3D Printer Creates Working Loudspeaker

Engineers at Cornell University have printed an entire working loudspeaker in one operation using a 3D printer.

The device emerged from the printer ready to use, requiring only to be connected to an amplifier and sound source. In a demonstration the researchers played a clip from President Barack Obama’s State of the Union speech which mentioned 3D printing.

Although it is now possible to buy relatively cheap 3D printers which can make intricate parts from plastic, creating working electronic components remains a difficult problem.

Printers can be constructed with multiple cartridges for different materials, just as traditional 2D printers use differently coloured inks. But the large hurdle to overcome is that these materials need to be extruded at different temperatures and have different curing times, making printing one object with two or more materials troublesome.

If it becomes possible to do so cheaply then it would pave the way for entire products such as radios, cameras or mobile phones to be printed.

Creating the speaker involved printing a plastic housing, a flexible diaphragm, a conductive coil and a magnet. The conductive parts were created with silver ink , while the magnet was created from a viscous blend of strontium ferrite. The rest was printed with traditional plastic materials.

The project was led by mechanical engineering graduate students Apoorva Kiran and Robert MacCurdy, working with associate professor and 3D-printing pioneer Hod Lipson.

Creating a market for printed electronic devices, Lipson said, could be like introducing color printers after only black and white had existed: “It opens up a whole new space that makes the old look primitive.”

Wildlife and Animal Museum Promotes Nature

Wild animals found dead in nature are taken to a wild life and animal museum with the help of academics and Trakya University Biology department displays the animals in the university, aiming to raise awareness to wildlife.

The biology department academic Beytullah Ozkan said to Anadolu Agency there are many wild animals living near and around Edirne and many of them are found dead from car accidents. The aim is to raise awareness to prevent these kinds of accidents. The dead animals are taken by the villagers and given to the academics because the academics wanted to make a wildlife animal museum to raise the awareness. Ozkan said the animals are sometimes used in biological and scientific research.

“There are many animals that die from car accidents. We use taxidermists to display these animals,” he said.

Noting there are many animals in the museum, Ozkan said their aim is to display these animals with a right purpose.

Water monkeys, wild reed cats, foxes, moles, squirrels and foumarts are some of the animals in the museum, said Ozkan, adding there are also skeletons.

Ozkan said the museum raised awareness in the village and now the villagers are more aware of the wildlife and how wildlife is important for nature. Noting that they go in the village and speak to people and leave their contacts, Ozkan said, we want them to tell us about the animals and bring them to us if anything happens to them.

“While speaking with the villagers, we see that they have been very careful with the wildlife, thanks to the information they learn from us and the media,” said Ozkan.

Learning to live with wild animals With this move, the villagers do not attempt to kill wild animals when they see them, he said. They scare these animals and tell academics they need help to learn to live with these wild animals.

That’s why we need to help them, said Ozkan. “We leave our contact details and want them to get in contact with us if they need help with the wild animals.”

The academics also give information to the villagers about the animals and educate them. “We give them information on reptiles, vertebras, other animals and biology.” For example the museum team has started to display an Alacalı foumart that was found dead in Sazlıdere Village last year. This is an important move when wild life animals are facing extinction, he said. For example, the Alacalı Foumart is one of the rare species in the world and face extinction. The team has examined the animal and decided that it was hit by a car.

Anxiety Linked to Higher Risk of Stroke

The greater your anxiety level, the higher your risk of having a stroke, according to a new study. The study is the first in which researchers have linked anxiety and stroke independent of other factors such as depression.

Anxiety disorders are one of the most prevalent mental health problems. Symptoms include feeling unusually worried,stressed, nervous or tense.

Over a 22 year period, researchers studied a nationally representative group of 6,019 people 25 to 74 years old in the first National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES I) in US.

Participants underwent an interview and took blood tests, medical examinations and completed psychological questionnaires to gauge anxiety and depression levels.

Researchers tracked strokes through hospital or nursing home reports and death certificates. After accounting for other factors, they found that even modest increases in anxiety were associated with greater stroke risk.

People in the highest third of anxiety symptoms had a 33 per cent higher stroke risk than those with the lowest levels.

“Everyone has some anxiety now and then. But when it’s elevated and/or chronic, it may have an effect on your vasculature years down the road,” said Maya Lambiase, study author and cardiovascular behavioural medicine researcher in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.

People with high anxiety levels are more likely to smoke and be physically inactive, possibly explaining part of the anxiety-stroke link. Higher stress hormone levels, heart rate or blood pressure could also be factors, Lambiase said.

The research was published in the American Heart Association journal Stroke.

Chewing Gum can give Kids Migraine

Chewing too much gum can give teenagers and younger children migraine headaches, a new study has warned.

Dr Nathan Watemberg of Tel Aviv University-affiliated Meir Medical Center found that gum-chewing teens and younger children could be giving themselves headaches.

Until now there has been little medical research on the relationship between gum chewing and headaches.

At Meir Medical Center’s Child Neurology Unit and Child Development Center and community clinics, Watemberg noticed that many patients who reported headaches were daily gum chewers.

Teenage girl patients were particularly avid chewers – a finding supported by previous dental studies. Watemberg found that in many cases, when patients stopped chewing gum at his suggestion, they got substantially better.

Taking a more statistical approach, Watemberg asked 30 patients between six and 19 years old who had chronic migraine or tension headaches and chewed gum daily to quit chewing gum for one month.

They had chewed gum for at least an hour up to more than six hours per day. After a month without gum, 19 of the 30 patients reported that their headaches went away entirely and seven reported a decrease in the frequency and intensity of headaches.

To test the results, 26 of them agreed to resume gum chewing for two weeks. All of them reported a return of their symptoms within days.

Two previous studies linked gum chewing to headaches, but offered different explanations. One study suggested that gum chewing causes stress to the temporomandibular joint, or TMJ, the place where the jaw meets the skull.

The other study blamed aspartame, the artificial sweetener used in most popular chewing gums. TMJ dysfunction has been shown to cause headaches, while the evidence is mixed on aspartame.

Watemberg backed the TMJ explanation. Gum is only flavourful for a short period of time, suggesting it does not contain much aspartame. If aspartame caused headaches, he reasoned, there would be a lot more headaches from diet drinks and artificially sweetened products.

Hair Care in Winter

As cool, dry air blows you feel dry skin, nails cracking and hair falling along with dandruff. If you end up having snowflakes on your shoulders in winter it is not due to snowing ,but dandruff has found its way into your scalp. Dandruff is not a serious health condition, but the victims of dandruff will do everything to prevent that particular kind of snow from falling as it leads to hair fall. Preventing winter dandruff and hair fall is a challenge that you can win with a proper hair care routine.

Shampoo your hair twice a week only

Excessive shampoo can be harmful for your hair and cause hair loss. It is recommended to wash your hair only twice a week so that you don’t lose the extra nourishing oils that your hair naturally produces. Over shampooing can make your hair dry and fizzy. To prevent dandruff apply a quarter-sized amount of specially formulated dandruff shampoo to your hair. Work the shampoo through your hair, cleansing the scalp area. Let the shampoo sit for five to seven minutes to properly work, and then rinse it out. Wash your hair once a day with the dandruff shampoo, which is formulated to eradicate the malassezia fungus.

Rinse with vinegar

To let your hair shine rinse your hair with vinegar when you are finished with shampooing. Take two tbsp. vinegar and mix it in ten tbsp. water. Now rinse your hair with it and don’t wash it with water later. Your hair will not have the white snowy flakes and hair fall would be much less.

Massage your hair with warm oil

Heat the oil you use. Coconut oil or olive oil are best for the extra moisture your hair needs. Massage warm oil in your hair slowly to let the hair gently sink into your scalp. For better results wrap a warm towel on your head after applying warm oil to your scalp. The oil will get penetrated more deeply inside your dry scalp. Thus preventing dandruff and hair fall.

Sit in the sun
Walk or sit outside in the sun for 20 to 30 minutes each day. Some people find that the ultra-violet rays from the sun help to reduce dandruff in the winter months. Don’t forget to wear sunscreen.

Fenugreek (Methi) seeds

Grind one tbsp. of methi seeds coarsely and soak it in two cups of cool water. Leave it overnight. Strain and use the water as a last rinse.

Neem leaves

Make a paste of neem leaves by soaking the neem leaves in water and grinding it. Apply the neem leaves’ paste on hair. Let it sit on your scalp for half an hour before rinsing it. Don’t apply any shampoo for best results. This remedy is not only best to cure dandruff but also very effective for hair loss. It also helps in hair growth.

Obesity May Make Kids Stressed

Obesity may make children more stressed-out as compared to their normal-weight peers, a new study has found.

Overweight children naturally produce higher levels of a key stress hormone than other youngsters, researchers said. The body produces the hormone cortisol when a person experiences stress, researchers said.

When a person faces frequent stress, cortisol and other stress hormones build up in the blood and, over time, can cause serious health problems.

Researchers measured cortisol in scalp hair, which reflects long-term exposure and has been proposed to be a bio-marker for stress. The study is the first to show obese children have chronically elevated levels of cortisol.

“We were surprised to find obese children, as young as age 8, already had elevated cortisol levels,” said one of the study’s authors, Erica van den Akker, from Erasmus MC-Sophia Children’s Hospital in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

“By analysing children’s scalp hair, we were able to confirm high cortisol levels persisted over time,” said van den Akker.

The observational case-control study analysed hair samples from 20 obese children and 20 normal weight children to measure long-term cortisol levels. Each group included 15 girls and 5 boys between the ages of 8 and 12.

Obese subjects had an average cortisol concentration of 25 pg/mg in their scalp hair, compared to an average concentration of 17 pg/mg in the normal weight group.

The hormone concentrations found in hair reflect cortisol exposure over the course of about one month. “Because this study took an observational approach, more research will determine the cause of this phenomenon,” van den Akker said.

“We do not know whether obese children actually experience more psychological stress or if their bodies handle stress hormones differently. Answering these key questions will improve our understanding of childhood obesity and may change the way we treat it,” said van den Akker.

Prototype Solar Cars Train Future Alternative Energy Experts

JOHANNESBURG — In South Africa, students at the University of Johannesburg have taken on the challenge of building their own solar cars and racing them in competitions. While it offers plenty of thrills, the goal behind the program is to train future experts in alternative energy.

Young engineers from the University of Johannesburg built a 300-kilogram solar-powered car. The car can go faster than 100 kilometers per hour and uses less electric power than a household kettle. The students who designed it will drive it in the Solar Challenge, a national racing competition for cars that use alternative energy.

Kegan Smith, the university’s former project manager, says the aim is to make these future engineers aware of the possibilities of green energy through a real world example.

“With what we do at the moment in fossil fuels, if we continue like this, there is not going to be a future. And if we do this kind of alternative energy, the cars are one application. But the nice thing with the cars it that it’s a mindset change. If you can start shaping students’ mind now, it’s going to change the mindset of people in general. How do you use your lights? How do you use your electricity?” explained Smith.

Smith was one of the six undergraduate students who decided to take an end-of-the-year paper design assignment a step further. The group built their own design, a hybrid alternative-energy powered car, in 2010.

Since then, more cars have been built, using both hydrogen and solar power. Warren Larter, a former student, is the university’s solar car project manager. While he does not expect solar cars to become mainstream, he pointed out that they do offer an important learning tool in the development of sustainable technologies.

“For us, it’s a research thing. Our exact example is Formula One. You’ll never see those cars on the road, but the technologies that go into them, you see it in every single car in every single household across the world. So that’s where we are pushing it. This is our Formula One of alternative energy,” said Larter.

White House review Panel Proposes Curbs on some NSA Programs

Among the panel’s proposals, made in the wake of revelations by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, the most contentious may be its recommendation that the eavesdropping agency halt bulk collection of the phone call records, known as “metadata.”

Instead, it said, those records should be held by telecommunications providers or a private third party. In a further limitation, the US government would need an order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court for each search of the data.

“We don’t see the need for the government to be retaining that data,” said Richard Clarke, a member of the panel and a former White House counterterrorism adviser.

The panel’s report expressed deep skepticism about both the value and effectiveness of the metadata collection program.

Lenovo Yoga goes Enterprise

Lenovo has launched a new range of enterprise devices, including a convertible ThinkPad S1 Yoga and new ThinkPad ultrabooks T440,T440s and X240s Ultrabooks. All these devices are powered by Intel’s fourth generation Haswell Core processors.

The ThinkPad S1 Yoga is a multi-mode device designed to function optimally in different scenarios, eliminating the need of separate ultrabooks and tablet. Like the first Yoga, this device can do a 360 degree flip from laptop mode to stand mode and tent mode to tablet mode. The keyboard is disabled when it is not in the laptop mode. With a pre-loaded Intel SBA platform, it allows better security and business continuity. ThinkPad S1 Yoga is priced at Rs 80,000 onwards.

The ThinkPad T440 Ultrabook has a 14-inch HD or HD+ screen with optional multitouch capability and a trackpad that supports Windows 8 gestures. Priced at Rs 78,000 onwards, the device comes with 1TB storage and 10 hours + battery life. With military-specific durability and glass fiber design for a touch, it is a durable device.

The ThinkPad T440s has a carbon fiber top cover that makes the device light and durable. It has has a wide range of connection options and touch capability with Windows 8 Pro. T440s is priced at Rs 90,000 onwards

The ThinkPad X240s Ultrabook is the thinnest and lightest full featured ThinkPad yet. Weighing just 1.28 kg, this device comes with full HD IPS touch screen display, carbon fibre construction and a glass TrackPad. This premium device is available at Rs 95,000 onwards.

Euro Satellite to Count a BILLLION Stars, find Origin of Milky Way

The European Space Agency’s billion-star mapper Gaia blasted off this morning aboard a Soyuz rocket on its mission to study millions of suns.

The satellite has been dispatched to create the most accurate map yet of our galaxy, using accurate measurements of positions and motions of one per cent of the roughly 100 billion stars in the Milky Way to answer questions about its origin and evolution.

Gaia will check out each of the billion stars an average of 70 times each over its five years of operation. Each time, it will plot the position of the sun and its key physical properties, like brightness, temperature and chemical composition.

The huge census should provide boffins with the position, motion and properties of the stars to give the most complete picture of the galaxy yet.

“Gaia represents a dream of astronomers throughout history, right back to the pioneering observations of the ancient Greek astronomer Hipparchos, who catalogued the relative positions of around a thousand stars with only naked-eye observations and simple geometry,” said Alvaro Giménez, ESA’s director of science and robotic exploration.

“Over 2000 years later, Gaia will not only produce an unrivalled stellar census, but along the way has the potential to uncover new asteroids, planets and dying stars.”

Over 400 different people at scientific institutes across Europe will end up processing and analysing the huge amount of data Gaia will collect, estimated to exceed one petabyte.

The Soyuz booster lifted off without a hitch at the scheduled time of 9.12am GMT from Europe’s spaceport in French Guiana. Around ten minutes later, after the first three stages had separated, the Fregat upper stage ignited and carried the probe into a temporary parking space in a 175km high orbit.

From there, Fregat fired again to take Gaia into its transfer orbit, before it separated from the upper stage 42 minutes after blastoff. ESA boffins in Darmstadt in Germany have already taken control of the spacecraft and started booting it up.

The sunshield, which both protects the satellite from soaring temperatures and carries solar cells to power the craft, has been deployed and Gaia is now en route to the stable point at L2, around 1.5m km from Earth as seen from the Sun. Tomorrow, mission control will get Gaia to perform the first of two critical thruster firings to make sure its on the right path to its new home, followed by the second around 20 days later to stick it in operational orbit.

“After years of hard work and determination of everyone involved in the mission, we are delighted to see our Gaia discovery machine on the road to L2, where we will continue the noble European tradition of star charting to decipher the history of the Milky Way,” said Giuseppe Sarri, ESA’s Gaia project manager.