the largest habitat for life on Earth. There are a lot of sea monsters yet to be discovered.


The deep sea is invisible to anyone on a ship, of course. It's just the open ocean. But there are subtle signs even on the surface that great depths lie below. Creatures like great whales, albatrosses, tuna and sharks may be seen. But no sea gulls, harbor seals or otters are found in these expanses. To live in this part of the ocean, an animal has to swim all the time. There is no place to rest or hide from natural enemies.


Many species of deep ocean fish have special adaptations to living in extremely high pressure, low light conditions. Viper fish (found at 80-1600 meters - about a mile down) are some of the most wicked looking fish dredged up from the depths. Some of them are black as night all over with light organs in strategic places on their bodies, including one on a long dorsal fin that serves as a lure for the fish it preys upon. Some viperfish (and many other deep ocean fish species) don't have any pigment (color) at all - they're "see through". They also have enlarged eyes, presumably for gathering as much light as possible where there is little or no light at all. The light organs create lights by using a chemical process called bioluminescence.


Other deep ocean fish, such as the the gulper eel have a hinged skull, which can rotate upward to swallow large prey. They also have large stomachs which can stretch to accommodate a fish much larger than itself. The gulper eel is particularly well-known for its impossibly large mouth - big enough to get its mouth around (and swallow!) creatures much bigger than itself. Fish that live down here must adapt to a very low food supply, eating only "scraps" that sink down from above, or sometimes eating each other.

The Big Bang

The Big Bang theory is an effort to explain what happened at the very beginning of our universe. Discoveries in astronomy and physics have shown beyond a reasonable doubt that our universe did in fact have a beginning. Prior to that moment there was nothing; during and after that moment there was something: our universe. The big bang theory is an effort to explain what happened during and after that moment.

According to the standard theory, our universe sprang into existence as "singularity" around 13.7 billion years ago. What is a "singularity" and where does it come from? No one knows for sure. Singularities are zones which defy our current understanding of physics. They are thought to exist at the core of "black holes." Black holes are, well we all know what black holes are. The pressure is thought to be so intense that finite matter is actually squished into infinite density (a mathematical concept which truly boggles the mind). These zones of infinite density are called "singularities." Our universe is thought to have begun as an infinitesimally small, infinitely hot, infinitely dense, something - a singularity. Where did it come from? We don't know. Why did it appear? We don't know.

After its initial appearance, it apparently inflated (the "Big Bang"), expanded and cooled, going from very, very small and very, very hot, to the size and temperature of our current universe. It continues to expand and cool to this day and we are inside of it: incredible creatures living on a unique planet, circling a beautiful star clustered together with several hundred billion other stars in a galaxy soaring through the cosmos, all of which is inside of an expanding universe that began as an infinitesimal singularity which appeared out of nowhere for reasons unknown. This is the Big Bang theory.

Solar Systems and Galaxies

Galaxies are large systems of stars and interstellar matter, typically containing several million to some trillion stars, of masses between several million and several trillion times that of our Sun, of an extension of a few thousands to several 100,000s light years, typically separated by millions of light years distance. They come in a variety of flavors: Spiral, lenticular, elliptical and irregular. Besides simple stars, they typically contain various types of star clusters and nebulae. We live in a giant spiral galaxy, the Milky Way galaxy, of 100,000 light years in diameter and a mass of roughly a trillion solar masses.

Spiral galaxies usually consist of two major components: A flat, large disk which often contains a lot of interstellar matter and young star clusters and associations, which have emerged from them, often arranged in striking spiral patterns and/or bar structures. The luminosity and mass relation of these components seem to vary in a wide range, giving rise to a classification scheme. The pattern structures in the disk are caused by gravitational interaction with neighboring galaxies.

Lenticular-These are, in short, "spiral galaxies without spiral structure", or smooth disk galaxies, where stellar formation has stopped long ago, because the interstellar matter was used up. From their appearance and stellar contents, they can often hardly be distinguished from ellipticals.

Elliptical galaxies are actually of elliptical shape (for those of you who failed geometry, that means they look like cosmic footballs or eggs). They have little or no global angular momentum (do not rotate as a whole). Normally, elliptical galaxies contain very little or no interstellar matter. They appear like luminous bulges of spirals, without a disk component.

Irregular galaxies-Often due to distortion by the gravitation of their intergalactic neighbors, these galaxies do not fit well into the scheme of disks and ellipsoids, but exhibit peculiar shapes. A subclass of distorted disks is however frequently occuring.