Created by Microsoft, the WorldWide Telescope sports a high performance Visual Experience Engine and allows seamless panning and zooming around the night sky, planets, and image environments.

The WorldWide Telescope (WWT) enables your PC to function as a virtual telescope, bringing together imagery from the best ground and space-based telescopes in the world. A web-based version of WorldWide Telescope is also available now, for preview. This version enables seamless guided explorations of the universe from within a web browser. It’s compatible with PC (requires Microsoft Silverlight 2.0 though) and Intel Mac OS X.

(more…)

If you're new here and you like our articles, how about subscribing free for our updates via RSS feed.

The Ford EcoBoost strategy for the coming year got its own boost through an announcement made at the 2010 model year preview in Dearborn, Michigan. The next generation EcoBoost 2.0-liter, four-cylinder engine will arrive in 2010. The engine upgrade will be coupled with the debut of a Powershift six-speed dual clutch gearbox.

For the future, Ford is advocating the use of a dry clutch system over the wet clutch option. The experts at Ford believe that the dry clutch is far more efficient when used on existing DCTs-which currently use the wet clutch system.

(more…)

Non-rechargeable batteries contribute to garbage and add dangerous toxins to waste making them an environmental threat. Rechargeable batteries have long been touted as safe or at least better for the environment but when you do not find a socket outdoors the entire praise falls flat.

It is in these circumstances that people look for those AA and AAA 1.5volts options that once used can be chucked into the bin. A rechargeable solution that needs no electric socket would also be a great option. But until now, it has been a far-fetched dream.

(more…)

In an effort to reduce electricity consumption, General Electric Company is going to combine energy-efficient lighting and energy-efficient appliances with energy management systems and renewable power generators. The systems – named ‘Net Zero Energy Home’ – involves photovoltaic cells and thin-film solar cells as well as advanced energy storage products that help save energy.

General Electric said in a press release that it is working with utility and government partners to help improve the power grid – “which has not changed much since the days of Thomas Edison” – in ways that will not cause consumers to “compromise their lifestyles.”

(more…)

It was the Japanese who realized the worth of the Prius almost two decades back and look where they stand today in hybrid vehicle development. The US government seems to have finally realized the worth of green cars on American roads and therefore, finally the car makers have found some solace in the form of grants.

(more…)

Though hydrogen as an alternative fuel for vehicles is more expensive compared to electricity, Mazda Motors is going ahead with its hydrogen-engine plans by delivering the first of its Premacy Hydrogen Rotary Engine Hybrids to the Iwatani Corporation.

Mazda Premacy Hydrogen Hybrid

Premacy (the model known in the United States as Mazda5) uses the same hydrogen rotary engine that powers its RX-8 Hydrogen RE and adds an electric motor. It has twice the range of the RX-8, at about 200 km – some 124 miles.

(more…)

More and more new-generation vehicles are using lithium batteries in an effort to cut down pollution levels, but could it be true that lithium batteries are as damaging to the environment as gasoline?

Yes, according to some experts on energy!

William Tahil, research director of Meridian International Research, an independent consultancy specializing in renewable energy, is not all that happy with lithium.

(more…)

By waggling a wing, aircrafts could save up to 20% fuel – thus saving on costs significantly and also cutting greenhouse-gas emissions from aviation.

An Airbus A380 on San Francisco Airport

The surprise discovery was made by researchers at the University of Warwick in Coventry, West Midlands, England, who were “playing with” a model aircraft-wing in a wind tunnel.

(more…)

Solar Powered Robot Takes Various Shapes

The current challenge for mankind is to seek the advantages of alternative energy. We are not quite sure whether we have reached a level where we can actually use solar energy to entertain ourselves but, if someone creates an “android” based on the same theory, we’re going to hail the development first and than be caustic.

(more…)

In an exciting invention, a British engineer has built a high-tech, winged submersible that claims to “fly” beneath the water.

Dubbed the Super Falcon Submersible (and resembling Thunderbird 4), it can reach a depth of up to 1,500 feet and move through the ocean at 6 knots – that is, about 7 miles a hour. It has a range of nearly 25 nautical miles.

“After 20 years of prototyping, Super Falcon is our most advanced and elegant submersible yet, encompassing all the innovations we made in introducing underwater flight from the surface to the bottom of the ocean,” said Graham Hawkes.

The Super Falcon Submersible, which has a pressure hull made of carbon fibre, encompasses two cockpits with dual flight controls and instrumentation that are familiar to military pilots.

The craft can go down into the water at speeds of up to 200 feet a minute and can come up to the surface twice as fast – at a sped of 400 feet a minute.

According to its inventor, passengers would not have to worry about “the bends” because the cabin pressure remains at one atmosphere.

But the most interesting aspect is that the vessel can be “flown through 360 degrees or in a very smooth, near-silent horizontal flight for observation.”

The Super Falcon’s pitch, roll and yaw are controlled by “fly by wire” – that is, being operated using electrical signals.

Graham Hawkes says his invention is “advanced enough to go barrel-rolling with dolphins, spy-hopping with whales or searching for sunken galleons.”

To be on the safe side, the Super Falcon Submersible comes with an auto-return system that will bring the craft back to the surface in case it runs into trouble while under water. It also possesses life support for 24 hours even if a typical dive will not take more than 5 hours.

Anyone to be the first for a test drive? We’re in if anyone cares.