sweat equity

It featured in the news that Sunanda Pushkar had on her own surrendered the sweat equity offered to her by Rendezvous Sports World, a member of the consortium that won the Kochi Indian Premier League (IPL) franchise.

So, what is sweat equity? Here is what Wiki has to say:

Sweat equity is a term used to describe the contribution made to a project by people who contribute their time and effort. It can be contrasted with financial equity which is the money contributed towards the project. It is used to refer to a form of compensation by businesses to their owners or employees. The term is sometimes used in partnership agreements where one or more of the partners contributes no financial capital. In the case of a business startup, employees might, upon incorporation, receive stock or stock options in return for working for below-market salaries (or in some cases no salary at all).

cryogenic engine

ISRO is reviewing the reasons for the failure of the GSLV-D3 mission on April 15, which was primarily meant to test the indigenously developed cryogenic upper stage of the rocket. In a recent statement, they have concluded that contrary to the earlier belief, the malfunctioning of another part and not the cryogenic engine, led to the failure.

Was curious to find out what is a cryogenic engine. So, here goes:

A cryogenic rocket engine is a rocket engine that uses a cryogenic fuel or oxidizer, that is, its fuel or oxidizers (or both) are gasses liquefied and stored at very low temperatures. Notably, these engines were one of the main factors of the ultimate success in reaching the Moon by the Saturn V rocket.

Various cryogenic fuel-oxidizer combinations have been tried, but the combination of liquid hydrogen (LH2) fuel and the liquid oxygen (LOX) oxidizer is one of the most widely used. Both components are easily and cheaply available, and when burned have one of the highest entropy releases by combustion, producing specific impulse up to 450 s (effective exhaust velocity 4.4 km/s).

Read more here.

Modern Rome – Campo Vaccino

This is a 170 year old painting by the British artist J. M. W. Turner and is supposed to go to auction on 7 July 2010.

Sotheby’s auction house said the painting was being sold by a descendant of the 5th Earl of Rosebery to help secure the future of estates. The painting has been estimated to fetch £18 million. It will be on view in Sotheby’s New York auction house from 29 April to 14 May, before returning to London for the auction. The painting, which is in immaculate condition, has been described by Sotheby’s as “undoubtedly among the most important of Turner’s works ever to come to auction”.

Read more here.

Australopithecus sediba

In what could rewrite the story of human origins, palaeontologists have discovered two ancient skeletons in South Africa, which they claim suggest that true humans may have emerged later than previously believed.

An international team, led by Lee Berger of University of Witwatersrand, has spotted the 1.9 million-year-old fossils of the two skeletons — possibly from a mother and son, having human and ape-like traits — in a South African cave.

It is suggested that this species, called Australopithecus sediba, may be a transitional species between the southern African Australopithecus africanusand either Homo habilis or even the later Homo erectus (Turkana boy, Java man, Peking man). The species has long arms, like an ape, short powerful hands, a very derived, Homo-like pelvis and long legs and was capable of striding and possibly running like a human, although the femur and tibia are fragmentary and the foot is more primitive.

Read the full article here.

Jive

TVS launched Jive, the first clutch-less bike in India. The technology is touted to reduce stress on the left hand as there is no need to operate a clutch anymore.

The engine is mated to TVS Motor Company’s innovative T-Matic technology which includes the four gear rotary gearbox that allows the rider to shift gears like a conventional bike except without the need to press a clutch. Further to this, the rider can start the bike in any gear and even while braking, the bike will come to a halt in any gear without jerks or stalling the engine. To make matters even easier, TVS has put an electric start on the bike as standard fitment.

It is priced at Rs. 42,235/- ex-showroom, Delhi. For more details, read this.

Abel Prize

John Tate of the United States wins the Abel Prize in 2010 “for his vast and lasting impact on the theory of numbers”. So, what is this Abel Prize?

The Abel Prize is an international prize presented annually by the King of Norway to one or more outstanding mathematicians. The prize is named after Norwegian mathematician Niels Henrik Abel (1802–1829). It has often been described as the “mathematician’s Nobel” prize and is among the most prestigious awards in mathematics. It comes with a monetary award of six million kroner, which in 2009 was €684,000 or US$929,000.

The only Indian by origin to win it so far was S. R. Srinivasa Varadhan in 2007 “for his fundamental contributions to probability theory and in particular for creating a unified theory of large deviation”.

iPad

The highly anticipated iPad tablet was launched recently and priced suprisingly low at $499 for 16GB of storage.

The iPad can run movies, games and a gamut of applications. And taking on e-readers like Amazon’s Kindle, Apple announced a digital bookstore called iBooks that will let users buy from publishers including Pearson Plc’s Penguin, News Corp’s HarperCollins, and Hachette Book Group.

Shares of Apple rose to as high as $210.58 after the pricing news, up 5.5 percent from their session low. The stock closed up 0.94 percent at $207.88 on Nasdaq, within reach of its all-time high of $215.59 logged on Jan 5.

Apple announced a data plan with AT&T Inc, which appeared to have beaten out Verizon Wireless for the deal.

The iPad is Apple’s biggest product launch since the iPhone three years ago, and arguably rivals the smartphone as the most anticipated in the company’s history.

Apple hopes to sell consumers on the value of tablets after other technology companies, including Microsoft Corp and Toshiba Corp, have failed in recent years.  As iPod sales wane, Apple is looking for another growth engine.

Jobs said there was a need for a new type of device that would sit between a smartphone and laptop computer, and that can perform tasks like browse the Web and play games. The iPad has a near life-sized touch keyboard and supports Web browsing. It comes with a built-in calendar and address book.

Click here and here to read more.

Smart Band Aid

According to this article, clinical trials have begun of a smart plaster – a sensor-studded band aid that wirelessly monitors vital signs. Once stuck to a patient’s chest, the band aid monitors heart rate, blood pressure and other health indicators. Its creators hope it will eventually take over from the wired devices that limit a patient’s movement. As well as monitoring standard vital signs, the gadget can be tuned to capture far more subtle indicators of a patient’s condition.

Initial trials will test the integrity of the data being gathered and transmitted by the plaster to ensure it gives accurate readings of a patient’s condition. The basic device monitors temperature, heart rate and respiration. The second series of trials will see it placed on patients who are recovering from minor illnesses and assess how it fares when the patient has a shower or an x-ray.

The smart plaster was developed at Imperial College by Professor Chris Toumazou who wanted a way to improve the range of data that can be gathered from a patient that did not involve festooning them with more wires and dermal patches.

Gordon Murray’s T.27

Gordon Murray, an ex-McLaren Formula One designer has come up with a trio of prototypes of his T.27 electric car that will cater for city or town use. The T.25 (its predecessor) tips the scales at a mere 600kg, which is half the weight of a small family car on average. The T.27 comes with a tubular frame to absorb energy and does well to pass all relevant safety tests.

The manufacturing process, called iStream, has received £9m of investment, half of which came from the government’s Technology Strategy Board. iStream plants can be just one fifth of the size of a conventional car factory, as the cars are not made from stamped steel. All the parts are designed by computer and welded together rather than being stamped out of metal sheets, explained David Bott, Director of Innovation Platforms at the Technology Strategy Board.

Read this news article to know more.

New ocean forming in African desert

In 2005, a gigantic, 35-mile-long rift broke open the desert ground in Ethiopia. At the time, some geologists believed the rift was the beginning of a new ocean as two parts of the African continent pulled apart, but the claim was controversial.

Now, scientists from several countries have confirmed that the volcanic processes at work beneath the Ethiopian rift are nearly identical to those at the bottom of the world’s oceans, and the rift is indeed likely the beginning of a new sea.

African and Arabian tectonic plates meet in the desert, and have been slowly pulling apart for roughly 30 million years. The same movement has also been parting the Red Sea. But this is only at a speed of less than 1 inch per year.

The new study, published in the latest issue of Geophysical Research Letters, suggests that the highly active volcanic boundaries along the edges of tectonic ocean plates may suddenly break apart in large sections, instead of little by little as has been predominantly believed. In addition, such sudden large-scale events on land pose a much more serious hazard to populations living near the rift than would several smaller events

Click here and here to read more.