EUROSOI 2009

The 2009 EUROSOI Workshop will be held at Chalmers University, Göteborg (Sweden) on January 19-21 2009.

The EUROSOI Workshop started as an event related to a former Coordination Action (called EUROSOI) funded by the European Commission. This Thematic Network, which includes most of the European teams working on SOI technology, will continue to exist at least until 2011, under the name of EUROSOI+, receiving more funding from the European Commission.

The EUROSOI Workshop has become an international forum to discuss the recent advances on all aspects of SOI technology: materials, devices, modeling, simulation and circuits.

EUROSOI 2008 will be organized by the Chalmers University. The Chairman is Prof Olof Engström, a recognized researcher in nanoscale semiconductor devices, including SOI technology.

The deadline for abstract submission is November 15 2008

Topics include all areas related to SOI technology, devices and circuits. The "SOI MOSFET modeling" topic is explicitly mentioned.

Göteborg is a leading conferences and event city in Europe. There is a strong joint commitment between the business community and the city council to support major events and conferences offering professionalism and excellent organizational skills.

Do not expect a very nice weather in Göteborg in January, but there are many things to see and enjoy in Göteborg.

Read The Full Article:
http://sedemos.blogspot.com/2008/09/eurosoi-2009.html

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Good Morning, Sunshine

Some companies in the pharmaceutical industry are patting itself on the back for its self-mandated reporting of speaker fees and consultancies to docs. Eli Lilly led the charge, followed by Merck, according to the NYT. With certainty, the other pharma...

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http://blog.bioethics.net/2008/09/good-morning-sunshine/

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Green Jobs: The time is now

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http://climatechangeaction.blogspot.com/2008/09/green-jobs-time-is-now.html

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ISPSD'09

The 21st IEEE International Symposium on Power Semiconductor Devices and ICs will take place in Barcelona (Catalonia, Spain) on June 14-18.

The deadline for abstract submission is October 24 2008.

ISPSD is the main international conference on the areas of power semiconductor devices, power integrated circuits, their hybrid technologies, and applications.

Topics include: processes, materials, CAD/Simulation, devices, power ICs, packaging and applications.

For researchers interested in compact modeling of power semiconductor devices, ISPSD is a top event to present and get to know the last results in this field. "Device & circuit simulation" is explicitly mentioned as one of the subtopic in the "CAD/Simulation" topic. Compact modeling fits very well this subject. And of course, there is a subtopic of "Modeling" in the "Device" topic.

The Conference will take place mainly at the Axa Winterthur Auditorium but some parallel sessions will be held at the NH Constanza Hotel which is just beside the Auditorium.

Certainly Barcelona is a wonderful place to have such an important event. There are many superb attractions in Barcelona: historical landmarks, the well-known modernistic buildings in Gaudi-style, the "Barri Gòtic" (middle-age downtown), the Museum of Fine Arts, or the stadium of the Barça Football Club. And one can find nice beaches very close to Barcelona. The weather in June is usually very good, warm enough to go to the beach, without been too hot.


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http://sedemos.blogspot.com/2008/09/ispsd09.html

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Gridiron Ganglia Gifts

It's time we made donating bodies to science cool again. So when former NFL players and a women's soccer player announce that they are going to donate their battered brains to science, one stops to think: "That's pretty cool." Mary...

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http://blog.bioethics.net/2008/09/gridiron-ganglia-gifts/

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A whole new spin on the phrase 'Milking It'

I am all for animal rights, to an extent. I mean, fur is murder, and who needs fur anyway? And those Japanese should definitely stop slaughtering dolphins and whales. That's just wrong. However, there is a such thing as taking an issue a bit too far, and that is exactly what PETA has done...again.

PETA, known for their outrageous activist stunts, has found their way into the headlines yet again with a recent letter they sent to Ben & Jerry's. Why, you ask? I'll let the letter itself explain.

"On behalf of PETA and our more than 2 million members and supporters, I'd like to bring your attention to an innovative new idea from Switzerland that would bring a unique twist to Ben and Jerry's.

Storchen restaurant is set to unveil a menu that includes soups, stews, and sauces made with at least 75 percent breast milk procured from human donors who are paid in exchange for their milk. If Ben and Jerry's replaced the cow's milk in its ice cream with breast milk, your customers-and cows-would reap the benefits...

The breast is best! Won't you give cows and their babies a break and our health a boost by switching from cow's milk to breast milk in Ben and Jerry's ice cream?"

Yeah. Wow.

I understand the sentiment - cruel treatment of cows and calves, yadda, yadda, etc. But... I simply can't bring myself to even think about buying breast milk ice cream. If you want to make it and eat it you go right ahead, but I'm sorry, it's just not for me.

For one, it's gross. But that aside, I don't think it's a good idea scientifically. While the PETA letter does outlines some of the links between cow's milk and health issues, they tactfully neglect to mention the possible risks of using human breast milk. HIV, tuberculosis, and other diseases as well as some drugs and antibiotics are transmitted through breast milk. So without some FDA-approved method of making breast milk safe for general consumption, you can bet that I won't drink any (and, considering the low demand, I doubt there's guidelines currently in place). To add to that, no formal studies (that I could find) have looked at how drinking human breast milk affects an adult, so for all we know, it could have all the same health drawbacks as cow's milk.

To be fair and unbiased, there are some people who suggest that breast milk is beneficial for adults as well as children. One study from 1995 did show that a protein in human breast milk, alpha-lactalbumin, killed brain tumor cells in a test tube. The same team used the compound in 2004 to destroy warts caused by HPV (Click to see study). Some patients have tried consuming human breast milk to treat cancer or boost immune systems, but there has been no scientific study that shows whether drinking breast milk does, in fact, help in those situations.

Bottom line: It's still gross. It's effects are wholly unknown in adults. And again, it's gross. I agree with Ben & Jerry's response: "We applaud PETA's novel approach to bringing attention to an issue, but we believe a mother's milk is best used for her child."

Read The Full Article:
http://observationsofanerd.blogspot.com/2008/09/whole-new-spin-on-phrase-milking-
it.html

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Big Performance from a Small Off-Grid System

Gasoline prices have soared over the past couple of years, and some believe that electricity rates will soon follow. When that happens, alternatives like PV (photovoltaic) systems will become an attractive option. The surge in demand for solar panels will result in higher prices, and only the well-to-do will be able to install systems large enough to meet the needs of an entire household. The average home owner will be forced to pay the high utility rates, or to learn to get by with a small PV system. The good news is that you can get by with a smaller PV system than you might have imagined, but it?s going to take some ?out-of-the-box? thinking.

Much has been written about the benefits of home improvements such as adding insulation, replacing windows and doors, efficient lighting and appliances, the elimination of phantom loads, and passive solar improvements. Alternatives to electric heating and cooling are also important. These are logical, and often necessary, prerequisites to PV system implementation, and especially important to anyone wanting to get by with a small system. Since those topics have been discussed at length elsewhere, this discussion will be limited to getting the most from a small PV system.


The daily capacity of a PV system can be calculated by multiplying the capacity of the PV array, in watts, by the number of hours of peak sunlight. A PV panel array consisting of five one hundred watt panels, for example, can produce 2000 watts/hours in a four-hour period. That?s 500 watts times 4 hours. It is widely accepted as fact that an off-grid PV system with batteries will be 65% efficient, lowering the expected daily production in this case from 2000 watt/hours to just 1300 watt/hours. Now that you know the basics, let?s explore some ideas for getting most from a small PV system:

1. Load shifting

An off-grid system is least efficient when it is used to charge batteries. The inefficiencies associated with converting energy, storing it, and converting the stored energy back to electricity results in a huge energy loss. The obvious solution therefore is to use electricity directly from the solar panels as it is produced, instead of storing it in batteries for use at a later time. Doing the laundry, running a vacuum cleaner, and cooking are some of the obvious tasks you can do in the daytime, but other strategies are not so obvious.


A well-insulated chest freezer will keep things frozen for many hours in the event of a power loss. Consider putting your chest freezer on a timer, limiting its operating hours to daytime. This will require a little experimentation, as you don?t want food to partially thaw each night.

To improve its efficiency, move your chest freezer to the coolest part of the house, perhaps the basement. Allow plenty of room for air circulation near the condenser to improve operating efficiency, don't limit it to the two or three inches that the manual suggests.

2. Eliminate unnecessary appliances

Could you get by without a refrigerator? You certainly could if you had to, and you?ll reduce the load on your PV system by 1000 to 3000 watt/hours each day. You?ll be able to eliminate a dozen or more solar panels from your array, saving a small fortune. I spoke to a friend recently who, after his refrigerator failed, continued to use it to keep items cold by using ice from his chest freezer. He used his chest freezer to produce ice, and placed that ice in his refrigerator. Milk jugs provided a convenient way to do it, and he cycled three, one gallon jugs, from his freezer to his refrigerator each day.


Perhaps you?re not quite ready to shut down your refrigerator full-time. Instead, why not put it on a timer? Shutting it down for a few hours each night will reduce the system load significantly.

Converting a chest freezer to a super-efficient refrigerator is another strategy you might consider. A thermostat mounted inside the freezer switches AC power to the freezer on and off as needed. No significant modifications to the chest freezer are necessary.

3. Add diversion load control to your PV system


If you monitor your PV system during the day you probably find that once the batteries are fully charged, you have a lot of excess energy available that doesn?t get used. Putting this previously wasted energy to use can significantly increase the usefulness of a small PV system. Adding diversion load control to your system is one way to tap into that extra energy. Some charge controllers can be used as diversion load controllers, but you can also use a PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) for the task. I use a Morningstar Relay Driver, a much less expensive option.

Often, systems are designed to use the extra energy to pre-heat water, but that?s probably the least-efficient way to use it. Using the sun to heat water directly makes more sense. If your home uses a cistern for its water supply, using this excess energy to pump water is a much better idea. It is far better to use excess energy for this task than to have to pump water at night, due to demand, using energy from batteries.

You could also use the excess energy to charge a spare battery bank. The spare battery bank might be used to power some DC loads, 12-volt dc lights for example. Using this surplus power for DC loads eliminates the conversion loss that you would otherwise experience by running a DC to AC inverter. This might allow you to turn off your inverter, perhaps all night long, saving yourself the power it consumes when idling.

4. Make Peukert?s Law work to your advantage

According to Peukert, a lightly loaded battery bank operates at higher efficiency than a heavily loaded battery bank. Looking at this another way; if you increase the size of the battery bank, without increasing the load, efficiency improves. Take advantage of this phenomenon by making your battery bank larger than necessary. As a bonus, your batteries will last longer because they?ll be stressed less.

Avoid using two or more high-power appliances at the same time. Making toast, while using the microwave oven, is an example of this. Heavy current from the battery bank results in lower efficiency, according to Peukert.

Conclusion

Anyone who?s ever struggled to get through an extended grid power failure knows that electricity is more than simply a matter of comfort and convenience. While it?s a necessity for some, it would be hard for any of us to get by without it. Imagine doing without lights on a long winter evening, or not having the ability to keep food refrigerated. Imagine doing without air conditioning, and not even having an electric fan to circulate fresh air.

Use these strategies to the extent that you can. You might start by adding the ability to log system data. The ability to log data will help you determine if system improvements and modifications are beneficial. Adding automation to your system is the logical next step. This allows you to shift loads and divert power when it is beneficial to do so. And most importantly, be on the lookout for other ways to lighten the load and improve system performance. Please share your ideas with the rest of us, in the form of a comment, so that we can all learn from each other.

John

Read The Full Article:
http://solarjohn.blogspot.com/2008/09/big-performance-from-small-off-grid.html

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TEDTalks : Chalking it up to the blank slate -
Steven Pinker (2003)

Steven Pinker's book The Blank Slate argues that all humans are born with some innate traits. Here, Pinker talks about his thesis, and why some people found it incredibly upsetting.

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TEDTalks_video/~3/av6zMGf5uNc/354

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12 Movie Industry Camera Cars

From Oobject: For high speed chase scenes or a low speed horse back rides, the film industry's cameras occasionally have to go mobile and when they do, they rely on specialist high tech. cars and trucks. Usually wearing intimidating matte black paint (to reduce glare) these veh

Read The Full Article:
http://cr4.globalspec.com/blogentry/6980/12-Movie-Industry-Camera-Cars?from_rss=1

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