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On Einstein’s centenary New products & discoveries Prof Yash
Pal THIS UNIVERSE |
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Entertainment on demand Rue not, you can watch all of these, and much more at the click of a button. Get wired to the fascinating world of Entertainment-on-Demand! The global computer In common terms, EOD means delivering personalised entertainment content (movies, music, games etc.) to consumers using the media of choice at the point of demand. The global computer network is currently a vast array of digital islands comprising large islands of commercial activities, educational islands, government islands, and the isle of Internet services. There is another group of islands that are small but are considered a most valuable prize, the residential island. Their vast numbers compensates the smaller size of these islands, as more households become multiple personal computer households. The sea between all of these islands is a web of transport carriers dominated by the phone companies. According to research, more than two-thirds of all active Internet users seek entertainment content online. This has opened up opportunities for traditional media companies to develop Vertically Integrated Portals (VIP) or online starting points dedicated to specific content or product category. The online entertainment seekers can be classified into four segments: movie and TV fans, music aficionados, sports enthusiasts, and online gamers. Says Atul Vohra, Head, Arena Multimedia, “Today’s consumer expects to be entertained, share information and communicate whenever and wherever they choose. The opportunity to satisfy this demand for the digital lifestyle is clear for all. Service providers seek to increase profitability by delivering both proven and new categories of digital entertainment services to every corner of the home efficiently and effectively. Consumers want, and are ready to pay for, services that provide them with flexibility and control over their home entertainment experience. The seamless integration of these services as well as technologies in a coherent and transparent fashion would facilitate in hiding the inherent technical intricacies from the end user and provide for simple and “off-the-box” usage.” This is most important for the current generation of users who requires freedom of choice as well freedom of creation. Both kinds of freedom do not exist currently, not necessarily because it is impossible to consume and produce information, but because it is much too difficult as well as cost and time expensive even for skilled people. The necessary shift of user behaviour towards free information exchange takes place on three different levels: individuals, workgroups and Mass Media, Information Providers. Services offered EOD includes the following services: 1. Interactive Television 2. Video-On-Demand (VOD) 3. Personal Video Recording (PVR) 4. Web-On-The-Television 5. Electronic programme guides (EPG) 6. Telecommuting (Working from Home) 7. Videoconferencing 8. Distance learning 9. Interactive home-shopping and games. |
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On Einstein’s centenary SCIENCE was, until the World War II, in the 19-20th century, free and universal. Research in those days primarily depended on individual’s interest and required but small funds. Scientists were free and proud to publish findings and discoveries of their research. Then, the Indian scientists were able to contribute directly to the advancement of science, and the gap between Indian and European (western) science was not so wide as it is now in the age of Secret Science. Dr Satyendra Nath Bose (born 1 January 1894,) had established his claim to the Bose-Einstein Statistics. Satyendra’s guru was Dr Meghnath Saha, professor of physics at Allahabad and Kolkata. Saha was elected to the Royal Society of England for his research in Thermal ionisation of atoms, stellar spectroscopy and propagation of radio waves. Saha’s “Ionisation Formula” enabled astronomers to know the temperature and pressure of the interior of the sun and stars, that proved the breakthrough in astrophysics. It was due to Saha’s efforts that the first Cyclotron was brought to India in 1941 by his brilliant student Dr B.D. Nag Chaudhuri. Satyendra at the age 24, under the guidance of Meghnath, wrote a four-page paper on “Plank’s Law and Light Quantum Hypothesis”. He submitted the paper to many science journals in India and abroad but all of them rejected an Indian’s paper. Satyendra and Meghnad both were self-taught in German. In 1920, they translated Einstein’s papers on relativity from German into English. In 1924, Satyendra boldly sent his (hand-written) paper directly to Albert Einstein. Young Indian’s research impressed the German so much that Einstein himself translated the paper into German and got it published in “Zeitschrift fuer Physik” (Science Journal of Physics). It is “An important forward step in physics”, commented Einstein. Satyendra’s research played a big role in the development of a new type of Statistics that help the scientists to explain the behaviour of radiation and is called “Bose statistics”. Elementary particles such as photons and alpha particles which obey the Bose statistics are called the “Bosons”. Satyendra’s experimental work initiated research in X-ray crystallography and themoluminescence. Our tricolour ( Tiranga ) was lowered on the 4th February 1974, as the tens of thousands in Kolkata followed the body of Satyendra Nath Bose to his last journey. “We owe a lot to the Indians, who taught us how to count, without which no worthwhile scientific discovery could have been made,” said Albert Einstein. |
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New products & discoveries THREE popular beach resorts were among seven islands on India’s Andamans archipelago that shifted southwestwards when a giant earthquake hit on December 26, geologists said. The state-run Centre for Earth Science Studies (CESS) found six inhabited islands and one that boasts a volcano moved “a few metres” after the undersea quake that measured 9.3 on the Richter Scale triggered deadly tsunamis. “Preliminary estimates from the GPS (global positioning satellite systems) survey around Andaman and Nicobar suggest the islands have shifted southwestward by a few metres,” CESS seismologist C. P. Rajendran told reporters on Wednesday. — AFP For better motor oils Motor oil’s protection against the wear and tear of steel engine parts takes effect only at high pressures, according to a new study. The analysis reveals the molecular behaviour of a common lubricant additive, whose mode of action had remained mysterious since the additive’s introduction in the late 1930s. Understanding the additive’s action may lead automotive engineers to design more environmentally friendly lubricants for steel as well as products especially suited for lighter, more efficient aluminum engines. Zinc phosphates have long been the most common lubricant additives for protecting steel parts, such as pistons and cylinders in car engines, against wear when they contact each other. Through trial and error, researchers have looked for new additives, but none has outshined the zinc phosphates. Brutal bubbles In each column of microsecond snapshots, a gas bubble swells, then collapses to about the size of a blood cell. Fill a flask with liquid, rattle it with ultrasonic waves, and hellish microcosms can form within the fluid. Tiny gas bubbles swell and then implode with a fury now revealed to be extreme enough to strip electrons from atoms trapped in the collapse. The Illinois chemists who have detected that atomic destruction for the first time have also directly measured temperatures of the imploding bubbles. Some of these register at least 15,000 kelvins, a temperature about three times as hot as the Sun’s surface. Researchers have long known that the collapse of ultrasonically generated bubbles emits flashes of light-a phenomenon called sonoluminescence Some scientists even claim that thermonuclear fusion can occur in the implosions. Venetian grinds While sifting through 15th- and 16th-century documents at the state archives in Venice, Louisa Matthew came across an ancient inventory from a Venetian seller of artist’s pigments. The dusty sheet of paper, dated 1534, was buried in a volume of inventories of deceased persons’ estates. As Matthew, an art historian at Union College in Schenectady, N.Y., scanned the more-than-100 items on the list, she realised that it was exactly what she had dreamed of finding. “I remember thinking, ‘Did someone plant this here?’” she says. “And why hadn’t anyone noticed this before?” This inventory of artists’ materials could hold the answer to a question that had long vexed conservation scientists: How did Venetian Renaissance painters create the strong, clear, and bright colours that make objects and figures in their paintings appear to glow? |
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THIS UNIVERSE What is the use of the glass sheet in a solar cooker? A To raise the temperature within, a solar cooker has to allow the maximum possible energy from sunlight to come in and lose the least amount through re-radiation into space. Most of sun’s energy is concentrated in visible range of radiation. A glass sheet is transparent in this range, so it allows a large fraction of the sun’s energy to enter the cooker. The temperature inside the cooker may rise to 100 degrees Celsius, at the most. At this temperature, most of the radiation is in the infrared range; in other words, it is heat radiation. Glass is not very transparent at these wavelengths. This radiation is trapped inside the cooker, thus raising the temperature. Of course, ultimately, the energy going out must become equal to the energy coming in. This balance is achieved only after the cooker temperature has been elevated. But this is all we want from the cooker – that the temperature inside should rise in order to cook the food. In a solar cooker, the glass sheet plays a role very similar to that of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide allows sunlight to reach the earth, but it absorbs a significant fraction of the heat radiation going back into space till the temperature rises to a range compatible for life. The solar cooker type of physics also comes into play in heating a stationary car which has been sitting in the summer sun with its windows rolled up, an experience no motorist in India can forget. There is one point that is not properly understood by many people. The role of the glass sheet or the carbon dioxide is to raise the temperature of the cooker, or the earth, to a level such that the out going energy is the same as the incoming energy. The amount of the incoming energy is not changed. The glass sheet and the carbon dioxide both act as blankets in their specific spheres. Speaking of another kind of blanket, we cover ourselves with a woolen variety during winter nights. We should understand that in that case, the source of energy is inside the blanket — the heat generated through body metabolism. We adjust the quality and thickness of the blanket to ensure that our temperature remains in a comfortable range. There is lots of physics involved in living. But even babies learn it quickly, almost automatically. Why are there no tides in Mediterranean
Sea?
A The Mediterranean Sea is almost a lake, in the sense that no large reservoir of water is available to fill up the extra volume that would be created if the waters were to rise up because of the attraction of the moon. The Mediterranean is connected to the Atlantic Ocean through the Straights of Gibraltar, but the opening is too narrow for a large amount of water to flow in and out. The connection with the Black Sea, which is even more enclosed, is no help either. |
DID you miss the last cricket match because you were slugging it out in office? Or did electricity play truant while your favorite TV programme was on air? Maybe you missed your favourite stars as they took their Oscars home… 