The State of Fear

It is one of those things I guess,  as you get older you completely forget part of one's thinking process that was started,  and never really went anywhere. Until that is, it is "awakened again" for introspection.

So if you find similarities to other bloggers and the title of this blog to theirs it is because four years ago I had started the thought process below in regards to climate change. I had created this blog called, "The State of Fear" in concert with reading the book, The State of Fear by Michael Crichton.

                                                                                                                       Adult mountain pine beetle,

                                                                                                                       Dendroctonus ponderosae

Some quotes from it were correlations in my mind about points made in context of the fiction that were relevant to me about where I lived and what was happening to the forests around me.

"I'm glad you do," Bradley said, gesturing for the kids to put their hands down. The only person talking today would be Ted Bradley. "But you may not know that global warming is going to cause a very sudden shift in our climate. Maybe just a few months or years, and it will suddenly be much hotter or much colder. And there will be hordes of insects and diseases that will take down wonderful trees."
"What kind of insects?" one kid asked.
"Bad ones," Bradley said. "The ones that eat trees, that worm inside them and chew them up." He wiggled his hands, suggesting the worming in progress.
"It would take a insect a long time to eat a whole tree," a girl offered.
"No it wouldn't!" Bradley said. "That's the trouble. Because warming means lots and lots of insects will come-a plague of insects-and they'll eat the trees fast!"

Page 402 of, The State of Fear by Michael Crichton

See also: You Kids Know What Global Warming Is?

*** 

Ecology of Thought

Now we have stocked in our wood shed the effects of this devastation that has run through our forests. I again have to interject not only with a scientific understanding but of one that emotively draws my attention to the "source of income" that has provided for the growth of my family, and the trees that support me today.

“I do not think anything, young man. I know. That is the purpose of my research - to know things, not to surmise them. Not to theorize. Not to hypothesize. But to know from direct research in the field. It’s a lost art in academia these days, young man-you are not that young- what is your name anyway?”
“Peter Evans.”
“And you work for Drake Mr. Evan?”
“No, for George Morton.”
“Well, why didn’t you say so!” Hoffman said. “George Morton was a great, great man. Come along Mr. Evans, and I will buy you some coffee and we can talk. Do you know what I do?”
“ I’m afraid I don’t, sir.”
“I study the ecology of thought,” Hoffman said. “and how it has led to a State of Fear.”

Michael Crichton, State of Fear, page 450

***

Now I have not spoken of what comes to past, as it may seem that prophecy has a way about it hidden in the fiction. To have been given the understanding that "prior knowledge" provides the thinking palate for what can come tomorrow in science, does not explain how is it that I could dream of this happening one day too, to see what I had envision long before. My wanting to save the forest perhaps.

Imagine a Genus 1 figured Tree , and it would not have been to unlikely that such vibrating could have amounted to "a signature" for the beetle to have it's dislikes( also patterned) motivating them to leave? But I think this now in retrospect of what was happening at the time in my dream and wonder about what evolves in terms of what came into expression(false vacuum to true) houses a description of the beetle somewhere in the valley of a vast theoretic expression.

So, I had a solution for this devastation that does not fit with the normal thinking, so I'll leave this alone too, because it would not be a satisfactory explanation to what the scientific process would be called as credible. You see I cared about what we were taking from the forest and I thought to explore avenues to provide for better growing seedlings, that replanting could immediately produce superior seedlings, hence a faster regrowth in areas to be replanted.

No one I think is better then nature to say what shall be and what shall not, but looking into the environment of what grows where and what soils are like, I couldn't help but think of what I could do to help give back to what we took out of the forests.

So how could I help Silviculture? By designing a better and stronger tree? No, again the perfect remedy is in what nature has provided.

***

In nature it is the cold, that has to be colder then, for an extended period in order to cut through the bark these bugs inject Blue Stain Fungi into the outer ring of the wood.  So nature by process of the beetle has left it's mark in what is called a "blue wood."

Natures past practise was to burn,  and in the forest, what quickly burns also returns to the previous states that existed long before we came along. This is the way of it as it had been in the past,  but today, we are very watchful of our forests and what can wipe out towns and cities very quickly if we left this unchecked.

So I have to apologize for my forgetfulness as to what was started before.

Do You Think This Cloud Experiment is Important?

"The aim of CLOUD is to understand whether or not cosmic rays can affect clouds and climate, by studying the microphysical interactions of cosmic rays with aerosols, cloud droplets and ice particles." This is one of the possible mechanisms for solar-climate variability since the solar wind – the stream of charged particles ejected from the sun – varies over time and affects the intensity of the cosmic rays that reach the Earth.See: On Cloud Nine

I have always refrained from speaking on the climate change topic mostly because I really did not know enough. I was uncertain as to whether we really had all the facts about what was taking place. This in no way was to limit the perspective on how we can make our world a better place, or create a better environ.

I just wanted these facts included in the assessment in terms of what scientists are actually doing now.  This then opens the mind up to whether the process here is valid one to take into consideration along with how we view climate change.

The Cloud Chamber in the Museum of Cavendish

Historically the validation of the process, it is necessary to converge on some notation about it's beginnings to know that it can evolve to what it is today. This is a necessary part of moving forward in experimental validation processes toward foundational thinking and our actions in the future. Our Actions now.

CLOUD – Cosmics Leaving OUtdoor Droplets

CLOUD is an experiment that uses a cloud chamber to study the possible link between galactic cosmic rays and cloud formation. Based at the Proton Synchrotron at CERN, this is the first time a high-energy physics accelerator has been used to study atmospheric and climate science; the results could greatly modify our understanding of clouds and climate.
Cosmic rays are charged particles that bombard the Earth's atmosphere from outer space. Studies suggest they may have an influence on the amount of cloud cover through the formation of new aerosols (tiny particles suspended in the air that seed cloud droplets). This is supported by satellite measurements, which show a possible correlation between cosmic-ray intensity and the amount of low cloud cover. Clouds exert a strong influence on the Earth’s energy balance; changes of only a few per cent have an important effect on the climate. Understanding the underlying microphysics in controlled laboratory conditions is a key to unravelling the connection between cosmic rays and clouds.

The CLOUD experiment involves an interdisciplinary team of scientists from 18 institutes in 9 countries, comprised of atmospheric physicists, solar physicists, and cosmic-ray and particle physicists. The PS provides an artificial source of ‘cosmic rays’ that simulates natural conditions as closely as possible. A beam of particles is sent into a reaction chamber and its effects on aerosol production are recorded and analysed.

The initial stage of the experiment uses a prototype detector, but the full CLOUD experiment will include an advanced cloud chamber and a reactor chamber, equipped with a wide range of external instrumentation to monitor and analyse their contents. The temperature and pressure conditions anywhere in the atmosphere can be re-created within the chambers, and all experimental conditions can be controlled and measured, including the ‘cosmic ray’ intensity and the contents of the chambers.See:CLOUD–Cosmics Leaving OUtdoor Droplets

Again I am remaining open to all points of view that are scientifically based and point toward a better understanding of our relationship with the effects of what we are doing to our planet.

Taking Cosmic Rays for a spin

SuperCDMS An Improvement on Detection

So far no WIMP interaction has been observed, so the sensitivity needs to be improved further. This will be achieved by increasing the total detector mass (and with this the probability that a WIMP interacts in the detector) and at the same time reducing the background and improving the discrimination power. This effort started in 2009 under the name SuperCDMS.

The first set of new detectors has been installed in the experimental setup at Soudan and is operating since summer 2009. First tests show that the background levels are in the expected range. Over the course of the next year all CDMS detectors will be replaced by the new larger detectors. The active mass will increase by more than a factor of three to about 15 kg.See:CDMS and SuperCDMS Experiments

***

It is known since the 1930's that a significant part of the mass of the universe is invisible. This invisible material has been named Dark Matter. Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) are considered as one of the most convincing explanation for this phenomenon.See:SuperCDMS Queen's Home

***

SNOLAB is an underground science laboratory specializing in neutrino and dark matter physics. Situated two km below the surface in the Vale Inco Creighton Mine located near Sudbury Ontario Canada, SNOLAB is an expansion of the existing facilities constructed for the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO) solar neutrino experiment. SNOLAB follows on the important achievements in neutrino physics achieved by SNO and other underground physics measurements. The primary scientific emphasis at SNOLAB will be on astroparticle physics with the principal topics being:
Low Energy Solar Neutrinos;
Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay;
Cosmic Dark Matter Searches;
Supernova Neutrino Searches.

***

The Sudbury Neutrino Laboratory, located two kilometres below the surface, is the site of groundbreaking international research.

 The 17-metre-wide SNO detector in Vale Inco’s Creighton Mine.
Ernest Orlando, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

Update:
Latest Results in the Search for Dark Matter
Thursday, December 17, 2009

 

 

Dark Matter Detected, or Not? Live Blogging the Seminar

by JoAnne

Sounding Off on the Dark Matter Issue

Fermilab

If dark matter can pull gravitationally, it has mass

So here is an article of 2006 with some interesting information. Now these experimental procedures are always interesting to me because of the type of detectors that were dreamt up in which to measure some aspect of the reality supposed, and realized, by noise in the background.

For scientists to "hear" a dark matter particle, it must hit an atom in one of the crystals at the heart of the CDMS detectors. The crystals are kept cold—close to absolute zero—to reduce atomic movement, keeping the crystals quiet. The detectors "listen" for vibrations inside the crystal, like ears listening for vibrations in the air.

The detectors contain two kinds of crystals, germanium and silicon. A germanium atom is larger than a silicon one: Its nucleus has 73 protons and neutrons compared to silicon's 28. This size difference helps CDMS sort out yet another source of background—neutrons. High-energy cosmic rays and radioactive decays in the matter surrounding the detectors can produce neutrons. Hitting atoms in the crystals, these neutrons cause a "sound" in the detectors similar to the one made by the predicted dark matter particles.See: Listening for whispers of dark matter

Model of the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search which translates actual data into sound and light. We have not yet had a dark matter interaction, but we have lots of particles hitting the detectors and that is what you are watching. A downloadable version is at my webpage http://www.hep.umn.edu/~prisca More info on our experiment can be found at http://cdms.berkeley.edu and http://www.soudan.umn.edu

So lets mover forward here to Dec 10, while waiting to hear on Dec 17 for more news.

The CDMS collaboration has completed the analysis of the final CDMS-II runs, which more than doubled the total data from all previous runs combined. The collaboration is working hard to complete the first scientific publication about these new results and plans to submit the manuscript to arXiv.org before the two primary CDMS talks scheduled for Thursday, Dec. 17, at Fermilab and at SLAC. See:The search for dark matter:has CDMS found something?

Update:
Latest Results in the Search for Dark Matter
Thursday, December 17, 2009

Dark Matter Detected, or Not? Live Blogging the Seminar

by JoAnne

What Began all Else Follows

ISAACSON: The virtue of tolerance, which I think is the most important virtue we need in the 21st century. When Thomas Jefferson wrote the first draft of the Declaration, he had a great line, "We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable." And Franklin crossed out "sacred and undeniable" and put, "We hold these truths to be self evident." [Franklin] said we need to be a very tolerant nation in which our rights are based on reason, not based on religion, and I think in this century, we have to be tolerant of all religions and all tribes, and that was the thing that Benjamin Franklin taught us.Isaacson on Benjamin Franklin book

Benjamin looked to the native population of the early Americas, and in the spirit of good science asked that this constitution remove religious dogma from it's inception. Native, and immigrant treated the same principled without due cosideration?

It is the belief then for me that inside we are all not so different.

The questions about democracy's seem to be precluded these days by the injustice that one might feel is taking place at the time. It orientates the mind to ask what use these democracies if they cannot protect the rights granted under these constitutions. Some might think that loosing sight of the message of what constitutes that democracy is to loose sight of it in the skirmishes all around it, in gay issues or gender inequalities. Racism.

I never did see these things as productive to the understanding of equalities( not that they did not exist or were necessary issues to try and understand),  that we administer with regard to respect and right to expression, but more the understanding that all three could be understood if we went further into our own makeup to understand that this effort is to find "a beginning within us" that is much purer and designed prior too, the time we may take to spend our lives here in this environ.

I have really tried to look past all this to get to the "heart of the matter."  Not to be drawn into those skirmishes( does not mean I do not care). It was better for me to understand what it is that applies to all people regardless of these differences of opinion about and what is felt as inhibiting the right of expression.

I mean being apart from the American dream and living in Canada, these principles did not escape myself as I look to my own founding fathers and the start of countries that became democratically based in principal.

Top 10 Most Interesting 4th of July Facts

9. Benjamin Franklin and John Adams were given an offer to write the Declaration of Independence but refused.

Franklin and Adams’ reason for turning the offer down was because they believed that Americans would be prejudiced if they learned that they were the ones who wrote it. But that did not stop Franklin from putting in a good number of corrections before the declaration’s final draft was done. One of these was inserting the line “and the pursuit of happiness” to substitute for the version Thomas Jefferson wrote that only had “property” on it.

So this became more the effort to understand the historical to try and bring perspective to what all peoples have in common, that we do not see these differences "in the inequalities" but to grant the patience and foresight to see all humanity regardless of these things. (Not to practise escapism)

So there has to be something said about what and how you feel inside to administer perspective and time fought in those skirmishes, to see that one can be affected and feel that they are labelled and are fitting a certain profile according to the idea of what those skirmishes mean.

The Power of Myth, by Joseph Campbell
With Bill Moyers,

Myth and the Modern World, Pg 31,

"Campbell:Yes. This is the first Nation in the world that was ever established on the basis of reason instead of simply warfare. These were eighteen-century deists, these genetlemen. Over here we read, In God We Trust." But that is not the God of the Bible. These men did not believe in a Fall. They did not think the mind of man was cut off from God. The mind of man, cleansed of secondary and merely temporal concerns, beholds with radiance of a cleansed mirror a reflection of the rational mind of God. Reason puts you in touch with God. Consequently, for these men, there is no special revelation anywhere, and none is needed, because the mind of man cleared of its fallibilities is sufficiently capable of the knowledge of God. All people in the world are capable of reason. All men are capable of reason. That is the fundamental principle of democracy. Because everybody's mind is capable of true knowledge, you don't have to have special authority, or a special revelation telling you that this is the way things should be.

So yes I do not waste time being "in the conflict" but ponder more the facets of the equilibrates to see that the measure of politeness and respect, lies not only in the act of writing those constitutions, that by recognition then,  any business person inclined,  will recognize the company adventure,  to also know,  that the other side of this writing can be for non profit.

People who gather to form  based on the adoptions in principle will speak to goals,structure and etiquette of the organization.

What Does Information Mean in Science?

Only time will tell if Einstein was correct when he said, "But the creative principle resides in mathematics. In a certain sense, therefore, I hold it true that pure thought can grasp reality, as the ancients dreamed."

The March 29 burst changes everything," said co-author Dr. Stan Woosley, University of California, Santa Cruz. Just as the Rosetta stone helped us understand a lost, ancient language, this burst will serve as a tool to decode gamma-ray bursts. It's now known for certain that at least some gamma-ray bursts are produced when black holes, or perhaps very unusual neutron stars, are born inside massive stars, according to the team.

Most certainly it is not without scientific value that I would say that all means to measure information, has to have a "simplistic modality" with which science garners it's view about and is correlative too. So in this sense, this program although dating back too, December of 2007, it's values are still retained.

So with this regard to the article and program below, information was an entropic realization in the expression of this universe. What are the constituents that form the state of the universe?

I enjoyed the humor as it manifested with this group of people. If anything is to help one remember the context of this information it always seems to be deeper entrench in memory if it can be light hearted and funny, as I found this hour and half to be.

WATERLOO, ON, December 17, 2007 - A recent panel discussion about ‘The Physics of Information’ from Canada’s Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics (PI), will air across Canada on CBC’s ‘Quirks and Quarks’ radio program. The Public Lecture will be broadcast via CBC Radio One on Saturday, January 5th from 12:06 to 1:00pm.

The program includes four top scientists who gathered in Waterloo, Ontario, in early December to hold a discussion for general audiences about the very essence of information and how this might inspire fruitful new approaches to some of the hardest problems in modern physics. Over 600 people attended to learn how a greater appreciation of information relates to the paradoxes of quantum mechanics, the beginning of the universe and our understanding of black holes.  The insights were surprising, enlightening and even controversial.See: The Physics of Information: From Entanglement to Black Holes

http://streamer.perimeterinstitute.ca/mp3/885c534d-2140-496a-8f73-6db23b011504.mp3

Now also, within this context, if one were to think of the ? and where all four forces joined, then what said this state prior too, cannot be allotted to the energy "before compartmentalization."  Is this not how us humans crystallize the way in which we experience this reality? That at birth, and with some now, such centering, in weighting the sensory categories,  help to define what existed scientifically as a concept of what begins, begins as it did in the beginning of this universe.

Fundamental Forces

This perspective may be confusing for some, but until you see emotive values expressed as artistic renditions that are evoked by Kandinsky as he did in his artwork, or, others who evoke this "cross wiring" as to how sounds and color associate, then how is it what gathered in the human perspective to allot reality the way it is? A "sensory adaptation" to methods to which we define aspects of the reality and seek to embed methods to which we measure that reality.



Wassily Kandinsky-Yellow, Red, Blue
1925; Oil on canvas, 127x200cm; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

September 18, 2009–January 13, 2010Pioneer of abstract art and eminent aesthetic theorist, Vasily Kandinsky (b. 1866, Moscow; d. 1944, Neuilly-sur-Seine, France) broke new ground in painting in the first decades of the twentieth century. His seminal pre–World War I treatise Über das Geistige in der Kunst (On the Spiritual in Art), published in Munich in December 1911, lays out his program for developing an art independent of one’s observations of the external world. In this and other texts, as well as his art, Kandinsky strove to use abstraction to give painting the freedom from nature that he admired in music. His discovery of a new subject matter based solely on the artist’s “inner necessity” occupied him throughout his life.

Also.....

The term "Composition" can imply a metaphor with music. Kandinsky was fascinated by music's emotional power. Because music expresses itself through sound and time, it allows the listener a freedom of imagination, interpretation, and emotional response that is not based on the literal or the descriptive, but rather on the abstract quality that painting, still dependent on representing the visible world, could not provide.

So it is a question then in mind that what began in the very beginning of this universe, also is closely related to what and how we began as we evolved toward the manifestation from another pre-existing state headed toward materialization in the bodily functions, according to this evolution, are standard in expression.


Credit: Weiqun Zhang and Stan Woosley

This image is from a computer simulation of the beginning of a gamma-ray burst. Here we see the jet 9 seconds after its creation at the center of a Wolf Rayet star by the newly formed, accreting black hole within. The jet is now just erupting through the surface of the Wolf Rayet star, which has a radius comparable to that of the sun. Blue represents regions of low mass concentration, red is denser, and yellow denser still. Note the blue and red striations behind the head of the jet. These are bounded by internal shocks.

Human after all, yet capable of experiencing the reality and factoring all measure of, as a truth verification for all that arrive here. An" internal recognition"  of an "outward expression into reality." If one cannot follow the sequence of evens here,  then how is it we can ever ask what begins anew, that the jets them self emit actionable qualities for the new reality? Pushes back time to some beginning. These attributes are measurable quantities that are signaled by,  and are represented in the valuations portrayed on the tscans.


Credit: Super-Kamiokande/Tomasz Barszczak Three (or more?) Cerenkov rings

Multiple rings of Cerenkov light brighten up this display of an event found in the Super-Kamiokande - neutrino detector in Japan. The pattern of rings - produced when electrically charged particles travel faster through the water in the detector than light does - is similar to the result if a proton had decayed into a positron and a neutral pion. The pion would decay immediately to two gamma-ray photons that would produce fuzzy rings, while the positron would shoot off in the opposite direction to produce a clearer ring. Such kinds of decay have been predicted by "grand unified theories" that link three of nature's fundamental forces - the strong, weak and electromagnetic forces. However, there is so far no evidence for such decays; this event, for example, did not stand up to closer scrutiny.

See:Picture of the Week




So we use measurable methods in which to calculate time in the milliseconds when at that time such expressions amounts too, and exhibits,  all of the fundamental forces and the methods to their expressions.


Supernova Starting Gun: Neutrinos

.....Next they independently estimated how the hypothetical neutrinos would be picked up in a detector as massive as Super-Kamiokande in Japan, which contains 50,000 tons of water. The detector would only see a small fraction of the neutrinos. So the team outlined a method for matching the observed neutrinos to the supernova's expected luminosity curve to figure out the moment in time--to within about 10 milliseconds--when the sputtering star would have begun emitting neutrinos. In their supernova model, the bounce, the time of the first gravitational waves, occurs about 5 milliseconds before neutrino emission. So looking back at their data, gravitational wave hunters should focus on that point in time.

An Idea: Percolating to the Surface

If one cannot see the dynamical relation toward "localization of the energy" it will never make sense how such energy can be used to advance sustainability. While they are close in the thinking, the idea, still remains apart from acknowledgement of the substance of the proposal.

Thin-Film Solar with High Efficiency

Solexant is printing inorganic solar cells with nanomaterials.

By Katherine Bourzac

Solar cells made from cheap nanocrystal-based inks have the potential to be as efficient as the conventional inorganic cells currently used in solar panels, but can be printed less expensively. Solexant, a company in San Jose, CA, is currently manufacturing solar cells to test the technology. In order to compete with other thin-film solar companies, Solexant is banking on simpler, cheaper printing processes and materials, as well as lower initial capital costs to build its plants. The company expects to sell modules for $1 per watt, with efficiencies above 10 percent.

Nanocrystal solar: The solar cells at top were made on a roll-to-roll printer from an ink consisting of the rod-shaped inorganic semiconducting nanocrystals shown below. The cells were printed on a flexible metal foil and will be topped with a glass plate. Credit: Solexant

The company has licensed methods for growing nanocrystals and making them into inks from Paul Alivisatos, professor of nanotechnology at the University of California, Berkeley and interim director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. (Alivisatos is on Solexant's board of directors.) Alivisatos says the advantage of these materials is their potential to combine low cost with high performance. Solar cells made from crystalline silicon are efficient at converting sunlight into electricity, but they're expensive to manufacture. To bring down the cost, companies have been developing thin-film solar cells from semiconductors that don't match crystalline silicon's performance but are much less expensive to make.

Solexant's goal is to make cheap thin-film solar cells with relatively high efficiencies. It would not disclose what the nanoparticle inks are made of, but the company says they are suspensions of rod-shaped, semiconducting nanocrystals that are four nanometers in diameter and 20 to 30 nanometers long. The Solexant cells are printed on a metal foil as the substrate. Nanocrystal films are simple to print but have poor electrical properties. Electrons tend to get trapped between the small particles. "The trick with these cells is how to deposit the materials on the fly in a way that makes a very conductive surface," which in turn ensures decent light-to-electricity conversion, says Alivisatos. Solexant begins with nanocrystals because they're easier to print, and heats them as they're printed, causing them to fuse together into larger, high-quality microcrystals that don't have as many places for electrons to lose their way.

The remaining parts of the solar cell, including the electrical contacts and a light-absorbing layer, are also printed on the flexible metal films. This process allows Solexant to print very large areas. When complete, the cells are cut and then topped with a rigid piece of glass.

I wanted to keep a record of these links for examination so besides the blog posting here, a direct link to the authors of this record keeping.

Evidence of Solar PV, Battery and Conservation Advancements

Solar PV

• Technology Review: Thin-Film Solar with High Efficiency
• Technology Review: Superconductors to Wire a Smarter Grid
• Technology Review: Mining Fool's Gold for Solar
• Technology Review: Nanopatterns Improve Thin-Film Solar Cells
• UPDATE 2-Dow to sell solar shingle, sees huge market | Industries | Financial Services | Reuters
• Technology Review: Nano Ink Boost for Silicon Solar
• Technology Review: Advanced Solar Panels Coming to Market
• Good News! Nanosolar Reaches Solar Cell Efficiency of 16.4% and Starts Mass Production : TreeHugger
• Technology Review: Superefficient Solar from Nanotubes
• Technology Review: More Efficient, and Cheaper, Solar Cells
• Power Purchase Agreements Drive Solar Energy
• Technology Review: Nano Printing Goes Large
• Homeowners Shopping for Solar Panels Find Prices Have Dropped
• China Outdoes U.S. in Making Solar Products - NYTimes.com
• Researchers at UNSW claim record 43% conversion efficiency
• Suntech grabs multi-crystalline module efficiency world record - Photovoltaics International
• Renewables Account for 11% of US Energy Production
• Technology Review: Solar Industry: No Breakthroughs Needed
• Electric Company Wants Monthly Fee For Solar Users
• First Solar analyst day post-mortem, Part II: Efficiencies will hit 12.5% by 2012, then surpass 16% - Photovoltaics International
• SunRun Partners with SPG Solar
• Technology Review: Nanopillar Solar Cells
• Solar cell prices continue decline, parity with fossil fuels by 2015
• 52 cents manufactured cost per watt seen by 2014
• Record-breaking solar cells are tailored to their location - tech - 01 July 2009 - New Scientist
• FutureGen 'Clean' Coal Plant Loses 2 Financial Backers
• Technology Review: Roll-Up Solar Panels
• Most Powerful Solar PV Panel: 19.3%
• Renewable Energy Through Micro-Inverters | Apr 2009 Page of
• Sanyo Claims HIT Solar Cell Efficiency of 23% -- Tech-On!
• Technology Review: More AC Power from Solar Panels
• $6.4 Billion for Green Schools
  
• China looking to increase solar power goals by order of magnitude – Computer Chips & Hardware Technology | Geek.com
• Evergreen Solar shifts manufacturing future to China, targets US$1/W in 2012 - Photovoltaics International
• Technology Review: Ink-Jet Printing for Cheaper Solar Cells
• Technology Review: Pushing Plastic Solar Cells
• Taiwan invests 0M in green energy tech, including 400 MWp solar – Tech Products & Geek News | Geek.com
• China Seeing Drop in Manufacturing Cost of Crystalline Si Solar Cell Module -- Tech-On!
• Cost of solar-grade poly-silicon ingots decreasing rapidly – Computer Chips & Hardware Technology | Geek.com
• Suntech pushes Pluto tech to 19% efficiency on monocrystalline solar cells, 17% on multi cells - Photovoltaics International
• Technology Review: Cheap, Durable Nonsilicon Solar Cells
• Technology Review: Nanotubes That See Everything
• Technology Review: Blogs: Potential Energy: Solar Industry Hopeful Despite the Downturn
• Cheap New Solar Cells Made Much More Efficient
• Taking Nature's Cue For Cheaper Solar Power
• Residential Solar PPAs Continue To Drive Solar Market Growth - Renewable Energy World
• EIA Renewable Energy-Solar Photovoltaic Cell/Module Manufacturing Activities
• Plextronics - Light. Power. Circuitry.
• IEEE Spectrum: Super Soaker Inventor Invents New Thermoelectric Generator
• Residential Solar PPAs Continue To Drive Solar Market Growth - Renewable Energy World
• Access : Large-scale pattern growth of graphene films for stretchable transparent electrodes : Nature
• Technology Review: Lifeline for Renewable Power
• Solar Providers Collaborate To Bring Homeowners Low-Cost, Roof-Integrated Installations
• When Will Solar Achieve Grid Parity? We're Already There! -- Seeking Alpha Forums
• Quantum Dots and Ultra-Efficient Solar Cells
• Nano World: Black silicon for solar power
• Technology Review: Betting on Green

Batteries and Storage

• Technology Review: Making Carbon Nanotubes into Long Fibers
• Technology Review: More Energy in Batteries
• Technology Review: Betting on a Metal-Air Battery Breakthrough
• Nickel-Lithium Battery
• Engineering prof lauded as leading innovator | ASU News
• Research
• Technology Review: Blogs: Potential Energy: U.S. Research Agency Focuses on Energy Storage
• Technology Review: Longer-Running Electric-Car Batteries
• Ceramatec Develops 24-hour Solar Energy Storage Battery | Cooler Planet News
• Viruses Grow Lithium-Ion Batteries - Web Extras - ASSEMBLY
• Technology Review: Ultracaps Could Boost Hybrid Efficiency
• Technology Review: Nanowire Advance for Lithium Batteries
• Technology Review: Lithium Battery Recycling Gets a Boost
• New Sony Rechargeable Battery Has 4X The Lifespan Of Current Lithium Ion Batteries | Sony Insider
• Greentech Media: Grid Storage Batteries and Ultracaps: An $8.3B Market by 2016
• Technology Review: A Costly and Unnecessary New Electricity Grid
• A Combined Capacitor and Battery Technology From Japan | New Energy and Fuel
• ZENN Motor Company Completes Additional Equity Investment in EEStor, Inc.
• Technology Review: Nanocapacitors with Big-Energy Storage
• Technology Review: IBM Invests in Battery Research
• Technology Review: Waterproof Lithium-Air Batteries
• Technology Review: GM Opens a Battery Research Lab for the Volt
• Technology Review: Blogs: Potential Energy: For Cheaper Solar, Fix the Inverters
• Atomic construction yields punchier power store - tech - 15 March 2009 - New Scientist
• New Nanoscale supercapacitor can store 100 times more energy | Electric Vehicle News
• Technology Review: Revisiting Lithium-Sulfur Batteries
• Future air-fueled battery could store 10 times more power | Green Tech - CNET News
• Technology Review: Biofuels vs. Biomass Electricity
• EEStor Gets a Trademark Patent on EESU and Provides Specs for a 24V EESU | GM-VOLT : Chevy Volt Electric Car Site
• Technology Review: Print-on-Demand Power
• Next-gen car solution? Scientists expand uses for electrostatic capacitor | Cleantech Group
• GE Invests US $15M in A123Systems - Renewable Energy World
• Technology Review: Better Lithium-ion Batteries
• Technology Review: Ultra-High-Power Lithium-Ion Batteries
• GM-Volt.com: Interview with Dr. Cui, Inventor of Silicon Nanowire Lithium-ion Battery Breakthrough | GM-VOLT : Chevy Volt Electric Car Site

Conservation and Efficiency

• Technology Review: Blogs: Potential Energy: Perverse Incentives for Fossil Fuels
• Panasonic: New LED bulbs shine for 19 years | Crave - CNET
• OLED production to increase eight-fold by 2013 – New Tech Gadgets & Electronic Devices | Geek.com
• BBC NEWS | Europe | EU bans old-fashioned light bulbs
• Search For Green Power On And Off Of The Grid : NPR
• Technology Review: The Big Smart Grid Challenges
• GE: Smart grid yields net-zero energy home | Green Tech - CNET News
• Microsoft Hohm: Micromanaging Your Energy Consumption | Culture Buffet | Fast Company
• House Passes Bill to Address Threat of Climate Change - NYTimes.com
• Technology Review: Gadget Charger Harvests Wireless Power
• Green Promise Seen in Switch to LED Lighting - Series - NYTimes.com
• Kodak developing cheap OLED lighting with government grant – Tech Products & Geek News | Geek.com
• Netbook runs on AA batteries
• 50% efficient LEDs by 2012
• Technology Review: Ultra-Efficient Organic LEDs
• Technology Review: Quantum Leap in Lighting
• Smart energy meters in every UK home by 2020 | Environment | guardian.co.uk
• LEDs get quantum dot color adjustment for warm softness – Tech Products & Geek News | Geek.com
• Make Your Home Tweet Its Energy Use (Earth Day Project!) - ReadWriteWeb
• Power and Processor Savings Make Linux Greenest OS
• VU1 - Green Inc. Blog - NYTimes.com
• Freaklabs - Open Source Zigbee Blog - More Google PowerMeter Details Revealed
• The More You Know... - WSJ.com
• Big Steps In Building: Change Our Wiring to 12 Volt DC : TreeHugger

Electric Vehicles

• Cars To Help Power Our Homes? : Renewable Energy News
• Technology Review: Next Stop: Ultracapacitor Buses
• Will e-bikes be the new 'commuter cool'? - CNN.com
• U.S. Lends Plug-In Car Maker $529 Million : NPR
• Technology Review: The Electric Acid Test
• G.M. Puts Volt’s Mileage in City in Triple Digits - NYTimes.com
• Nissan dials iPhone for car remote control | Mobilize - InfoWorld
• MIT electric car may rival gas models on performance - Network World
• Technology Review: Blogs: Potential Energy: Tesla Receives Key Funding for Electric Sedan
• Technology Review: A Startup's Electric Sedan May Be First on the Road
• New Electric Racecar
• The Great Ethanol Scam - BusinessWeek
• Commerce and Energy Secretaries Agree on Smart Grid Framework - Renewable Energy World
• BBC NEWS | Americas | Obama to curb vehicle emissions
• U.S. Drops Research Into Fuel Cells for Cars - NYTimes.com
• Technology Review: Blogs: Potential Energy: Death of the Hydrogen Economy
• The Grid, Our Cars and the Net: One Idea to Link Them All | Autopia
• GM loses another $6 billion - May. 7, 2009
• BBC NEWS | UK | England | Beds/Bucks/Herts | Four-seater electric car unveiled
• Technology Review: A Gas-Sipping Van
• Technology Review: Blogs: Potential Energy: Criticism of the Obama Administration's Volt Report
• BBC NEWS | Business | Plan to boost electric car sales
• Technology Review: Can GM's Volt Save the Company?
• Japan gets solar parking spot for electric bikes
• Solar Energy's Sunny Side - Forbes.com

Gian Paolo Lomazzo

Self-portrait of Giovanni Paolo Lomazzo

Gian Paolo Lomazzo (26 April 1538 – 27 January 1592; his first name is sometimes also given as "Giovan" or "Giovanni") was an Italian painter, more remembered for his writings on art theory, belonging to the second generation that produced Mannerism in Italian art and architecture.

Gian Paolo Lomazzo was born in Milan from a family emigrated from the town of Lomazzo. His early training was with Giovan Battista della Cerva in Milan. He painted a large Allegory of the Lenten Feast for San Agostino in Piacenza (1567). He also painted an elaborate dome with Glory of Angels for the Capella Foppa in San Marco in Milan. He also painted the Fall of Simon Magus in the wall of the chapel.

Lomazzo became blind in 1571, and turning to writing, produced two complex treatises that are milestones in the development of art criticism. His first work, Trattato dell'arte della pittura, scoltura et architettura (1584) is in part a guide to contemporary concepts of decorum, which the Renaissance inherited in part from Antiquity, which controlled a consonance between the functions of interiors and the kinds of painted and sculpted decors that would be suitable; Lespingola offered a systematic codification of esthetics that typifies the increasingly formalized and academic approaches typical of the later sixteenth century.

His less practical and more metaphysical Idea del tempio della pittura ("The ideal temple of painting", 1590) offers a description along the lines of the "four temperaments" theory of the human nature and personality, containing the explanations of the role of individuality in judgment and artistic invention.

Lomazzo's criticism took into account three aspects of critical viewing of works of art: doctrina, the record of discoveries— such as perspective— that artists had made in the course of history; prattica, the personal preferences and maniera of the artist, and iconography, the literary element in arts. Lomazzo’s contribution to art criticism was his systematic extraction of abstract concepts from art, not merely a recounting of the marvels of verisimilitude and technique and anecdotes of the works' reception among contemporaries of the type that Giorgio Vasari had reported in the previous generation.
Giovanni Ambrogio Figino and Girolamo Ciocca were his pupils.

***

The Fall of Simon Magus is a subject taken from The Golden Legend of Jacobus de Voragine and it involves a contest between a sorcerer at the court of Emperor Nero and Saint Peter. Nero is seen enthroned on the left while Saint peter and Saint Paul are on the right. Simon Magus, endeavouring to prove his magical powers, attempts to launch himself from a wooden tower towards heaven, but even though supported by demons his experiment fails and he falls to the ground. See:Web Gallery of Art

Coffee and Donut?

A continuous deformation (homeomorphism) of a coffee cup into a doughnut (torus) and back.

Similarly, the hairy ball theorem of algebraic topology says that "one cannot comb the hair flat on a hairy ball without creating a cowlick."

***

This fact is immediately convincing to most people, even though they might not recognize the more formal statement of the theorem, that there is no nonvanishing continuous tangent vectorfield on the sphere. As with the Bridges of Königsberg, the result does not depend on the exact shape of the sphere; it applies to pear shapes and in fact any kind of smooth blob, as long as it has no holes.

In order to deal with these problems that do not rely on the exact shape of the objects, one must be clear about just what properties these problems do rely on. From this need arises the notion of homeomorphism. The impossibility of crossing each bridge just once applies to any arrangement of bridges homeomorphic to those in Königsberg, and the hairy ball theorem applies to any space homeomorphic to a sphere.

Intuitively two spaces are homeomorphic if one can be deformed into the other without cutting or gluing. A traditional joke is that a topologist can't distinguish a coffee mug from a doughnut, since a sufficiently pliable doughnut could be reshaped to the form of a coffee cup by creating a dimple and progressively enlarging it, while shrinking the hole into a handle. A precise definition of homeomorphic, involving a continuous function with a continuous inverse, is necessarily more technical.

Homeomorphism can be considered the most basic topological equivalence. Another is homotopy equivalence. This is harder to describe without getting technical, but the essential notion is that two objects are homotopy equivalent if they both result from "squishing" some larger object.

Equivalence classes of the English alphabet in uppercase sans-serif font (Myriad); left - homeomorphism, right - homotopy equivalence

 

An introductory exercise is to classify the uppercase letters of the English alphabet according to homeomorphism and homotopy equivalence. The result depends partially on the font used. The figures use a sans-serif font named Myriad.

Notice that homotopy equivalence is a rougher relationship than homeomorphism; a homotopy equivalence class can contain several of the homeomorphism classes. The simple case of homotopy equivalence described above can be used here to show two letters are homotopy equivalent, e.g. O fits inside P and the tail of the P can be squished to the "hole" part.

Thus, the homeomorphism classes are: one hole two tails, two holes no tail, no holes, one hole no tail, no holes three tails, a bar with four tails (the "bar" on the K
is almost too short to see), one hole one tail, and no holes four tails.

The homotopy classes are larger, because the tails can be squished down to a point. The homotopy classes are: one hole, two holes, and no holes.

To be sure we have classified the letters correctly, we not only need to show that two letters in the same class are equivalent, but that two letters in different classes are not equivalent. In the case of homeomorphism, this can be done by suitably selecting points and showing their removal disconnects the letters differently. For example, X and Y are not homeomorphic because removing the center point of the X leaves four pieces; whatever point in Y corresponds to this point, its removal can leave at most three pieces. The case of homotopy equivalence is harder and requires a more elaborate argument showing an algebraic invariant, such as the fundamental group, is different on the supposedly differing classes.

Letter topology has some practical relevance in stencil typography. The font Braggadocio, for instance, has stencils that are made of one connected piece of material.

I Have An Idea

Now as many of you know,  a creative individual if they are open enough can bring forth something that is accessible to all, but,  if the mind is not in a particular travelling mode, the idea might not appear on it's radar screen for observation.

So understanding what it takes to materialize these efforts on idea manifestation to appearance on a human scale

Now remember,  what I propose could in affect revolutionize the auto industry and our dependence on oil and gas? Economy

In a philosophical sense, when thinking about "symmetry as a place." How  could one move to such a position creatively to derive a new possibility? See it's effects, here on earth?

The effects of a polarizing filter on the sky in a photograph. The picture on the right uses the filter.

Ya, it's is an idea that could in fact change the way society uses the technologies it has, expands on it, and applies it in a different way.