05/09/2014 Weekly Tech Article

Good Idea/Bad Idea: Use a Stun Gun...

• Good Idea: Lift Fingerprints
• On a hunch, crime scene investigator Richard Warrington, now retired, found a new way to fight crime with a stun gun: lifting prints. Warrington's hack involves placing a sheet of sun-blocking film over a freshly dusted print. He attaches the loose end of a wired probe to one outer contact of a stun gun. While holding the wire's probe one quarter inch above the film, he turns on the gun and slowly guides the electricity-shooting probe around the perimeter of the film, electrostatically charging it. Then Warrington turns off the gun, waits 10 to 15 seconds, and glides a foam brush across the film's surface to attract a reverse image of the print for forensic analysis.
• Bad Idea: Remove Poison From Wounds
• For two decades, survivalist forums and even some doctors have recommended shocking snake and spider bite wounds to neutralize venom. Science says this idea bites: You're most likely to get burned--and remain poisoned.
• http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/good-ideabad-idea-use-stun-gun?dom=PSC&loc=recent&lnk=1&con=good-ideabad-idea-use-a-stun-gun-to

Article Reflection Post

"Social Media Advice for Career-minded Students. 10 Things to Consider."

• This article is about advice about what to do when it comes to how to best use Facebook, Twitter, and other digital  platforms. The main message as reported in the Staten Island Advance: "Think before you post, tweet...and curse." I completely agree with this because nowadays individuals literally post whatever they feel with no filter. Don't get me wrong, you should be able to express yourself freely but there's a proper manner instead of using vulgar language or hurting someone's feelings.

05/02/2014 Weekly Tech Article

Invention Awards 2014: Seal Combat Wounds in 15 Seconds

• When bullets or shrapnel strike a soldier, standard first aid calls for stuffing gauze as deep as five inches into a wound and applying pressure. If bleeding hasn't stopped after three minutes, the old gauze is pulled out---and the new gauze shoved in.
• There's room for improvement. Military doctors estimate that, during the most violent years of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, blood loss killed about 90 percent of the wounded that might have otherwise survived with better emergency care. To save more lives, a group of veterans, scientists, and engineers known as RevMedx has created a pocket-sized device called XStat: a faster, more effective way to plug wounds. The polycarbonate syringe slides deep into a wound, such as a bullet track. When a user pushes down on the handle, it deposits dozens of pill-size sponges that expand to stem bleeding. Meanwhile, a substance in the sponge fights infection while clotting blood.
• http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/invention-awards-2014-seal-combat-wounds-15-seconds?dom=PSC&loc=recent&lnk=1&con=invention-awards-2014-seal-combat-wounds-in-15-seconds

04/25/2014 Weekly Tech Article

A Pacemaker Powered by Heartbeats

• A pacemaker's battery needs to be swapped out about every five to eight years, requiring surgery. Engineers are now working on a device that converts the mechanical energy of a beating heart into electrical energy and could last indefinitely. A prototype tested in farm animals has generated a microwatt of power, enough to keep a pacemaker going.
• The Parts:
• A) Flexible polymer holds system in place.
• B) Piezoelectric ribbons harvest energy.
• C) Rectifier switches current.
• D) Microbattery stores energy.
• E) Leads connect battery to pacemaker.
• F) Pacemaker controls heart rhythm.
• http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/pacemaker-powered-heartbeats?dom=PSC&loc=recent&lnk=1&con=a-pacemaker-powered-by-heartbeats

04/11/2014 Weekly Tech Article

How it Works: Surgical Snakebot

• Surgery has always been synonymous with incisions. But the new snake-inspired Flex System from Medrobotics could reduce bloodshed and hasten healing by traveling through a convenient (if unsettling) alternative: a natural orifice, such as the mouth.
• During a Flex procedure, the surgeon stands or sits within arm's reach of the patient and a video console, and alternates between steering the robot with a joystick and manually operating the instruments threaded through its tip. Since the bot curves and pivots to maneuver around tissue and organs, Medrobotics claims it's more versatile than laparoscopy, which often requires multiple punctures to insert a camera and tools.
• The company is now submitting Flex for approval in the United States and Europe for head and neck procedures, such as the removal of throat tumors. But the snakebot's ultimate destination is the abdomen, via a small incision---or a private orifice. It's an approach that, while distressing to imagine, could revolutionize surgery.
• http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/how-it-works-surgical-snakebot?dom=PSC&loc=recent&lnk=6&con=how-it-works-surgical-snakebot

04/04/2014 Weekly Tech Article

A Telescope That Finds Stars For You

• For non-astronomers, stargazing may seem simple: Just plop down a scope, and peer toward the heavens. It's usually not quite that easy. Scopes can be tricky to set up and celestial objects elusive. The Celestron Cosmos 90 GT uses a Wi-Fi connection with a smartphone to do the hard work for you. To align it, users point it at any three bright objects in the sky; the scope uses them to triangulate its precise location. Through an app, users then select the celestial body they want to see from Celestron's 120,000-entry database. Motors in the base position the scope in seconds.
• http://www.popsci.com/article/gadgets/telescope-finds-stars-you?dom=PSC&loc=recent&lnk=3&con=a-telescope-that-finds-stars-for-you

03/28/2014 Weekly Tech Article

Elephant Trunk Robot Learns like a Child

• Four years ago, German engineering firm Festo came up with a concept for a robotic arm. Somewhere between an iron snake, a mechanical claw, and a sci-fi tentacle, the Bionic Handling Assistant is functionally most similar to an elephant's trunk.
• But what should a robot arm grab? For inspiration about learning what to do with hands, the scientists turned to babies. The arm remembers movements that have been guided by a researcher, much like how a baby grabbing onto a parent's finger will let his arm be moved when the adult moves. The programming behind the robotic trunk teaches it to remember positions that worked for grabbing.
• http://www.popsci.com/article/science/elephant-trunk-robot-learns-child?dom=PSC&loc=recent&lnk=6&con=elephant-trunk-robot-learns-like-a-child

              

03/21/2014 Weekly Tech Article

How it Works: An Electronic Cigarette (Are They Safe?)

• Since electronic cigarettes hit the market in 2007, yearly sales have reached $1 billion in the U.S. Although they're popular, it's still unclear how safe they are. Last year, a study from an international group of scientists showed that the toxins in e-cigarette vapor are 9 to 450 times lower than in tobacco smoke. The Food and Drug Administration is still determining its regulatory stance. It's sponsoring more research while sorting out its position.
• Labled Parts: A. LED, B. Sensor, C. Battery, D. Heating Element, E. Nicotine Liquid, F. Mouthpiece.
• http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/how-it-works-electronic-cigarette?dom=PSC&loc=recent&lnk=8&con=how-it-works-an-electronic-cigarette

03/14/2014 Weekly Tech Article

Slug-Inspired Glue Can Heal a Broken Heart

 

• When it comes to mending a broken heart, researchers say they may have found the key. And it comes in the form of a slug-inspired glue. Most heart defects today are fixed via surgeries that involve stitches or staples, but these sutures can do damage to the heart's fragile tissue, especially because the heart still has to stretch and strain to pump blood as it heals. And while surgical glues do exist, they are mean to close up skin wounds---some are toxic while others simply can't stick to a wet, beating heart.
• The slug-inspired glue could lead to less-invasive surgeries and faster healing times, which is good news for the 40,000 babies born with congenital heart defects in the U.S. each year. The researchers say it could be used on other slippery moving parts like the intestines, as well as emergency surgeries where quick sutures are necessary to take care of trauma.
• The paper, published in Science Translational Medicine, suggest this stuff could be ready to roll out to market in two to three years, assuming long-term trials and human testing prove successful.
• http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/d-brief/2014/01/09/slug-inspired-glue-can-heal-a-broken-heart/#.UyIiYvldUpY

03/07/2014 Weekly Tech Article

This Pacemaker Membrane can Keep a Heart Beating Perfectly

• You're looking at what might be the pacemaker of a decade from now: a custom-made membrane, developed by researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Washington University in St. Louis, that slides over a heart and keeps it regulated by a network of sensors and electrodes.
• This is a rabbit's heart, but the building process would be similar for people: a team computer-modeled the heart, 3-D printed a mold, and created a membrane tailored to the organ. The sensors make sure the heart stays beating at a proper rate, and the the electrodes automatically correct any discrepancies, like an arrhythmia. And, yes, unlike this one, a real one stays inside your chest.
• http://www.popsci.com/article/science/pacemaker-membrane-can-keep-heart-beating-perfectly

02/27/2013 Weekly Tech Article

R.I.P. CAPTCHA

• Say good-bye to CAPTCHA, the boxes of warped text that separate humans from bots online. Al company Vicarious claims to have developed an algorithm that can pass the test about 90 percent of the time. What will save us from spam now? These alternatives could come to a site near you:
• Two-step verification: validate your user name with a confirmation code sent to your phone or e-mail.
• Games: solve puzzles, draw shapes, or describe pictures.
• Timers: if a form is filled out and submitted faster than is humanly possible, the bot is denied access.
• Honeypot: programming hidden to humans but visible to bots tricks a nefarious algorithm into identifying itself and eventually blocks it.
• Motion: using a device's camera, a program analyzes gestures to determine whether you're flesh and blood.
• http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/rip-captcha?dom=PSC&loc=recent&lnk=1&con=rip-captcha

02/14/2013 Weekly Tech Article

Olympic Ring Fails Spectacularly During Sochi Opening Ceremony

• Sochi has been fraught with problems in the days leading up to the Olympics, but no one issue has been quite so telling of Russia's hosting struggles as a malfunction at its opening ceremony that lead to an incomplete set of Olympics rings going up on display. While the ceremony was supposed to feature all five rings growing from small snowflakes into the Olympic logo's five intersecting circles, the top-right ring failed to expand alongside the others, leaving four circles beside what looked almost like an asterisk. Although that may have been a glaring mistake in the ceremony, the overall show was very well executed and quite impressive.
• http://www.theverge.com/2014/2/7/5390152/olympic-ring-malfunction-sochi-opening-ceremony

02/07/2013 Weekly Tech Article

Finally, A Super-Simple Modular Robotics Kit

• The robot of the popular imagination, whether it's R2D2 or Rosie, just works. But in reality, making a robot just work takes a lot of hard work. Many would-be roboticists give up when faced with a soldering iron, an Arduino board, and lines of code. The EZ-Robot kits make constructing and coding modular, so anyone can build a custom bot in 30 mins or less.
• Builders assemble their EZ-Robots physically and digitally. They attach motors and appendages to a controller board that contains a processor and a Wi-Fi radio. Alongside their creation, users configure their robot with the Wi-Fi. Advanced users can code their own robotic quirks and even download plans to 3-D print custom appendages for specific tasks. After all, who wouldn't like a personal snow shoveler in February?
• http://www.popsci.com/article/gadgets/finally-super-simple-modular-robotics-kit?dom=PSC&loc=recent&lnk=9&con=finally-a-supersimple-modular-robotics-kit

My Blog Tour

Erick Peralta's Blog

1/02/2013 Weekly Tech Article

New Year's Eve 2013 marked with Google Doodle

• New Year's Eve 2013 featured in the new Google Doodle. 
• Google has marked the countdown to 2014 with a disco-themed Google Doodle on New Year's Eve. 
• The animation shows the digits marking up 2013 doing a halting jig on a stage under a glitter ball while the number 4 waits to take its place in the line-up.
• Clicking on the Doodle takes the user through to a page of results listing New Year's Eve festivities, news articles, and other results from around the world.
• A further link in the search homepage goes to Google's Zeitgeist 2013 interactive, giving highlights of the year in video, the top 100 searches, search trends, a 2013 gallery and a page of year-in-review lists ranging from celebrities to song lists, recipes, sports teams, and TV show.
• http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/dec/31/new-years-eve-2013-celebrated-with-google-doodle

Do Now: 2013 Reflection/2014 Goals

                                                              2013 Reflection/2014 Goals

2013 was a good year for me because I had a lot of positive things happen to me. I practiced hard for the SAT and ended up getting a good score, 1600. My hard work for preparing for the SAT paid off. Also, I found out that I'm in the 15% of my graduating class, which is great. Also, I got accepted to four colleges so far: Bergen Community College, Montclair, Seton Hall, and Rutgers. My goals for 2014 is to get accepted to my top college TCNJ and continue doing well in school. Also, I hope I get a job because I really need one. 2013 was great, but 2014 will be better!