text:
(Nanowerk News) Imec realized an integrated poly-SiGe-based piezoresistive pressure sensor directly fabricated above 0.13 µm copper (Cu) -backend CMOS technology. This represents not only the first integrated poly-SiGe pressure sensor directly fabricated above its readout circuit, but also the first time that a poly-SiGe MEMS device is processed on top of Cu-backend CMOS.
Polycrystalline SiGe has emerged as a promising MEMS structural material since it provides the desired mechanical properties at lower temperatures compared to poly-Si, allowing the post-processing on top of CMOS. The MEMS-last approach is the most interesting approach for CMOS-MEMS monolithic integration as it leads to smaller die areas and enables integrating the MEMS without introducing any changes in standard foundry CMOS processes. Comparing to alternative technologies, for example using the CMOS top interconnect layers to fabricate the MEMS device, poly-SiGe offers a more generic and flexible technology for above CMOS integration, thanks to the fact that the MEMS fabrication can be completely decoupled from the CMOS fabrication.
Cross-section SEM picture of the integrated sensor. At the bottom, the two Cu metal lines of the CMOS circuit can be observed. Above, the MEMS layers (the poly-SiGe membrane and piezoresistors, the oxide sealing layer and the metal interconnects) are visible.
In the past, imec already proved the potential of poly-SiGe for MEMS above-aluminum-backend CMOS integration. However, aggressive interconnect scaling has led to the replacement of the traditional aluminum metallization by copper metallization, due to its lower resistivity and improved reliability. Our results now broaden the applications of poly-SiGe to the integration of MEMS with the advanced CMOS technology nodes.
The imec integrated sensor (fully fabricated in imec) includes a surface-micromachined piezoresistive pressure sensor, with a poly-SiGe membrane and four poly-SiGe piezoresistors, and an instrumentation amplifier fabricated using imec's 0.13 µm standard CMOS technology, with Cuinterconnects (two metal layers), oxide dielectric and tungsten-filled vias. To enable above-CMOS integration the maximum processing temperature of the complete sensor, including the poly-SiGe piezoresistors, is kept below 455°C.
Moreover, an appropriate passivation layer was included to protect the electronic circuit from the aggressive etch and deposition steps needed to fabricate the MEMS devices. The CMOS circuit showed no significant deterioration after the MEMS processing. Despite the low processing temperature, the poly-SiGe piezoresistive sensor alone (250x250µm2 membrane) showed a sensitivity of around 2.5 mV/V/bar. The integrated sensor (same sensor + Cu-based CMOS amplifier underneath) showed a sensitivity of about 158 mV/V/bar, ~64 times higher than the stand-alone sensor.


text:
The Book of Ruth:A Story of Love and Redemption
A Daily-Bible-Reading Study
The Book of Ruth
Deborah H. Bateman
Christian Daily Resources
About The Book
The Book of Ruth is a Daily Bible Reading Devotional. The Book of Ruth A Story of Love and Redemption is a love story from the Bible. The characters in "The Book of Ruth" deal with loss, lack, and romance. Through their many trials they learn to lean on God and His sovereign will for their lives. Even though Ruth is a Moabite she decides to follow her mother-in-law, Naomi back to her homeland of Judah, the promised land.
The two ladies travel back with nothing and are not sure how they will survive, but they trust God to make a way for them. As you read "The Book of Ruth", you will see the story unfold and see God's provision for these two ladies.Reading"The Book of Ruth" will help you recognize God's sovereignty and provision in your own life.
The Book of Ruth A Story of Love and Redemption
- You will be studying The Book of Ruth from the Bible.
- You will enjoy a beautiful love story.
- You will be reminded of God's provision in our lives.
- You will see God's ultimate plan of salvation come into being.
- You will see how God leads, guides and directs in our lives.
- You will be encouraged in your walk with God.
- You will see God's grace at work.
- Your faith will increase from reading this book.
- You will see God's hand of provision throughout this story.
- You will get a clearer picture of God's sovereignty.
- You will see how God brings different people into our lives.
- You will learn about what a kinsman-redeemer is.
- You will see God's blessings in Ruth's life.
- You will be encouraged by reading The Book of Ruth.
- You will learn how God provided for the salvation of humankind through the genealogy of Ruth.
What People are saying about
The Book of Ruth:
A Story of Love and Redemption
The story of Ruth as highlighted in this book opens a new revelation of God's hand at work. His grace is active in the life of those who choose to obey in humility and commitment. The prayer at the end of each lesson brings a challenge for all and ushers relevance to us today.
– Janet Perez Eckles, author, Simply Salsa: Dancing Without Fear at God's Fiesta
Deborah sheds light on the truths in this inspiring book in the Bible. I love that she showed the connection between Ruth and Boaz and Christ and the church. Even though I've studied Ruth before, Deborah pointed out several details that I hadn't known. It's amazing how God speaks through His children. Deborah has a loving, humble heart for the Lord. You can see her heart throughout the book. I am so happy for her first release. I look forward to more books from Deborah in the future.
– Amanda Beth, author, You Can Have a Happy Family
I appreciated the attention to detail, the explanation of the Hebrew customs, and making the story relevant to my life so I could relate to Naomi and Ruth. Each chapter ends with a rendering of the passage in the King James Translation with a short, heart-felt prayer and study questions for further reflection.
I also appreciated that the book is Biblical sound and concise and written in a style that is easy to understand.The Book of Ruth – a Story of Love and Redemption, would serve as a helpful study guide for women of all ages.
– Lorilyn Roberts, author, Children of Dreams, The Donkey and the King, How to Launch a Christian Best-Seller Book, and founder of the John 3:16 Marketing Network
Author Deborah Bateman does a great job of explaining the role of the kinsman-redeemer in reclaiming the family of one who has died. She also explains the relationships that are key in the story: 1) Ruth who loves her mother-in-law so much that she leaves her own family and homeland to care for Naomi in Bethlehem; 2) Boaz who marries Ruth as the kinsman-redeemer; 3) God who honors the lineage of Boaz & Ruth by becoming the ancestors of King David and eventually the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Book of Ruth by Bateman is a tender and valuable study for a week of looking into your own family relationships as well as your relationship with God.
– Diane Tatum, author, Gold Earrings
The author of this handy, easy-to-read volume, Deborah Bateman, has captured the essence of this love in her first publication, The Book of Ruth-A Story of Love and Redemption.
Bateman begins each chapter with a simple expository, followed by the Scripture verses to which it refers. Writing it thus makes it easy for the reader to remain in the book and not have to move from book to Bible. This format also makes it easy to follow the Biblical record and use it as a daily Bible reading. The prayer and thought for the day, which concludes the chapter, enabled me to reinforce what I had just read.
– Yvonne Pat Wright, author, From Spice to Eternity
The Book of Ruth-A Story of Love and Redemption by Deborah Bateman is a daily Bible reading study of the book of Ruth. It is broken up into eight chapters beginning with the loss of Naomi's husband and sons. Deborah relates the story of Ruth in modern language and the reader is invited to travel with Naomi and Ruth on their journey to Bethlehem.
–Theresa Franklin, author, Triumph Through Trial, Don't Forget Daddy, Journey to Fulfillment, From Stumbling Blocks to Stepping Stones, and A Sunny Tomorrow
This Bible study of the book of Ruth is more of a reading guide, breaking the book into bite-size pieces for adults "on the fly" who have time to read a bit but not do an in-depth study. It is simply written, easy to read and follow.
–Carol Brown, author, The Mystery of Spiritual Sensitivity
Get your copy now!
The Book of Ruth-A Story of Love and Redemption
The Book is Available as a Kindle Ebook on Amazon
Now Available in Paperback
at Create Space
We were not able to use the same cover as the Kindle version, so it looks a little different but still has the Daily-Bible-Reading logo and the same great-even updated content. We have added lines after each question so you can use the book as a sort of workbook while doing your Bible study. I hope that people will do small group Bible studies with them as well as personal Bible study. Celebrate with me, my first book in print. I hope to be getting more of them in print this year.

source: HuggingFaceFW/fineweb-edu


The Fortress : The Great Siege of Przemysl by Alexander Watson
Regular price £25.00
Tax included.
From the prize-winning author of Ring of Steel, a gripping history of the First World War's longest and most terrible siegeIn the autumn of 1914 Europe was at war. The battling powers had already suffered casualties on a scale previously unimaginable.
On both the Western and Eastern fronts elaborate war plans lay in ruins and had been discarded in favour of desperate improvisation. In the West this resulted in the remorseless world of the trenches; in the East all eyes were focused on the old, beleaguered Austro-Hungarian fortress of Przemysl. The siege that unfolded at Przemysl was the longest of the whole war.
In the defence of the fortress and the struggle to relieve it Austria-Hungary suffered some 800,000 casualties. Almost unknown in the West, this was one of the great turning points of the conflict. If the Russians had broken through they could have invaded Central Europe, but by the time the fortress fell their strength was so sapped they could go no further.
Alexander Watson, prize-winning author of Ring of Steel, has written one of the great epics of the First World War. Comparable to Stalingrad in 1942-3, Przemysl shaped the course of Europe's future. Neither Russians nor Austro-Hungarians ever recovered militarily from their disasters.
Using a huge range of sources, Watson brilliantly recreates a world of long-gone empires, broken armies and a cut-off community sliding into chaos. The siege was central to the war itself, but also a chilling harbinger of what would engulf the entire region in the coming decades, as nationalism, anti-semitism and an exterminatory fury took hold.


text: Nano-crystalline titania coatings were prepared by microarc oxidation (MAO) on titanium alloy (TC4) substrates in Na2CO3-KF electrolytic solution. The coating thickness was measured by an optical microscopy with a CCD camera. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) were employed to characterize the microstructure and phase composition of coatings. The results show that the coatings are porous nano-crystalline structures mainly composed of anatase and rutile (TiO2). With the increase of anode voltage, both the relative contents of rutile and the sizes of micropores increase gradually, whereas the sizes of the nano-crystalline decrease first and then increase. The prepared samples were employed to study the photo degradation characteristics of Rhodamine B. The results show that the photodegradation performance of the samples prepared under 220V is the best.

source: openbmb/Ultra-FineWeb


text: What's the shortest distance between two points? This multi-page worksheet will help your child with her pencil-control skills by having her draw a straight line between two points. To complete this exercise your child will need to use her fine-motor skills to trace a line between two animals. In the first two activities she will practice her skills at drawing vertical lines. The second two activities she will practice her skills at drawing horizontal lines. This activity will help prepare your child for writing letters.


Skip to Content
'OMG!': Why Cell Conversations Are So Annoying
MONDAY Sept. 27, 2010 -- Overhearing someone talk on a cell phone can be very annoying because it makes it hard, if not impossible, to concentrate on what you're doing, according to a new study.
Hearing just one side of the conversation is much more distracting than hearing both sides and erodes your attention to other tasks, explained Lauren Emberson, a psychology Ph.D. candidate at Cornell University.
She played recordings of one side and both sides of a conversation to volunteers as they tried to complete computer tasks that required attention, such as using a mouse to track a moving dot. The participants did much worse on the task when they could hear only half of the conversation, she discovered.
Your brain tends to ignore predictable things, but pays more attention to unpredictable situations. When you hear both sides of a conversation, it flow predictably. But just one side of phone conversation is quite unpredictable, Emberson explained -- that's why it's so hard to shut out.
The study appears in the journal Psychological Science.
Talking on a cell phone in public "has a really profound effect on the cognition of people around you, and it's not because they're eavesdropping or they're bad people. Their cognitive mechanism basically means that they're forced to listen," Emberson said in an Association for Psychological Science news release.
More information
For more on evolving cell phone etiquette, please visit PBS's Media Shift.
Posted: September 2010
Recommended for you
View comments


text:
Councils should be given greater powers to create designated streets that favour cyclists over cars, a national inquiry has concluded.
'Active communities: cycling to a better quality of life' is the report of an inquiry held by the Local Government Information Unit (LGiU) and Cycling England.
This report has found that transport regulations should be reviewed to give councils greater control over cycling routes to get more people out of their cars and onto their bikes.
Councils would be able to design the street to favour cyclists while also making it accessible for cars and pedestrians.
For every car driver converted to a bike, the UK economy saves around £400 a year through reduced medical bills, congestion and pollution, according to research conducted by Cycling England.
The inquiry report - downloadable as a PDF here - also calls for every public building to be an exemplar to encourage cycling, for example by implementing storage facilities and bike loan schemes.
LGiU Centre for Local Sustainability policy analyst Gemma Roberts said: "Councils should be given greater control over cycling routes to ensure more roads are made cycle friendly. We need to make it easier and safer for people to cycle.
"Local authorities need to take the lead and make cycling a priority in their communities," she said.
"But the efforts to promote cycling do not stop with the council. We also need the professional and political backing to invest more heavily in cycling so we can really tackle some of the wider issues communities face, such as obesity, climate change and congestion."


text:
By Bill Holloway
A new study in the Journal of Transport and Land Use documents changes in residential property values for homes located within one mile of Charlotte, North Carolina's, new light rail line – formerly a freight rail facility. The study analyzed home values over a period of 11 years divided into four time periods: 1) prior to any concrete plans for a light rail system (_PHONE_), 2) during the planning phase (_PHONE_), 3) during the construction phase (2005-2007), and 4) since the system has been operational (2007-2008).
The 9.6-mile light rail line analyzed in the study is Charlotte's first light rail facility, making it an ideal case study for the property value impacts of rail transit service in new markets. Although many studies have documented the relationship between a home's value and its proximity to well-developed rail transit systems, the relationship between property values and proximity to semi-developed systems is less certain.
The results indicate that the price discrepancy that existed during the first time period between homes less than a quarter mile from the line, which were somewhat lower, and those between one quarter and one mile from the line – likely due to the presence of industrial land uses along the rail line – narrowed considerably over the 11-year period. At the same time, home prices in both areas trended upward throughout the study period. While there are a number of potential explanations, the authors cite improved transit accessibility, an improved image of the area following the construction of the light rail system, or an increasing number of multifamily and commercial properties in the vicinity of the light rail stations as potential causes of the increasing property values near the new light rail line.
Although more research is needed on how transportation investments affect property values, this study represents an important step in quantifying these effects in lower-density communities that do not have well-developed transit networks.
For additional information on the economic impacts of transportation investments, see SSTI's report Economic Effects of Public Investment in Transportation and Directions for the Future.
Bill Holloway is a Transportation Policy Analyst at SSTI.


Swahili in Greece
Photo Source: Copyrighted © 2021
International Mission Board-SBC All rights reserved. Used with permission
Send Joshua Project a map of this people group.
People Name: Swahili
Country: Greece
10/40 Window: No
Population: 5,800
World Population: 1,797,700
Primary Language: Swahili
Primary Religion: Islam
Christian Adherents: 5.00 %
Evangelicals: 0.30 %
Scripture: Complete Bible
Online Audio NT: No
Jesus Film: Yes
Audio Recordings: Yes
People Cluster: Bantu, Swahili
Affinity Bloc: Sub-Saharan Peoples
Progress Level:
Introduction / History
Since that time, groups of Swahili have migrated to different parts of the coast, forming their own dialects and cultural variations. The Swahili language has many different dialects. A number of its words were borrowed from Arabic, the second language for many Swahili.
More recently, Africans have come to Greece and other countries in Europe seeking for work, freedom, and a chance to start anew.
Where Are they Located?
What Are Their Lives Like?
Since A.D. 2000, some 61,000 Swahili speakers have immigrated to Greece from East Africa. Among them are some Christians, numbering some five percent of Greece's Swahili population. They have settled in three metropolitan areas, including Athens. Some are well-known athletes. Muslim or Christian, athlete or not, they fear racism. Africans definitely stand out in Greece. Gender roles are very different between post-modern Greeks and Muslim Africans like the Swahili.
What Are Their Beliefs?
Nearly all of the Swahili profess to be Muslims; however, they have kept many of their traditional pre-Islamic beliefs and practices. For example, they believe in many spirits - both good and evil. They also believe in the supernatural power of witches and sorcerers. The Swahili often have folk explanations for natural occurrences. For example, some believe that a cow is supporting the earth and that earthquakes are caused when the cow moves its horns. They believe that thunder is the sound of God speaking with the angels and that lightning occurs when God is pleased. To the Swahili, lightning is a good sign because it means that God will send plentiful rain and food that year.
What Are Their Needs?
Although Christian resources are available in the Swahili language, there are only a small number of Swahili believers. Laborers who are sensitive to their Muslim culture are greatly needed to work among the Swahili. Greece has religious freedom, so it would be especially easy for someone to reach them there. Who will do it?
Prayer Points
* Pray for His kingdom to come and His will to be done among the Muslim Swahili people in Greece.
* Pray for a movement of Swahili households to study the Bible and accept the blessings of Christ.
* Pray for a spiritual hunger that will drive the Swahili people to the arms of Jesus.
* Pray for workers who are filled with the fruit and the power of the Holy Spirit to go to the Swahili people.
Text Source: Keith Carey


text:
On Sunday, Oct. 28, two one-of-a-kind, hand crafted crosses will be auctioned during the Annual Fall Festival at Our Lady Refuge Catholic Church. Last year, two other items made from the anaqua were the most popular items at the festival.
Festival organizers Kate Campbell and Betty Bauer said the items make it possible to "own a little piece of Texas history." The supply of the anaqua wood remains limited.
For more than 175 years since Houston languished in its shadow, the anaqua tree spread its massive branches behind Our Lady of Refuge Church, a historic gem for the town as well as the church members.
After years of trying to keep the tree healthy, the tree died in March, 2011. The heartbreaking decision to cut the tree down was made for safety reasons. Until 1976, the tree was considered the largest of its species on record in the United States, according to the book, "Famous Trees of Texas."
To preserve its place in history, parishioners gathered wood from the healthy trunk and larger limbs.
Former Refugio resident Sam Campbell crafted the crosses from the anaqua for the church's annual fundraiser.
The book of famous trees provides its history. The tree was removed in this years edition of the book.
Following their defeat, Mexican General Martin Prefecto de Cos and his troops withdrew from San Antonio early in December 1835. Previously, a wealthy, educated Scotsman, Dr. James Grant's large estate was confiscated by the Mexican government. Bitter feelings prevailed and he wanted to recoup his property.
Grant persuaded approximately 200 Texans and Francis W. Johnson, their commander, to attack the rich settlement of Matamoros. The Council of the Provisional Government were at odds with Gov. Henry Smith and Sam Houston so he approved the mission. The council appointed Gen. James W Fannin as their agent, commandeering Gen. Houston's legal authority and dividing command of the expedition.
When Houston heard of the removal of his troops and most of the supplies from Bexar (San Antonio), the general went to Goliad to challenge the expedition. Houston was only able to persuade approximately 30 men to return to Bexar.
Houston believed the attack was doomed to failure. So, again, on Jan. 17, 1836, Houston came to Refugio to stop the illegally authorized expedition.
Under the Mission Anaqua on the north bank of the Mission River, Houston spoke to Grant's men who were camped along the river. Explaining the futility of the expedition, Houston pleaded with the men to wait for reinforcements from Alabama and Georgia.
While some agreed to wait, 60 men left for San Patricio, taking the three brass cannons, while Johnson and Grant awaited Fannin's arrival.
On Feb. 1, 1836, Fannin arrived in Refugio from Copano, a port settlement between Refugio and Bayside which was later abandoned after several devastating hurricanes.
Instead of joining Johnson and Grant, Fannin left to reinforce Goliad and sent troops to San Patricio to retrieve the cannons.
Johnson and Grant needed horses so the two leaders divided the forces in order to obtain more at area ranches.
During the time they were divided, General Jose Urrea's troops overwhelmed 35 men in Johnson's party in San Patricio. Twenty were taken prisoner, six escaped and several of the Texans were killed.
Grant and all but six of his men were killed during an ambush in Agua Dulce.
Houston's wisdom shared with freedom fighters under the shade of the great Mission Anaqua was largely ignored but the great leader lived to change the course of Texas history.


text:
To understand what the economics of Blockchain, we need to first define and understand the term economics. Hopefully after the Blockchain series, there will be a post of what is economics. For now lets stick to the general understanding of the term.
There are two lenses through which the economics of Blockchain could be understood.
- Blockchain as an ICT technology – Economics of information, innovation and technological change.
- Blockchain as an institutional technology for making economic transactions – New institutional economics
The first lens of Blockchain as an ICT technology is the default setting today. Most of the literature around Blockchain looks at it only as an ICT technology or a general purpose technology innovation and its stages of development (McKinsey 2015, Oliver Wyman 2015). This view looks at the banks or institutions adopting Blockchain on a large scale, with huge efficiencies that it can bring in, the disruption that it will cause and various other insights on the lines of Schumpeterian phases of adoption and diffusion throughout industries and the economy. The analysis of the value chain and the impact in this study also follows a similar approach. This line of thought could be extended to understand the relation between market structure and innovation based on how certain domains in BFSI are taking a more proactive approach to the technology as compared to the others.
The five stages described in the previous section describe the workings of the technology. When applied together, they are capable of replacing any centralized system that records, reconciles and verifies transactions. There are three laws which make a case for Blockchain being an effective solution.
Table 1 : Laws of The Technology Market and Their Implications
|Moore's Law||Computing speed doubles every 18 months||Cost of processing halves every 18 months|
|Kryder's Law||Storage capacity doubles every 12 months||Cost of storing information halves every 12 months|
|Nielsen's Law||Bandwidth doubles every 21 months||Cost of transmitting ditigal information halves every 21 months|
Based on these three, the long run cost and output curve would be a downward sloping curve, that with time, the cost of technology will fall rapidly. This could have significant impact on the current operations of organizations. Assuming the scale to be constant, with time, the cost will fall by half at the end of a particular time period. Given the network effects and switching costs, substation, once the technology is proven, will happen at a non-linear pace.
Cryptoeconomics ensures the system keeps going. The word 'cryptoeconomic' is used to describe any decentralized cryptographic protocol "that uses economic incentives to ensure that it keeps going and doesn't go back in time or incur any other glitch.". As the entry barrier to become a miner is limited (only the computing power, electricity and internet connection), the system cannot be held hostage by miners.
The institutional economics approach looks at Blockchain as an enabler in a new type of economy. When the whole process logic of Blockchain is put together, it enables the evolution of Decentralized Autonomous Organizations or DAOs. These organizations are self-governing and have governance rules which are formalized and enforcement is automated. The implication this can have to service enables whose services are commoditized or are on the verge of being commoditized are serious. To understand the impact, it is necessary to understand the characteristics of Blockchain from an economic perspective.
Why is Decentralization important?
Adam Smith has argued that while individuals may not know what is best for them, a decentralized system through trial and error can successfully help develop rules required to achieve individual goals as well as social order (Paganelli 2006). Smith believed that decentralized systems can cope with human imperfections at an individual as well as group level.
Complex systems have always evolved from basic centralized system to decentralized systems. Centralization has been the starting point given the ease with which rules can be created, established and enforced. In the event of a dispute, the hierarchy in the system and the guidelines can address them effectively. As the costs of the centralized systems begin to become exploitative through the follies that come with concentrated power such as corruption, rent-seeking behaviour and so on, the decentralized structure comes across as a solution to the problems caused by the existing structure.
While organizations are centralized, it is important for the market to be decentralized for it to be efficient (Glode & Opp 2016). One of the primary functions Blockchain performs is to decentralize any sphere it is applied to.
Ronald Coase explained why firms exist by relating them to the market through the idea of transactions costs. The basic unit of analysis is the transaction. Any economic activity to take places, requires coordination with various other units in the economy. To produce, there has to be coordination with suppliers, buyers, labour unions, financiers and various other entities. Coordination problems arise from uncertainty. In a world of uncertainty, contracts are incomplete and need to be renegotiated at intervals. Asset specificity allows the firm to be vulnerable to opportunism, where the counter party may renege to extract a more favourable deal for itself. The costs of renegotiation can be painful and costly under conditions of asymmetric information and asset specificity. This leads to a question of why some transactions occur in firms and not in markets. Here, Coase introduces a concept called Transaction Cost and that transaction costs determine how transactions are done. With the help of some additions, Blockchain, through DAOs, can solve the problem of opportunism by reducing transaction costs through cryptoeconomics, public transparency and automatically enforceable smart contracts. Smart contracts can eliminate "one of the most frustrating aspects of contractual drafting: the inherent ambiguity" of language. Incompleteness of contracts due to bounded rationality or any other reason increase transaction costs, according to Coase. Contrary to such contracts, smart contracts will have to be complete. A smart contract can be used to ensure that a contractual condition is executed, forcing the parties to remain bound to their respective obligations (Wright & Filippi, 2015). This has serious implications for traditional firms. DAOs require the full business logic to be laid out and the process integrity ensures the entire transaction is carried out without any trust.
Transaction costs arise from information problems and the cost of writing and enforcing contracts. Blockchain, through DAOs, will reduce the cost of writing contracts. The cost of enforcing contracts depends on the element of human judgement allowed in the system. If the entire process of enforcement is also automated, the cost will be lowered again. The public ledgers address the informational problems to a certain extent.
Blockchain as a Catallaxy
As Blockchain can be used as an alternative governance institution, the same business logic, with some additions such as a constitution, private money, can be applied to a create self-organizing and constitutionally ordered catallaxy. This views Blockchain as a spontaneous organization that competes with traditional organizations without really being an organization.
Hayek defines a catallaxy as a "special kind of spontaneous order produced by the market by people acting within the rules of the law of property, tort and contract".
This enables Blockchain to facilitate transactions and not just exchange, making them superior to markets. However, it isn't an economy. Hayek defined an economy as "an organization or an arrangement in which someone conspicuously uses means in the service of a uniform hierarchy of ends". Hayek goes on to say "the two advantages of a spontaneous order or catallaxy: it can use the knowledge of all participants, and the objectives it serves are the particular objectives of all its participants in all their diversity and polarity.". This enables the Blockchain to have multiple markets within its ambit.
A catallaxy is characterized by a multitude of agents living within an 'extended order'. Its agents are
- Social, and governed by social rules
- They have specialised/distributed knowledge
- They form their own plans
- These are mutually coordinated through the market/price system
Blockchains are 'orders of economies' in the same way a market order is a catallaxy of mutually adjusting individual plans (economies). The first remarkable property of emergent economies built on Blockchains is that they are non-territorially unbundled. Second, the price system in Hayek's conception operates at the level of a system of markets, as in a region or nation, but a further surprising property of Blockchains is that they provide a mechanism to radically reduce the size and scale of effective catallaxies. (MacDonald, Allen, & Potts)
Blockchain can enable better sharing economies. The Blockchain's trust protocol allows for cooperatives, or autonomous associations, to be formed and controlled by people who come together to meet common needs. All revenues for services, except for overhead, would go to members, who also control the platform and make decisions (Tapscott & Tapscott, 2016).


text:
Under the watchful eye of ESAs Vecmap initiative, the Asian bush mosquito is about to get bitten in Belgium. First observed in Belgium in 2002, the Asian bush mosquito can spread viruses such as Chikungunya, Dengue, and West Nile.
Vecmap tests the accurate mapping of mosquitoes in Europe and in particular, mosquitoes carrying diseases.
Diseases carried by mosquitoes or ticks are an increasing public health concern in Europe. However, predicting where mosquitoes will flourish and spread infections is difficult. The conditions, location and timing of mosquito hatching vary widely between species.
Vecmap provides a one-shop-stop that simplifies the entire mosquito mapping process by defining key habitats based on field data and delivers risk maps for a wide range of users.
It consists of both software and supporting services, combining inputs from measurements taken during field work as well as data from Earth observation satellites. Data such as vegetation type, land temperature and soil moisture are used.
Field measurements are entered by inspectors into a smart phone, which pinpoints their location using satnav. Data is then transferred to a central database.
Depending on the user's needs, a variety of graphs and interactive research can be made through this database.
Avia-GIS was asked to coordinate a programme to eradicate the Asian bush mosquito from Belgium after authorities reviewed a risk assessment made by the Scientific Institute of Public Health with experts from Belguim's Modirisk project.
Avia-GIS is working with ESA to develop Vecmap and will be using the system for the surveying requirements of the Belgian eradication programme.
Mosquitoes will continue to be tracked until the end of the season and the project may continue in March 2013.
Explore further: Brazil to breed GM mosquitoes to combat dengue


New Testament
Symbolism and Symbolic Meanings
What does a black horse symbolize in the bible?
Top Answer
User Avatar
Wiki User
Answered 2012-09-19 13:44:01
It represents 'Famine' and Matthew 24:7 is Jesus' parallel of Revelation 6:
Revelation 6:5-6New King James Version (NKJV) Third Seal: Scarcity on Earth5 When He opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, "Come and see." So I looked, and behold, a black horse, and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand.6 And I heard a voice in the midst of the four living creatures saying, "A quart[a] of wheat for a denarius,[b] and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not harm the oil and the wine."Footnotes:
 1. Revelation 6:6 Greek choinix; that is, approximately one quart
 2. Revelation 6:6 This was approximately one day's wage for a worker.
Matthew 24:7New King James Version (NKJV)
7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences,[a]and earthquakes in various places.Footnotes:
 1. Matthew 24:7 NU-Text omits pestilences.
User Avatar
Your Answer
Still Have Questions?
Related Questions
What does a black horse symbolize?
In the Bible a black horse symbolizes famine
What does the color black symbolize in the Bible?
Usually sin or evil.
What does a sea horse symbolize?
There are a number of things a sea horse could symbolize. A sea horse could symbolize peace or fragility for example.
What is the meaning of the black horse in the book of Revelations?
In the book of Revelations, the black horse is generally understood to represent famine. In later years, and in different contexts, a black horse has also been known to symbolize suffering and death.
What does The Bible symbolize?
the bible symbilizes the religion of christianity
What did salvia symbolize in the Bible?
In the bible it states that salvia is limbo
What do clouds symbolize in the Bible?
in bible cloud means peace
What does a horse rider symbolize?
What does the hair symbolize in the bible?
What do black cats symbolize?
In some cultures black cats can symbolize good luck. However, in many cultures, a black cat can symbolize bad luck.
What does a horse shoe symbolize?
good luck!
What does Jesus riding a horse symbolize?
What did Jesus riding a horse symbolize?
He never rode a horse. He rode a donkey.
What is the symbolize of white horse alih?
The white horse symbolizes beauty and purity. Seeing one can symbolize good luck and this is considered a rare event.
What does the number 80 symbolize in the Bible?
What does rain symbolize in the Bible?
Alot of times rain symbolizes blessings in the Bible.
What do the color purple in the Bible symbolize?
The color purple in the Bible represents ROYALTY!
What does a black swan tattoo symbolize?
A black swan tattoo can symbolize man different things. It could symbolize that the owner of it is peaceful and graceful. Swans are mainly known to symbolize grace.
How would you describe black beauty the horse?
A black horse.
What does the horse symbolize?
the horse symbolizesPowerGraceBeautyNobilityStrengthFreedom
What does a deer symbolize?
In the bible, a deer is the symbolization of a saint.
What does a serpent symbolize?
In the bible it represents wisdom and evil.
What does red symbolize in the bible?
It symbolizes Jesus speaking.
What does the night of the ants symbolize in Poisonwood Bible?
What does color black represent in the Bible?
Black usually signifies negative events in human life - evil, terror, disease, famine and death. Consider the 'black horse' in Revelation.
Still have questions?


text:
Rugby Union is a game that necessitates the movement of players and a ball around the pitch. The exploitation of space makes this movement easier and faster. To exploit space and gaps in defence speed and acceleration are both important. In attack, pace allows a player to exploit smaller spaces, to support faster players and to get away from the opposition. In defence, speed is important to allow more flexibility, reliability and scope for aggressive counter-attacking tactics.
Importance of personal speed in attack:
* Ability to exploit and open up small gaps in defence.
* An attacker running at speed is more difficult to tackle than a slower moving target.
* A high level of speed allows closer support for the ball carrier which gives him more options and can allow more dynamic, aggressive tactics to be used.
* When the ball is kicked, a faster player may get to it before the opposition. This allows a much more expansive game to be played.
* A quick player is able to get to break downs and tackle situations quicker, therefore able to retain more possession and keep the game flowing.
Importance of personal speed in defence:
* Makes the defender more likely to catch attackers who break through the first line of defence.
* A fast defender can pressurise the opposition and limit the time and space they have to play in.
* Again, kicks can be got to faster which gives more security in depth.
* A fast defender who has turned over possession is able to turn defensive situations into attacking ones by exploiting the positioning of the opposition and by quickly counter-attacking.
Specific Situational examples:
In an attacking situation where a team mate has possession of the ball and is running at the opposition, a fast supporting player who is able to give close support, empowers the attacker with more options in attack, security in recycling the ball and also it presents the defence with a problem as they have to cover two potential attackers rather than just the ball carrier.
If the ball carrier does get tackled then both the tackled and the tackler are prevented from touching the ball while they are still on the ground. If there is close support for the attacker then the movement may be continued as the supporting player may pick the ball up if they are first to arrive; thus the momentum of the attack is preserved.
In defence, it is often necessary for the full-back to come out of position, into the defensive line to provide cover in width. This means that there is a large space behind the line that can be exploited by an aware attacker. If a kick is put over, into this space then a fast defender would be able to turn, get back to the ball before the attack, and still have time on the ball to make decisions and take action. A slower defender would be pressurised and may not even reach the ball before the attackers.
Speed is defined as the time taken to travel a set distance, therefore, it is relatively easy to see differences in speed. As pace increases, the time taken to travel that set distance decreases. The accepted standard test for max speed is the measuring of the time taken for an individual to sprint 30 metres from a rolling start.
This test is relatively well-suited to test the type of speed that I would be using in rugby. 30 metres is a distance that a rugby player would be expected to sprint many times during the course of a regular match; whether it is to chase a kick, catch an opposition or to make a break. However, it is rare that these sprints are started rolling. During a game it is much more likely that a player will be required to begin a run or movement from a stationary position than a rolling start; for example getting across the pitch from a lineout to tackle an opposition ball carrier.
Usually these sprints are for short distances and require a high level of acceleration to reach the target. I will reflect this in the way that I test myself. I will perform the 30m sprint test as this will provide data that can give an approximation of how I compare with other players of my age and position using performance tables. But I will also perform a 10m stationary start sprint that will more effectively measure my acceleration and therefore give findings that are more applicable to match situations.
For both tests I will have an independent judge to time me, and will perform three trials, choosing the fastest time for recording. I will ensure that I have a sufficient rest period between each trial to prevent a build up of lactate and the consumption of adenosine triphosphate. However, it will be necessary to take into account the effect of the body's tendency to over-compensate in ATP re-synthesis, that could make later trials faster.
Exercises to improve Speed
Speed can be improved by a) increasing the rate of muscular contraction in the muscles used for the sprinting action, or b) by increasing the force produced by each of those muscular contractions.
The increase in muscular contraction force is a result of the hypertrophy of muscle fibres. When a muscle fibre is forced to contract at a higher power level than it is used to, micro-tears occur as a result of this added pressure. It is the Myosin 'levers', that contract to produce movement, that get damaged during overload, as the force required is more than the structure of Myosin arms can handle. Hypertrophy therefore is the body's adaptation to this new set of force requirements. A larger number of Myosin arms are grown so that next time the same force required will be spread more evenly and will not precipitate the same damage. This results in an increased maximum muscular contraction force and a larger cross-sectional diameter.
I can initiate this process by increasing the required force by upping resistance to the contractions during the exercises, thus utilising the principle of overload.
By performing weight-lifting exercises I can target specific individual muscle groups and therefore get the improvement in the areas that need it most. Weights are also easy to use and make progression easy to implement; I just need to increase the weights being lifted. The weight lifting drills I will use include: squats, power cleans, leg extensions, leg curls and calf raises. When performing Weight lifts it is crucial, in order to achieve maximum benefit to use correct technique. The full range of motion should be utilised in order to recruit the maximum number of muscle fibres and when lowering the weight it is important not to 'rest' by just dropping the weight. Instead I should lower the weight slowly thusly working not only the Prime mover but Antagonist muscle groups also.
* Hill Sprints.
By performing sprints against a gradient I am increasing the resistance to muscular contractions using gravity. Again I can easily increase resistance by increasing gradient.
I can increase the rate of muscular contraction by working on quick steps. Drills to help improve this include:
* Ladder Work.
Using a rope ladder, laid along the ground encourages the fast pick-up of knees and accurate placement of the feet. By moving along the ladder at a fast pace while ensuring that each 'section' is stepped in, forces the legs to move quicker than usual and therefore helps improve rate of muscular contraction.
Using a rope to skip quickly again helps to improve the rate at which feet are picked up from the ground as well as improving coordination and leg strength.
It is also possible to use plyometric exercises to improve power. These drills involve the fast contraction of muscles to produce a large force. The most common form is bounding over steps. The only problem with this type of exercise is the possibility of inducing muscular damage as a result of the stretch reflex.


Using the RDBMS Operation Classes
JdbcTemplate is ideal for simple queries and updates, and when you need to build SQL strings dynamically, but sometimes you might want a higher level of abstraction, and a more object-oriented approach to database access. This is provided by the org.springframework.jdbc.object package. It contains the SqlQuery, SqlMappingQuery, SqlUpdate, and StoredProcedure classes that are intended to be the central classes used by most Spring JDBC applications. These classes are used together with a DataSource and the SqlParameter class. Each of the RDBMS Operation classes is based on the RDBMSOperation class and they all use a JdbcTemplate internally for database access. As a user of these classes you will have to provide either an existing JdbcTemplate or you can provide a DataSource and the framework code will create a JdbcTemplate when it needs one.
Spring's RDBMS Operation classes are parameterized operations that are threadsafe once they are prepared and compiled. You can safely create a single instance for each operation that you define. The preparation consists of providing a datasource and defining all the parameters that are needed for the operation. We just mentioned that they are threadsafe once they are compiled. This means that we have to be a little bit careful when we create these operations. The recommended method is to define the parameters and compile them in the constructor. That way there will not be any risk for thread conflicts.
SqlQuery and MappingSqlQuery
We have looked at some methods available for JdbcTemplate that make running simple queries and updates possible. There are, however, situations where you want a more complete solution as well as one that is more object oriented. These classes are part of the org.springframework.jdbc.object package. For running queries and mapping the results to Java classes, there is a class called MappingSqlQuery. It is easy to use and should give you enough power for the most demanding mappings. Let's look at a short example. Again, we will use an example table from our sample application. This time the example is based on the Performance table. We have added a few tables to our data model, and it now looks like Figure 5-3.
image from book
Figure 5-3
The additional DDL for these two new classes is as follows:
CREATE TABLE Performance ( id INTEGER NOT NULL, date_and_time DATETIME, Price_Structure_id INTEGER, Show_id INTEGER, PRIMARY KEY(id)); CREATE TABLE Price_Structure ( id INTEGER NOT NULL, name VARCHAR(80), PRIMARY KEY(id)); ALTER TABLE Performance ADD CONSTRAINT fk_Price_Structure FOREIGN KEY (Price_Structure_id) REFERENCES Price_Structure (id) ALTER TABLE Performance ADD CONSTRAINT fk_Shows FOREIGN KEY (Show_id) REFERENCES Shows (id)
We will start by creating a very simple mapping of just the Performance table. The class we are mapping to is also called Performance and Figure 5-4 is the class diagram with just setters and getters defined to start out with. We will most likely add some behavior as we develop the application further.
image from book
Figure 5-4
Mapping the table data to this class is straightforward, so it gives us an opportunity to focus on the basics involved in using MappingSqlQuery. We first create a class named PerformanceQuery and this class extends MappingSqlQuery which is provided by the framework. We create a constructor that accepts the DataSource, which together with the static SQL statement gets passed to a constructorof the super class. Next we declare the single parameter we included a placeholder for in the SQL statement. We do this by passing in an SQLParameter to the declareParameter method. The SQLParameter is given a name, which usually is the name of the property, and a type, which is the data type from java.sql.Types for the column parameter. Once we are done declaring parameters, we call compile to finalize the setup of this RDBMS Operations class. Here is the beginning of our PerformanceQuery class:
package org.springframework.prospring.ticket.db; import java.sql.ResultSet; import java.sql.SQLException; import org.springframework.jdbc.object.MappingSqlQuery; import org.springframework.prospring.ticket.bus.Performance; class PerformanceQuery extends MappingSqlQuery { private static String SQL_PERFORMANCE_QUERY = "select id, date_and_time from Performance where id =?"; public PerformanceQuery(DataSource ds) { super(ds, SQL_PERFORMANCE_QUERY); declareParameter(new SqlParameter("id", Types.INTEGER)); compile(); } public Object mapRow(ResultSet rs, int rowNumber) throws SQLException { Performance performance = new Performance(); performance.setId(rs.getInt("id")); performance.setDateAndTime(rs.getTimestamp("date_and_time")); return performance; } }
The MappingSqlQuery is an abstract class and there is one method that you must implement: the mapRow method, which performs the actual mapping from the result set that gets passed in. In our example, the first thing we do in this method is to create a new instance of Performance. Then we populateit with data extracted from the result set. This result set is a regular java.sql.ResultSet so we can access all methods available for this interface. We should not do any ResultSet navigation like calling next() since this is all handled by the framework. We set the two instance variables and we ignore the references to Show and PriceStructure for now. The last task is to return the object we just created. This method is called once for each row in the result set, so the number of all the objects returned should be the same as the number of rows that were returned. All the returned objects will be put in a list that will be returned to the class using the query.
Let's take a quick look at an example of how the PerformanceQuery that we just built can be used:
public void setUp() { jt.execute("delete from Performance"); jt.execute("insert into Performance (id, date_and_time)" + " values(3, {d '2005-01-31'})"); } public void testGetPerformance() { PerformanceQuery performanceQuery = new PerformanceQuery(ds); List perfList = performanceQuery.execute(3); assertEquals("list contains one entry", 1, perfList.size()); }
First of all, you need to have a data source available. Next you create a new instance of the PerformanceQuery passing in the data source to the constructor. This can also be done using setters, but we prefer to use the constructor as we do in this example. Finally you need to execute the query. There are several methods for executing the query and all of them will return a list of objects retrieved. In our example we are doing a unique lookup for a specific ID, so we can use an execute method that takes a single int as its parameter. If we need to pass in several parameters we can use an object array like we did for the query methods of JdbcTemplate.
Note the use of an escape sequence used to specify the date in the setUp method. This makes it possible to execute this code against most databases regardless of their specific date representation syntax. The JDBC driver is required to make the translation.
Inserts and Updates with SqlUpdate
Next we will look at the class from the RDBMS Operation group of classes that is used for updating the database. This class is SqlUpdate and it is fairly straightforward to use. Here we are updating one column in the Performance table containing the date-and-time for a specific performance:
SqlUpdate updatePerformance = new SqlUpdate(); updatePerformance.setDataSource(ds); updatePerformance.setSql("update Performance set date_and_time =? where id =?"); updatePerformance.declareParameter( new SqlParameter("date_and_time", Types.TIMESTAMP)); updatePerformance.declareParameter(new SqlParameter("id", Types.INTEGER)); updatePerformance.compile(); Object[] parameters = new Object[] {new Timestamp(System.currentTimeMillis()), new Integer(3)}; int count = updatePerformance.update(parameters);
In the next example you'll see what an insert statement would look like. It is basically the same approach as for the update statement: Provide the SQL, and if you provide parameter placeholders, then you must declare the parameters and pass in an object array containing the parameters for each execution. The order in which you declare the parameters is important because JDBC relies on them being set by position rather than name. The name is not strictly necessary here, but you are encouraged to provide a name because that makes the code self-documenting:
SqlUpdate insertPerformance = new SqlUpdate(); insertPerformance.setDataSource(ds); insertPerformance.setSql( "insert into Performance (id, date_and_time) values(?,?)"); insertPerformance.declareParameter(new SqlParameter("id", Types.INTEGER)); insertPerformance.declareParameter( new SqlParameter("date_and_time", Types.TIMESTAMP)); insertPerformance.compile(); Object[] parameters = new Object[] {new Integer(1), new Timestamp(System.currentTimeMillis())}; int count = insertPerformance.update(parameters); parameters = new Object[] {new Integer(2), new Timestamp(System.currentTimeMillis())}; count = count + insertPerformance.update(parameters);
Updating a ResultSet Using UpdatableSqlQuery
Sometimes you have to update a large number of rows and it would be convenient to just iterate over an updatable ResultSet and make your updates as you go along. Spring provides a class named UpdatableSqlQuery for just this purpose. The alternative would be to use an SqlQuery and then issue update statements for the rows that needed to be updated. We have found the latter approach to be better performing against an Oracle database, if you use batch updates. For other databases we have not noticed this performance difference and the UpdatableSqlQuery approach has performed just as well.
The Updatable


text:
Lithium hexafluorophosphate is an inorganic compound with chemical formula LiPF6. The main use of lithium hexafluorophosphate is as the salt used in the electrolyte in lithium-ion batteries which are used in used in new energy vehicles, energy storage, and consumer electronics.
Specifically, the non-aqueous solutions of lithium hexafluorophosphate in carbonate solvents (e.g., ethylene carbonate (EC), dimethyl carbonate (DMC), diethyl carbonate (DEC) and/or ethyl methyl carbonate (EMC), with a small amount of one or many additives such as fluoroethylene carbonate and vinylene carbonate, serve as electrolytes in lithium-ion batteries.
Lithium hexafluorophosphate is currently the lithium salt with the best comprehensive performance, and it is also the most widely used commercial lithium salt.
The performance requirements of the lithium salt include:
- The lithium chemical salt has high solubility in organic solvents, and the degree of association is small and easy to dissociate, so as to ensure that the electrolyte has a high ionic conductivity. The ionic conductivity of the electrolyte can reach 7.2-11.5 ms/cm.
- Wide electrochemical window, the maximum voltage can reach 5V, which is higher than the 4.5V requirement of lithium-ion batteries.
- Facilitates the formation of SEI film on the anode.
- High stability, and no chemical reaction with electrode active materials and current collectors. Excellent anti-corrosion nature toward aluminium current collector of the cathode.
- Thermal stability, the best stable temperature range is -40 to 60oC, ensuring the safety of the electrolyte.
- Environmentally friendly, decomposition products.
- It is scalable and has cost-effective preparative processes developed in industry.
Before 2011, the global lithium hexafluorophosphate was mainly dominated by three Japanese companies, Morita Chemical Industries Co., Ltd, Rising Chemicals (Stella Chemifa Corporation), and Kanto Denka Kogyo Co., Ltd.
Tianjin Chemical Research and Design Institute was the first to develop lithium hexafluorophosphate in China. It started the research on lithium hexafluorophosphate electrolyte for the first time in China in 1996, and completed a 4 t/a pilot plant in 1999. In 2005, it was approved by Tianjin Jinniu Power Material Industry Chemical for the construction of 80 tonnes/year lithium hexafluorophosphate construction project and a production capacity of 500 tonnes/year by 2010.
By 2013, Chinese domestic manufacturers, like Tianci Materials and Duofuoduo, achieved technological breakthroughs and rapidly expanded lithium hexafluorophosphate production capacity. From 2009 to 2015, China production capacity increased from 320 tonnes/year to 14,000 tonnes/year.
In 2021, China's LiPF6 production capacity and output was 99,900 tonnes and 75,000 tonnes respectively. Major producers were Tianci Materials with a 34.6% market share and Duofuoduo with a 21.6% market share. With the commissioning of new projects, the output in 2022 has exceeded 120,000 tonnes while demand was about 103,800 tonnes.
Contact us to purchase the full report today
Click to view the Table of Contents
Our comprehensive battery mineral research reports include a brief introduction, industry chain, product specifications, processing methods, raw material requirements, cash cost analysis, pricing metrics, future industry development trends, and the competitive landscape. If you have specific reseach topics, reach out by email and contact us today to learn more.
For Further Information


text:
With the aid of lasers, researchers have developed various two-photon absorption (2PA) based applications, which include biological imaging, 3-dimentional microfabrication, frequency up-converted lasing, optical power limiting, and photodynamic therapy etc. Unlike 2PA, five-photon absorption (5PA) related phenomenon, is more difficult to observe due to the low transition probability of the 5PA process. Furthermore, the realization of five-photon pumped stimulated emission will be even more difficult because it requires the 5PA to be large enough for creating population inversion in the gain medium.
Prof. Zheng Qingdong's group at Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences (FJIRSM) has reported on the first experimental observation of five-photon induced stimulated emission in collaboration with Prof. Chen Xueyuan's group at FJIRSM.
By rational molecular design, a multi-photon absorbing material IPPS with the molecular configuration of Donor-Pi-Acceptor was prepared and selected from a large number of multi-photon active chromophores. Through simultaneous five-photon absorption, stimulated emission from IPPS was realized for converting the 2100nm invisible infrared laser into the visible 501nm blue-green laser.
At the same time, by direct three-photon absorption, the IPPS system exhibited a high net conversion efficiency of 10.4 percent, which thus enable the realization of novel frequency up-converted lasing in practical device applications. The results have been published in Nature Photonics.
This work is the first real application for five-photon absorption, which belongs to a ninth-order nonlinear process with extremely low probability. For the 5PA process, its 5th-order dependence on the input light intensity would provide a much stronger spatial confinement so that a much higher contrast in imaging can be achieved as compared to lower-order nonlinear absorption.


text:
Students go wild filling Beasty Books and their brains with fun facts and figures about their favorite creatures.
1. Which animal makes you curious? Look up facts about your animal. Where does it live? What does it eat? How big do these animals grow? Find a picture of your animal.
2. Use Crayola® Construction Paper Crayons to draw the animal on construction paper. This is your Beasty Book cover. Cut out your cover with Crayola Scissors.
3. Trace the cover several times. These pages will make the inside of your book and the back cover. Cut out all the animal-shaped pages.
4. Decorate your Beasty Book's front cover with crayon drawings. Give your book a title and include the author's name (that's you).
5. Organize and write your information on the animal-shaped pages. Illustrate the facts whenever possible.
6. Staple all the pages together to create your Beasty Book.
Adult supervision is required for any arts & crafts project. Observe children closely and intervene as necessary to prevent potential safety problems and ensure appropriate use of arts and crafts materials. Some craft items, particularly beads and buttons, are potential choking hazards for young children. Avoid use of such small parts with children younger than 3 years. Craft items such as scissors, push pins and chenille sticks may have sharp points or edges. Avoid use of materials with sharp points by children younger than 4 years. Read all manufacturers' safety warnings before using arts and craft supplies.
Scissors—ATTENTION: The cutting edges of scissors are sharp and care should be taken whenever cutting or handling. Blunt-tip scissors should be used only by children 4 years and older. Pointed-tip scissors should be used only by children 6 years and older.
- Create dioramas of habitats for the creatures.
- Find Internet sites about the specific animal, as well as books and stories that feature the creature, to share with classmates.
- Students with special needs may find it helpful to work in pairs or to use a computer to write their material.


text:
Roof drains are an essential component of a plumbing system that allows for the efficient removal of rainwater from rooftops. They play a crucial role in protecting buildings from water damage and preventing costly repairs that can arise from leaks or flooding.
Roof drains are installed on flat roofs, sloped roofs, and other roof types to collect rainwater and transport it away from the building. The purpose of this article is to provide an objective overview of what roof drains are in plumbing, how they work, their installation process, and common issues that may arise with them.
Readers will gain technical knowledge about the function of roof drains, including their components and materials used in construction. The article aims to inform professionals in the plumbing industry as well as homeowners who want to understand more about their home's drainage system.
Definition of Roof Drains
What is meant by the term 'roof drains' in plumbing systems, and how do they function to prevent water damage on roofs?
Roof drains are an integral part of a building's plumbing system that collects rainwater from the roof and directs it to the building's drainage system. They come in various types, including scuppers, downspouts, and gutters. These types can be made from different materials such as copper, aluminum, or galvanized steel.
The primary function of roof drains is to prevent water damage on roofs caused by standing water or ice dams. By directing the rainwater away from the roof surface and into a proper drainage system, it reduces the risk of leaks and structural damage caused by excess moisture.
Understanding how these devices work is crucial for maintaining a healthy roofing system that protects your property from costly repairs or replacements in the long run.
How Roof Drains Work
Roof drains are an essential component of any plumbing system that collects and diverts rainwater from the roof to prevent water damage.
The drainage system is generally gravity-based, where water flows down through pipes towards a collection point.
However, siphonic systems are becoming more popular due to their high efficiency in removing large volumes of water.
Proper maintenance and regular cleaning are necessary to ensure optimal performance of the roof drain system.
Gravity-based systems for roof drainage rely on the natural force of gravity to direct water from the rooftop towards the downspouts. Design considerations for these systems include ensuring adequate slope and sizing of gutters and downspouts based on expected rainfall intensity, as well as proper placement of roof drains to avoid ponding or overflow.
Advantages of gravity-based systems include simplicity, low maintenance requirements, and lower cost compared to siphonic systems. However, these systems may not be suitable for large commercial or industrial buildings with complex roof configurations or high flow rates.
The subsequent section will explore siphonic systems, which offer an alternative approach to roof drainage by using pressure differentials rather than gravity to achieve efficient water removal.
Siphonic systems utilize a unique approach to efficiently remove water from rooftops by using pressure differentials, allowing for increased drainage capacity without the need for additional plumbing.
Unlike gravity-based systems that rely on the force of gravity to remove water, siphonic systems use negative pressure created by a vacuum to draw water from the roof into the drainage system.
This method allows for smaller pipe sizes and fewer downspouts, making it ideal for large commercial or industrial buildings with flat roofs.
Siphonic systems also have several advantages over traditional gravity-based systems, including increased flow rates, reduced installation costs due to smaller pipe sizes, and less excavation work required during installation.
However, siphonic systems can also be more complex and require more maintenance than gravity-based systems. In the subsequent section about maintenance and cleaning, we will discuss these requirements in greater detail.
Maintenance and Cleaning
To ensure the efficient functioning of the drainage system, regular maintenance and cleaning are essential. Roof drain components such as strainers, roof scuppers, and downspouts can become clogged with debris over time, resulting in improper drainage and potential damage to the building structure. It is important to perform routine inspections of these components to identify any blockages or defects. Troubleshooting techniques may include using a plumbing snake or high-pressure water jetting to clear out any obstructions. Additionally, periodic cleaning of the roof surface surrounding the drains can prevent buildup of leaves and other materials that could clog them. By performing regular maintenance and cleaning on roof drains, property owners can avoid costly repairs and ensure proper functionality for years to come. Moving forward into installation of roof drains, it is important to consider factors such as location and sizing in order to optimize their effectiveness.
Installation of Roof Drains
During the installation of roof drains, it is important to consider the potential for clogging due to debris buildup in the drain. To properly install a functioning roof drainage system, one must take into account proper sizing and design. This can be achieved by following these steps:
1) Determine the required size of the roof drain based on local plumbing codes and regulations.
2) Choose a location for the roof drain that will allow for optimal water flow and minimize the potential for blockage.
3) Install a strainer or grate over the drain to prevent large debris from entering and blocking the pipe.
4) Ensure that all components of the drainage system are securely fastened and sealed to prevent leaks.
By taking these precautions during installation, common issues with roof drains such as clogs and leaks can be avoided.
Moving forward, understanding how to properly maintain and clean roof drains will ensure their continued functionality in preventing water damage to buildings.
Common Issues with Roof Drains
Blockages caused by debris buildup are a prevalent issue that can impede the functionality of a building's drainage system. Roof drain clogs may cause water to back up onto the roof and into the building, leading to serious damage to both the interior and exterior structures. To avoid this problem, regular maintenance and cleaning of the roof drains should be carried out. In addition, roof drain leaks are another common problem that can lead to water infiltration, causing damage to walls and ceilings as well as creating an environment for mold growth. Proper installation and constant monitoring of roof drains can help prevent these issues from occurring. The table below provides a summary of common causes and solutions for roof drain clogs and leaks.
| Causes | Solutions |
| ————— | ————— |
| Debris buildup | Regular cleaning|
| Clogged pipes | Professional unclogging services|
| Improper slope | Adjusting pitch or adding more drains|
| Aging materials | Replacement with more durable materials|
| Poor installation| Redoing installation according to code|
Overall, it is crucial for building owners or managers to pay attention to their roofing drainage systems' maintenance regularly. Early detection of problems such as clogs or leaks can save time and money in repair costs while minimizing potential damages caused by water infiltration.


text:
This is really cool. All Streets is a map of the United States made of nothing but roads. A surprisingly accurate map of the country emerges from the chaos of our roads:
All Streets consists of 240 million individual road segments. No other features — no outlines, cities, or types of terrain — are marked, yet canyons and mountains emerge as the roads course around them, and sparser webs of road mark less populated areas. More details can be found here, with additional discussion of the previous version here.
In the discussion page, "Fry" writes:
The result is a map made of 240 million segments of road. It's very difficult to say exactly how many individual streets are involved — since a winding road might consist of dozens or even hundreds of segments — but I'm sure there's someone deep inside the Census Bureau who knows the exact number.
Which raises a fascinating question: is there a Platonic definition of "a road"? Is the question answerable in the sort of concrete way that I can say "there are 2 pens in my hand"? We tend to believe that things are countable, but as you try to count them in larger scales, the question of what is a discrete thing grows in importance. We see this when map software tells us to "continue on Foo Street." Most drivers don't care about such instructions; the road is the same road, insofar as you can drive in a straight line and be on what seems the same "stretch of pavement." All that differs is the signs (if there are signs). There's a story that when Bostonians named Washington Street after our first President, they changed the names of all the streets as they cross Washington Street, to draw attention to the great man. Are those different streets? They are likely different segments, but I think that for someone to know the number of streets in the US requires not an ontological analysis of the nature of street, but rather a purpose-driven one. Who needs to know how many individual streets are in the US? What would they do with that knowledge? Will they count gravel roads? What about new roads, under construction, or roads in the process of being torn up? This weekend of "carmageddeon" closing of 405 in LA, does 405 count as a road?
Only with these questions answered could someone answer the question of "how many streets are there?" People often steam-roller over such issues to get to answers when they need them, and that may be ok, depending on what details are flattened. Me, I'll stick with "a great many," since it is accurate enough for all my purposes.
So the takeaway for you? Well, there's two. First, even with the seemingly most concrete of questions, definitions matter a lot. When someone gives you big numbers and the influence behavior, be sure to understand what they measured and how, and what decisions they made along the way. In information security, a great many people announce seemingly precise and often scary-sounding numbers that, on investigation, mean far different things than they seem to. (Or, more often, far less.)
And second, despite what I wrote above, it's not the whole country that emerges. It's the contiguous 48. Again, watch those definitions, especially for what's not there.


Irish immigrants have been remembered at an event in the US state of Utah celebrating the 150th anniversary of the 'Golden Spike', the moment when the First Transcontinental Railroad was completed.
The railway connected the east and west coasts of the United States and was finished on 10 May, 1869.
An estimated 10,000 Irish immigrants worked on the railroad.
Many of them were veterans of the US Civil War and made up at least half of the workers from the Union Pacific railway company.
They worked alongside a mix of Mormons, other European immigrants and recently emancipated African Americans to construct the line from the east.
Many Irish also worked alongside the 15,000 Chinese immigrants who were the main workforce building the line from Sacramento, California to Promontory Summit, Utah.
A ceremony was held in Utah to mark the 150th anniversary of the railroad's completion.
The event was addressed by the Irish Ambassador to the US, Daniel Mulhall.
He said he was proud and honoured to mark the enormous role played by Irish immigrants in the building of the transcontinental railroad.
Irish Ambassador to the US, Daniel Mulhall, addressing the crowd
"Theirs was a magnificent contribution to the making of modern America," he said.
The US President Donald Trump has paid tribute to the workers who built the transcontinental railroad.
In a statement he said: "We honor the undaunted efforts of the people who made this innovation possible, including workers of Irish and Chinese descent, as well as freed slaves, Native Americans, Civil War veterans, and Latter-day Saints."


In the Lab
Researchers Study Self-Knowledge (Literally)
The Body Sends Cues to the Brain; Understanding Them Can Improve Your Health
Aug. 26, 2013 6:59 p.m. ET
How well do people know their bodies and how does that help them function day to day?
The attempt to understand how humans make sense of all the complex feedback they receive from the eyes and ears down has taken off and reached a new level of understanding in the last decade.
One prong of the research being conducted in the United...
Available to Subscribers


John Nosta: THINKOLOGY The Intersection of Thought, Creativity and Inspiration
Science is Spooky–Thoughts from the Other Side of Reality
Science is spooky!
Today's big think is what Einstein called "spooky". I'm not sure if that was translated from the German or actually English but those are his words and are very well linked to this idea. By the way, Einstein never embraced the English language and spoke his native German for all his years in Princeton at the Institute for Advanced Studies.
Anyway...action at a distance refers to an unusual correlation between distant events, usually expressed in the context of sub-atomic particles. It seems that there is communication between each event that effects an outcome. I'll leave out all the technical stuff but the bottom line is that the communication is INSTANTANEOUS. Regardless of the distance, the communication happens in ZERO time.
Now, stop and think--FAST!
Zero time. That is faster than the rules allow--faster than the universal speed limit (the speed of light). Now you might begin to see why Al called it "spooky".
Instantaneous communication or action results in a whole group of really cool things...and are some of my favorite "thoughts".
Let's talk about two:
Non-causal reality. When things can happen faster than the speed of light, you can set up certain conditions where actions just don't make sense. For example, if you could shoot a can off a fence with a bullet that goes faster than the speed of light, you can actually set up the right angles and positions to see the can fall off the fence BEFORE you see the gun being fired. Freaky....or should I say spooky! This can play out in many interesting ways...and create a reality that is not linked to causation. What people call non-causal reality.
The second implication of action at a distance is the notion of "interconnectedness". In other words, connections exist that allow this interaction to happen and there is no actual "transmission" from one thing to another. Gravity is a great example. Gravitation was once thought of a force that "pulled" things closer. Actually, gravity is better explained as warped space and the actual movement of things (let's say planets) is just the movement across that bent or warped fabric of space (yea, space/time). But let's push on this concept a bit more. Interconnectedness jumps from physics to philosophy and takes us to the idea on "oneness" or unity. In other words, we are all profoundly connected! This fabric of mind / space / consciousness could be a profound aspect of the reality in which we live...(but more on that later). Any just "thoughts" themselves--are they instant? Is there a human connection between twins that express the action at a distance. Very cool indeed!
Sometimes, connections (like linking physics and philosophy) are real but sometimes just accidents of language. And that is the fodder for great thought!!
Keep thinking...


Skip to main content.
Solution to puzzle 75: Car journey
Skip restatement of puzzle.A car travels downhill at 72 mph (miles per hour), on the level at 63 mph, and uphill at only 56 mph The car takes 4 hours to travel from town A to town B. The return trip takes 4 hours and 40 minutes. Find the distance between the two towns.
Let the total distance travelled downhill, on the level, and uphill, on the outbound journey, be x, y, and z, respectively.
The time taken to travel a distance s at speed v is s/v.
Hence, for the outbound journey
x/72 + y/63 + z/56 = 4
While for the return journey, which we assume to be along the same roads
x/56 + y/63 + z/72 = 14/3
It may at first seem that we have too little information to solve the puzzle. After all, two equations in three unknowns do not have a unique solution. However, we are not asked for the values of x, y, and z, individually; but for the value of x + y + z.
Multiplying both equations by the least common multiple of denominators 56, 63, and 72, we obtain
7x + 8y + 9z = 4 · 7 · 8 · 9
9x + 8y + 7z = (14/3) · 7 · 8 · 9
Now it is clear that we should add the equations, yielding
16(x + y + z) = (26/3) · 7 · 8 · 9
Therefore x + y + z = 273; the distance between the two towns is 273 miles.
A unique solution is possible because the speeds are chosen so that a round trip over a sloping section of road takes the same time as that over a flat section of the same length. Had we chosen to write down an equation for the round trip, the answer would have been immediately apparent.
Source: From A to B, on flooble :: perplexus
Back to top


text:
Understanding matchmaking in FUT is a key issue. In an earlier article, we confirmed that FUT seasons matches you against opponents with similar skills, in effect what is known as ELO matchmaking. Based on those findings, an intriguing question came up: If our opponents are as skilled as ourselves, then how come that some players win 60 % of their matches, while others only win 20 %? In this article, we try to come up with a qualified guess to answer that question.
To confirm that that FUT seasons uses ELO matchmaking, we used our dataset covering 218 random players and their 10 latest opponents. For each of these ~2,200 players, we calculated a skill rating consisting of win ratio, best completed division and goal difference per match. In the chart below, we plotted each of our 218 base players, having the "average skill level of the player's 10 latest opponents" as the Y-coordinate and the base player's own skill level as the X-coordinate.
The chart confirms the existence of a relationship (correlation) between the player's own rating and the average ratings of his 10 latest opponents. Speaking statistics, this implies that you are more likely to come up against an opponent who is on par with you skill-wise than the opposite.
To further support his conclusion, take a look at the two charts below, where we have created random matches within the same player population that forms the basis of the actual data set used above.
- Yellow chart: We matched players completely randomly. For each base player, we picked 10 random opponents within the full population of 3200 opponents.
- Red chart: We picked three, random opponents per match and chose the the opponent's whose skill rating came closest to the skill rating of our base player's own skill rating.
It is clearly visible is that the red chart comes significantly closer to the actual matchmaking results (the blue chart above) than the yellow chart.
The flat S
Although the game has a preference for opponents with similar skill levels, not all players have the same probability of getting matched against an opponent who is below and above them in terms of skill.
When we look at the lowest rated players (to the far left), their average opponents are somewhat superior, whereas the average opponents of the better players to the right were slightly inferior to the players themselves. If we draw a trend line (red) through the data set, we see a "flat S"-shaped curve rather than the straight, 45 degree line, which we would have seen if everyone's average opponents had the same rating as themselves.
How come, that bad players on average get opponents who are slightly superior to themselves, whereas good players get opponents who are slightly inferior to themselves?
The bell shaped curve
Less successful players get a higher percentage of superior opponents, while more successful players get a higher percentage of inferior opponents than the average player. Our best candidate for an explanation for that has to do with the way, players are distributed skill-wise.
As would have been the case if we were measuring height, shoe size or intelligence, the majority of players are average skilled with a small minority having extraordinarily good skills and an approximately similar sized group having extraordinarily poor skills. In statistical terms, we call this a normal distribution. When plotted into a chart, it shows up as a bell shaped curve. Below, I have plotted two different, skill-related stats: Win-ratio (orange) and the combined Skill rating (blue).
The consequence of this distribution is that players with different skill profiles face different probabilities of pulling superior and inferior opponents.
If we for a second forget about ELO matchmaking and assume that matchmaking is completely random, a player with a win ratio of 30 % would have 97 % chance of pulling an opponent with a higher win ratio, whereas a player with a win ratio of 35 % would have 14 % chance of pulling an opponent with a lower win ratio.
The fact that FUT uses ELO matchmaking doesn't change the basic fact that you only can get matched against opponents who (a) have decent connectivity to you and (b) are searching for a match at the same time. Hence, at the end of the day, the matchmaking algoritm will have to pick the best available match in terms of ELO ranking among the alternatives available at the given time.
Even though the game will pick the best available match, the best available match for a bad player is more likely to be a superior player than an inferior player, which probably is why our blue curve has it's flat S-shape.
The number of alternatives available
You might have noticed that even though our ELO simulation (the red chart) had some resemblance with the actual matchmaking results (the blue chart), the curves weren't exactly the same: The red curve appears "tighter packed", which translated into human language means that our simulation is too effective in finding opponents with a similar skill level when compared to what is possible in the real world.
Considering that approximately 5,000 FIFA matches are started every minute, one might have expected a success rate when looking for similarly skilled opponents. So, how come that the actual matchmaking results appear as random as they do?
We can come up with minimum three, possible reasons.
- One is that our ELO rating system isn't the same system that EA is using, meaning that our assessment of the players' skill levels is somewhat off. In essence, we don't know how accurate our skill ranking system is. Hence, although the actual matches appear more random through the binoculars that we build for ourselves, we don't know whether they appear equally random through EA's presumably even more accurate binoculars.
- The second possibility is statistical accuracy. After all, we calculate the average opponent's skill level based on just 10 opponents. The inevitable consequence is that we will have more outliers, as just one odd opponent will skew the average considerably.
- The third possible reason is that the game, in spite of the large number of matches being started, perhaps doesn't have that many alternatives available when trying to find a match due to connectivity restrictions. Below, we ran the same simulation with 3 respectively 2 opponent alternatives per match. It is clearly visible that the more alternatives available, the more even matches will you get. The resemblance between the actual matchmaking (the blue curve) and the simulation with only two alternatives available is clearly bigger than when we allow the simulation to chose between three opponents.


Why Pursue an Online MIS Degree
What is an online MIS Degree? Many factors influence success in the business sector, from the products companies produce to the drive professionals possess. In this day and age, the right information can also impact an organization's potential for growth.
If you want to play a crucial role in helping organizations succeed in the business sector, you may want to pursue an online MIS degree in areas such as business intelligence, data mining and information systems. With an educational background in these fields, you could be well-positioned to meet the growing demand for professionals who can gather, mine, analyze and present valuable data. This makes a degree in MIS ever more of a growing importance in the business arena.
Read More About Earning a Degree in MIS


text:
The Fatal Conceit
The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism (1988) is a non-fiction book written by the economist and political philosopher Friedrich Hayek and edited by William Warren Bartley. Bruce Caldwell has questioned how far Bartley was the editor and how far the author.
|Series||The Collected Works of F. A. Hayek|
|Publisher||University of Chicago Press (US), Routledge Press (UK)|
In the book, Hayek aims to refute socialism by demonstrating that socialist theories are not only logically incorrect but that their premises are also incorrect. According to Hayek, civilizations grew because societal traditions placed importance on private property, leading to expansion, trade, and eventually the modern capitalist system, which he calls the extended order. Hayek says this demonstrates a key flaw within socialist thought, which holds only purposefully designed changes can be the most efficient. Also, he says statist (e.g., "socialist") economies cannot be efficient because dispersed knowledge is required in a modern economy. Additionally, Hayek asserts that since modern civilization, and all of its customs and traditions, naturally led to the current order and are needed for its continuance, fundamental changes to the system that try to control it are doomed to fail since they are impossible or unsustainable in modern civilization. Price signals are the only means of enabling each economic decision maker to communicate tacit knowledge or dispersed knowledge with each other to solve the economic calculation problem.
There is scholarly debate on the extent of William Warren Bartley's influence on the work. Officially, Bartley was the editor who prepared the book for publication once Hayek fell ill in 1985. However, the inclusion of material from Bartley's philosophical point of view and citations that other people provided to Bartley have led to questions about how much of the book was written by Hayek and whether Hayek knew about the added material. Bruce Caldwell thinks the evidence "clearly points towards a conclusion that the book was a product more of [Bartley's] pen than of Hayek's.... Bartley may have written the book".
|Wikiquote has quotations related to: The Fatal Conceit|
- Hayek, F.A. "The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism". The University of Chicago Press. 1991. p. 6.
- Alan Ebenstein. "The Fatal Deceit". Liberty. Archived from the original on 2008-06-22. Retrieved 2008-07-06.
- Friedman, Jeffrey (1998). "What's Wrong with Libertarianism?". Critical Review. Summer 1998: 463.
- Karl Popper, a Centenary Assessment Vol. 1: Life and Times, and Values in a World of Facts, p. 120


text:
Nobody knows for sure exactly why the rocks ring like bells when struck with a hammer is a mystery. The rocks do contain a significant amount of iron, which might be part of the explanation. However, the high iron content doesn't explain two other strange qualities that the rocks possess... Not all of the rocks ring when struck, and they don't ring when they are removed from the site, suggesting that the ringing has something to do with the way the rocks lay against one another. Larger flat ones seem to produce an especially impressive sound when struck.
Compared to the neighbors.
The Ringing Rocks are very small part (160 acres) of a mountainous region called the Boulder Batholith, which encompasses a large portion of southwestern Montana. Batholiths originate when magma cools slowly beneath the surface to form granite.
Edited by zoser, 04 February 2013 - 07:53 PM.


text:
MODERN WITCHES: TRANSCEND EARTH WITH CYBORG ARTIST MOON RIBAS
Realism is a term significant beyond the field of art, instead defining, among all else, our lives. We've become "head-people," who, through central European conventions and social conditioning, have lost a sense of the invisible and unknowable. That said, there do still exist women who have reclaimed both this sense and the word "witch."
In the long tradition of healers, from women hunted down and burnt at the stake in the Middle Ages, and in the spirit of 90s Girl Power heroines à la Prue, Piper, and Sabrina, these modern-day witches are searching for an alternative to the patriarchal worldview that has permeated all elements of society. Their solution lies in a return to nature, faith in female intuition, and connection by analogue or digital means with their sixth-sensed sisters. In the present time, when Walpurgis Night has been rendered obsolete by hashtags and WordPress, the context of witchcraft has shifted: the sense of the term is so individual that it is now synonymous with feminism and empowerment – a new form of activism, for both outside and inside. Those who are connected to nature and their surroundings must, after all, first understand the language of their feelings and thoughts. It's here that the real force of witchcraft lies: in the natural, in the craft of using the resources offered by the earth, in reaching the supernatural, a higher sense of self.
Earthquakes don't enjoy a great reputation. They come hand-in-hand with disturbance and suffering, fear and often sadness. But for Barcelona-based artist Moon Ribas, they're like a second heartbeat. Through an online implant in her elbow, she can feel the vibrations of earthquakes resonating through her whole body – a live transmission. Moon Ribas is a cyborg, or as she prefers to call herself: transspecies. Her desire to modify her body came from a fascination with movement.
From the vibrations constantly running through her body, she creates dance and sound performance, as well as paintings. "To me it is the most natural, primitive feeling of being connected to nature. I feel that we still need to get to know our own planet, all the other species have adapted to our world and we haven't. We have always been changing our environment in order to feel comfortable. Maybe, it's time now to change ourselves to live more according to our planet. It's more about modifying our mind rather than our body."
Moon Ribas gave herself a superpower. A superpower that resembles phenomena in nature, such as that experienced by elephants. She and her cyborg-partner Neil Harbisson use technology as energy, taking inspiration from nature to grant humans animal senses, broadening the horizon of humanity to include the supposedly supernatural. While witches in the middle ages were reliant on potions and spells, for Moon Ribas it's progressive steps like these that are the key to healing: "We have new senses that no longer make us human. We're not creating a new species, but transforming it to get closer to this world. The freedom of designing yourself, your own mind and your own body. The freedom of living wherever you want and the freedom of identity. If everyone has an individual freedom everything would be so much better."
Technology and spirituality are not mutually exclusive in her world, the two constantly intermingling through the Spaniard's art. Neil and Moon don't want to deprive the rest of the world of this experience: they have founded a company that promises to give everyone an extra sense. The first project is on an implant that knows in which direction the North Pole is. Moon, who has had this nickname since childhood, is dreaming beyond the bounds of the Earth. She wants to feel moonquakes: "Cyborgs are people designed to survive in other climates – in that case to survive in space. We can explore it, while we are here. We use new senses to find space…"
Featured image by Neil Harbisson, other imagery by Michael Sharkey


text:
Stories about Robots
Plant roots inspire 3D-printed automotive sensors
As NASA's Mars InSight is set to burrow into Martian soil, roboticists on Earth are still developing devices for soil monitoring and exploration
A robo-vegetal hybrid society is rising
Plants can grow elaborate shapes for public spaces through a network of sensors and 3D-printed robotic nodes
FET People: Martina Szopek and Vaios Papaspyros on the use of AI to protect species
Robotic spies among bees
Research projects about Robots
The goal of the subCULTron project is the development of three types of robots, to be distributed in the Venice lagoon. Besides monitoring the water, the robots will learn how to cooperate with each other and how to react to the environment. This is expected to lead to significant improvements in the field of artificial intelligence.
The Swarm-Organ Project worked on developing new algorithms in swarm robotics to make it more efficient. Rather than looking to the insect world as previous studies in swarm technology have done, the project studied cell behaviour to extrapolate organisation principles derived from GRNs (gene regulatory networks). The project carried out successful demonstrations of robots emulating cell behaviour, particularly in terms of regeneration behaviour.
The TimeStorm project aims to implement human-like cognitive skills in artificial agents, such as robots. To overcome this challenge, researchers have studied the principles of time processing in the human brain and replicated them in-silico, because our sense of time plays a key role in the development of many cognitive processes. Introducing time perception in artificial agents will contribute to the design of truly autonomous, cognitive machines.
The flora robotica project targets to develop and investigate closely linked symbiotic relationships between robots and natural plants and to explore the potentials of a plant-robot society able to produce architectural artifacts (e.g., walls, roofs, benches) and living spaces, providing functionality such as shade, air quality control, and stress relief. The project assembles a highly cross disciplinary team drawn from the fields of Computer Science, Robotics, Molecular and Cellular Biology, Zoology, Advanced Mechatronics & Environmental Sensing and Architecture.
The PLANTOID project designed and developed a number of innovative robots and ICT technologies directly inspired by the roots of plants. These robotic roots are equipped with sensors monitoring the environment and giving inputs to let them decide how to move into the soil. This technology may find applications in soil analysis, agriculture, medicine and space exploration.