Science can sometimes just blow my mind. This is one of those times.

Researchers at IBM last week stored a bit, the smallest form of computer memory, into 12 atoms. They make the point of saying that this is significantly less than today’s hard drives that use about one million atoms to store a single bit of information. They say that the ability to manipulate matter by its most basic components could lead to our ability to build smaller, faster and more energy-efficient devices.

The usual route of technological advancement is to start out big and work your way down to smaller devices. The team at IBM flipped that notion on its head and started at the smallest they could go: a single atom. From there, they tested it to see how many atoms they could get before it would take to a single bit.

The researchers demonstrated magnetic storage that is at least 100 times more dense than today’s hard drives and solid state drives. Think of the load times off of something that compact. It would create a huge advancement in computing!

The team thinks that future applications of nanostructures built one atom at a time that apply their unconventional form of magnetism called antiferromagnetism could allow people to store 100 times more data in the same space of today’s disk drives.

“The chip industry will continue its pursuit of incremental scaling in semiconductor technology but, as components continue to shrink, the march continues to the inevitable end point: the atom. We’re taking the opposite approach and starting with the smallest unit — single atoms — to build computing devices one atom at a time.” Andreas Heinrich, the lead investigator into atomic storage at IBM Research – Almaden, in California, said.

For those wondering how they did it, IBM used ferromagnets which have similar properties to the magnets inside refrigerators. The ferromagnets align the spins of all of bound atoms in a single direction. The problem came from the bits on the atomic level that could strongly affect their neighboring bits. It took precise control on the part of the IMB researchers to control the interactions between the bits.

The researchers then used a scanning tunneling microscope to atomically engineer a group of twelve coupled atoms that stored a bit of data for hours at low temperatures. Taking advantage of their magnetic spin directions, they were able to pack the magnetic bits much closer together than was ever previously thought. They did all this without the atom structure becoming unstable.

The lead image shows a magnetic byte imaged five times in different magnetic states to store the ASCII code for each letter of the word THINK, IBM’s corporate mantra since 1914. The team achieved this by using 96 iron atoms, one bit was stored by 12 atoms and there are eight bits in each byte.

For those who want to know more or would prefer an audio-visual explanation of how they did it, IBM has you covered.

John Schlesinger’s gritty, unrelentingly bleak look at the seedy underbelly of urban American life is undeniably disturbing, but Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight’s performances make it difficult to turn away.

MIDNIGHT COWBOY
Time: 1 hr 15 mins
Released: May 26th 1969
Directed By: John Schlesinger
Produced by: United Artists

Based on a James Leo Herlihy novel, British director John Schlesinger’s first American film dramatized the small hopes, dashed dreams, and unlikely friendship of two late ’60s lost souls. Dreaming of an easy life as a fantasy cowboy stud, cheerful Texas rube Joe Buck (Jon Voight) heads to New York City to be a gigolo, but he quickly discovers that hustling isn’t what he thought it would be after he winds up paying his first trick (Sylvia Miles). He gets swindled by gimpy tubercular grifter Rico “Ratso” Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman) but, when Joe falls in the direst of straits, Ratso takes Joe into his condemned apartment so that they can help each other survive. Things start to look up when Joe finally lands his first legit female customer (Brenda Vaccaro) at a Warhol-esque party; Ratso’s health, however, fails. Joe turns a final trick to get the money for one selfless goal: taking Ratso out of New York to his dream life in Miami. One of the first major studio films given the newly minted X rating for its then-frank portrayal of New York decadence, Midnight Cowboy was critically praised for Schlesinger’s insight into American lives, with the intercut mosaic of Joe’s memories and Ratso’s dreams lending their characters and actions greater psychological complexity. While they may have been drawn by the seamy content (tame by current standards), the young late ’60s audience responded to Joe’s and Ratso’s confusion amidst turbulent times and to the connection they make with each other despite their alienation from the surrounding culture. Midnight Cowboy became one of the major financial and artistic hits of 1969, winning Oscars for Best Picture (the first for an X-rated film), Best Director, and former blacklistee Waldo Salt’s screenplay. Though the one-two punch of Midnight Cowboy and The Graduate (1967) proved Hoffman’s range and Voight’s Joe Buck made him a star, both lost Best Actor to classical cowboy John Wayne for True Grit. The film was later re-rated R by the MPAA. ~ Lucia Bozzola, Rovi

Watch it now at NETFLIX!

Like the iPhone SJ concept before it, De Rosa’s iWatch 2 (which is itself a refresh of an older iWatch design) looks like something that you could easily imagine gracing the desk of Apple design guru Jony Ive at this very moment: It has the aluminum and glass appeal of the iPhone 4 and 4S, along with an on-screen UI that looks convincingly iOS inspired.

De Rosa says the watch’s imaginary specs include Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity, the latter to provide a steady feed of data from a connected iPhone or iPad, along with a standalone RSS reader and front-facing camera. He also adds an LCD projector to the list, because why not?

While I don’t expect to see anything quite so feature-rich come out of Cupertino, I do think De Rosa is on the right track; an Apple-created connected watch would no doubt have similar good looks, a minimum of buttons and the ability to connect to iOS devices to grab and display information feeds.

But Apple also is notorious for keeping its product lines tight, so such a device, which would admittedly probably have limited appeal initially (will iPhone buyers really want to spend an additional $200+ for what’s essentially a secondary display?) likely isn’t a top priority.

Regardless of what Apple actually has planned in the way of wearable wrist-top computing, I still want this concept to fly out of my dreams and on to my wrist. What about you?

Source:
http://gigaom.com

When you are feeling low try smiling; even if you do not feel happy on the inside. It has been proven that smiling can actually trick your body into altering your mood. It lowers your blood pressure, boosts your immune system, and releases endorphins that make you feel wonderful, relieving feelings of sadness or depression.

Want to be more prosperous? Smile! Even though this may be hard to believe, it has been shown that individuals that smile more often than not are generally more pleasant and outgoing. Those who appear happier in their day to day tasks are less likely to be passed up for promotions. It’s something to consider. Your next step up the ladder may be only a smile away.

Smiling also causes people to look younger and appear more attractive. When you smile the muscles in the face lift creating an appearance of youth and vitality. This makes you look and feel good, and when you feel great you will draw people towards you by presenting an appearance of happiness. And smiling is contagious. When you see others smile, it makes you want to smile. In turn when others see you smile it makes them want to smile as well. Everyone likes to be near others that make them feel energetic and happy so spread the love by spreading a smile across your face!

It’s amazing how many wonderful things can be accomplished, and lives made better, with something as simple as a smile.

From Source

Date : 2011-10-01
Bathing People : 24
Size : 7.5 palettes
Water Temperature : 38

Suspended Jaccuzzi ~ From the Gueuroz bridge!

JC’s and Cat’s return from their trip to South America, was just what we needed to initiate this dream project, namely to suspend a jaccuzzi from a bridge. The bridge had our name written all over it, as it was the highest in Europe at the time of its construction (1933-1934) with 600 ft of void.

We then needed a group of friends that would be ready to take up the challenge. Out of 25 e-mails we got 25 positive answer all more motivated then the other. With this number it was all said: the size of the jaccuzzi (8 palettes), which with its occupants and the structure itself was going to weigh more than 6 tons; the choice of the cable and the dimensions of the logs as well as their spread out, in order to have the right safety factor on all elements. The platform that we had built for the spinning jaccuzzi filled all the criteria and could be recycled.

The length of the cables was absolutely critical, because the water does not forgive the slightest error, as it always flows to the lowest point, increasing the error and making the system unstable. The next challenge was to find a way to make the rappelling (abseiling) and climbing up the rope as easy as possible and absolutely safe, with at all moments two independent safety lines, well protected from the friction on the concrete bridge.

As the month of September was exceptionally sunny, we had great conditions to build and test all the parts, so that on the d day everything could run smoothly with no time lost and guaranteeing the safety of every one. To ensure that all participants be well accustomed in large rappels and rope climbing techniques, 3 training evenings were organized. During the first one we optimized the gear and climbing technique, staying close to the ground. The two following trainings were off the Fenil bridge and the Gueuroz bridge, where we rappelled and climbed back up the rope without reaching the ground.

October 1st, JC’s birthday, was the big day, meeting everybody at 4:30am on top of the Gueuroz bridge. Several teams had different task. Some were pre-heating the water on top of the bridge using the 3 gas burners we had used for the jaccuzzi on top of Mont Banc); others lowered all the parts necessary to built the platform 130 feet below the bridge; others still were hanging low down and assembling the platform and setting up the hot tub with its gas burner to keep the water at 100°F; while others prepared the rappelling lines for all participants; in short, everybody helped so that 4.5 hours later the first person could jump in the water with a breath taking view. Six hours later the last person came out of the water and at 6:00 pm everything was back on the trailers to get back to Lausanne where we enjoyed a fantastic raclette at Jan’s place.

Read More…
http://www.jaccuzzi.ch/html/affichjacc_264_e.html

It should be said however, that Rep. Steve Holland meant it as a sarcastic joke and social commentary. It drew a lot of media attention and even drew protests from a lot of Latino groups.

Holland says that the statement he wanted to make was that people usually see things in a very high level. The ridiculousness of his bill was meant to make people reflect on that and bring issues like illegal immigration down to a more hman level.

“I did it to rebut all those damn Republicans down there who want to run illegal immigrants out of the state, and drug-test welfare people who can’t help being on welfare,” he said. “What I was doing is showing that we need to be serious and more sensitive about how we approach our responsibilities, and need to think about the human level of the things,” he said.

However, for those keeping count, the United States does have a longer coast line on the Gulf than Mexico does. However, that is what the territory looks like now, and not like it looked when it was originally named. The whole coast used to be Mexican.

Source:

http://blog.gulflive.com/mississippi-press-news/2012/02/hollands_gulf_of_america_propo.html