DIY science is the perfect way to use your creative skills and learn something new. With the right supplies, some determination, and a curious mind, you can create amazing experiments that open up a whole world of possibilities. At home-made laboratories or tech workshops, makers from all backgrounds can explore new ideas by finding ways to study their environment in novel ways – allowing them to make breathtaking discoveries!
Follow up on the solar powered scooter – With Don approaching 1,000 solar-powered miles (he has 932 and counting), Don’s scooter seems to still be going strong. In fact, it has been five months since Don last had to charge it. In those five months, Don has been driving his scooter almost every day going around 11 miles on the average day. By occasionally giving his scooter a day off, he is able to make sure that his scooter always has a charge. Link.
The site plans to get permission and/or make custom versions, but for now no more NYC maps for the iPod – the New York MTA has ordered me to remove the official maps from the site. I am hoping to acquire a license from their marketing department to offer the maps here. In the meantime, I hope you can all wait. Thanks. If worse comes to worse, I’ll make up a custom set of maps and offer them here. . Link.
Soon, Romania, Colombia and a high school in San Jose, Calif., will join the space race. An ambitious program called CubeSat, developed at Stanford University and California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, is giving students and companies the opportunity to build and launch functional satellites into low Earth orbit, or about 240 to 360 miles above the planet. Link.
The Green Building is humming, and not just from activities in its labs and offices and classrooms. Thanks to Carrie Bodle (SM Visual Studies 2005), Building 54 has been turned into a giant speaker, resonating with sounds from the upper level of the Earth’s atmosphere. Every day, through Friday, Sept. 16, from 12-1 p.m., “Sonification / Listening Up,” a large-scale sound installation using 35 speakers installed on the south facade of the building, will broadcast an abstract sound collage generated from research data collected in the ionosphere. Link.
Encouraging…Disabled scientist Professor Stephen Hawking is using a hi-tech gadget to communicate by blinking because his deteriorating health limits movement. The Infrared Sound Touch (IST) switch has been developed by the American company Words+ and works by emitting a very low-powered infrared beam. The reflection of the beam changes when the eye is closed and the cheek muscle moves and so controlling the computer is as simple as blinking. Link.
Off-the-shelf technology used in tracking fingers in high resolution for human interfaces…a simple active tracking system using a laser diode (visible or invisible light), steering mirrors, and a single non-imaging photodetector, which is capable of acquiring three dimensional coordinates in real time without the need of any image processing at all. Thanks Emeka! Link.
Popular Science commissioned contributing troubadour, Jonathan Coulton, to write and record a soundtrack to their current Future of the Body issue. Each of the five songs he has crafted accompanies a feature article in this issue and, using clever lyrics, catchy hooks and secret harmonic frequencies, unlocks powerful regions of your brain not normally used in the reading of magazines. There are five songs, each inspired by an article, and CD cover art for available for download… Link.
