guruevi - Slashdot User

Submission + - First known binary star is a sextuplet system (rochester.edu)

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guruevi

on Friday December 11, 2009 @11:34AM

guruevi writes: "The two stars named Alcor and Mizar, sometimes also called "Horse and Rider" can be seen with the naked eye and has been thought to be a binary system since ancient times. Using his telescope, Galileo documented Mizar to be itself a pair of binaries with later discoveries in spectroscopy showing it was actually four stars orbiting each other. However an astronomer at the University of Rochester made the discovery that Alcor is actually two stars and it is apparently gravitationally bound to the Mizar system making the whole group a sextuplet.

The discovery is surprising since Alcor is one of the most studied stars in the sky. Eric Mamajek, assistant professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Rochester, and leader of the team that found the star says "We were trying a new method of planet hunting and instead of finding a planet orbiting Alcor, we found a star." The star seems to be a cool and dim M-class dwarf star."

Submission + - Brain Separates Living and Non-Living Objects (rochester.edu)

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guruevi

on Friday August 14, 2009 @08:32AM

guruevi writes: "For unknown reasons, the human brain distinctly separates the handling of images of living things from images of non-living things, processing each image type in a different area of the brain. For years, many scientists have assumed the brain segregated visual information in this manner to optimize processing the images themselves, but new research shows that even in people who have been blind since birth the brain still separates the concepts of living and non-living objects.

The research, published in today's issue of Neuron, implies that the brain categorizes objects based on the different types of subsequent consideration they demand — such as whether an object is edible, or is a landmark on the way home, or is a predator to run from. They are not categorized entirely by their appearance.
"If both sighted people and people with blindness process the same ideas in the same parts of the brain, then it follows that visual experience is not necessary in order for those aspects of brain organization to develop," says Bradford Mahon, postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at the University of Rochester, and lead author of the study. "We think this means significant parts of the brain are innately structured around a few domains of knowledge that were critical in humans' evolutionary history."

Previous studies have shown that the sight of certain objects, such as a table or mountain, activate regions of the brain other than does the sight of living objects, such as an animal or face — but why the brain would choose to process these two categories differently has remained a mystery, says Mahon. Since the regions were known to activate when the objects were seen, scientists wondered if something about the visual appearance of the objects determined how the brain would process them. For instance, says Mahon, most living things have curved forms, and so many scientists thought the brain prefers to processes images of living things in an area that is optimized for curved forms.

I just wonder where zombies and the undead would appear on your fMRI."

Submission + - Regular Light Bulbs Made Super-Efficient (rochester.edu)

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guruevi

on Monday June 01, 2009 @08:24AM

guruevi writes: "An ultra-powerful laser can turn regular incandescent light bulbs into power-sippers, say optics researchers at the University of Rochester. The process could make a light as bright as a 100-watt bulb consume less electricity than a 60-watt bulb while remaining far cheaper and radiating a more pleasant light than a fluorescent bulb can.

The key to creating the super-filament is an ultra-brief, ultra-intense beam of light called a femtosecond laser pulse. The laser burst lasts only a few quadrillionths of a second. During its brief burst, Guo's laser unleashes as much power as the entire grid of North America onto a spot the size of a needle point. That intense blast forces the surface of the metal to form nanostructures and microstructures that dramatically alter how efficiently can radiate from the filament.

In 2006, Guo and his assistant, Anatoliy Vorobeyv, used a similar laser process to turn any metal pitch black as reported on Slashdot. The surface structures created on the metal were incredibly effective at capturing incoming radiation, such as light.

Guo's team has even been able to make a filament radiate partially polarized light, which until now has been impossible to do without special filters that reduce the bulb's efficiency. By creating nanostructures in tight, parallel rows, some light that emits from the filament becomes polarized. Guo is also announcing this month in Applied Physics Letters a technique using a similar femtosecond laser process to make a piece of metal automatically move liquid around its surface, even lifting a liquid up against gravity."

Submission + - Pure IPTV providers in the US

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guruevi

on Monday May 11, 2009 @12:02PM

guruevi writes: "We currently have Time Warner Cable in our area but no viable competitors. We have no FiOS, we have no decent DSL (unless you call 512/128 good, we have no U-Verse. We only have TWC for Cable and High-Speed Internet or DirectTV for Sattelite. TWC knows this and thus can charge anything for no service. Currently we were forced in their All-In-One package since it is cheaper than buying just cable and internet from them. Recently the quality of the basic cable (analog) offer has been degrading to the point that there is visible pixelation and the color has been degraded to something that looks like 256 color VGA (looks like a 90's era compressed DivX) especially during peak hours. This is (I think) done to save on bandwidth since they are offering more HD and On-Demand channels and a whopping 10MBps Internet (Turbo Boost).

So I wanted to switch to digital and HD since it's supposed to be better, we payed for HD service and were forced to rent their DVR with it (they don't offer HD service without). Not a problem, the channels are decent. Now we want a second television so I have an HD television but you can't receive their HD channels without a DVR since they are all encrypted. No problem I think, I plug into the Firewire plugs on the back of the DVR which are supposed to be able to tune the box and stream it over the network using MythTV however these plugs have been (illegally or intentionally) disabled. Calling TWC doesn't help, they don't want to ship me a DVR with the plugs enabled nor do they want to ship me a cable box that can decode the HD service I'm paying for. The only solution they have is to pay for another DVR box ($120 for the box + $120 installation) and rental (~$20/month for the box + $4/month for the remote (no kidding) + taxes and fees). CableCard has recently been discontinued on the network so I can't buy a TiVo.

I think the best solution in my situation would be to dump TWC all together for cable and switch to a pure IPTV provider. The problem is however, I found a few IPTV providers outside the US (Israel, China, India, Europe, ...) that offer some type of TV channel offer (either with or without a set top box) but I can't find any that offer the US. I don't need local channels however I would like to have at least NBC (although I can get that over antenna), ABC, A&E, Discovery, Comedy Channel etc. Ideally I would be able to integrate an IPTV offer in my MythTV setup but it's not a requirement. I am more than happy to pay for a set top box rental or pre-paid as long as I can get some decent service for a decent price. My bandwidth is good and stable enough for certain HD channels (they are currently already compressed with TWC and I can stream 720p QuickTime) and I can always upgrade my bandwidth from the current 3 Mbps. Anybody that tried out some good providers or content distributors and had good results?"

Submission + - Scientist forced to remove prediction was right (cnn.com)

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guruevi

on Monday April 06, 2009 @11:15PM

guruevi writes: "It seems that the scientist that was forced to remove his prediction about earthquakes in the L'Aquilla region was right after all. According to CNN up to 150 people have lost their life in that region because of a powerful earthquake. No word yet from the news tickers on what became of the bully that censored this scientist because of the 'panic' he started."

Submission + - Apple silently introduces new iPod Touch (apple.com) 1

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guruevi

on Tuesday February 24, 2009 @04:28PM

guruevi writes: "Apparently Apple has really stopped introducing stuff at big events and are silently introducing products on their website without much fanfare as seen with Safari 4 Beta.

The new iPod Touch (http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/shop_ipod/) has a shiny metal backplate (compared to the previous all-plastic one) and comes into it's previous 8GB and 16GB versions as well as a (new) 32GB version and seems to be marketed towards handheld gaming."

Submission + - DRM-free iTunes also means increase in pricing (apple.com)

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guruevi

on Tuesday January 06, 2009 @02:35PM

guruevi writes: "Apple just announced that all iTunes songs will soon be available in DRM-free format. The concession for this will be the 3-tier pricing structure. Now the media generators finally got it's much wanted price increase. Songs will now be available for USD 0.69, USD 0.99 or USD 1.29. Other announcements from the company were a new (expected) MacBook 17" and new versions of iWork and iLife. Online versions of iWork are also going to become fee-based and Keynote Remote is going to cost money as well. Does giving up Steve Jobs as Apple's main man also mean giving up the set, relatively low prices of it's services?"

Submission + - Controversial wiretap law passed through the House (cnn.com)

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guruevi

on Friday June 20, 2008 @03:01PM

guruevi writes: "The controversial wiretap law which has had quite some coverage here on Slashdot and created an outcry with people concerned about their privacy has finally been passed through the House and is now going to the Senate. The law will grant retroactive immunity to the telecom industry which has aided the Bush Administration and 3-letter agencies with illegal wiretaps and will legalize such wiretaps.

For future wiretaps, the new measure would require a special court set up under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to approve any effort to spy on Americans. Authorities could act for up to seven days before seeking a warrant — more than twice the three-day emergency period under the current secret laws and courts.

The House vote was 293-129, with 188 Republicans and 105 Democrats voting for it. One Republican voted against the measure.

Bush said the legislation will "allow our intelligence professionals to quickly and effectively monitor the plans of terrorists abroad while protecting the liberties of Americans here at home." He's also fearmongering by saying that 'the enemy' that attacked us at 9/11 will attack again and this legislation will allow

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-West Virginia, said the bill would prevent administration officials from conducting any new warrantless surveillance. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Maryland, said the new plan is "not perfect" but "strikes a sound balance" between intelligence-gathering and civil liberties.

Rep. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan, the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, said the intelligence community depends on "the backing of patriotic private companies."

"The telecom companies simply have to produce a piece of paper we already know exists, resulting in immediate dismissal," said Caroline Fredrickson, the head of the ACLU's Washington legislative office. She said the bill "does nothing to keep Americans safe and is a constitutional farce.""

Submission + - Anonymous Coward steals data of 6m Chili's (cnn.com)

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guruevi

on Monday May 12, 2008 @04:23PM

guruevi writes: "Slashdot's most favorite poster, the one and only with uid 666, Anonymous Coward stole personal data of 6 million Chileans — reportedly including a daughter of the president — and posted it briefly on the Internet, authorities said Sunday. The hacker said he intended "to demonstrate how poorly protected the data in Chile is, and how nobody works to protect it."

Police Chief Jaime Jara confirmed that authorities were investigating the theft of the leaked data, which he said included identity card numbers, addresses, telephone numbers, e-mails and academic background. The data is currently offline but it could have been downloaded by some visitors. Torrent anyone?"

Submission + - Researchers compress 20s of music onto 1kb (rochester.edu)

Submitted by

guruevi

on Thursday April 03, 2008 @01:56PM

guruevi writes: "Researchers at the University of Rochester have digitally reproduced music in a file nearly 1,000 times smaller than a regular MP3 file. The music, a 20-second clarinet solo, is encoded in less than a single kilobyte, and is made possible by two innovations: recreating in a computer both the real-world physics of a clarinet and the physics of a clarinet player.

A comparison of samples of both reproductions (MP3 and this new algorithm) can be heard on the site.

Apparently they sample all physics that interact with the clarinet at speeds a human can produce (as opposed to sampling the sound it produces thousands of times per second) and then reproduce the sound. I don't know if this would be similar to MIDI but according to the researchers, even the human voice could be synthesized this way."

Submission + - The 'Planet' in Planetary Nebulae (rochester.edu)

Submitted by

guruevi

on Tuesday March 11, 2008 @09:27AM

guruevi writes: "Astronomers at the University of Rochester, have announced that low-mass stars and possibly even super-Jupiter-sized planets may be responsible for creating some of the most breathtaking objects in the sky.

The news is ironic because the name "planetary" nebula has always been a misnomer. When these objects were discovered 300 years ago, astronomers couldn't tell what they were and named them for their resemblance to the planet Uranus. But as early as the mid-19th century, astronomers realized these objects are really great clouds of dust emitted by dying stars.

Now, researchers have found that planets or low-mass stars orbiting these aged stars may indeed be pivotal to the creation of the nebulae's fantastic appearance. Pretty pictures and more information in the link."

Submission + - Is Apple becoming shy of the spotlight?

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guruevi

on Tuesday February 26, 2008 @10:22AM

guruevi writes: "We've all come to know the big releases of Apple through Steve Jobs' typical keynote in black turtleneck and jeans. Lately however, more and more products have come to the daylight without the big announcements, without the keynote, without Steve? Recent releases include the new XServe and the replacement of the XServe RAID with Promise gear, the 2GB iPod Shuffle, Pink iPods, Aperture 2 and today the new Macbook models featuring faster processors, multi-touch touchpads and NVIDIA chipsets. Is Steve on his way out? Is this a change in future direction for Apple? Or is Apple working on something so much better for their next keynote?"

Submission + - Apple drops XServe RAID, continues with Promise (apple.com)

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guruevi

on Tuesday February 19, 2008 @11:32AM

guruevi writes: "When I went to configure a server today on the Apple Store, I couldn't find their XServe RAID systems anymore. Apple released Xsan 2 today but silently they also replaced the XServe RAID, Apple's in-house PATA-based RAID solution with a Promise VTrak E-Class RAID Subsystem which can seat up to sixteen 750GB 7200-rpm SATA or 300GB 15,000-rpm SAS drives for up to 12TB of raw capacity. These solutions come in at $11999 for 8x 750G SATA drives, $14999 for 12TB and $18999 for 4,8TB of SAS drives spinning at 15,000 rpm So no more nicely brushed aluminum storage enclosures, hopefully they are just as simple to maintain."

Submission + - TSA testers slip fake bombs through security (cnn.com)

Submitted by

guruevi

on Monday January 28, 2008 @01:17PM

guruevi writes: "But apparently it's not all that difficult. According to the CNN writeup, about 60%-75% of tests fail (as in, the investigators successfully slip through security successfully with a potential bomb. This doesn't inspire much confidence in the TSA security systems which have become more of an annoyance ever since 9/11 to any Slashdot and non-Slashdot reading traveller. This particular investigator actually has a bomb strapped to his back, gets a pat down because of a metal leg and gets away with telling it's a back support. Scary or common knowledge?"

Submission + - Hip-Hop and Cell Phones Attract Girls to Science (rochester.edu)

Submitted by

guruevi

on Tuesday October 23, 2007 @09:30AM

guruevi writes: "In order to attract girls to Science, seventh and eighth grade girls from Wilson Foundation Academy will be searching for real scientific answers to questions on topics that interest them most. As part of Science STARS (Students Tackling Authentic and Relevant Science), an after-school program at the University of Rochester's Warner School of Education, middle school girls will investigate how hip-hop dance affects balance coordination and reaction time, what the impact of hairstyling products on hair is and how cell phones distract us through everyday usage. So is this just going to be a fad or will girls really be attracted and make the 'science choice' later in life by these type of programs?"

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