Tracking a Ball with Compressed Air System

This is fun experiment done by graduate students of Urban Champaign.



They point out a 1989 paper [E. H. Brandt, “Levitation in physics,” Science, vol. 243, no. 4889, pp. 349–355] to illustrate how such system was long known to scientific community. However, getting ball into complex trajectory is a tricky business. I agree. The control strategy being implemented is a feedback mechanism with implementation of extended Kalman filter for state estimation. They track the object with stereo vision camera and use classical fluid dynamics model for the air jet being mounted with two degrees of freedom.

Whenever possible, have a look at their [paper].

Schrodinger's Cat walks into Bar and it does not...

The fun in class room gives student a different point view to the subject matter.
In the following video, collection of science jokes has been thrown into the floor and students seem to enjoy it.

Glimpse of Big Bang

Following short video shows how scientists are studying on the question of big bang and hence towards solving the yet unsolved questions such as what happened immediately after big bang!
Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation is believed to be the key to understand why the universe went through rapid expansion after the big bang.
The project as shown here has successfully covered 5% of the sky and may take months to cover the whole sky and may throw some hints of hidden dimension etc.







From:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17807

Digital Dumping Ground

This is the ground reality of poor countries. E-wastes are being dumped in developing countries in Africa and Asian countries like China, India, Pakistan etc. E-wastes are toxic and harmful to human health. People in these countries have to suffer from the technology and facilities used by people in Europe and America. This is not fair. Where ever the waste is generated, it has to be managed there. Please watch the video below by FRONTLINE.

NASA MOON CRASH

Search for water in moon.
Nasa Crashed an aircraft at the speed of about 6000 miles per hour that is about 1.6 mile per second on purpose in the south pole of moon where it is assumed to be ice deposited in layers under the moon's surface during the span of time.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Voice from the Future ...

I am here to speak for ...




A very impressive address.

The Large Hadron Collider: The End Of The Universe?

Bijaya Dasami (Dashain)

Dashain, the one of the great festival in Nepal which is known as the win of Good over Bad. The festival is of 10 days which is believed that God Durga had a battle with Devil Mahisasur for 10 long days and had a victory so it is also called Bijaya Dasami, Bijaya implies Victory and Dasami implies 10 (the days of battle). After 10th day of festival, which goes on for another 5 days, we go to our seniors and get blessings and put TIKA (made of rice, red color known as Abir, yogurt, little bit of banana) in our forehead and Jamara by the side of our ear and ladies especially decorate it in their hair. Believe me or not this is the festival of lots of fun, food and gathering (family get together).
During these ten days a special music is played for the peace and prosperity to heal the world and minds. It is played in different tunes also known as Malasari Dhun and Mangal Dhun. Present here is the Malasari Dhun and I hope it will help to heal the world and individuals.

Mind over Matter: Brain Computer Interface

Brain Computer Interface is one of the challenge lying at the fore front of today's research.
We all know that our brain sends and receives numerous amount of signals from different parts of the body. Out of which, useful signals are picked up and are used in activities such as planning and movements as well as other activities. For people with severe neural diseases the brain-body communication might not be as easy as for the healthy person. So, even if the brain wants to send out the signal, decrypting what you are thinking in real time is really a huge challenge. This is challenging since you have to find the message deeply buried in the noise of the signals that the neurons are producing. It is just like talking at the busy railway station where everyone needs to talk: may be much more complicated than that. They are talking in some coded language and you need to understand it.

Fortunately, today's processing power of computer and advancements in research is making it possible.

Please watch a nice presentation by Stanford Research Group:

Green Gasoline from Trees

Energy crisis, its consequences and possible alternatives are widely discussed and debated issues in present time world. There is no second belief that stock of fossil fuel is limited and one day it will be finished. Use of fossil fuel is causing environmental problems. But there are many opinions on alternatives to the traditional fuels being used. One option scientists are working on is the use of bio-diesel. Fuel is produced using biological materials mainly plants and used in vehicles. Bio-diesels are being produced by corn, sugarcane and other plant materials. There are lots of controversies on the production and use of these plants for fuel. Researchers are still going on to make this cheap, readily available and utilization of 'new' plants like algae. I n the video presented below shows the production of green gasoline. They say green, because they are using trees to produce gasoline. Trees contain cellulose which is produced by plants from sunlight and carbon di-oxide. Cellulose from tree logs made into powder is treated with catalysts which convert cellulose into gasoline and this gasoline can be used into regular machines without any modifications of the machines. However, the video doesn't speak about the commercial, economic and other parts of the green gasoline.

Amazing Talent: Sand Animation

Sand Animation performed by Ksenia Simonova in Ukraine Got Talent and it just amazing and with full of emotions brings tears in your eyes. Art has universal language and it speaks for everyone.

Lion Whisper

Watch this video and have your say.

How Differential Works!

I came across this nicely explained video of how differential works!
I had made a differential quite a while back using LEGO, it looks like these:

In the following video, I liked the way it has been nicely explained and illustrated for general public.
Differentials proved to be very valuable innovation for motor driven vehicles. It was interesting to learn about lowered shaft driven differentials.

The Making of DNA

Roller Babies for Ad

This video is to advertise water (Evian Water). I am not going to comment on the Water itself. They used little babies to advertise their product and babies dance incredibly. I have no word to say. Its awesome. Enjoy it.

Rodney Brooks: Nice Robotics work

Robotics as become one of the essential feature for our daily life. The robots has not only served us in the manufacturing process but also has come to life for direct interactions.
Are you ready for it?

King of Footbag

Robotic Vision on the Sony Aibo

This is wonderful example of how pattern recognition can be implemented for robotics and get the jobs done!

Light without Electricity

We have seen the transparent ceiling for rooms that has less lights. The problem with that is the fact that they are very expensive.
Here is a Brazilian Innovation to get light out of the Water put in the two liter bottle.
This saves energy (and money) for sure.



Quite interesting!

Dirt poor Haitians eat cookies made of mud

The small island nation of Haiti relies heavily on food imports, but with prices soaring, some Haitians are resorting to eating mud.

The cookies — made of dirt, butter and salt — hold little nutritional value, but manage to keep Haiti’s poor alive.

Worldfocus special correspondent Benno Schmidt and producer Ara Ayer report from Haiti, showing how far some people are going to fill their stomachs.

Multistage rocket Lunch

The following video shows a multistage rocket being lifted up. The "slow motion" capture of the dynamics really excites me.




The Saturn V was a multistage liquid-fuel expendable rocket used by NASA's Apollo and Skylab programs from 1967 until 1973. In total NASA launched thirteen Saturn V rockets with no loss of payload. It remains the largest and most powerful launch vehicle ever brought to operational status from a height, weight and payload standpoint.

The largest production model of the Saturn family of rockets, the Saturn V was designed under the direction of Wernher von Braun at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, with Boeing, North American Aviation, Douglas Aircraft Company, and IBM as the lead contractors. The three stages of the Saturn V were developed by various NASA contractors, but following a sequence of mergers and takeovers all of them are now owned by Boeing.

Global Warming and Atmospheric Brown Clouds

Global warming and climate change are global problems. Eventhough, the countries and people who have not contributed anything for these environmental problems they have to face the impact of these problems equally.

Professor V Ramanathan is one of the best scientist working on climate change and global warming. His latest research describes Asian Brown Clouds (ABCs) which is very important in terms of global warming. In this video he talks about global warming, climate change and specific to ABCs which is a threat to Asia.

This is a long video (54min) of his lecture at UC Davis. I definitely recommend you to watch full video which helps to better understand the latest problem we are facing.

Flame Tube: Standing Wave of Flames

Teaching With Example has always been fun.

In the embeded video a nice presentation of the stationary wave has been demonstrated.
Enjoy!



Note:
The video was taken from doflick. I have found do flick to be a nice place to find educational video for educational purposes.

Human Kind flying as a Bird over english channel

Discovery - First Time Machine

One comment on you tube says---"Einstein has proven that it is possible to bend what we cannot see..in this case it is empty space in space itself..also known as "dark matter"...Einstein also concluded that if we were to bend the space-time over itself then we can, possible, thravel to the past...to help you visualize...try taking a piece of paper..and poking to holes on each end..both representing different points in time...now fold the paper so that the two holes are over each other....this my friends is how it is possible"

watch the wonderful video about the fundamentals of the physics.

Robotic Designs Inspired by Animals

Bio-mimics are the robots which are inspired by animals.
Taking into account the informations that has been fine tuned by the evolution machinery should be a good idea. Since the body shape and functions has already been fine tuned to work efficiently under given conditions, scientists can not only design them but also can have a greater insights into how the things work. {However, the question on how efficiently the nature has designed animals can be open question.}

In this video, taken from new scientists, a nice demo of bio-mimics has been presented. Please Enjoy!

Catacomb of Paris

Warning this video contains the images that may disturb some viewers.



The Catacombs of Paris or Catacombes de Paris are a famous underground ossuary in Paris, France. Organized in a renovated section of the city's vast network of subterranean tunnels and caverns towards the end of the 18th century, it became a tourist attraction on a small scale from the early 19th century and has been open to the public on a regular basis from 1867. The official name for the catacombs is l'Ossuaire Municipal.
To know more please follow the link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catacombs_of_Paris

President Barack Obama 2009 Inauguration and Address

Past week America made another history. Barack Hussain Obama took oath of office and he became President of America from president elect. A African American on the post itself is big change in the history. Nobody had thought this day would come true soon. A hard working man from "not good family-because of his father and mom" achieved this success in dramatic way.

He has shown hope to not only the people of America but also to the people of world. There are number of big problems America is facing and he has to work hard to fix these problems. There is no guaranty that he can solve some of the problems but I think he will try his best. The above video is his Oath taking ceremony and his address to millions of people who waited for hours in cold weather outside the place.

All the best Mr. Obama.

Walking Robot: Honda Asimo

Physics of Walking is very practical field for robotics.
Walking robot looks really nice and is pleasing to the people. People are simply impressed by humanoid robots, the value added by self standing and walking robot can just amaze people.
Honda has been developing the walking robots called Asimo.
More about Asimo can be read here ...

In this video Asimo has been presented with different conditions...
Enjoy!

Lyre Bird

The Australian Bird that can imitate any sound that is heard. Not only the sound of at least 20 different species of bird but also the chain saw, car alarm, camera shutter and many other.

How NOT to use PowerPoint!

Power point presentation has been proved as a powerful tool of presentation in all fieds: academia, industries, business everywhere. Some presentations are boring because of the ppt are not made properly. The video presented here gives some clues about how to make effective power point slides. Enjoy it.