technizzel

According to the 2006 Nielson study, cited in USA Today, an average American family watches about 8 hours and 14 minutes of television a day. Clearly, since the days of turning knobs for volume and channels have vanished, the hours spent in front of this tube have only increased. It’s almost sad to say that the days of referring to the television set as a tube are also numbered because let’s face it- a flat screen is just beautiful.

Yes, beautiful, because now unlike the regular CRTs (Cathode Ray Tube) that we have grown up with, we have our HDTVs- sleek, shiny models that mock the bulky sets of black boxes sitting on tables about to fall due to accruing layers of dust. It’s not as if we can even walk into Circuit City, and say, “Yes, I would like that 30 inch TV over there.” There are Direct View TVs, projection sets, LCDs, and Plasmas…but if they’re all TVs, what’s better? What’s the best? What’s the difference?

The two most popular types of televisions in the up and coming market are LCDs (Liquid Crystal Display) and Plasma. To the naked eye, each shares physical similarities; however, what lies beneath the surface is what characterizes these two displays. The plasma monitor, for example, functions by the help of tiny gas plasma cells that are charged by exact electrical voltages to create a picture. While also being able to show blacks better, providing better contrasts when demonstrating other colors, the plasma screen offers a higher resolution than either the CRT or the LCD monitor. At the moment, plasma also offers wider viewing angles than either TV. Its characterizing mark, though, is how it can be molded into a lightweight mode of style, perhaps only three inches wide able to hang on your wall like a picture frame- it’s too bad that they’re just a smidgen beyond a college student’s budget!

LCDs, on the other hand, offer a compromise that is seemingly ideal. Unlike plasmas, the LCD operates with the use of a liquid crystal solution that wavers between a solid and liquid state and rests between two polarizing transparent panels. Innately are lightweight by design, which makes them perfect for laptop and desktop monitors or any screen less than forty inches. The most enticing aspect of the LCD screen is that the burn-in settles in at a much slower rate than the plasma, allowing for a longer lifespan.

Sadly, each screen has a few drawbacks that prove difficult when having to make the choice for yourself. With the LCDs, for example, they have lesser quality in black levels which mean that colors are not as vibrant. The viewing angle is narrower as well, and instead of looking uniform throughout the screen, certain areas appear lighter or darker which take away from the overall viewing appeal.

Not to take away from the pleasure of watching an LCD screen because they do offer quality that rivals any plasma monitor; it’s just that the plasma screen has very few faults. Such perfection, though, comes at a steep price- the prime fault. Plasma screens also provide a lesser native resolution- the resolution at which a TV or monitor is designed to display images. And the worst facet is its susceptibility to a quick burn-in, which attributes to its shorter life-span.

However, to the viewer sitting in front of the television set for eight hours a day, I doubt he or she would notice the narrow viewing angles of the LCD or the lesser native resolution of the plasma. Each screen offers a myriad of positives, but naturally is coupled with negatives that force the consumer to be wary of choice. If you are interested for a long-lasting TV but willing to sacrifice quality, shoot for the LCD, but if you want to show off a sleek design, go with a plasma. Just don’t forget what it was like watching saved by the bell on ye old cathode ray tube!

Video Link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=3DAr8Udu-vU

All throughout the country, gas prices are still climbing to numbers that seem to unhinge wallets, yet jaws even wider. Car advertisements now highlight gas mileage efficiency rather than the quality of steering and handling. Thus, the era of the Hybrid has begun, and with it, revolutions in saving power and energy have become the forefront innovations in recent cars. As hybrids rely primarily on the battery, recharging this mechanism to exhume the maximum power is vital to prolonging the existence of this car. One such way is via the braking system.

Everyone is quite familiar with the concept of friction, a force that resists the direction of motion and reduces the force causing that motion. Now the braking system of most hybrids transfers the torque from the wheels into the motor shaft through chains and gears. The electric motor inside, maintains the ability to convert electric energy into mechanical (normal) as well as mechanical energy, such as heat, a byproduct of friction, back into electric (regenerative). Located on the shaft of the motor, also known as a rotor, are magnets that move past electric coils on the stator, the stationary part of a motor. This creates electricity which is delivered to the battery in the form of electrical energy. In laymen’s terms, this process is defined as turning the electric motor backwards to convert the mechanical energy into electric energy. The regenerative nature of the braking system and the conversion of mechanical energy into electrical energy are very efficient processes and contribute to saving the car’s power.

And although the process rests on the good principle of recycling, Bradley Berman, editor of hybridcars.com, says, “Actually, the batteries are charged most of the time by the electric motor, powered by the gas engine and functioning as a generator. Only about 30% of the braking energy is regenerated. The rest is wasted as heat. Regenerating the braking energy accounts for perhaps 10% of the total used to recharge the batteries, unless one is driving downhill and braking most the time.”

In a full hybrid car, two forces work together to recharge the battery in addition to the regenerative braking system. The mighty combination of an electric motor and an internal-combustion engine power the vehicle, in which the engine keeps the battery charged. If Mr. Berman is correct, as much of the world’s driving population will not be driving downhill or braking often, then these two parts provide for a better electrical source than the transfer of kinetic energy.

Currently, the cost of replacing such a battery is an amount not yet fathomed, as most are still under warranty. Yet as the hybrid becomes a popular car of the decade, sporting styles and comforts to meet the rigid requirements of teens and save-the-world patriots alike, the fuel-efficient car is sparking ingenuity in the automotive industry today. Perhaps as years persist and the hybrids go from luxury to necessity, the technologies for recharging this battery will extend not only from the brakes but any system involving a mechanical-electrical operation.

Video link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=Kogz4wedwtk

Whether you’re at a party, a wedding, a birthday, or just chilling with some friends on a Friday afternoon, a camera has always found itself at the scene as well. With our digital cameras, we forgo the limitations of the 24 film rolls and click away to albums with fifty or more photos. The onset of Facebook^® has only furthered this interest of capturing every moment at every event, as every picture is now shared with all your friends with teasing captions to highlight the emotions.

Now and then, though, there comes that arduous task of showing Grandma what you have been up to in those past months, and oddly enough she is not your Facebook^® friend and cannot see those embarrassing images of you at 2 AM in Cancun. Thus, you are left with the option of printing them out from your computer, slowly sucking the very ink that would fuel your term papers into a one-inch thick album of random innocuous pictures of you.

Imagine, now, an alternative that saves your ink, your time, and is fast and easy to use. Clearly that argument has won you over, and that is exactly what Zink^® claims with its product. Zink^® (Zero INK) is a fully-funded start-up company that grew from the Polaroid^® Company in 2005. Since then, the company has channeled its name throughout the country by sponsoring the ideals of promoting new technology, innovating ideas, and creating a future without ink. The key to Zink^®’s success, having birthed over twenty billion prints in the United States alone in 2007, is the unique paper.

This paper’s special technology enables for the images to print on surface without the messy hassle of wet ink or replacing empty ink cartridges. As zink.com explains, this paper is “an advanced composite material with dye crystals embedded inside and a protective polymer overcoat layer outside”. These crystals are colorless before printing, resembling regular white photo printing paper, however with the use of heat, Zink^®’s printer activates the crystals to render perfect digital images from your camera.

The most enticing aspect of this product is the size of the printer. In this day and age, where the smaller it is, the better it is, Zink^® printers can fit in the palm of your hand, in your pocket, become attached to your cell phone, or just mundanely sit on your desk. Anywhere, anytime you want a picture, just print!

While the paper is water-resistant, resists fading from exposure to light, heat and humidity, affordable, non-toxic and earth-friendly, as well as durable, Zink^® also provides even more incentives to buy its product. With high-resolution colors on paper not sensitive to light these pictures will never lose color with age. Regardless of the size of the picture, the speed is fast, the process is efficient, as there is nothing to throw away. No more ribbons, toner, or ink- it’s Zink^® time!

The future may be a little short of the Space Odyssey’s expectations, but that doesn’t deter Zink^® from experimenting with smaller printers, newer forms of paper, and other unfathomable printing phenomenons. At least at the moment, you can just zink Grandma images- less time, no ink. And that’s right- for the future, zink is the new print; it’s all about the future now.

Video Link: http://www.zink.com/discover/how_ZINK_works/

 Written by: Ben Jabbawy, Cornell University

Tom, a friend of mine who recently graduated as a Materials Science major, is very excited about his work at Intel.

What triggered your interest in applying to engineering programs?

The story you’ll hear from a lot of engineers is that they were simply good at math and science and it only seemed natural to apply to engineering schools. However for me, it was more about wanting to understand how and why things around me worked, from something as simple as an alarm clock to something much more complex like an automobile or even a computer.

Which class stands out most for you? Why?

The classes I enjoyed most were the ones that opened my eyes to amazing new technologies that could revolutionize the way we live our lives. The most impressive of these was a class focused on organic electronics. When thinking of electronics you normally imagine copper wires, lead batteries, silicon computer chips, and other inorganic materials. This class taught me about a whole new class of plastics and other organic materials which performed the functions of normal inorganic materials. What was even better about these materials is that they could be printed onto flexible plastic sheets to form futuristic devices like electronic newspapers and solar energy producing windows.

What was your major?

My major was Materials Science which focuses on the physics and theory of why materials behave the way they do. So for example we learned why metals when bent will keep their form, why plastics when bent will return to their original form, and why ceramics when bent will shatter. This major also included some revolutionary laboratory research like the organic electronics I mentioned above. This gave undergraduates the ability to apply their classroom learning in a real world situation in a cutting edge laboratory environment.

Were you apart of any cool student groups or project teams related to science?

I was part of an amazing research group which eventually became some of my best friends at Cornell. We all worked extremely hard in the lab and then loved to celebrate after successfully publishing a scientific paper or discovering something previously unknown to the scientific community.

What does Intel do?

Intel is the world’s largest computer chip producer. Chances are the computer you use daily has an Intel computer chip inside. We make computer chips for desktops, laptops, and even super powerful server computers which process the huge amounts of information that travels through the internet on a daily basis.

Where do you fit in at Intel?

Making a computer chip takes hundreds and even thousands of process steps. My position is called a Process Engineer, which basically means that I am in charge of a particular step, or process, required in making a computer chip. This involves running silicon wafers through large, highly complicated equipment capable of adding or removing extremely thin layers of material, which create billions of transistors. These transistors act as on/off switches and form the basis all computer chips.

What kind of cutting edge work are you involved in?

I currently work in Intel’s newest and most advanced computer chip manufacturing plant. This plant has equipment which is capable of creating features as small as 65 nanometers. This is 150,000 times smaller than a centimeter and far smaller than what the human eye can see. Because we can create such tiny features, we are able to cram more transistors and therefore more computing power into a computer chip. 

As you may well know, there are many facets of engineering. Today, I’d like to focus on Materials Science Engineering (MS&E).

Q: So what is MS&E anyway?

MS&E is a growing field within engineering that examines the properties of different existing materials, the development of new materials and the improvement of those we encounter every day. Many high tech industries that have been developing over the past few years (nanotechnology, biotechnology) heavily rely on the research and developments in this field.

Q: What real world applications does MS&E have?

As handheld devices (MP3 players, cell phones, and laptops) continue to get smaller and more powerful, the need for lighter weight, radiation resistant, self cooling materials continues to grow. Materials Science engineers are continuously studying material properties in order to find the right glue to adhere an artificial heart without infecting the body, or the strongest, yet lightest, form of protection to put in bullet proof vests for soldiers. Understanding materials is a crucial part of our society, even if these properties just help us clean our lenses on reading glasses! Here is an example of a water resistant wood currently in development for use on ships, trucks and cabins.

Q: What sort of classes do you take when studying MS&E?

MS&E classes include physics and chemistry, atomic & molecular structures of matter, electronic and magnetic properties of materials, ceramics and many others that deeply the properties of the materials that surround us.

Q: What are typical career paths taken after graduating with a degree in MS&E?

MS&E graduates go into a wide range of fields. Many continue researching new alternative materials, some with the hopes of developing an alternative to silicon computer chips. Others pursue biological applications of MS&E to help build artificial limbs. Those interested in working for large companies go on to work for major companies such as Kodak, Intel, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Motorola and Xerox.

An MS&E friend of mine describes the major like so:

Materials Science focuses on the physics and theory of why materials behave the way they do. So for example we learned why metals when bent will keep their form, why plastics when bent will return to their original form, and why ceramics when bent will shatter.

Every now and then, we will take a deeper look into some of our favorite gadgets in order to get a better understanding of how they work and the technology they involve.

To start, let’s examine the iPod craze. Besides their small size, light weight and aesthetic beauty, what is inside the iPod that makes everything click so well? More generally, what allows us to take these MP3 players anywhere and listen to thousands of songs, TV shows or movies in the palm of our hands, or in the iPod shuffle’s case, our fingertips?

To give you some perspective, consider burning a CD from your computer. On average, one CD holds about 15-16 songs, right? Think about that for a second…how can something less than half the size of a CD hold hundreds more songs? MP3 files enable the storage of musical information by squeezing the data into about one twelfth as much space. You can make MP3 files that are smaller or larger by compressing them by different amounts, but the more you compress them the worse they’ll sound.

Inside an MP3 file, music is stored as long strings of binary numbers (zeros and ones) in a series of chunks called frames. Each frame starts with a short header, including the track name, artist, genre, etc, almost like a table of contents. The music data is stored directly afterward. The reason MP3 players, namely iPod’s, have become so popular, is because they can store many many more MP3’s in a smaller space. A normal track from a CD requires about 60 Megabytes of storage space, compared to an average of 5 Megabytes per MP3 file.

An MP3 is just another type of computer file (jpeg, doc to name a few others). Therefore, the iPod, or any MP3 player is essentially a miniature computer. In fact, these handheld “computers” are more powerful than the early desktops from 20 years ago that would fill up an entire room!

All MP3 players have similar components under their pretty shells:

Most MP3 players have another output as well: a little display that tells you what’s playing. It basically just relays the information in the short header discussed earlier.

Next time you turn on your iPod, imagine what’s going on inside the gadget. As you scroll to your favorite song, the processor searches the hard-drive for the desired track, matching the short header. Next, it reads through the frames related to that specific MP3 file. It displays the artist and track name on the display, then begins to turn the digital information stored in each frame as ones and zeros back into sound frequencies that travel through your headphones. Music to your ears!