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     Volume 5 Issue 103 | July 14, 2006 |


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Sci-tech

A mosquito repellent to drive away pesky teens!
Shopkeepers who have to bear with loitering teenagers may now not find it a very difficult task to deal with. Inventors claim to have innovated a mosquito box that emits a harmless, high frequency sound that can be heard only by people under the age of 20. Security consultant Howard Stapleton, founder of Compound Security in Merthyr Tydfil, South Wales, who invented the device, said he came up with the irksome sound after a long brainstorming session. He recalled a particular sound he had heard as a teenager, while visiting his father at a factory, which only he heard. "It's horrid. The frequency is right at the top end of hearing for teens. That's what makes it highly annoying. If a high-pitched noise is heard over a few minutes or more, it becomes maddening," said Stapleton. He said Presbycusis, or age-related hearing loss, is usually caused when cells inside the ear naturally deteriorate. As a result, older men do not hear many high frequency noises. According to Stapleton, it takes several minutes before a young loiterer might notice the noise and 10 to 15 minutes before it becomes annoying. In this way, the mosquito repellent does not deter young customers, but only encourages them to move along.

Making sure you're heard
Just because you can get mobile-phone reception on the subway doesn't mean the person you're speaking to can hear you. Unless, of course, you have the Invisio Q7 Bluetooth headset. The Invisio Q7 doesn't have a microphone. Instead, it uses bone-conduction technology to convert the vibrations from your jaw into sound, making it perfect for ballgames, concerts and any other noisy public place you like to hold your private conversations. It'll be available later this year exclusively at RadioShack for USD 200.

New cellular technology
Japan's electronics giant Sharp employee Miyuki Nakayama displays the company's new PDA shaped cellular phone "W-Zero3 es", equipped with Intel's PXA270 processor with Microsoft's Windows Mobile 5.0 for Pocket PC, a 2.8-inch color LCD display and a sliding keyboard at a Tokyo. Japan's mobile communication operator Willcom will put it on the market at the end of July with a price of USD 260.

Maintaining a good posture
Journalists try the new horse-back riding exercise training machine "Joba Fit", produced by Matsushita Electric Industrial. The "Joba Fit" is aimed at increasing muscle power to help maintaining a better posture as well as reducing waist and hip size.

The Availabot
Meet the Availabot -- this Instant Messenger avatar, which plugs into your USB port, stands at attention when your chat buddy comes online and crumples to a heap when he/she logs off. It can be customised to look like the person it represents, allowing you to have a unique one for each of your friends -- and making the quantity you purchase limited only by the number of USB ports on your computer and your own gregariousness. As the Availabot also stores all the IM details of the person it represents, you could buy several in your own likeness, load them up with your personal info and distribute them to friends. Currently these are only compatible with iChat, but Availabots for use with Skype and Windows are in the works.

New invisible stealth technology can even penetrate walls
US Scientists claim to have developed a virtually undetectable radar system, which could have far reaching use in military, law enforcement and disaster management. Eric K. Walton, senior research scientist in Ohio State's ElectroScience Laboratory, who along with his colleagues worked on the project, said the radar's signal resembles random noise, which makes it almost invisible. The radar worked by scattering very low-intensity signals across a wide range of frequencies that resembles random noise, and a computer calculates very small differences in the return signal. The calculations happen billions of times every second, and the pattern of the signal changes constantly. As such a receiver couldn't detect the signal unless it knew exactly what random pattern to look for. "Almost all radio receivers in the world are designed to eliminate random noise, so that they can clearly receive the signal they're looking for. Radio receivers could search for this radar signal and they wouldn't find it. It also won't interfere with TV, radio, or other communication signals. Due to this, a TV or radio tuned to any one frequency would interpret the radar signal as a very weak form of static," Walton said. Like traditional radar, the "noise" radar detects objects by bouncing a radio signal off them and detecting the rebound. However, it can also be tuned to penetrate solid walls, like radio and TV signals. The radar's most important characteristic is however, its ability to distinguish between many types of targets because of its ultra-wide-band characteristics. As such the military could use it for surveillance and pick up enemy soldiers inside a building without the radar signal being detected. Traffic police could measure vehicle speed without setting off drivers' radar detectors, and vehicle drivers could know what lay beyond a curb or a bush.

 

Compiled by IMRAN H. KHAN

Source: Wired, NewScientist and Webindia123

 

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