Just prowling through my latest edition of Popular Science, and I stumbled upon this article.  This article had to do with a advancement in the technology of law enforcement – the mechanics of the Taser evolving to more and more weapons to replace the actual handguns and pistols that many police officers use.  The evolution of the Taser/electric stun technology solves many of the problems that are present with the commonly used Taser – the regular Taser being used in the police force all over America lacks the range needed to hit assailants.  If the assailant is more than thirty or so feet away, the Taser has absolutely no chance of hitting its target.  The new shotgun slug extends the range to 35-100 feet, solving most of the problems that come with the regular Taser.   The reason why this article is pretty significant is because more of the design and engineering in order to make a much more efficient stun weapon.  The transformation from large thick probes connected with wires flowing with electric current to a small, simple lithium battery powered plastic shock canister is a significant advancement for technology.

This is the link to the complete article with pictures if you’re interested in seeing what the slugs and shotgun itself look up close, and a much more in depth analysis of this new law enforcement weapon: http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-03/shock-bullet

I’m working on redoing the BW Science Labs website, and will be moving from Blogger to the WordPress platform to integrate the store and blog. Unfortunately this also involves the less fun search for a good web host, artist, and so on. However, once the site is done it’ll be really cool.

Here’s an interesting project called The Lumen, a 3D display that adds depth to 2D images. The neatest part is how they get each little pixel up and down; they use a wires made of “shape memory allow” that expand when heated and shrink when cooled.

[or watch this video here]

Good look to everyone taking final exams!

For the last few weeks I’ve been exchanging emails with an out of country graphic design firm. I had hired them to make the new BW Science Labs logo. It’s been a frustrating last few weeks.

That’s what I get for outsourcing, I guess. In the end I gave up trying to get the designer to do what I had asked, after about 5 or so attempts. I’m still happy with the final product, though I was shooting for something more like MIT’s logo.

Once I get the high-res image sent to me I’ll begin ordering T-Shirts, its about time we are able to wear our pride.

In some earlier posts several months ago I discussed cyber warfare, something that just made big headlines. In tonight’s 60 minutes, some interesting news has arisen. Apparently, Brazil has been attacked multiple times by cyber terrorists, and specialists say that America is a risk.

I have a hard time going without power for 3 hours, imagine what would happen if the entire west or east coast lost power for lord knows how long at a time. Fortunately, Obama is allocating more funds for cyber security, I hope that that’s enough.

Micro

I’ve spent the week looking for a good web developer to help me redo the BW Science Labs website, but I haven’t found anyone yet. In the meantime I’ve made some progress on Unity development, and I’m now comfortable with the scripting language. As always though, most of my time goes to school, which reminds me of a t shirt I saw labeled “Homework kills trees, stop the madness!”. It would be fun to see the carbon footprint of one year of homework. I’ll have to look into that.

Global

I order my electronics components from all over, but one place in particular that I could not be without is Sparkfun. Also, having met some of the Sparkfun employees at the Maker Fair ’09 its nice ordering from a small, friendly company with a face. Unfortunately, starting early this week, Sparkfun is being sued by SPARC International, a large company owned by Sun Microsystems that sells servers. Apparently, SPARC’s legal department decided that Sparkfun sounded too much like SPARC, so legal warfare has begun. If Sun (SPARC) spent more of its time and money developing new technologies and less of it bullying smaller businesses, they would probably not be dying such a slow and painful death.

Micro

As I said its been a busy week. I’ve had a little time to look into Unity, but not much. So far so good.

For those of you who don’t know, Unity 3D is a really powerful enviornment that allows developers to create interactive 3D content. It can be embedded in a web page like Flash, or made as a download for Mac or PC.

Unity 3D originally has been $199 for the Indie (independent developer, kind of like Lite), and the pro version has been $1499. There’s also an iPhone and Wii tool available for an elevated cost. Now there’s a few reasons why I did not buy this earlier:

1) cost

2) I already own Flash CS4

3) I’m really bad at art, so I’d need a 3D artist, preferably someone I could get away with paying really little (least I’m honest)

However, now that it’s free, I might as well download it.

I haven’t had more than a few minutes to play with it, but so far it seems pretty awesome. It seems like it has a pretty big learning curve, and I’m inept with 3D art by nature. I’ll also need to be careful about investing my time in Unity, as I need to keep up with all my other favorite programming languages and projects.

I really do feel bad for the guy who downloaded this the day before it became free.

Download Unity 3D

While developing this kit I uncovered my true love for Ultra-violet LEDs. There just plain awesome! You can use them to detect counterfeit money, kill germs (now that’s pretty impressive for a LED), authenticate drivers licenses (and passports?), and stun an assailant (*cough* *cough* shine it in their eyes). Not to mention Ultra-violet light produces a really neat effect on its environment, like making white objects eerily glow (there you go, another idea for Halloween).

I have some kits already neatly put together in packages, ready for sale. However, it may take a day or two for me to put it on the Store site as most of my time is wasted away studying for an endless barrage of Spanish tests, also known as “¡examines!”. Interestingly enough, the exclamation points don’t make me feel any better.

I’m really happy with how I balanced cost with awesomeness, as this little guy in relatively inexpensive (I intend to price the kit for around $11.99), and as you can see, it packs a pretty powerful punch.