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     Volume 5 Issue 109 | August 25, 2006 |


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Sci-tech

Invisible Ink
Tattoo artist Richie, who lives and works in Colorado, has been offering UV blacklight reactive ink to his clients for most of his 4-year career. "Three and a half years ago, I was asked by a friend about the UV ink," Richie says. "So I did a little research and got a sample of the ink and all the paperwork explaining how it was made and how safe it is. After trying a small sample on myself, I began to use the ink."

Retro EVs Need More OoMPH
Q. What's black and white and green all over?
A. The Xebra, an electric vehicle from ZAP

California-based ZAP says it is delivering the first of the 3-wheeled EVs to dealers. The car can go for up to 40 miles and has a top speed of 40 mph. The Xebras were designed in China, where 3-wheeled vehicles are common. Because of being tri-wheelers, they are classified as motorcycles. The Xebras are being aggressively priced at under USD 10,000 (thank you Chinese factory workers!). ZAP, like FeelGoodCars, is trying to capitalise on the renewed interest in electric cars, but unfortunately the technology is based on 90s innovations. Lead acid batteries still have the same issues of a decade ago. The teeny cars may be doing more harm than good in creating an EV market.

Watch it Sway and Move
Humanoid robot "PLEN" of Japan's metalworking company Systec Akazawa keeps its balance as it skates at the Robot Expo in Tokyo. People can control the 228-millimeter-tall robot by bluetooth radio attached to mobile phones. The company is selling the humanoid robot at a price of USD 2,160 without consumption tax.

Quest Chair Moves With Your Movie
The Quest Chair puts extra 'action' in your action movie. Like similar chairs, it adds motion to your movie-viewing experience with a suspension system that moves in sync with whatever film you're watching. The Quest Chair provides other cinematic sensory treats as well, such as heat and massage, and it's available in 10 colours. It'll set you back a whopping USD 7,000, but we figure if you're really interested in it, you're probably used to sparing no expense on your home theatre system.

Fish is good for the heart
Eating fish like tuna or salmon once or twice a week can help older hearts keep their rhythm and reduce the risk of sudden cardiac death, according to a new study. It suggests eating fish rich in omega-3 fatty acids regularly acts directly on the heart's electrical function, which regulates the heart rate and keeps it from beating too fast or too slow. "The good news is that we're not talking about a large amount of fish intake, or fish oil supplements, but rather modest fish in-take, one to two servings per week," says Dariush Mozaffarian, MD, cardiologist and instructor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. "But that modest intake may have important benefits," researchers say adding that it's the first large-scale study to look at the effect of fish and fish oil consumption on the electrical function of the heart.

The new Nokia N93
As much camera as phone, the front of Nokia's N93 lifts open to form a 90-degree angle with the base, and the screen swivels around so that the phone resembles a camcorder. The hinge houses a 3.2-megapixel image sensor and a Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar 3X optical zoom lens. In addition to high-res still images, the camera captures MPEG-4 video, and Nokia includes Adobe Premier Elements 2.0 for editing the footage. The N93 also has Wi-Fi for surfing the net or uploading photos to TypePad blogs or Flickr photo galleries. Real savings will come if someone writes a Skype voice-over-internet-protocol client for the phone, allowing people to make free internet calls.

LG Chocolate VX8500 (Verizon)
If Apple Computer ever makes an iPod phone, it might look like the LG Chocolate. The Chocolate is a gorgeous phone with a clever layout for playing music -- the front resembles a little brown iPod with screen and click wheel. But slide up the front and a phone keypad is revealed. The Chocolate can hold up to 2 GB of music using a microSD card. Songs can be transferred from a computer by USB cable or downloaded to the phone from Verizon's music store. The Chocolate supports EVDO wireless broadband and can act as a modem for a laptop. It also includes a 1.3-megapixel camera.

 

Compiled by IMRAN H. KHAN

Source: AFP Wired and Webindia123

 

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