April 30, 2012
Good Morning,
Here's an interesting investigation: The first article takes a look at media outlets, and--in the age of advanced, compact technology--finds that America still prefers the TV as a primary source.
Until Next Time,
Erin
Questions? Comments? Email me at: mailto:gizmo@gophercentral.com
Email your commentsP.S. You can discuss this issue or any other topic in the new
Gizmorama forum. Check it out here...
http://gizmorama.gophercentral.com
------------------------------------------------------------
Home TVs still first choice for viewingWASHINGTON - Although tablets and smartphones provide digital access to video, 91 percent of U.S. consumption still comes on traditional TVs in real time, analysts say. While consumers increasingly are watching video on more devices and at more locations, TV at home still remains most Americans' primary source, Nielsen Vice Chairman Susan Whiting said in written testimony intended for the Senate Commerce Committee. While 166 million Americans watched video online in October 2011, and more than 117 million accessed the Internet through mobile devices, such viewing is still mostly in short bursts rather than large blocks of time, she wrote. Compared with the average monthly total of viewing on mobile devices and computers of a little under 9 hours, the average viewer watches 146 hours-plus of traditional television content on a home TV set, Whiting wrote in her testimony, a copy of which was obtained by Multichannel News. YouTube and Netflix dominate online video viewing, accounting for over half of the 4 hours, 31 minutes of average streaming video per month, she wrote. And viewing video on smartphones is up more than a third in just the past year, she said, showing "consumers are saying unequivocally that online video will continue to play an increasingly larger role in their media choices."
Printable, low-cost solar cells developedLOS ANGELES - U.S. researchers say nanotechnology can create an ink that conducts electricity and will allow cheap, stable solar cells to be printed on clear surfaces. Scientists at the University of Southern California said nanocrystals just 4 nanometers in size -- more than 250 trillion could fit on the head of a pin -- can float in a liquid solution, so "like you print a newspaper, you can print solar cells," USC chemistry Professor Richard L. Brutchey said. While liquid nanocrystal solar cells are cheaper to fabricate than single-crystal silicon wafer solar cells, they haven't been as efficient at converting sunlight to electricity. In the past organic molecules were attached to the nanocrystals to keep them stable and to prevent them from sticking together but the molecules also insulated the crystals, hampering the conducting of electricity. Brutchey and USC postdoctoral researcher David H. Webber developed a new surface coating for the nanocrystals that not only works well at stabilizing them but also actually builds tiny bridges connecting the nanocrystals to help transmit current, a USC release reported Wednesday. As a low-temperature process, it could lead to solar cells that can be printed onto plastic instead of glass without issues with melting, creating flexible solar panels that can be shaped to fit anywhere, the researchers said. "While the commercialization of this technology is still
years away, we see a clear path forward toward integrating this into the next generation of solar cell technologies," Brutchey said.
Odd-shaped galaxy puzzles astronomersPASADENA, Calif. - Most galaxies are either round or are flat, slender disks like our Milky Way, but one nicknamed the Sombrero galaxy manages to be both, U.S. astronomers say. The Sombrero galaxy, which in visible light looks like its namesake wide-brimmed hat, is a round elliptical galaxy but has a thin disk embedded inside, making it one of the first known to exhibit characteristics of the two different types, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., reported Tuesday. Astronomers have used NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope to capture an infrared image of the galaxy that reveals it unusual structure. "The Sombrero is more complex than previously thought," Dimitri Gadotti of the European Southern Observatory in Chile said. "The only way to understand all we know about this galaxy is to think of it as two galaxies, one inside the other." While it is tempting to think the giant elliptical swallowed a spiral disk, astronomers say this is highly unlikely because that process would have destroyed the disk structure. Instead, they say, the giant elliptical galaxy may have been inundated with cosmic gas more than 9 billion years ago, with the gas being pulled into the galaxy by gravity and falling into orbit around the center and spinning out into a flat disk. "This poses all sorts of questions," ESO astronomer Ruben Sanchez-Janssen said. "How did such a large disk take shape and survive inside such a massive elliptical? How unusual is such a formation process?" The answers could help piece together how other galaxies evolve, the researchers said.
Study: More plastic in ocean than thoughtSEATTLE - Research on how much plastic litters the oceans may vastly underestimate the true amount because it only looks at the surface, a U.S. researcher says. University of Washington oceanographer Giora Proskurowski said he was on a research cruise in the Pacific Ocean and noticed the water surface was littered with tiny bits of plastic -- until the wind suddenly picked up and the plastic "disappeared." Taking water samples from 16 feet he discovered the wind was pushing the light-weight plastic particles below the surface. The finding suggests data collected from just the surface of the water commonly underestimates the total amount of plastic in the water by an average factor of 2.5, a university release reported Wednesday. "That really puts a lot of error into the compilation of the data set," Proskurowski said. Proskurowski and his study co-authors have developed a simplified mathematical model to match historical weather data, collected by satellites, with previous surface sampling to estimate more accurately the amount of plastic in the oceans. "By factoring in the wind, which is fundamentally important to the physical behavior, you're increasing the rigor of the science and doing something that has a major impact on the data," Proskurowski said.
------------------------------------------------------------
Check out Viral Videos on the Net at EVTV1.com
http://www.evtv1.com/
EVTV1.com