more on water and air, tele-surgery and titanium solar cells

You know, when it rains it pours. So in the last few posts I have discussed water that does not splash, smooth water, and water that mixes with oil. I connected the water that does not splash (ok it was liquid, not water as it was done in a vacuum and water would have boiled off in a vacuum) with smooth water which also does not splash. I also connected it to an Australian researcher who found that oil and water will mix if the air is removed form the water first. Well today another article involving water and air and oil has come to light. This article is all about using a water oil mixture to deliver drugs properly, and they use the Australian scientists process for mixing the two. This article also told me that my memory was correct, it was an Australian scientists and it was in early 2003. Anyway, its all really cool stuff and worth looking into. Right now he is patenting his technique for use with about 355 different drugs. I wonder which industrial processes could be streamlined and cleaned up with this technique? I challenge him (and anyone else) to figure it out and make money while making the world a little cleaner.

This is a cool device that scares the crap out of me. I once read a great short story, by William Gibson if I am correct in the Mona Lisa Overdrive collection. In it a character (a minor one, but important all the same) commits suicide by re-programming/tricking the medical-bot on his starship so that it will run an autopsy on him while he is still alive. This new device, though truly useful and worth investing in and making and etc. brings up fears of someone remotely controlling or reprogramming it. Well, I hope the guys making this thing take that as a cautionary tale and put lots of safe guards into it. Here is a link to a more complete blurb on the 'trauma pod'.

So a company called daystar has come up with a thin-film photovoltaic cell that is based on titanium foil instead of silicon. (here is a better link, but the first one is still valid) That gets rid of the problem of a shortage of solar-grade silicon but it brings up the fact that titanium, which is being increasingly used in just about everything, is also in limited supply. Here is a link to wikipedia on how solar cells work.

Gatta love the commercial spirit. Someone decided they wanted to sell something that required no shipping but allowed them to create new fashions. So they came up with this. (in truth I know there are other reasons for this, but I choose not to mention them)

Britian's top climatologist backs global warming claims. How come they have a top climatologist and all America has is a top Scientific Advisor chosen by his ability to tow the party line?

Location is more important that funding past a certain point when it comes to conservation.

Cool article on how the Secret Service cracks encryption on seized hardware.


thats it for now.