We’re living in some great times in terms of writing! Bloggers all over the world want to act and react to stuff. They hear things on the tv and off they go to their computer. They listen to things on the radio on the way home and burst through the door at home and boom… start blogging. Folks just love to blog. How about you? Are you a blogger? Do you love information? Does this make you want to comment? Then blog!
Verifying the accuracy of network analyzers—instruments that are used to measure key performance characteristics of electronic networks—was once an awkward process involving multiple steps and pieces of equipment. Now, thanks to an electronic verification standard and accompanying software developed by electrical engineers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), much of that process can be automated and the performance of the calibration system checked with NIST via the Internet. Results are both more complete and available in a matter of minutes, not hours or days as once was the case.
So-called “vector network analyzers” (VNAs) have become workhorse tools for checking how well complicated electronic components—systems used in cell phones, wireless Internet links, radar components, radios and satellites, for example—transmit signals. Until now, calibrating VNAs involved plugging a number of mechanical artifacts with known performance characteristics into the testing machines and running tests on that individual artifact. Then another artifact with different characteristics would be swapped out, measured, recorded, etc. This took up to an hour to complete, the artifacts were expensive, and the measurements were not always reliable.
NIST electronics engineer Dylan Williams and team has eliminated much of that complexity with a new verification procedure based on a device with a wide variety of measurement characteristics that plugs into the computer being used to do the calibration.* By using the software tool provide by NIST, a equivalent calibration can be done quickly via automation—the user doesn’t have to play an active role in the process.
Williams said this new procedure also has the benefit of being traceable directly to NIST labs, comparing measurements to an independent calibration process and authenticating the tests both electronically and with a printable certificate from NIST that includes the serial number of the device being calibrated.
“Every time a vector network analyzer, a common electrical measurement instrument, took a measurement, it would measure eight different parameters at once and you were never sure if it was measuring them all correctly,” Williams says. “It has been a nagging problem for some time with no real way to check it. Now, you can verify the performance of your analyzer and cover the whole space of what the instrument can measure.”
With thousands of vector network analyzers in use by industry every day, Williams expects there to be a constant demand for their verification devices. For further information on obtaining the software and one of the hardware devices needed for the calibration procedure, contact Ronald Alan Ginley at (303) 497-3634,ronald.ginley@nist.gov.
The Automated Computer Time Service (ACTS) has been provided since 1988 for users who need to synchronize computer clocks to the correct time.
| Keep in mind that ACTS only works with analog modems that use ordinary telephone lines. Digital modems, such as Digital Subscriber Line (DSL), cable and wireless modems, cannot synchronize using ACTS. For computers with Internet access, the Internet Time Service should be used to synchronize to NIST. |
Urban Meyer is stepping down as coach of the Florida football team, athletics director Jeremy Foley announced Saturday afternoon in a release.
“I have given my heart and soul to coaching college football and mentoring young men for the last 24-plus years and I have dedicated most of my waking moments the last five years to the Gator football program,” Meyer said in statement. “I have ignored my health for years, but recent developments have forced me to re-evaluate my priorities of faith and family.”
Physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have used lasers to cool and trap erbium atoms, a “rare earth” heavy metal with unusual optical, electronic and magnetic properties. The element has such a complex energy structure that it was previously considered too wild to trap. The demonstration, reported in the April 14 issue of Physical Review Letters,* might lead to the development of novel nanoscale devices for telecommunications, quantum computing or fine-tuning the properties of semiconductors.
Laser cooling and trapping involves hitting atoms with laser beams of just the right color and configuration to cause the atoms to absorb and emit light in a way that leads to controlled loss of momentum and heat, ultimately producing a stable, nearly motionless state. Until now, the process has been possible only with atoms that switch easily between two energy levels without any possible stops in between. Erbium has over 110 energy levels between the two used in laser cooling, and thus has many ways to get “lost” in the process. NIST researchers discovered that these lost atoms actually get recycled, so trapping is possible after all.
The NIST team heated erbium to over 1300 degrees C to make a stream of atoms. Magnetic fields and six counter-propagating purple laser beams were then used to cool and trap over a million atoms in a space about 100 micrometers in diameter. As the atoms spend time in the trap, they fall into one or more of the 110 energy levels, stop responding to the lasers, and begin to diffuse out of the trap. Recycling occurs, though, because the atoms are sufficiently magnetic to be held in the vicinity by the trap’s magnetic field. Eventually, many of the lurking atoms fall back to the lowest energy level that resonates with the laser light and are recaptured in the trap.
The erbium atoms can be trapped at a density that is high enough to be a good starting point for making a Bose-Einstein condensate, an unusual, very uniform state of matter used in NIST research on quantum computing. Cold trapped erbium also might be useful for producing single photons, the smallest particles of light, at wavelengths used in telecommunications. In addition, trapped erbium atoms might be used for “doping” semiconductors with small amounts of impurities to tailor their properties. Erbium—which, like other rare earth metals, retains its unique optical characteristics even when mixed with other materials—is already used in lasers, amplifiers and glazes for glasses and ceramics. Erbium salts, for example, emit pastel pink light.
NIST Fellow Joseph Stroscio was honored with the 2009 Nanotechnology Recognition Award at the AVS 56th International Symposium in San Jose, California on November 10, 2009. This award recognizes a member of the Nanoscale Science and Technology Division of the AVS for outstanding scientific and technical contributions in the science of nanometer-scale structures, technology transfer involving nanometer-scale structures, and/or the promotion and dissemination of knowledge and development in these areas. Joe was cited “for his pioneering development of instrumentation to create and characterize nanostructures enabling fundamental insights into the mechanisms of atom manipulation and the magneto-electric properties of low-dimensional structures.” Joe is a Project Leader in the Electron Physics Group, performing measurements of the geometric and electronic structure of surfaces and nanostructures, including those created by atom manipulation, using innovative ultra-high vacuum, cryogenic/high-magnetic-field scanning probe microscopy systems developed at NIST.
(Photo: The real Julia Childs-Wikipedia photo)
By Nan Ramey (Associated Blogger)The performance of Merel Streep in the movie “Julia and Julie” was fantastic. Streep played the life of Julia Childs, the American turned French cook.
I watched the movie even though I am not a cook, nor do I care too much about cooking. While I cook out of necessity, I found the movie fascinating. Mostly, it was fabulous because of Merel. She looked, acted and sounded like Childs. She must have practiced Julia Child’s chatter and high-pitched voice hours on end. Her voice went up and down like a keyboard the entire movie.
During the movie, I was curious about the blog of “Julie”, the girl in the film who made a project of cooking 365 of Childs’ recipes in a year so I looked up the blog. It was found on “Salon.com”. To my disappointment, it was full of curse words, even the “f” word. This made me a “not impressed” reader.
She may have a movie written about her blog but if a person cannot speak without using the “f” word, who should be impressed?
But, the movie itself was great, funny and entertaining.
2009 Blog Awards Now Open for Entries
New York, NY (PRWEB) December 2, 2008 — Today, the New York-based New Media Institute opened up the 2009 Blog Awards (http://www.newmediaawards.org) for entries. The aim of competition is to celebrate excellence in blogging communications.Enter your blog.
”Unlike many competitions, blog finalists are not selected based solely on design, but how well they are utilizing blogging technology to serve and communicate to their audience. Most importantly, the size of an organization or blog is not a consideration in judging,” explained John Spagnuolo, President of the New Media.
The 2009 Blog Awards is the first of four competitions to take place in the 2009 New Media Awards, followed by the Web Awards, Digital Advertising Awards and the Web & Mobile Video Awards.
Benefits of winning
• Validation – You will know that your Web site, blog or digital advertising campaign is recognized as an outstanding use of new media in communications. Since this is a high profile competition, your employer, clients, competition and the general public will know what you have accomplished and you will receive the credit that is so well deserved.
• Media Exposure – The New Media Institute releases the winners of each category of entry to the media. Entrants will also receive a press release tailored to their entry that can be added to their site and released to the media.
• NMA Web Seal and Link – All entrants, finalists and winners will receive blog awards image seals that can be placed on their Web site. The seal will link directly to an entire page dedicated to their project on newmediaawards.org, including a description of their project, link to their project or sponsoring company/agency, and image of their project.
• Trophy – Each winner will be able to order a trophy symbolizing their accomplishment. They will have the opportunity to edit the inscription on the trophy and order additional trophies. This year’s trophy is a glass sculpture and is absolutely magnificent!
| Blogging is great for traffic and web business, but sometimes it can be tough to muster up the energy to entertain your blog audience on a regular basis. This holiday season, Wordfeeder.com offers daily blogging support and coaching for marketers, business owners and entrepreneurs who want to turn up the volume on their blogs — with a free blogging event, “24 Blogging Days ’til Christmas.”
(PRWEB) – Online business owners who would like to attract more visitors to their websites during the holidays and beyond are invited to participate in 24 Blogging Days ’til Christmas. The blogging event is hosted by Wordfeeder.com and offers one blog copywriting tip per day for the entire month of December leading up to Christmas.
Dina Giolitto, copywriting consultant and owner of http://Wordfeeder.com Copywriting and Marketing, dreamed up 24 Blogging Days ’til Christmas while searching for a solution to keep in better touch with her readers during the busy holiday season.
“Everyone is in such a frenzy this time of year,” says Giolitto. “I just thought it’d be nice to get folks in the spirit while providing value to readers who want to leverage their blogs for more traffic and sales. In a way, it’s my equivalent of an office holiday party, but for virtual consultants and online business owners.”
“24 Blogging Days ’til Christmas” kicks off the December holidays with the tagline, “‘Tis the Season to be Bloggy.” For those who have never blogged before, this event offers daily coaching in the form of ideas for blog posts, instructions on how to set up blog categories, blogging as a social medium, suggestions on what not to write in your blog and much more.
Bloggers who would like access to the free holiday blogging course can sign up at Wordfeeder.com. As an extra incentive, participating bloggers are invited to share the link to their blogs, which will be posted on the 24 Days Blogroll for all to see.
Once they’re on the list, members will receive one blog alert per day via email. As an added bonus, bloggers who are really letting loose on their blogs, sharing stories and photos, playing holiday music, telling jokes, offering great information and so forth, may just garner a Feature Spot on the Wordfeeder.com Copywriting and Marketing Blog.
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White Horse is Offering a Complimentary Webinars Series to Outfit Marketers with Innovations in Social Media, Online Promotions and Digital Advertising
Portland, OR (PRWEB) — White Horse, an award winning 29-year old digital marketing agency, is offering a series of complimentary Webinars to help marketers derive better results from their social media, promotions, advertising and Web sites investments in 2010 by pushing the bounds of digital.
The QuickStart 2010 Webinar Series includes five of the most popular White Horse Webinars. With the final stages of 2010 planning underway, the events are consolidated in December. Marketers can sign up for one or many of the events and will receive a downloadable version of the Webinar after the event. The full Webinar schedule includes:
• Five Ways Your Brand Strategy Must Evolve in the Social Media Landscape on December 3rd, 2009
• Three Ways to Make Online Advertising Work Harder through Advanced Tactics on December 4th, 2009
• The Three New Rules of Effective Online Promotions on December 10th 2009
• Top 10 for 2010: Digital Marketing for Financial Services on December 16th, 2009
• Seven Top tools for Social Media Monitoring: A Benchmark Study – Now Available to Download
“As brands rely on digital to anchor effective cross-channel strategies, it’s essential that marketing leaders understand the latest thinking and technical capabilities to derive the full channel value,” said Jen Modarelli, Principal and CEO at White Horse. “The QuickStart 2010 Webinars offer real-world case studies and proven insights on today’s hottest digital opportunities.”
Recognizing a growing gap between digital marketing technology capabilities and the pace of marketing program evolution, White Horse launched its complimentary Webinar program in 2008. Marketers now have a destination for free training offered through monthly live events and a library of recorded events that are available on demand. Registration for the QuickStart 2010 Webinars is now open. Events begin at 10:00 am PST/12:00 pm CST/ 1:00 pm EST.