Beware: green chemistry is soon to serve you green wines. And in boxes, too.
Once I read in Chemical and Engineering News a list of the chemicals in either red or white wines. I remember thinking "generic wines" to start with: Let's see the difference in the young and the old wines!
Chose my chemistry picks
Knew it was coming.
Let's see Science's tricks
Got the list humming?
1. Cellular reprogramming
2. Exoplanets
3. Cancer genes
4. High temperature superconducting materials
5. Proteins' work
6. Excess renewable energy storage
7. Embryo video
8. Good fat to fight
9. World weight calculation
10. Genome sequencing
ScientificBlogging.com has been plugging
Quite well, on plotting
Except one, World's Weight*
Who knew "that" quantum(ing)!
L. Frank Baum wrote "The Wizard of Oz" in 1900. As a centennial-celebration of this hugely popular American story, I went back to a reread. There are many themes to be explored in the land of Oz created by Baum. Starting with "Oz," you knew it stood for ounce, ounces of silver, contrary to others saying the tabs of O to Z in file folders, right?
The author was into supporting the silver platform in contemporary US politics. In 1960, S. J. Sackett wrote "Utopia of Oz", The Georgian Review, Vol XIV, pp 275-290. Here, staying with politics, are the political elements that I culled from this article. My assessment of these fifteen positions in 2008 is given as grades in progress since 1900.
Chemistry is wonderful. Chemistry now has to play more than ever an interdisciplinary role for new visions. Here are two wonderful studies that I caught singing to me in 2008. Both contain elegant science that promises sheer greatness. Each rocks in a different manner by means of chemistry.
The first one is in polymer chemistry, a dear interest of mine, for molecules that can rotate and slide. The second, an Inventors Hall of Fame winner, solves living-cell networks to cure the sick.
Dinosound revival is no kidding to me. I was at the foothills of tall snow-capped mountains by the sea when this happened. A very loud sound filled the meadows and startled my senses like a dinosaur call! Well, it happened again, the next day about the same time, just before the sunset and for several minutes. I had to inquire swiftly for a local answer.
Come on, did you just accept that we know the sounds of an animal that lived long before even a woman was on the world scene? I mean, did the dinosaurs bark or tweet, scream, hiss, roar, coo, neigh or sing?
"Ted" calls his name
Service is his fame
Turner turned World News
Into a 24-7 game!
As the world turns
So Ted's passion burns
Humanity loves him such
His charity widely churns.
Ted must love hilarity
Color B&W to clarity
Why to fuss here
Over a man o'Rarity?
In fields of snow
Ted's buffalo herds know
Free to roam large
While praising Turner's bow.
Since first, Fine Scientist
Said Ted's the greatest
"Man with a heart"
Helped humanity the Bravest.
Seventy is a perfection
Arrives at Ted's station
2008's only a warm-up
For 150's in transaction.
Look people, in deed
Shrinkage is a good thing when you want it to happen. Energy consumption in buildings is a great candidate for shrinkage. Do you have a building in mind?
Two reports (1-2) were published recently to show how to achieve 50% energy savings over the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) Standard 90.1-2004 in medium-sized retail buildings and grocery stores. They represent the first technical support documents for commercial retail buildings under the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Net-Zero Energy Commercial Building Initiative.
In all cases studied, these design measures were recommended to achieve a 50% reduction in energy consumption:
Letter* published in Nature Geoscience concluded at last: Overall, despite the paucity of observations, we find that human-induced warming is detectable in both these regions of high vulnerability to climate change.
Consistent with their position that greenhouse gas emissions are causing global warming, the Royal Society (United Kingdom) is soliciting submissions to "moderate climate change by deliberate large-scale intervention in the working of the Earth's natural climate system." http://royalsociety.org/downloaddoc.asp?id=5845
