Japan exempts programmers from jury duty because they are “too busy”

The Japanese supreme court is currently developing guidelines as to what type of jobs are allowed to decline jury duty summons for a new citizen judge system, which is planned to be introduced in May 2009.

The current list of excusable jobs in the initial draft includes System Engineer (or, “SE”, which is a bit different from the original meaning. SE is now a Japanese IT industry expression that means senior software engineer). The reasoning behind this decision is that some people feel that the programmers may need to be dispatched for emergency system troubles.

The current bill for the citizen judge system states refusal of duty is only permitted when the selected citizen is: over 70 years old, a student, severely ill, in charge of caring relatives and minors living together, or attending causes brutal mental and/or economical loss

Inside the Nike Research Lab

Ever wonder what Nike’s famous research facility looks like or what they do in it? If so, watch the above video.

The “ultimate” shopping bag for geeks

Joao Sabino is a designer from Portugal who has created quite the geeky shopping bag. The bag is made from hundreds of keyboard keys.

How many keyboards do you think he ripped apart?…

Swedish Company Develops New Airbags for Motorcycle Riders

Ask any motorcyclist what the most dangerous part of riding is and most of them will tell you, "People in cars that aren't paying attention." Not too long ago, an airbag suit was developed to help reduce the number of deaths and injuries to riders. Autoliv Inc., out of Sweden has developed a new system that should cut the numbers even further.

The system uses an airbag mounted in the A-Pillar of the car. When a front end impact is detected, the airbag will inflate, covering most of the hood and some of the windshield. Studies show that many of the injuries and fatalities could be avoided if this simple measure was taken. In fact, the Dutch Cycling Federation estimates that over 60 lives could be saved and over 1500 serious injuries could be avoided every year by using these airbags.

The system won't only serve motorcycle riders however, it will cover pedal bikes and pedestrians as well. Obviously these accidents will be at a much lower speed, but the impact on the hood will still be reduced by a significant amount. It should else help in the event of a head on collision with another car if either the driver or passenger is ejected through the windshield.

No official word on where or when the system will be installed, but with so much potential, it shouldn't take long.

Source : Autoblog

Preserved Coelacanth Highlights Tokyo Evolution Exhibition

A fish out of water... and out of time
Japan's National Museum of Nature and Science has acquired a preserved Coelacanth to highlight its "Darwin" evolution-themed exhibition being held in Tokyo. The Coelacanth, a fish often referred to as a "living fossil", has changed very little since the species originated approximately 380 million years ago.

Preserved specimen of a coelacanth from the Fish Division specimen collection at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (photograph by Sandra J. Raredon)

The Coelacanth, an odd-looking deep-water fish, caused a sensation in the scientific community when a fisherman landed one 70 years ago off the coast of Madagascar.

Fossil coelacanths have been found in rock layers dated to approximately 380 million years ago, and until its rediscovery in 1938 it was thought the species went extinct about 70 million years ago. The first coelacanths coexisted with one of the earliest vertebrates to walk on land, Ichthyostega.



Coelacanths are lobe-finned fish with bones inside their fins. It is thought that similarly built fishes evolved these movable fins into arms and legs able to support their weight on dry land, and by doing so, take advantage of a new ecological niche. As for the coelacanths themselves, their body design was so well adapted to life in the deep sea that they have changed remarkably little over an immense expanse of geological time.

Something's not-so-fishy about this fin...

The "Darwin" evolution exhibition now taking place at the National Museum of Nature and Science in Tokyo features a 1.7 metre (5.5 ft) long coelacanth caught off the coast of Tanzania in 2005. The fish was preserved in resin before being put on display.

By observing this amazing "living fossil", visitors to the exhibition will be able to more fully imagine a time in our planet's remote past when the earliest human ancestors to walk the earth were gasping their first breaths. (via Yomiuri News)

MoneyMaker Pump Inventor Wins Lemelson-MIT Sustainability Award

Super MoneyMaker Pressure Pump

Dr. Martin Fisher, inventor of the MoneyMaker irrigation pump has won the $100,000 Lemelson-MIT Award for sustainability for his invention. The pump, available now in three versions, has helped more than 300,000 African farmers become entrepreneurs and rise out of poverty. Fisher, through his non-profit organization KickStart, has taken an active role in helping to spread his technology to farmer/entrepreneurs in Kenya, Tanzania, and Mali.

Dr. Fisher, who holds a PhD in mechanical engineering from Stanford University, spent several years in East Africa as a development worker, but decided that raising funds and giving them to poor Africans was not a sustainable approach to development. Instead, he founded KickStart to develop technologies to "kick-start" businesses in poor countries. His supply chain turns out to be a profitable venture for the manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers, as well as the entrepreneurs using the technologies.

The Super MoneyMaker Pressure Pump is a mini-irrigation solution for the farmer with a small plot, up to a few acres of land. It can go as far as 30 feet below the surface of the pump to an underlying water source and draw water up to 46 feet above ground through pressurization. The above ground distance is very important to irrigate hilly land, as it means the water can be sprayed from the source for up to forty-six feet.

Operation of the pump is achieved by a person using his or her arms, legs, and body weight to rock the machine. There are three models of the MoneyMaker currently available: The Super MoneyMaker Pressure Pump, the most powerful model that sells for $100; the MoneyMaker Plus Pump, a smaller scale leg-operated pump that sells for $35; and a MoneyMaker Hip Pump that sells for $33. (Unfortunately, the MoneyMaker pumps are only sold in Africa right now.)

The $100,000 Sustainability Award is made by Lemelson-MIT annually to the inventor who has demonstrated ways to advance economic opportunity and community well-being in developed or developing countries without harming the natural environment.

Jerome Lemelson, who with his wife Dorothy, founded the Lemelson Foundation, was one of the most prolific inventors in history, having received 550 patents during his 40 years of inventing. He contributed to many fields, from aeronautical engineering to electronic vision/scanning to toys and games. He fought hard for the rights of independent inventors, for several of his patents were infringed by big companies.

Kickstart has designed other technologies for the developing world, including an Oilseed Press to extract pure oil from seed. The resulting oil is ready for sale once pressed and the remaining "seedcake" is a great high protein supplement for animals.

Keyboard Pants: The Ultimate in Typing Readiness!

I like to consider myself of the geek culture but this pair of jeans may even be too strange for the likes of me. That didn't stop designer Erik De Nijs from creating a pair of trendy-looking jeans with a keyboard stitched right into their front! Once you stop gawking, please take a minute to consider the practical applications: never allow yourself to stop off at a keyboard-less computer and be unable to utilize it again!

The utility of these pants does not stop at the keyboard stitched across their front, no sir. Notice the mouse built in to the rear of the pants on a lanyard-like attachment- what easy access! It could double as a way to punish those pesky pick-pockets.

From my research, I can't tell how they interface with the computer. Nor can I understand how this concept could be anywhere even in the ballpark of comfortable. Some guy just got so fed up of having to carry a mouse, keyboard, and speakers along with his laptop. that he decided to do something about it, kudos to him. But really? A keyboard across the front of your britches? The next step is a shirt with an LCD monitor built-in to the chest.

Via Vous Pensez

Japanese Spacecraft Records Full Earth Rising Over the Moon

The Earth as seen from the Moon
Japan's Kaguya spacecraft has relayed the very first Full Earthrise movie in high definition (HD) video, giving humans a uniquely beautiful view of our small blue planet just in time for Earth Day.

Japan's Kaguya lunar orbiter showing fields of wide- and narrow-angle cameras
Kaguya orbits the moon at an altitude of just 60 miles (100 km), allowing its HD television cameras to record the finest video footage ever taken in space. Although film and photos of the colorful earth rising above the desolate lunar surface have been taken before, most famously by Apollo 8 and 11 astronauts in 1968 and 1969 respectively, never before has a rising Full Earth been caught on video - truly the ultimate in "satellite TV"!

Waning Earth, photographed earlier by Kaguya

The following video sequence shows not only the spectacular full Earthrise, but also an Earthset:



Kaguya, named for a mythical moon princess from Japanese mythology, was launched (click here for launch info & video) late last year on a Mitsubishi H-IIA rocket from the JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) space center on Japan's southern Tanegashima Island. The orbiter, whose stated mission is to "gather data on the chemical composition and mineral distribution of the moon, its surface features and gravity field", has performed flawlessly to date.

The exquisite view of our planet provided by Kaguya is a poignant reminder that the Earth is just one small, fragile oasis in the vast emptiness of space... well worth taking care of! (via informitv, video c/o JAXA)

In Celebration of Earth Day: Amazing Recycled Architecture

Ever since the day my mom found out I was writing for an environmentally friendly blog she's continuously suggested I write something on homes made from junk. For Earth Day and in honor of my mom who taught me to be creative, a good person and to love trees, below is a list of unique and innovative homes made of recycled material.

1. Cardboard House

Remember the days when your dad would cut out a door and some windows out of a giant cardboard box and then you got inside box to play house? Well imagine now a giant more sophisticated version of a house made of cardboard and you may see something like inexpensive temporary housing option made from cardboard. All the material in the house is recycled. To find out more about it go to Houses of the Future.

2. Scrap House

Some save scrap in their garage to build stuff for their homes. Others find scrap at garbage dumps and use it to build a home. This is a 700 sq ft single-family house built for Earth Day 2005from salvaged scrap material. The house has furniture, a kitchen, a bathroom, two bedrooms, a deck, and a yard. Watch the video and listen to where some of the scrap comes from and how much it all cost. Check out the funky music in the background too. For more on the scrap house project visit Scrap House .

3. Phone-booth Home

With the Internet available there is hardly any use to look up addresses or phone numbers in the phonebook anymore. Yet still we receive them and since there is no -opt off the phonebook list- available in 2005 a group of Architecture students from Dalhousie University decided to build a one-room home with it. To build it they used about 7,000 phone books. Can you imagine the potential of this?

4. Highway House

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This house was built from dismantled highway pieces. In 2006 Pedini, a civil engineer used steel and concrete left as waste, from a $14.6 billion highway construction project in Boston, to make the "Big Dig House" in just 3 days. The house, which is now on a hill in Lexington, is 4,300-square feet large. The house cost $645,000 to build and kept tons of steel and concrete from ending up in the dump.

5. Bottle House

Environmental activist in Bolivia have created a house that can help the environment as well as those in need by making a house made out of bottles. Thousands of bottles are filled with sand and then connected together and reinforced with cement and steel. Watch the video to take a look at this fascinating environmentally friendly and affordable home. For more pictures on other amazing bottle houses click here.

6. Railroad Car House

In Sausalito, California a house is made of a Pullman car from the San Francisco Northern Pacific Railroad. It is among a community of floating houses and is hooked up to sewage, electricity and water. They are also secured to docks.

7. Shipping Container House

Designer Keith Dewey built this house for his family. He reused eight decommissioned containers (once used to hold consumer goods) to build this two-story house. The inside of the house is eco-friendly too. For example, a reclaimed claw-foot bathtub for the bathroom and the cabinets and floor are made of bamboo. The neat thing about it is that this idea is catching on quickly. More and more designers are using shipping containers to build homes .

8. Boeing 727-200 House

Jo Ann Ussery, a grandma, had the right idea when she bought a Boeing 727-200 and turned this retired jetliner into her new home. The house has three bedroom' news.html?in_article_id? news articles live pages www.dailymail.co.uk http:>http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id"> src="http://inventorspot.com/files/images/knittedHousePA0806_468x316.jpg" alt="" title="" class="image _original" width="468" height="316" />

The Gingerbread House is not eatable nor can it be lived in, but it is an amazing piece of work knitted together from top to bottom. Almost everything in the house, for the exception of a wooden door and windows is knitted. The furniture, the food, the garden, the 12-foot trees, etc are knitted. Designed by Alison Murray, the 140 square foot house was knitted by hundreds of women across the world.

15. Earthship Homes

Earthship is an organization that builds homes made of recycled material. Their main material consists of tires, aluminum, glass and plastic bottles. Want to take a part (volunteer, build etc) in recycled architecture checkout Earthship .

16-22. Is there a unique recycled house I haven't added to the list? Please feel free to send me a link or add it in the comments section.

I hope you have enjoyed the list and that it inspires you to think twice before throwing something in the garbage. You never know what can be turned into a home. Imagine waking up in the morning in your eco-friendly home and everything you see and touch from floor to ceiling has been made from recycled or reused material, but it doesn't look recycled, unless you want that look. Recycled homes come in all shapes and sizes. Some are prettier than the others, but the general goal is the same: to make what some think of as trash into a treasure of shelter for everyone. It can be done. It has been done.

Happy Earth Day!

For more ideas or books to read on recycled architecture visit Green Home Building.

Exhaust Jack Takes the Work Out of Changing a Tire

Have you even been on the side of the road with a flat tire and had to cringe at the though of pulling out the old scissor jack, crawling on the ground to get it in the right spot and spending the next 10 minutes lifting the car far enough to do the job? Next time this happens, the Exhaust Jack could be your answer.

As if we needed any more proof that the human race is doomed to laziness. Anyway, the Exhaust Jack does exactly what you are thinking. All you have to do is take it out the bag, unfold the oversized cushion, place it under the frame of the car and insert the hose into your tailpipe. According to the designer it is able to lift a 3 ton vehicle up to 18 inches and hold it there for 45 minutes, which should accommodate even the most unsavy driver.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOmAe-WKQmo

It is also 100% safe for your vehicle. The pressure build up will usually never exceed 0.7 atmospheres, which is roughly 10.3 PSI. It can also be used to free stuck vehicles if you are off roading and I'm sure at least one person has found it useful in a non-automotive purpose. (Buy here )

From : Gizmodo

How Google Has Screwed Up the MySpace Deal

Lots of smart people are trying to figure out how to monetize socialnetworks. It's no easy feat: Even if millions of people log on toFacebook twice a day, they aren't there to buy sneakers, they're thereto connect with friends.

"I don't think wehave the killer, best way to advertise and monetize the social networksyet," said Google co-founder Sergey Brin, on a conference call inJanuary. "Some of the things we worked on in fourth-quarter didn'treally pan out and there were some disappointments there."

Brinought to know. Google has an agreement with MySpace, which has proven mostly disappointing. Under the deal, Google will serve ads on MySpace through the second quarter 2010. In return for the privilege, it will cumulatively pay the social network $900 million as part of a revenue-share agreement. Here's the problem: If Google doesn't make enough money over MySpace to meet the minimum revenue-share requirements, it has dig deep and make those payments, anyway. And thus far, the deal has shaved roughly 1.5 percent off the company's gross margins, according to estimates from Bernstein Research analyst Jeffrey Lindsay.

So if Google can't make a buck off social networks, who can?

AndyMonfried thinks he can help publishers do it. Monfried, a formerAdvertising.com executive and current CEO and founder of Lotame, sayshe's discovered the secret sauce for monetizing social networks -- andhe says Google's going about it all wrong.

"Youcan't put up contextual ads against user-generated content," Monfriedsays. "It's irrelevant, and advertisers don't want to risk their brandson user-generated content."

Lotame doesn't work with the big social networks (MySpace, Friendsteror Facebook), but it has partnered with 16 smaller social networks, from whichit has aggregated data on 30 million users. Monfried says Lotamedramatically improves targeting for advertisers by doing things such as identifying the "influencers."

Monfriedwas reluctant to disclose too many details on how Lotame's solutionvaries from Google's ad-targeting platform, but says his company isfocused on "verbs and actions." So instead of serving ads based on the text in users' profiles, Lotame focuses onusers' actions and demographic data -- such as when a 28-year-oldwoman in Southern California downloads a video on a social network.

"Googledoes a great job of monetizing intent," says Ray Valdes, an analyst atGartner Research. "It knows what I'm searching for and it can show merelevant ads. But social networks are not about intent."

Valdes argues that its unfair to slam Google's approach-- after all, the company's core business is search, not social media. And to be fair, Google said on yesterday's earnings conference call thatthey're trying new things -- including demographic targeting -- and that they've seen some progress.

Photo: Flickr/Kyle Jones

No One Wants To Be An Entrepreneur

Statistic: 90 percent of new businesses fail after 5 years.

This is not a new statistic. In fact, you've probably heard about this before. Naysayers (which often include everyone from your spouse to the convenience store cashier) have probably cited this to you millions of times.

Psychologically, it is difficult for people to become an entrepreneur because no one really likes risk--especially if they believe that they have high chances of failing. Sigmund Freud called the concept the "pleasure principle," which states that a person always drives to seek pleasure and avoid pain.

This is why most people perceive leaving your job to start your own business as not just inviting failure, but literally standing on its doorstep and banging down the door. The entrepreneur's worst nightmare is waking up and realizing that he's lost everything except the shirt on his back.

It's risky, scary, and you've heard so many horror stories about it. And it's not just that, everyone around you is saying, "No, don't do it."

And yet, some people do it anyway. Some win the first time. Others fail and fail repeatedly until about fifth time when they suddenly understand the magic formula.

A friend of mine thought her husband was crazy when he used up their entire life-savings to buy old antique bottles. He later made a killing on eBay, but for a while, she was worried that she was going to feed her kids some fried glass for dinner.

90% percent of businesses fail? The good news is that it's just probably just an urban legend like those safety signs in gas stations forbidding you to use your phone. No one really knows if it's true, but it's better to be safe than sorry.

The true picture in small businesses is that 50 percent of small business survive in the first five years. That's your half-full glass right there, if you ask me. And what's more startling is that most companies don't fold because they were failing, the close because the owners have lost interest in it already.

However, given the challenging year in store for America, what do you think? In the middle of the entire hullabaloo of the political fever, subprime meltdown, and the current recession, is now the best time to be an entrepreneur?

Or should you still keep your day job? Only you can answer that question.

Heart Ailment Diagnosis Could Be Just a Spit Away

Heart ailments have become a common problem over the recent years, most especially in developed countries. Unfortunately, most people find out they have heart problems when it’s already too late—particularly after they’ve already suffered from a heart attack. But this new development by The University of Texas at Austin could really improve save people in the nick of time. And yes, it only needs saliva.

The technology entails smearing saliva onto a credit-card-sized nano-bio-chip, which is then inserted into an accompanying analyzer. Within just 15 minutes, the results could be seen. The test could pinpoint if someone has a heart ailment and needs to get medical help soon, or even predict if a person has a high risk to have a heart attack.

While this wouldn’t be thought of a mere decade ago, the recent identification of blood serum proteins which are directly related to heart diseases made this possible. Basically, some of these proteins could also be found in human saliva, all the scientists had to do was find a way to take advantage of that. As with any new development in medical science, it’ll take some time before this technology gets out of the clinical stage process. So until then (and even BY then), take good care of your hearts!

Source: University of Texas at Austin

The camera behind Virtual Earth Birds eye view

In the recent months there has been good improvements in Virtual Earth's Birds eye view. One of the reasons this was possible was due to new camera used for these excellent high resolution images - Ultracamx. UltracamX is from a company (Vexcel) Microsoft acquired some time back. It supports very large image format available (216 megapixels: 14,430 pixels across track; 9,420 pixels along track) which means they do fewer flights to capture images. It has something like 13 CCD Arrays, each of them controlled by a dedicated CPU and instance of Windows CE Embedded and a 14th CPU for overall control.

Seating for Squares: The Box Bench ...

Not necessarily inviting unless you like testing your balance, the Box bench nonetheless offers some cutting-edge design and uncomplicated style. Designed by Cread Estudi for the Spanish firm Ferfor, this square-inspired seating might work best in public places where you know the wait time is short and you won't be gingerly balanced atop a thick bar for very long. Who knows? They might actually be comfortable (sure). Perhaps the designer incorporated the desired ergonomic angle for the perfect lean back (looks doubtful, though).

skinny mini

Comfort aside, I think the gaping hole where support usually exists might need to be addressed for safety's sake, especially if kids are involved. They might just fall right through! As for the more cushioned booties, the scenario is equally grim. I can see this news of the weird now: "While waiting for their flight, passenger gets stuck in newfangled airport seating, with rear end dangling out one end, limbs flailing wildly through the other. Authorities are summoned with power tools for rescue..."

Regardless of my wild imaginings, this futuristic seating arrangement is definitely slick, but in terms of comfort the proof is in the pudding of testing it out.

Novate via the design blog

Brake-Lights of the Future

When a car's brake lights come on in front of you, especially at night, your mind has to process quite a few things. Are they coming to a complete stop? Are they slowing abruptly or gradually? Will I have enough space? A new design from Virginia Technical Institute takes almost all of the guess work out for you and should hopefully make the roads a little safer.

The new concept has been dubbed "Smart Brake Lights." By using a pressure sensor on the braking system, the computer can determine how hard you are applying the brakes. This information is the transmitted to the control unit for the light bar.

Only Image I Could Find

When you apply the "expected" amount of pressure on the pedal, the inside portion of the bar will illuminate orange. When a threshold of pressure has been reached, the outside portions of the bar will illuminate bright red. If you are making an emergency stop, the entire bar will flash red in an attempt to get your attention.

Team leader, Professor Mehdi Ahmadian, hopes to find a more cost effective way to produce the system and eventually see them standard on new vehicles. All I can say is, if everything does go through, driving at night will be much more fun.

Source : VirginiaTech

It's a Bird, It's a Plane ... No, It's a Camera!

If you see something that looks like four hula hoops attached together with some sort of weird contraption in the middle hovering in the sky, don't automatically assume that it's a UFO.

Sure, the aliens have probably been slowly infiltrating our unsuspecting planet for many years now, but for a moment, put that thought aside. That device you see buzzing about might just be the Aeryon Scout, a new product from Aeryon Labs of Waterloo that is actually a flying camera.

The Aeryon Scout

The device consists of four connected foam rings with a roter inside. Attached to its bottom is a camera.

Why would anyone make such a weird thing, you ask? Well, the makers of the Aeryon Scout say the intent is to fly the camera via remote control to take pictures of places where it's too difficult, dangerous or time consuming to go.

The company hopes to sell its invention to police forces, security companies and surveying and engineering firms. No doubt the paparazzi will also be lining up to buy the product so they can snap those hard-to-get photos of Beyonce or Salma Hayek. For the ladies, how about George Clooney or Brad Pitt?

Aeryon was founded by Steffen Lindner, 39, Dave Kroetsch, 28, and Mike Peasgood, 34. "I've always liked engineering and building stuff," Kroetsch, Aeryon's president, told The Record newspaper, based in Ontario. "As rewarding as it was to build chips for DVD players, it's not as fun as building something that flies around."

Source: The Record and Aeryon Labs

Brilliant Idea! A Cell Phone Defibrillator - Innovation for saving lives

Sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) is responsible for more deaths every year than AIDS, breast cancer, lung cancer and stroke combined. Sudden cardiac arrest means that, without warning, the heart stops beating. If the heart is not defibrillated (therapeutically shocked) within a few minutes, the victim dies. Imagine how difficult it is to reach the victims of SCA in time to save their lives. In fact, 95 percent of victims die as a direct result of SCA.

But suppose we all carried our own personal defibrillators? What if defibrillators became a feature of our cell phones?

Just that brilliant idea is addressed in Benjamin Sacketkhou's international patent application entitled "Wireless Communication Device With Integrated Defibrillator," published in December 2007.

Sudden cardiac arrest is caused by an interruption in the heart's electrical system, causing the heart to stop beating, or pumping blood. If the heart is not "jump started" within a few minutes after SCA, the victim will die. Automatic external defibrillators (AEDs) can be used with minimal training by most adults to restart the victim's heart, and many public buildings and transportation systems have them, but access to them may be too late.

Although many persons, including professional athletes in their seeming "physical primes," have no advance warning before an sudden cardiac arrest, almost half of SCA victims have had episodes of cardiac arrhythmia or heat attacks. Cardiac arrhythmias can be curtailed by defibrillator implants (formerly "pacemakers"), but they are not advised for all cardiac patients.

What Mr. Sacketkhou describes in his patent application is a GPS device, such as a cell phone, with a component part of an automatic external defibrillator, that a user could

1) attach, by electrical pads, to his or her chest to detect any occuring arrhythmia.

2) Such device would automatically check for the necessity of a therapeutic shock,

3) automatically deliver the therapeutic shock to the heart,

4) and automatically notify the nearest emergency professionals as to the victim's whereabouts though the cell phone (GPS system).

If the defibrillator wires are not attached to the victim, a passerby could observe the cell phone, quickly employ the defibrillator, and set the same system into motion.

When you consider that just a few minutes is all you have to revive an SCA victim, a portable personal cell phone/defibrillator is just what the doctor ordered... and fast! Mr. Sacketkhou, please develop this invention!

via Register Hardware. Sources: "Wireless Communication Device With Integrated Defibrillator," Sudden Cardiac Arrest Association, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

Great Invention Idea? A New Twist on Skating and Water-Sking

The advancements of the last thirty years have raised the invention stakes for everyone. What's wrong with that, you ask? Nothing, except that this often results in the less creative among us churning out mediocre or bad ideas when they could be doing something much more productive, like removing shopping carts from the parking lot at a local Wal-Mart! In my opinion, the following two patented inventions illustrate this point exactly.

The kneeling skates, designed by a fellow who loves to skate but was put off by the fact he couldn't wear his skates in restaurants or shops, enables skaters to enjoy their favorite activity and when the time comes simply stand up and walk into any establishment. As for shoes, you can wear any ordinary pair of shoes because the skates come with rubber pads to protect your shoes, which also serve as your brakes. Sounds good to you? Maybe. But I have to wonder why this clever guy didn't just outfit a pair of shoes to resemble those sneakers kids are wearing with the retractable wheels?

Not as Cool as Inline Skates

Of course, from a practical perspective I get the United States patent for Propulsion Sticks: these motorized paddles are used for water skiers who don't have access to a ski boat. The trouble is I've actually water-skied and I don't see how these things could ever really work. First of all, they'd have to go really fast to lift a skier out of the water. As a result, they'd have to be pretty heavy or the speed of the sticks would cause them to come out of the water and fly out of the skier's hands. And who wants to go to the beach carrying a couple of anchors anyway?

Looks like Ethel Merman, not Ethel Mermaid

Besides, water-skiing is a social sport. It's something we do in groups. We all pitch in, get a boat and some beers, then laugh and make fun of the person bobbing in the water like a buoy because the person driving the boat has got a sense of humor! If you've got to ski solo it's just not worth it. And it's a little sad too.

Skating, on the other hand, is a solo sport. Although it can be done in pairs or groups, skating with equipment that makes you look like Tiny Tim in Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol," practically guarantees the skater a solo status, which I suspect they are already accustomed to.

I admit, both of these ideas aren't bad, they just seem self-serving. What do you think?

Scientists Find Mixing is Key to Turning Manure into Biogas

Researchers have taken another step toward turning animal waste into biogas on a large scale.

Farmers have long called the odor of farm waste "the smell of money" in hopes of converting it into a practical energy supply. Animal waste can produce methane, which can be used directly for energy or converted to either methanol or a mix of hydrogen and carbon monoxide. This synthetic mix can then be converted to clean fuels.

In the new study, led by Muthanna Al-Dahhan of Washington University, researchers have found that the manure must be thoroughly mixed when being treated in large reactors called anaerobic digesters. In anaerobic digesters, bacteria is used to break down organic matter without oxygen. Lack of adequate mixing may be one of the main reasons why more than 75% of the 100 anaerobic digester facilities in the US have failed.

As Al-Dahhan explained, turning waste into energy could have a double benefit of minimizing the amount of toxic methane that enters the atmosphere. Methane is a greenhouse gas considered 22 times worse than carbon dioxide.

"Each year livestock operations produce 1.8 billion tons of cattle manure," Al-Dahhan said. "If it sits in fields, the methane from the manure is released into the atmosphere, or it can cause ground water contamination, dust or ammonia leaching, not to mention bad odors. Treating manure by anaerobic digestion gets rid of the environmental threats and produces bioenergy at the same time. That has been our vision."

The final goal, Al-Dahhan says, is to both scale up and simplify the conversion process in order to develop a system that farmers can use on-site for bioenergy production and farm waste management.