Apple’s announced latest batch of productions. It includes afresh, lighter and smaller iPod. It is the thinnest ever iPod nano. It’s the fourth generation. The new models both feature sleek new designs. This nano has the biggest advance in terms of functionality. It is attained through an elaborated user interface and an integral accelerometer. It lets the user in performing tricks. It automatically switches to Shuffle mode when the unit is juddered.

It is having 3.5-inch widescreen glass display, 802.11 b/g Wi-Fi wireless networking, integral speaker, accelerometer and Multi-Touch™ user interface. The fresh iPod touch also has inbuilt Nike + iPod. It enables to monitor workouts. It is customized to the individual needs when utilized with the Nike + iPod shoe sensor.

The fresh iPod Touch is for sale up to 32GB. Good news is that it is cheap. 8GB model is available at USD$229 and the 16GB model at USD$299. 32 GB model is also available at USD$399. The fresh iPod nano is for sale now. 8GB is available at USD$149 and 16GB model is available at USD$199. It offers up to 24 hours of music playback. Four hour timing period is for video playback. The available colors are silver, purple, blue, green, orange, yellow, pink, red and black.

The third release is a new edition of iTunes (iTunes 8). It features “Genius” function. It is configured to enhance the creation of playlists. It supports television programs to the iTunes Store.

ASUS is going to enter into the world of touch screen-interfacing with the release of its new product. It announced ASUS P552w PDA phone. It is not announced when it will be in the market and also not mentioned its cost.
The following features are included in this unit.

1. 624 MHz processor. ( Marvell Tavor)

2. GPS.

3. 2.8” touch-screen.

4. In-built camera (2 MP).

5. 3.5G HSDPA.

6. Bluetooth

7. WLAN 802.11b/g connectivity.

Dimensions are 102 x 60.5 x 14.5 mm (4″ x 2.4″ x 0.57″).it weighs 105g (3.7oz). It features the touch-navigation system. It is marketed with the name of “Glide”. It is easy to operate and ensures simple fingertip use of applications. The user would have intuitive control over functions like zooming, scrolling and flipping.

The company already had offered smart phones running on Windows Mobile 6.1 operating system. The ASUS P552w will also work on that OS. It will have photo and music management applications like EziPhoto and EziMusic. The common web application programs like RSS newsfeeds, YouTube and Flickr will also work on that.

One byproduct of this is the ASUS SMS Location Link. This is the feature which allows people at different places to swiftly find each other. This is achieved by sending and receiving SMS messages and links to relevant info and directions through Google Maps.
The appearance and the 3D touch interface of the HTC Touch had already been compared with each other. We’ll be waiting to see the final shape of the P552w. it will soon hit the market. Detail about Specifications is as under.

Features:

Networks: HSDPA 3.6Mbps, UMTS 2100, EDGE/GPRS/GSM 900/1800/1900, Class 10.
Operating System: Microsoft Windows® Mobile 6.1™ Professional.
Standby Time: 300 hrs with 3G and 250 hrs with 2G.
Talk Time: 3 hrs with 3G and 5 hrs with 2G.
Memory: 256MB Flash + 128MB DDR.
Expansion Slot: MicroSD with SDHC support.
Connectivity: WLAN 802.11b+g, USB v1.1 (FS), Bluetooth 2.0+EDR.
WAP Browser: HTTP / WAP 1.2.1/2.0.
Messaging: SMS / MMS / Email / MSN / Push E-mail.
Battery: 1100mAh Li-Ion.
GPS: SiRF StarIII with internal antenna.
PIM: Word (editor), Excel (editor), Power Point (viewer), IE, Windows® Live, MSN, Voice Commander and Push.
Email (Exchange Server)
The available color will be black or white. Display would be 2.8″ TFT, Touch Screen 65K color, QVGA 240 x 320 pixels.

The advancement of Solid State Drives (SSDs) employing flash memory is going on. These drives are not having any moving components. SSDs work in a cooler and quieter way. They are a more authentic choice than conventional hard drives available in the market today.
Intel has brought together the company with the declaration of two fresh SSDs. This technology will be based on multi-level cell NAND flash technology for laptop and desktop computers. The 1.8-inch X18-M drive and the 2.5-inch X25-M assure a lot of advantages. This includes faster overall system functioning, startup and resume times.
Intel calls that laboratory trials depict that the Intel X18-M and X25M boosts up storage system functioning. It is said that it is raised up to 9 times over conventional hard disk drive operation. This is credited to the SSDs power to take away input/output (I/O) functioning constrictions related to with hard disk drives. This successively helps increase the efficiency of Intel’s processors to its full extent. Both the X18-M and X25-M Mainstream SATA SSDs are in the market for sale in 80GB capacities. They are having 250MB per second speed for reading and 70MB per second speed for writing and 85-microsecond read latency. 160GB versions of the drives would also be available.

Within the incoming a couple of months Intel is also going to release some new creations. They are anticipated to bring in some productions of single-level cell (SLC) SSDs. These will be designed for the server, storage and enterprise environments. It will be introduced with the name of Intel X25-E Extreme SATA Solid-State Drive. These SLC SSDs are configured to take the Input/output performances Per Second (IOPS) to their maximum level. This makes functioning to its higher level and lowering enterprise costs. Intel also says that an SSD-based data center will cut down gross infrastructure costs.

It will maximize the performance-per-square-foot to 50 times. This reduction of cost is made possible by the SSDs lower energy consumption, maintenance, cooling and space costs.
The 80GB drives are now ready to be delivered to OEMs for US$595 in a supply of 1,000. The customer products such as HP EliteBook 6930p notebook holding in the Intel SATA SSDs are likely to start shipping in the next a couple of weeks.

Below is the link of a video of Intel Co-founder and Chairman Emeritus Gordon Moore, in which they are talking about the affect of solid-state drive technology. You can download it to get more information about it.

http://download.intel.com/pressroom/video/Gordon_Moore_SSD_HighRes.wmv

Eggan’s team worked on the patients skin cells. They put them under four genetic factors found in the developing embryo. This process made cells to look and behave like embryonic stem cells.

Such types of reprogramming techniques were also used earlier to create stem cells from skin cells. But in this new experiment the cells were generated from a patient body. These cells were given a name of IPS cells - Induced Pluripotent Stem cells.

This new ability means that scientists would now be able to create models for examining and doing research work on complex type of genetic diseases like Alzheimer’s. It is also feasible to use this reprogramming technique on the aged patients or patients having serious type of diseases.

These new findings will enable scientists to produce uncountable number of motor neurons same in nature to those provided by the cell donor. By this they will research on the causes and reasons which activate the disease in the cells.

Chris Henderson, who is the co-director of the Motor Neuron Center at Columbia University, in New York said that if these cells die or degenerate in the culture dish then they will came to know much about degeneration process through researching on them. One other useful thing about these cells is that scientists will use these cells to screen the new drugs to protect against neurodegeneration in ALS.

Scientist has successfully achieved to derive stem cells from the skin of an eighty two year old patient suffering from ALS - amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Through this the scientists have found a new method to study the degenerative motor disease. It will also help them to test new treatment drugs. Finally this new technique will bring a new revolution in cell-replacement therapies.

All this was achieved when scientists were using new techniques on the patient to reprogram adult cells to make them pluripotent. When cell is made pluripotent it means that it could be made any type of the cell in the body.

The researchers have been working to make stem cells from patients since a long time. They were trying so because they believe that this will help them in better understanding the disease. Actually the cells hold the genes of the disease from which the patient is being suffered. If those cells could be taken out they can be examined in the laboratory to understand the disease in different ways. This was stated by Kevin Eggan, who is working as a stem-cell scientist at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and contributed much of his useful work in this research.

The latest technique developed by scientists in Japan was used by the researchers in their work to create the stem cells. That technique was developed in such a way that it doesn’t require human eggs or creation or destruction of embryos. This resolved many problems that have plagued the research work in the field of embryonic stem-cell.

Technology has commenced to peek its head into all prospects of our routine lives. Almost each house has a computer and businesses have no concept without them. Even supermarkets have advanced their check out arrangements. Acknowledging this it’s not amazing that technology can also be detected in our leisure time activities. Yachting is a great past time activity for people who want to have enjoyment the open seas.

It is big even for just an easy afternoon on a lake. And it is even best for people who can now get pleasure from their favorite past time in addition to as not leave the world behind. Today there are luxury voyaging yachts equipped with specified technology which are capable to allow a human to bring their work with them. Because a few may prefer to go at sea to get out from it all, other people might prefer to do this but not be capable to. Whenever this is the case they want not care, they can draw out a sauceboat with such scientific equipment like computers and televisions. They can love the view simultaneously as working on an electronic mail.

The manner in which these boats are created is advancement in technology. This allows those who take out superior luxury catamarans to have fluent sailing, well and with comfort. The combination of technology is a big instance of the technological advancements that this generation has made. Yachting was at one time a civilization of break away and exemption but today it is all the same but also includes methods to rest associated to aliveness and the humans while on holiday.

Adjustable beds are usually used in hospitals to serve patients to change their positions. They help them in rising with least effort and help. Now Charles Filipi who is a surgeon at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska worked to make it more advance. He strived to take them a step further, literally.

He says that many weighty patients are asked to take exercise daily. This exercise is a part of their treatment. But a lot of staff is required to make them into a standing position to get started. And additionally finding a treadmill for them to take them into exercise can also be time taking activity.

For that, Filipi proposes fixing the treadmill into the hospital bed. When not being used the treadmill goes into a vertical position at the end of the bed (the image illustrates it).
When the patient desires to make an exercise, the bed tardily moves into the right angle position. It establishes the treadmill onto the ground in a ready position. It means a patient can always use the treadmill easily without anybody’s assistance.

The cost differs by $10 per barrel. This was stated by Hall. He says that a Fischer-Tropsch plant is having the capacity to produce a barrel of gasoline giving a production cost of $35 but by Synfuels refinery same amount of gasoline could be produced for just $25.

By making the calculations under current fuel prices, it is said by the company that this plant can cover up its own manufacturing cost in four years.

Texas A&M University has got license to own the Synfuels Company. It is presently having the partial ownership of the company. The company has been running a 50 million USD demonstration unit situated in Texas since the year 2005. In the near time it is hopefully said that it will also sign to establish its first commercial refinery which will be located near Kuwait City.

Paul Wolfe says that the company has developed few proprietary parts and chemicals to use as catalyst in the plant. Paul Wolfe is presently president of Synfuels. He further says that the best thing about Synfuels is that it cracks down and rejoins the hydrocarbon molecules in a very efficient manner. He told that we can proudly say that in today’s world nobody can claim that high level of conversion rate to convert natural gas into acetylene as we have claim to achieve.

Ali Mansoori is a professor of chemical engineering and physics currently doing research work at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He says that when we take this system from the complication point of view we found that its mechanism is very much simple than that complicated process of Fischer-Tropsch.

There are some other companies also researching to develop GTL more economical other than Synfuels. Gas Reaction Technologies is one of them; it is an establishment working under the University of California. They also claimed to develop a conversion process to form bromine-based compounds from natural gas. These bromine-based compounds are later processed to produce liquid fuels.

A Texas company has claimed of developing a new conversion method which is cheaper and cleaner one to create gasoline and other liquid fuels from natural gas. This method would render a way which is more economical to make use of natural-gas reserves which were difficult to develop due to small in size or located at far away places.
Synfuels International which is an American company based in Dallas, is working behind this technology. The company says that the process consists of just few steps. This decrease in the number of steps makes it far more efficient than other conventional techniques which are adopted in the Fischer-Tropsch process. By this process natural gas could be converted into syngas. Syngas is a gas mixture of hydrogen and carbon monoxide. A catalyst used in this process, forces the carbon and hydrogen gas to rejoin resulting in the formation of other new compounds like alcohols and fuels.

Fisher-Tropsch process was first used In the World War II by Nazi Germany. They produced diesel by taking coal and coal-bed methane as a source material.

In a Synfuels gas-to-liquids (GTL) refinery natural gas is processed through number of steps to convert it into gasoline. This method is said to be having better overall efficiency. In the first step structure of natural gas is split by putting it under high temperatures to form acetylene, which is a simplest form of hydrocarbon. The next process includes a separate liquid-phase step. In this a proprietary catalyst is used which causes to convert 98 percent of the acetylene into ethylene. Ethylene is the most complex form of hydrocarbon. This ethylene is used to make several fuel products. The process of its conversion is easy at that stage. These end products include products like high-octane gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel. All of these products are absolutely free of sulfur.

This process has enabled us to produce a barrel of gasoline with a low cost than produced through Fischer-Tropsch process. This is said by Kenneth Hall, who is the member of the inventor team of this process. He also remained at a time the head of Texas A&M University’s department of chemical engineering.

There was a time when animal and green life was present in the valleys of Antarctica which are now barren and does not have any sign of life on them. This was revealed by the scientists doing research work on that frozen continent. They recovered remains of life from that land.
These researchers further said that the fields we see now were tundra lands fourteen million years ago. Just as we see some regions of Alaska, Canada and Siberia. These areas were cold but were supporting the life.

Geoscientist Adam Lewis and his fellow-researchers found the remains of moss on a valley floor. All of them belong to North Dakota State University. They were doing study on ice cover of the continent.

After the reports came out of this discovery, a telephonic interview was taken from Lewis. He said that the moss was dried and frozen. He said that its condition was dissimilar to the fossils. Normally in fossils we see that minerals replace the soft materials. The moss tissues were present in their original form.

Lewis said that it is the best thing about this finding that all the details are present as they were, even after the 14 million years. The tissues were actually plant tissues.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published that report on its Tuesdays’ edition.
The researchers say that when we see to the wet-based glaciers, proglacial lakes, tundra plant life and the remains of the insects we conclude that 14 million years ago the climate of the western Olympus range was warmer and wetter as compared to todays. This thing also helps them in better understanding the climate system of Earth.

In the next step they moved already fabricated central plane array and associated electronics from a silicon wafer to the tensioned membrane that is stretched taut over a drum.
When this tension is free, the membrane attains its formal form. This procedure presses the focal plane arrangement.

As a result of this electrical interconnects, which are especially designed, delaminate from the rubber surface and make arcs, fastened on the ends by detector pixels.

By deforming the shape in this way provide housing for strains created during the planar to hemispherical transformation. This is achieved without stressing the silicon. This theory was practically proven by researchers at Northwestern during mechanics modeling.

The array package is then transfer printed to a matching hemispherical glass substrate. Attaching a lens and connecting the camera to external electronics completes the assembly. The camera has the size and shape of a human eye.

The research is going on since the last 20 years. Many scientists have worked to develop electronic eye systems of this type but none of them succeeded in making a working camera.
Roger said that through optics simulations and imaging examination we came to know that these arrangements a much broader field of view.

Not only this but also enhances illumination uniformity and causes fewer aberrations as compared to flat cameras which are having same type of imaging lenses. Roger is the scientist doing research at the Beckman Institute and at the university’s Frederick Setiz Materials Research Laboratory.

He said that hemispherical sensor arrangements are suitable to use as retinal implants as compared to flat sensing elements. It has the ability to cover superior quality silicon devices onto surfaces complicated in structure and biological tissues. This ability the design of electronic and optoelectronic device gets very interesting and powerful capabilities.

Scientists from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Northwestern University developed electronic-eye camera.
The 7th august publish of Nature – a journal – described that scientists have succeeded in preparing a superior, hemispherical “eye” camera. This camera is employing a number of single-crystalline silicon sensors and electronics. Those components are set up in a stretchable and interlinked mesh. These scientists were doing research work at University of Illinois and Northwestern University.
This study work unfolds a new future prospect for progressed camera structures. It also indicates signs for artificial retinas for artificial eyes. Such type of eye-concepts has been used in many popular science fiction movies like “Terminator”.
By enwrapping surfaces with stretchy sheets of optoelectronics we get a practical way for incorporating two-dimensional device technologies onto composite curvilinear objects. It is said by John Rogers who is the Flory-Founder Chair Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at Illinois.
He also said that this idea made it possible to set electronics in positions where it was difficult to place previously. He said that at present we are able to enhance device design beyond the flatland simplicities of formal wafer-based systems.

The design of this newly developed camera is derived from human eye. This design consists of simple, single-constituent lens and a hemispherical sensing element. The sensing element is incorporated with a hemispherical cap and imaging lens system by the camera. This arrangement brings in a system which is having the same size, shape and layout as human eye has.
The scientists doing research work on that created this camera by molding a thin rubber membrane in the form of a hemisphere. After this they elongated that membrane with especially designed mechanical stage to give it a shape of flat drumhead.

Weather forecasters would now be able to predict in advance with more precision that when and where heavy rainfalls are expected. This development was made during the research work which started after heavy destruction of floods in the last summer which affected large parts of England.

Met Office gave the statement and claimed that this scientific development would now make it possible to predict floods one day more before. Not only this but additionally it would tell about the areas to be affected by flood; it would also be predicted with greater geographical precision, better than before.

National weather service of UK is trying to make a team which would be comprised of specialist forecasters. This team will make use of this new technology and warn the organizations earlier and inform them about the upcoming disastrous flood. This information would be useful for the emergency responders and other professionals relating the flood monitoring agencies.

Paul Davies who is the extreme rainfall service manager of the Met Office says that the weather forecasts and alerts which were provided to the emergency responders in the last summer were very accurate and timely.

The destruction in the last summer flood directed the attention of the agencies more towards providing better forecasting updates. Met Office started transferring the science and technology more quickly so that the future challenges could be faced in a better way.

Pamel Taylor who is the chief executive of Water UK says that his organization welcomes the new developments presented by Met Office. He said that such type of disastrous incidents affects the water industry and customers very seriously and it is the need of time to advance quickly in this technology.

The second major component is its internal combustion generator. The function of this generator is to convert the gas into electric power. This electric power could be used for any domestic need.

This station is being publically demonstrated heating, cooking and operating a fridge in Sheffield.

The critical element of this is how much it would cost to put such a refueling station in your home. The technology is very plausible but there are some issues about public acceptance.

The technology is very impressive but the thing to think about is that it would cost much to install it in home and could it be affordable to people.

The fact that the refueling station uses electricity meant it would not be a much-sought after zero emissions system unless the electricity itself is produced in a more green way, he added.

The fact that the refueling station uses electricity meant it would not be a much-sought after zero emissions system

As we discussed earlier that water and electricity are the source items to produce hydrogen gas. It would not lead to desired results as claimed for zero emissions unless electricity is produced without polluting the environment.

A new hydrogen refueling station has been introduced by the ITM - British company. The company is leading innovator within the alternative energy source industries. This station could be installed in the home and would be a best alternative to visiting a petrol station.

To comply with this new technology hydrogen-powered cars are also going to set in production. The interesting thing about this is that this could also be used for heating and cooking purposes.

It is always said and proved by scientists that Hydrogen could be used as an alternative energy source to other fossil fuels originated from carbon.

The question is that why not fuel-cell vehicles became so popular and highly used so far. The answer is due to the lack of hydrogen fuelling stations. Now with the release of this station it would get much better in the future.

Hydrogen could not be used directly as a fuel in this system. It needs some processes and other energy sources to get it in useable form.

While some scientists are hopeful of the fuel uses of hydrogen, many others are skeptical because it is inefficient to produce, expensive to transport and to convert into electricity.

When we ask the scientists about this new hydrogen-station they give two views over it. one group says we are hopeful and expecting good results by the fuel uses of hydrogen. Whereas other group shows some doubts about the feasibility of the project. They say that it would be inefficient to produce and cost much on transportation and its conversion into electric power.

The most important functioning part of the station is an electrolyser. This electrolyser works to produce hydrogen gas from water and electricity.