Fastest car in the world top speed – Bugatti Veyron

Fastest Car in the World Bugatti Veyron

 

 Bugatti Veyron Top Speed 407 km/hr

 

iPhone cushion – Funny iPhone applications

How creative mind, creates creative things

 

Amazing Traffic Signal in Japan

6 AMAZing Inventions you Probably Didn't Know Exist

Progress Bar on a Traffic Light

 
A design award has been given for a concept that would allow existing traffic lights to be retrofitted with progress bars that offer a visual representation of when the light will change.
Damjan Stanković -the designer- promotes this stoplight as an eco solution in the following ways: If you’ve got the amount of time you’ve got to stop in front of you, you can shut your engine off, wait, be calm, and turn it back on again when the time is almost up. This not only lessens the amount of gas you use sitting still, but it lessens the amount of crazy madness you have wondering if the stoplight is stuck, or just really, really long.Source.

Waterproof Gadget Coating

Golden Shellback Coating is here and it is specifically created to protect gizmos against damage and loss of function due to harsh weather conditions and moisture. This protective shield produces a vacuum-deposited film that is non-flammable and insoluble in solvents. It is an ideal protection for plastic, copper, aluminum, metal, ceramic, steel, tin, or glass.
The price of this excellent anti-corrosion coating depends on the equipment you want to use it for. For the BlackBerry Pearl, $120; the iPod Shuffle, $60; the iPod Touch $120.Source.

Airport Sleep Pods

Have you ever slept at the airport? For those of us who want the convenience of sleeping at the airport, without so much of the crazy, there’s these amazing things right here! “Sleep Box” they go by the name of, designed by Arch Group for those who need private time in strange, unfriendly places!
There’s a thousand instances where the ideal personal cubical could come in handy. Here’s one of them: the airport. In between flights, what do you do? Sit in some marginally comfortable seats. Lots of time in between flights, what do you do? Sleep box.
The box itself is 2mx1.4mx2.3m. The main bed is 2×0.6m, equipped with an automatic system which changes the linens (think Fifth Element.) The bed is a soft, flexible strip of polymer and pulp tissue.
Ventilation system, sound alerts, built-in LCD television, wireless internet access, power sockets, extra luggage space under lounges. Payment is made in time, anywhere from 15 minutes to several hours.

Live Checking Card

Do you know who the Green Monster is? It’s that skunk-of-a-bill that you get at the end of the month; it devours all your Dollars because you overspent! Only if you could use something like the Live Checking Card! A Credit Card won’t let you go beyond your limits. It’s a digital thang with an E-ink display that allows you to check your payment history on it. It even tracks your bank account’s transaction through RFID. A cumulative amount shows up on the screen every time you swipe the card; giving you your account balance on your finger tips.
Designers: Jin-young Yoon, Wook-sun Oh, Young-ho Lee & Jun-kyo Lee.

Hydropak – World’s First Portable Fuel Cell

The HydroPak is the world’s first commercially available fuel cell. The system consists of a fuel cell and water-activated power-cartridge. Insert a hydrogen cartridge and add water, and the fuel cell would be sufficient to recharge your laptop computer between 8 and 10 times. In addition, the HydroPak is designed with a common AC outlet as well as x2 USB connectors, allowing you to connect/charge a variety of appliances such as lights, television sets as well as communication systems. The unit will cost $400 dollars when released, and each disposable cartridge would cost about $20.

All-In-One Credit Card

Quite a few of us use multiple credit cards and every time one card expires, its plastic adds to the trash. So do the numerous receipts that we accumulate after swiping our CC. The fundamental of the One Card Electronic Card is quite simple; it wants to eliminate the trash (and resolve issues like identity theft via discarded expired CCs) by proposing to be this all-credit-cards-in-one device. On one end of the gadget is a Memory Card Slot that will help the user upload their various CC Details.

Amazing computer technology

10 Amazing James Bond Gadgets that are REAL!

We’ve searched the web (and James’ back catalogue) to bring you 10 of the greatest gadgets that have somehow made their way from the silver screen to the real world. Anyone remember the story about the alleged undercover agent and the poisoned umbrella….
1. Jetpack

It just had to come in first, if only because we all dreamed of having one when we were kids. After appearing first in Thunderball

the Pentagon (who else?) commissioned Bell Labs to turn this flight of fancy into something they could use. The boffins came back

with a device that could propel its owner up to 9 metres in the air at a gentle pace of around 10 mph. For up to 30 seconds. It’s quite possible that the Department of Defense weren’t sure if this would make their soldiers more or less of a target, and the unit was never mass produced. On the plus side, the high pressure nitrogen gas it uses won’t burn off your trousers, and the fact remains that our schoolboy fantasies are now a reality.

2. “Blaster”

Q Branch would definitely have appreciated the “Blaster”. A hidden flamethrower fitted to several hundred high-end vehicles (and possibly a few Aston Martins) and pioneered by South African inventor Charl Fourie. Despite his assurances that it “would definitely blind” any would-be assailant or carjacker that it didn’t kill, the product never really took off in the real world, although we’re sure that James would have found a use for it.

3. Fake Fingerprints

Slightly more sedate than the previous two, but no less useful for those of us with a mischievous disposition. There has been a huge amount of research in this field, for obvious reasons. Scientists from all over the world are competing to create the most convincing fingerprint covers. The better experimental models being churned out by Japanese and American teams have an almost perfect success rate against even the best scanners. Just in case you were getting worried (or thinking of investing in a set), don’t bother, apparently “odor detection units” currently being rolled out can smell the difference.

4. Re-breather

Used in Thunderball and again in Die Another Day. The real life version is about the same size as the one used by 007, and, strangely, is much more useful than the models he uses. The Neptune EBD1 (pictured) is developed by Homeland Security Group International, Inc. and allows for up to 1 hour of breathing time, roughly ten times better than the ones shown in the films.

Problem : A 2000Kg Great White Shark is speeding towards you. Solution: Use on of the many commercially available “Shark Darts” to pierce its hide and inject it with CO2 from a cheeky little compressed gas cartridge. Apparently some twisted genius realised that the shark will be forced up towards the surface before it gets a chance to attack. In practice, the shark will probably have its guts flung out of its mouth before it gets there. Quite a neat little “refinement” as Q might say. Bond forces one of the pellets down Kananga’s throat, putting an end to his “inflated opinion of himself” in Live and Let Die.


6. X-Ray Glasses

Another schoolboy favourite. Although admittedly this one hasn’t been perfected to the same extent as seen in The World Is Not Enough. Scientists at Carnegie Mellon University have developed an ultrasound scanning unit that looks like “a small windowpane attached to a ray gun” that does the job. And lets not forget the new “Backscatter X-ray Scanner” developed at the US Transportation Security Administration’s research lab. Allthough you might prefer to forget the publicity image it revealed of the Director, Susan Hallowell (most certainly NOT pictured)

7. Q’s Pet

Not used for any operational purposes in A View To a Kill, instead used by Q for some peeping-tom action after the, ahem, climax of the film when Bond saves water by showering with Stacey Sutton. Rovers similar to the one seen in the film have dozens of high-tech applications, not least in bomb disposal and search and rescue, God bless ‘em.

8 Homing Device

One of the few objects that has managed to truly make the leap from fantasy to reality. Seen as cutting edge technology when originally showcased in Goldfinger, since then the miniature homing device has hit the streets in a massive way in the developed and developing world. The most common variant being found in your own mobile phone, modern tracking gadgets have become so common that 007 had to be surgically implanted with a tiny GPS transmitter in Casino Royale just to stay ahead just to stay ahead of the curve.

9. Skyhook

So good that Batman had to steal it. First seen in Thunderball and possibly only rivalled by the Shark Gun in terms of the amount of adrenaline you would get through if you ever actually used it. Once the inventor of the “Surface-To-Air-Recovery-System” (STARS) felt it was ready to be tested on a living creature, he strapped a pig into the harness and released the helium balloon. The attached towline was quickly snagged by a modified US Navy aircraft. Unharmed but disoriented at first, once safely aboard the pig proceeded to attack the crew. Apparently its more fun if you spread out your arms and legs because you don’t spin around so much in the air, an option that wasn’t available to the pig.

10. Laser

We couldn’t bring ourselves to keep this one out. After decades of on screen near-misses, and potentially earth-shattering misuse of the awesome power of the military and industrial strength laser in the hands of various evil-doers, we are proud to announce that lasers that are actually powerful enough to be dangerous are here. Sort of. Nowadays anybody who can afford it can buy a handheld laser online that will burst a balloon or potentially blind someone….and didn’t George Bush want to put a massive Moonraker laser on Airforce One or something?

Top 10 Lost Technologies

The world has never been more technologically advanced than it is now, but that doesn’t mean that some things haven’t been lost along the way. Many of the technologies, inventions, and manufacturing processes of antiquity have simply disappeared with the passage of time, while others are still not fully understood by modern day scientists. Some have since been rediscovered (indoor plumbing, road building), but many of the more mysterious lost technologies have gone on to become the stuff of legend. Here are ten famous examples:

10. Stradivari Violins

One lost technology of the 1700s is the process through which the famed Stradivari violins and other stringed instruments were built. The violins, along with assorted violas, cellos, and guitars, were constructed by the Stradivari family in Italy from roughly 1650-1750. The violins were prized in their day, but they’ve since become world famous for having an unparalleled—and impossible to reproduce—sound quality. Today there are only around 600 of the instruments left, and most are worth several hundred thousand dollars. In fact, the name Stradivari has become so synonymous with quality that it has come to serve as a descriptive term for anything considered to be the best in its field.

How was it Lost?

The technique for building Stradivari instruments was a family secret known only by patriarch Antonio Stradivari and his sons, Omobono and Francesco. Once they died, the process died with them, but this hasn’t stopped some from trying to reproduce it. Researchers have studied everything from fungi in the wood that was used to the unique shaping of the bodies in order to describe the famous resonance achieved by the Stradivarius collection. The leading hypothesis seems to be that the density of the particular wood used accounts for the sound. Still, some dispute the claim that the instruments are special at all. In fact, at least one study concluded that most people don’t even notice a difference in sound quality between a Stradivari violin and a modern counterpart.


9. Nepenthe

The sheer sophistication of the technology wielded by the ancient Greeks and Romans is often quite astonishing, especially when it came to medicine. Among other things, the Greeks were known to treat the bereaved with Nepenthe, a primitive anti-depressant that was known for its ability to “chase away sorrow.” The drug is frequently mentioned in Greek literature like Homer’s Odyssey.  Some claim that it might be fictional, but others have argued that the drug was real and used widely in ancient Greece. Nepenthe was said to have originated in Egypt, and its effects as “a drug of forgetfulness” have led many to compare it to opium or laudanum.

How was it Lost?

Oftentimes these “lost” technologies are possibly still around today, and it’s only our inability to identify their modern equivalent that makes them mysterious. Supposing that it really did exist, this is probably the case with Nepenthe. The drug is most likely still used today, but historians are unable to pinpoint just what modern substance the Greeks were referring to. Opium is definitely the most popular choice, but other frontrunners include wormwood extract and scopolamine.

8. The Antikythera Mechanism

One of the most mysterious of all archeological artifacts is what is known as the Antikythera Mechanism, a bronze machine that was discovered by divers off the coast of the Greek island of Antikythera in the early 1900s. The mechanism consists of a series of over 30 gears, cranks, and dials that could be manipulated in order to chart the astronomical positions of the sun, moon, and other planets. The device was found among the remains of a shipwreck that scientists have dated to the 1st or 2nd century BC.  Its true purpose is still not fully known, and the mystery behind its construction and use has puzzled researchers for years. The consensus now seems to be that the Antikythera Mechanism was a kind of primitive clock that could calculate lunar phases and solar years, which has led some to refer to it as the earliest example of an “analog computer.”

How was it Lost?

The sophistication and precision evident in the design of the mechanism suggests that it was not the only device of its kind, and many scientists have speculated that its use might have been widespread. Still, the existence of other devices like the Antikythera Mechanism doesn’t appear on the historical record until the 14th century, which would mean that the technology was lost for nearly 1400 years. Why or how will probably remain a mystery, especially since the mechanism still stands as the only ancient discovery of its kind.

7. The Telharmonium

Often recognized as the world’s first electronic musical instrument, the Telharmonium was a large organ-like device that used tonewheels to creative synthetic musical notes that were then transmitted by wires to a series of loudspeakers. The Telharmonium was developed by the inventor Thaddeus Cahill in 1897, and at the time it was one of the biggest instruments ever built. Cahill would eventually construct three versions of it, one of which was said to weigh some 200 tons and take up enough space to fill an entire room. Its set up consisted of a collection of keyboards and foot pedals, which the user could manipulate to reproduce the sounds of other instruments, particularly woodwinds like flutes, bassoons, and clarinets. The first public exhibitions of the Telharmonium were met with great success. People came in droves to hear public performances of the primitive synthesizer, which was said to produce a clear, round sound that resembled a sine wave.

How was it Lost?

Following its initial successes, Cahill developed big plans for his Telharmonium. Because of its ability to transmit a signal over telephone wires, he envisioned Telharmonium music being broadcast remotely as background sound in places like restaurants, hotels, and private homes. Unfortunately, the device proved to be too far ahead of its time. Its massive energy consumption strained early power grids, and at a price tag of a whopping $200,000, the instrument was just too pricey to build on a large scale. What’s more, early experiments in broadcasting its music over the telephone proved disastrous, as its sound would often bleed over into private phone conversations. After a while, the public’s fascination with the device waned, and the different versions of it were eventually scrapped. Today, nothing remains of the original three Telharmoniums—not even sound recordings.

6. The Library of Alexandria

Although it wasn’t a technology, the legendary Library of Alexandria warrants a place on this list, if only because its destruction meant that so much of the collected knowledge of antiquity was forever lost. The library was founded in Alexandria, Egypt in roughly 300 B.C., most likely during the reign of Ptolemy Soter. It marked the first serious attempt to gather all the known information about the outside world in one place. The size of its collection is not known (though the number has been estimated to be in the neighborhood of one million scrolls), but the library undoubtedly attracted some of the great minds of its day, among them Zenodotus and Aristophones of Byzantium, both of whom spent considerable time doing scholarly work in Alexandria. The library became so important that there is even a legend that all visitors to the city would have to surrender their books upon entering so that a copy could be made for storage in the great library.

How was it Lost?

The Library of Alexandria and all its contents burned sometime around the first or second century AD. Scholars are still uncertain just how the fire was started, but there are a few competing theories. The first, which is backed up by historical documents, suggests that Julius Caesar accidentally burned the library when he set fire to some of his own ships in order to block the path of an advancing enemy fleet. The fire spread to the docks and then enveloped the library. Other theories contend that the library was sacked and burned by invaders, with the Emperor Aurelian, Theodosius I, and the Arab conqueror Amr ibn al ‘Aas serving as the main contenders. However the Library of Alexandria was destroyed, there’s little doubt that many of the secrets of antiquity were lost along with it. We’ll never know for sure just what was lost, but had it remained standing, there’s an argument to be made that many of the technologies on the list would have never been lost.

5. Damascus Steel

Damascus steel was an impossibly strong type of metal that was widely used in the Middle East from 1100-1700 AD. It is most famously associated with swords and knives. Blades forged with Damascus steel were known for their amazing strength and cutting ability, and were said to be able to slice rocks and other metals—including the blades of weaker swords—cleanly in half. The blades are believed to have been created using wootz steel, which was most likely imported from India and Sri Lanka and molded and blended to create a patterned blade. The special quality of the swords is thought to have derived from this process, which weaved together tough cementite and soft iron to form a metal that was as strong as it was flexible.

How was it Lost?

The particular process for forging Damascus steel appears to have disappeared sometime around 1750 AD. The exact cause for the loss of the technique is unknown, but there are several theories. The most popular is that the supply of ores needed for the special recipe for Damascus steel started running low, and sword makers were forced to develop other techniques. Another is that the whole recipe for Damascus steel—specifically the presence of carbon nanotubes—was only discovered by accident, and that sword smiths didn’t actually know the technique by heart. Instead, they would simply forge the swords en masse, and test them to determine which met the standards of Damascus steel. Whatever the technique, Damascus steel is one technology that modern experimenters have been unable to fully reproduce. There are pattern welded knives that are marketed as being made from “Damascened steel”, but while usually well made, they are only approximations of the lost technique for real Damascus steel.

4. Apollo/Gemini Space Program Technology

Not all lost technology dates back to antiquity—sometimes it’s just become so obsolete that it’s no longer compatible. The Apollo and Gemini space programs of the 50s, 60s, and 70s were responsible for NASA’s biggest successes, including some of the first manned space flights and the first trip to the moon. Gemini, which ran from 1965-66, was responsible for the much of the early research and development into the mechanics of human space flight. Apollo, which followed shortly thereafter, was launched with the goal of landing a crew on the surface of the moon, which it succeeded in doing in July of 1969.

How was it Lost?

The Apollo and Gemini programs aren’t truly lost. There are still one or two Saturn V rockets lying around, and there are plenty of parts from the spacecraft capsules still available. But just because modern scientists have the parts doesn’t mean they have the knowledge to understand how or why they worked the way they did. In fact, very few schematics or records from the original programs are still around. This lack of record keeping is a byproduct of the frenetic pace at which the American space program progressed. Because NASA was in a space race with the USSR, the planning, design, and building process of the Apollo and Gemini programs was always rushed. Not only that, but in most cases private contractors were brought in to work on every individual part of the spacecraft. Once the programs ended, these engineers—along with all their records—moved on. None of this would be a problem, but now that NASA is planning a return trip to the moon, a lot of the information about how the engineers of the 1960s made the voyages work is invaluable. Amazingly, the records remain so disorganized and incomplete that NASA has resorted to reverse engineering existing spacecraft parts that they have lying around in junkyards as a way of understanding just how the Gemini and Apollo programs managed to work so well.

3.  Silphium

Lost technologies aren’t always the result of too much secrecy or poor record keeping—sometimes nature just doesn’t cooperate. This was the case with Silphium, an herbal wonder drug that the Romans used as one of the earliest forms of birth control. It was based on the fruit of a particular genus of the fennel plant, a flowering herb that only grew along a certain shoreline in modern day Libya. The heart-shaped fruit of the Silphium plant was known to be something of a cure-all, and was used to treat warts, fever, indigestion and a whole host of other ailments. But it was Silphium’s powers as a contraceptive that made it one of the most valuable substances in the Roman world, to the point that the plant appears on several different pieces of ancient Roman currency. Women would drink Silphium juice every few weeks, and this would be enough to prevent pregnancy. Using the herb would even terminate an existing pregnancy if used correctly, which would make Silphium one of the earliest methods of abortion.

How was it Lost?

Silphium was one of the most sought after drugs of the ancient world, and its use spread rapidly across Europe and into Asia. But despite its remarkable effects, the particular genus of plant needed would only grow in one area along the Mediterranean in North Africa. Its scarcity, combined with an overwhelming demand, more than likely led to over harvesting, which drove the plant into extinction. Because the particular species no longer exists, modern scientists are unable to examine Silphium to see if its powers of contraception were really as effective as Roman historians and poets would lead one to believe, or if there were any adverse side effects. Still, it is worth noting that other herbs that are chemically similar to Silphium have been proven to have a fairly high rate of preventing pregnancy.

2. Roman Cement

Modern concrete was developed in the 1700s, and today the simple mixture of cement, water, sand, and rocks is the most widely used building material in the world. But the recipe developed in the 18th century wasn’t the first time concrete was invented. In fact, concrete was widely used throughout antiquity by the Persians, Egyptians, Assyrians, and Romans. The Romans in particular made extensive use of concrete, and they were responsible for first perfecting the recipe by mixing burnt lime with crushed rocks and water. Their mastery of its use allowed them to build many of their most famous structures, among them the Pantheon, the Colosseum, the aqueducts, and the Roman Baths.

How was it Lost?

Like so many technologies of the Greeks and Romans, the recipe for concrete was lost during the descent into the Dark Ages, but just why remains a mystery. The most popular theory is that the recipe was something of a trade secret among stonemasons, and that the method for making cement and concrete died along with those who knew it. Perhaps even more interesting than the disappearance of Roman cement are the particular qualities that separate it from more modern Portland cement, which is the most common type of cement used today. Structures built with Roman cement, like the Colosseum, have managed to weather thousands of years of punishment from the elements and remain standing, but buildings constructed with Portland cement have been known to wear down much faster. This has been theorized to be the result of different chemicals that the Romans added to their cement, among them milk and even blood. These were said to create air bubbles within the concrete that helped the material to expand and contract in the heat and cold without damaging itself.

1. Greek Fire

Perhaps the most famous of all lost technologies is what is known as Greek Fire, an incendiary weapon that was used by the military of the Byzantine Empire. A primitive form of napalm, Greek Fire was a kind of “sticky fire” that would continue burning even in water. The Byzantines most famously used it during the 11th century, when it was credited with helping to repel two sieges of Constantinople by Arab invaders. Greek Fire could be deployed in many different ways. In its earliest form it was poured into jars and thrown at enemies like a grenade or a Molotov cocktail. Later, giant bronze tubes were mounted on warships, and siphons were used spray the weapon at enemy vessels. There was even a kind of portable siphon that could be operated by hand in the style of a modern flamethrower.

How was it Lost?

The technology behind Greek Fire certainly isn’t completely alien. After all, modern militaries have now been using similar weapons for years. Still, the closest counterpart to Greek Fire, napalm, wasn’t perfected until the early 1940s, which would mean the technology was lost for several hundred years. The weapon’s use seems to disappear after the decline of the Byzantine Empire, but just why still isn’t known. Meanwhile, the possible chemical composition of Greek Fire has been widely studied by historians and scientists. An early theory was that the mixture included a heavy dose of saltpeter, which would make it chemically similar to gunpowder. This idea has since been rejected, because saltpeter wouldn’t burn in water. Instead, modern theories propose that the weapon was more likely a cocktail of petroleum and other chemicals, possibly including quicklime, niter, or sulfur.