Crazy, Cool and Weird Stuff

In Marvel movie The Avengers, it is stated that the Tesseract contains an unimaginable power and can be used as weapon of mass destruction if the power can be unlocked. Well, the tesseract that i'm refering to is not in the movie but rather the one in field of geometry.

Tesseract from the movie The Avengers

According to wikipedia, a tesseract is a four dimensional analog of the cube and sometimes is called 8-cell, regular octahoron or cubic prism. Tesseract is a four dimensional hypercube, (cube with dimension higher than 3) and first proposed by Charles Howard Hinton, a British mathematician in the 19th century. 

A tesseract image in Schlegel diagram.

A tesseract can be unfolded into 8 cubes in 3D space, the same as a cube unfolded 6 squares in 2D surface. The image below shows how a tesseract can be build from 1 dimensional space until the first cube projection in 4 dimensional space.

How to draw a tesseract from a single point ie one dimension.

There are other types of tesseract for example truncated tesseract and rectified tesseract in which they have different Schlafli Symbol and Schlegel diagram.  The existence of higher dimension is by far an abstract concept and none have observed these higher dimensions. Nonetheless, the mathematics suggests the possibility and therefore could exist in this vast universe.


p/s: I read somewhere in which lower dimensional object couldn't possibly see the higher dimension but the higher dimensional object can definitely see the lower one. Not sure how this implicates the existence of higher deity though. 

For the past hundred years, many scientists tried to do alchemy, in which the ultimate aim is to create a philosopher's stone, an object powerful enough to convert normal metal to gold or silver. The stone also is believed to hold the secret of immortality through elixir of life. Though not all part from alchemy is understood nowadays, it did provide a foundation for modern science and chemistry.

Nonetheless, people are still trying to find ways to create gold because after all, gold is considered high value item and represents the wealth of an individual. Unfortunately, the status may change due to recent finding at Michigan University. The finding, which is a bacteria named Cupriavidus metalliduransc (right?) is found to be able to produce gold nugget through microbial processes.

"Gold nugget" after the microbial alchemy

Well, the amount, as you can see from the picture is not much compare to the gold that you'll find in nature but with more research, the capability to turn something into gold, though amazing, may bring impact to world's economy.

Gold nugget found in nature

The researchers presented their finding as an art project called The Great Work of Metal Lover by using a portable lab house where the bacterium performs the "microbial alchemy" thingy. And luckily, the researchers said that replicating the bacterium's actions on a larger scale would be impractical and cost prohibitive.

Source: here

Dawn chorus refers to a phenomena that occurs during sunrise and with proper but unsophisticated equipment, you can hear a music played by the Earth.


The music is believed to be generated by interaction between high energy electrons that trapped in the Earth's magnetosphere and electromagnetic field from solar wind. Well, ignore the scientific jargon for now, chill and listen to the song of the earth.

P/s: I'm not grasping the how this music is created just yet. But you are welcome to read about it here and here.




Source: Here.

Since the discovery of brainwave by Hans Berger, neurologist from Germany, more advance applications are made to utilize the brain function, which includes using brain to give instructions to physical object. The video below shows several experiments done by researchers at Zhejiang University, China regarding thought control. 

Problems regarding weight has been well documented over the past decades or so. Diabetes, renal malfunction and high blood pressure which can lead to stroke are all associated with weight. Well, fear not, recent studies on John Hopkins University stated that there'll be an easy way to prevent and control this problem.

Neuropeptide Y - protein involves in regulating food intake and physical activity.

Researchers at the university found out that rat group injected with the virus ate less as compared to the control group. The virus is said to interrupt/attack/inhibit the process of Neuropeptide Y (NPY), an amino acid said to be responsible for energy regulation, learning and memory processing.

To make it even more surprising, the observation on the rat revealed that injected rat when given high calorie food, didn't convert them into white fat, but easy-to-burn brown fat instead. The virus is years from being able to be used on human though, but one can feel the ramification of this finding towards mankind.


Source: Here and here



p/s: i think the virus 'forced' the NPY to convert it to brown fat cause i don't think the virus is responsible for fat conversion. Well, it's just an opinion, i have no idea how it actually behaves though.

An insect fitted with piezoelectric generator to harness the energy from the insect's wing.

There is a new clock that makes you wanna wake even if you don't want to cause you can't afford not to.

The Shredder Clock is just a concept, but it’s a pretty good idea, and a new spin on the notion that money is a great morning motivator. Other alarm clock inventions force you to feed them money before they’ll shut up, or automatically donate to charities that you hate until you get out of bed, but this one lets you see your money going to waste.

You could conceivably shred anything you find precious, from letters to pictures, not just money even summons if you want to risk going to jail.

This actually seems like a decent DIY project — it probably wouldn’t take much work to sync a paper shredder to your alarm clock although the outcome won't be as good as this.

Source (http://www.popsci.com/gadgets/article/2011-06/shredder-clock-chews-money-get-you-out-bed)

The game Janken or rock-paper-scissors is so famous that almost everyone know how to play it. In fact, recent news in the world of technology reveals the ability of a robot hand to play this game, and you'll never beat it.

The robot hand on the right is designed to have 100% winning rate

This robot was developed by Ishikawa Oku Laboratory (Japan, obviously) and with the super-duper high-speed sensor that'll read opponent's hand gesture, the robot will make a counter move that will beat the human's move.

Here's the video.
The purpose of this highly frustrating machine (cause you play the game and lose everytime) is to demonstrate its ability in real world situation where the robot must be able to react like human when necessary.

I hope the researchers can tweak the algorithms so that it can play rock-paper-scissors-lizard-spock just like in the series The Big Bang Theory.
Here's the graphical representation as to what Sheldon Cooper said in the video.

Certainly technology has advance quite fast and hopefully all of these achievements can give benefit to human in a peaceful way. 

A group of engineers from Duke University and University of Arizona recently have managed to build a camera with 5 times better than human vision of 20/20.

The camera was built by synchronizing 98 tiny cameras into one device and a computer processor will then compiles all the image captured by the cameras using a software developed by a team led by Michael Gehm.

The 50 Gigapixel Camera with 2 and half feet square and 20 inches deep

The typical consumer camera ranges from 8 to 40 megapixels only and by comparison, the image produced by this new camera will have 12++ more pixels than consumer camera. This undoubtedly will create an image with excruciating details.

Even with the 50 Gigapixel of resolution, the optic part of the camera only constitutes around 3% of the overall size of the camera and the rest is divided into processors and electronics used to assemble the information gathered by the optic.

Example of a picture taken by the high resolution camera

Currently, the highest amount of pixels in a picture is 272 Gigapixels, created by Alfred Zhao using 12000 images all taken in Shanghai, China. You can see the picture and the amount of details in this website. Engineers in this team claim that with smaller electronics and processors are being made, camera with this resolution may be able for general consumer and everyday photographers.

Source: Here.

Below are some characters, that you might have seen throughout your life. Some of them may be familiar to you and some of them are not. 

Dr R. Andrew Hicks, a math professor at Drexel University has successfully eliminates 'blind spot' in current design of side mirror by introducing a curved side mirror. Normal side mirror is often flat, giving you around 17 degrees field of view. This revolutionize side mirror, on the other hand, can give you field of view around 45 degrees, allowing you to see more as compared to flat side mirror.

The curvy side mirror might gave you a wider field of view but the visual distortion on the mirror which can make straight line looks curvy presents with great risks, hence no car companies want to try and use it. But Dr Hicks invention on the other hand is created with mathematical algorithm so that the visual distortion is minimized and in his invention, the curvy straight line is barely detectable, suggesting low visual distortion, but still, object appears in a distance when in reality it is much closer.

In the curvy mirror above, the silver car is seen at a distance but is much closer in reality. However, the field of view in above mirror allows driver to see details that aren't present in flat mirror.

The metaphor given by Dr Hicks to his invention is like disco balls bouncing off light. We can imagine the mirror's surface is created with thousands of smaller mirrors and the algorithm will manipulate each of these smaller mirrors' direction so that the resulting big mirror will give wider view to the driver without distorting the visual appearance on the mirror.

His invention though great, but it won't be installed in any new car soon because of US regulations that a car must have flat side mirror or a phrase 'Objects in mirror are closer than they appear' must be included for curve mirror. Nevertheless, this is a good invention to eliminate the high statistics of vehicle accidents in the whole wide world. Dr Andrew Hicks also have designed several bizarre mirrors. You can check it out here.

Source: Here

Eidetic comes from Greed word eidos which means "seen". Eidetic memory means the ability to recall any visual/audio events with perfect accuracy and details. People who claim to have this kind of memory possess the skills to exactly remember an event, for example the event in a ball room, where he/she can recall where the person was standing, the people around him/her, the shirt they were wearing, food they ate down to what kind of conversation that they were having.

There are several series depicting a genius with this kind of memory for example Dr Spencer Reid in Criminal Minds and Dr Sheldon Cooper in The Big Bang Theory. In real life however, the case of eidetic memory have yet to be understood fully but there are a few who claim to have this memory for example Stephen Wiltshire, a British architectural artist that can draw a landscape after seeing it once. Another person, Daniel Tammet, also a British citizen, who can recall the number pi up to 22 000 digits.

Dr Spencer Reid holds Ph.D in Math, Chemistry and Engineering as well as B.A. in Philosophy.

Dr Sheldon Cooper portrayed by Jim Parsons in The Big Bang Theory.

Psychologically, people who have eidetic memory sometimes suffer from a condition known as autism, a medical condition characterized by problems in social interaction and communication together with repetitive behavior. Generally, people who have eidetic memory suffer also with autism but people who suffer from autism may not have eidetic memory.


There are several myths involving photographic memory especially as to whether normal people can acquire it or not. Most of the techniques that claim to help you acquire this memory are actually memory improvement technique, not the actual eidetic memory. Nevertheless, it is always good to improve your memory as it may helps you from time to time.

Source: here and if you like to read about some of the myths, you can go here.

In space exploration, there are terms where researchers use in order to determine the distance of a star from earth. The two most common terms are astronomical unit, which is equivalent to approximately 150 million kilometers or the mean distance from earth to sun, and the other unit is light year, which is the distance of light travel by a year or 9.5*10^13 kilometers.

The video below shows how the distance of two stars between universe is measured. The video used only simple terms and people with no scientific background can also understand this. Give it a whirl.

Blue strawberry is now available in real life. Scientists have try to come up with a way for strawberry to not degrade after being left in a freezer. While doing their research, the group of scientists discover an anti-freezing gene in Arctic Flounder Fish and use that to genetically modify the strawberry.

The Arctic Flounder Fish

Some concerns regarding this genetically modified strawberry are raised including the nutritional content and allergy. As for now, researchers created the blue strawberry for the purpose of research, not for production. So, for anti-GMO out there, just don't go on a demo just yet.

p/s: Somehow i wonder why they change red to blue. Last time there was an announcement saying that blue roses are now available and now, the strawberries. 

The combination of air and land transport certainly would be the best for those who love to drive but hate the traffic. Well, Terrafugia, an American corporation has developed what would appear to be the first affordable flying car.


Equipped with foldable wing, Transition can moves 65 mph while on road and 115 mph while on air. Transition first successful take off was on 2009 with the supervision of FAA. Check this video out to see Transition's ability on both air and land.


Despite its ability as transportation vehicle, spectators expect that the cost for mass production of Transition will exceed the selling price, which is at 280 000 USD. I think most of the money is spent on extremely light and expensive carbon fiber. Since it falls under light-sport aircraft, you're gonna need to have a sport pilot license in order to fly.

All in all, this is a good way of showing that the world's technology is advancing. Personally, i like the hoverbike more. Read more about hoverbike news here.

Source: Here and here.

Read more about Kim Ung - Young here.

1. Vishalini’s IQ is around 225. It is higher than that of the Guinness record holder, Kim Ung-Yong, whose IQ is around 210.
2. She has passed Microsoft Certified Professional and Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) with more than 90% when she was just 10 years old - a world record again. (The previous record was held by a 12-year-old boy from Pakistan, Irtaza Haider)  
3. She regularly now gets invited for "guest lectures" on Engineering topics at International conferences and by prestigious institutions like National Institute of Technology
4. Both NITK of Mangalore and Kalasalingam Engineering College are now more than ready to welcome Vishalini. But her parents want the girl to enjoy her childhood for the next three years before thinking of entering a college campus.

There's a difference between geek and nerd and this infographic tells you just that.


Image source: Here.

P/s: I feel kinda lazy these days cause i can't figure out few problems that i have with Matlab programming. Hence the infographics. Will continue writing about stuff as soon as all the problems are gone. 

Same hand gestures may not have the same meaning if you're in different part of the world. See the most common hand gestures and places where you should avoid using them.


Some things aren't just the same......

Source: Here.

The above picture isn't just a picture, but rather a message that was broadcasted from Arecibo radio telescope towards M13, a globular star cluster located 25 000 light years away. Scientists predict that Earth has to wait for 50 000 years for the reply.

The message was created by Dr Frank Drake, the creator of Drake Equation with the help of few other people including Carl Sagan, an American astronomer. The message consists of seven parts which generally explain about life on Earth.

The parts are:

1. The numbers 1 through 10. (white)
2. Atomic number of Hydrogen, Carbon, Nitrogen, Oxygen and Phosphorus, the elements that make up Deoxyrebonucleic Acid. (purple)
3. The formula for sugars and bases in nucleotides of DNA. (green)
4. Number of nucleotides (green) and the basic double helix structure of DNA. (blue)
5. Graphic figure of human, dimension of the average man and human population on Earth in 1974. (red)
6. Graphic of the solar system. (yellow)
7. Graphic of Arecibo radio telescope and the dimension of the transmitting antenna dish. (bottom purple)

What is stock? How is it worth? How can you understand stock? The infographic below explains some of these questions and help total newb in understanding stock and its value. 

Click to enlarge

First, some facts from WHO:

You can find out more in here.

January: The name was given after the Roman god of beginnings, Janus.

Janus

Mars as God of war and agriculture guardian.

Juno, also called Regina or the queen.

Julius Caesar

Augustus Caesar

A long time ago i posted something about 3D Printer. But the world does not stop at just that. Now, with time, 3D printing is advancing towards medical and food industry. 

Roadmap to bioprinting

Watch the video of the printer. 

If you've never heard of Amelia Earhart's, then you probably didn't know the fact that she was the first aviatrix to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean.

Click on the image to view larger version

Map showing the location of Howland and Nikumaroro Island

With the world of technology advancing everyday, we now can experience a whole new environment. But this advancement has its own cost, most obvious is the effect towards nature. But thanks to ecoATM, now we can recycle electronic products (cellphones and digital music players) in return for cash.