“Wolf Children” with the “Werewolves’” Disease

 What's Hot  1 Response »
Feb 282011
 

The World's Hairiest Girl

One girl in Bangkok has hit puberty early. Really early, having a full beard and body hair before she is even out of elementary school. And believe it or no, this girl’s predicament has caused her to become more popular. You heard it right, the more hair, the more your friends care.

Supatra Sasuphan, won the award for world’s hairiest girl awarded by Guinness book of world Records. It is this accomplishment, which Supatra attributes to dramatically boosting her popularity.

“I’m very happy to be in the Guinness World Records! A lot of people have to do a lot to get in,’ she said. ‘All I did was answer a few questions and then they gave it to me.”

Before Suptra’s recognition many of the children used to tease her calling her monkey face and wolf girl. However proud of her accomplishments, Suptra says:

“’It does sometimes make it difficult to see when it gets long. I hope I will be cured one day.”

If Suptra had been born just a couple generations before in the middle ages she would have been branded a werewolf and outcast from society. The condition is rare, less than 75 cases have ever been recorded. I was able to find one other living “wolf child” in India
Pruthviraj Patil, too has the genetic disorder, hypertrichosis, or the werewolf disease. Whilst not as hairy as Suptra, Pruthviraj too is covered with hair.

Hopefully someday there will be a cure so that these “wolf children”, and all the other “werewolves” out their can return to their bare human skin.

Sources:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1361409/Wolf-child-named-worlds-hairiest-girl-delighted-makes-popular-school.html#ixzz1FGv6ZtHK

http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/856778-worlds-hairiest-child-happy-to-put-wolf-girl-jibes-behind-her

http://www.babble.com/CS/blogs/strollerderby/archive/2008/11/24/rare-condition-makes-boy-look-like-werewolf.aspx

Eats On Feets

 What's Hot  1 Response »
Feb 252011
 

Pregnant moms all over the country can share their milk via Facebook

The following link will take you to a page where you can trade breast milk, on Facebook.

http://www.facebook.com/eats.on.feets

Eats on Feets, as the page is called, is a place where pregnant mothers can go to share and take find milk. With many modern woman working and many more taking care of their children single- handed, it is sometimes hard for new mothers to pump as much milk as is required during the day for their babies.

As it states on the page: “I created this page after receiving a call from a mom who was desperate to find breast milk for her baby. I posted her need on fb and the the results were dramatic and immediate!”

And so Eats for Feets has been born and has been acting to help mothers get connected with mothers for milk. 70 mothers are currently using the Facebook page.

The site has since expanded from the original Facebook page and has now gotten its own domain name at http://www.eatsonfeets.org/

The apparent long-term goal of Eats on Feets is to create a global human milk network. The Facebook page currently has 2434 friends and could have another!

The milk network is a shortcut from the milk banks, which often charge costly fees for the milk to be tested and the original source of milk is unknown.

Sources:

http://boston.cbslocal.com/2011/02/23/breastfeeding-mothers-share-milk-with-other-moms/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/27/breast-milk-facebook_n_788749.html

http://www.newser.com/story/105901/moms-share-breast-milk-on-facebook.html

Commercial Space Travel

 What's Hot  1 Response »
Feb 242011
 

If you have 200,000 dollars, you can book your flight into the last great frontier, space. Anyone is eligible (given you have the cash). Virgin Mobil meets Virgin Galactic in the first commercial space venture ever constructed. The VSS Enterprise can fly, tested in early October the Enterprise proved that it could both detach from the mother ship and land safely in California. If it can propel itself through the atmosphere and back is yet to be determined.  Richard Branson is expecting to shoot people through the earth’s atmosphere to sneak a peek back at the world we call home, next year.

Boeing has been given government grants to produce technology to do the same, yet Virgin Galactic is way ahead of its time. With this first space race, it is imaginable that space tourism may become commonplace in the future as the price of a trip declines steadily.

If this venture is expanded, and we one day have traffic in space, where does this leave our planet? We have enough pollution coming from the ground, and now were blasting it in the sky too.

A report done by Nature.com stated, “emissions from 1,000 private rocket launches a year would remain high in the stratosphere, possibly altering global atmospheric circulation and distributions of ozone,”

Is this threatening cost too much? Or is it like the 200,000 dollar payment, just the price that need be paid for innovation. The engines used currently implement a process that burns hydrocarbons with nitrous oxide. This would leave pollutants in the stratosphere for years and could seriously affect climate change.

Before the industry even takes off the ground, perhaps it is time for them to re-evaluate their “green agenda” Asking if the adventurous space tourism is really worth the worldwide risk it brings. Even the rich will need to come back to earth sometime.

Sources:

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/technology/2010/10/12/virgin-galactic-spacecraft-for-tourists-is-a-success-on-test-flight-115875-22627319/

http://www.virgingalactic.com/

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/5928560/will_fears_of_climate_change_keep_space.html

Images:

http://www.loveangeles.com/love_angeles/2010/10/bransons-virgin-galactic-completes-first-solo-space-flight.html

http://www.crunchgear.com/tag/virgin-galactic/

A Kitchen’s Waste is an Engine’s Fuel

 What's Hot  1 Response »
Feb 242011
 

A Kitchen’s Waste is an Engine’s Fuel

Vegetable Oil in Place of Diesel


The first Diesel engine ever produced was made to run off of peanut oil. That engine never really caught on post-creation,; this is apparent, as most gas stations still offer a petroleum based Diesel fuel. With the recent environmental revolution that is sweeping the nation, organic oils are back on the rise. It is true that a Diesel engine can run off of vegetable oil without problem. However, most Diesel engine cars cannot run entirely off of the oil without a mixture or engine modification.

Vegetable oil is much thicker than diesel fuel . Furthermore, it gets even thicker the colder it gets. If you wish to run your diesel engine entirely off of vegetable oil without engine modification or with a mixture of diesel, you will need to heat the oil up. Heating the oil up will allow it to be burned and kept warm in the engine while you drive. If you were to stop your car for an extended period of time in cold weather, you may have trouble re-starting your engine.

Creating a mixture of vegetable oil with diesel will counteract this problem. You can directly pour as much as 50% of your fuel from oil, and the rest diesel and your car would run fine as long as it was not met with extreme cold:, the colder it is, the more parts diesel to veggie oil you will need.

If you want to modify your engine to specifically run off of vegetable oil, this can also be done in a number of ways. One of the most common ways to go about this is by adding a second fuel tank. The engine will start using the diesel tank, but as the car engine warms up, it will switch to the oil, and you’re good to go.

There are 3 main reasons people switch from diesel to vegetable oil.

  1. Cost. Vegetable oil is cheaper. If you can find a local restaurant to give you their vegetable oil, they will often do so for free as they no longer have to pay for disposal cost themselves. Otherwise many organic markets sell it. One thing to remember if you are to get your vegetable oil from source, it will need to be filtered, which is a relatively easy process but requires some space if you have room in the garage. Also, the oil will save you some repair cost, as it is better for you engine.
  2. Safety. Vegetable oil will not combust like regular fuel, so it is safer in the event of a crash.
  3. Environmental. Vegetable oil is better for the environment than regular petroleum based fuel. Unlike regular fuel, veggie oil is not mined, it does not emit C02 like other cars, and it smells like McDonalds French fries if you were to drive behind a car running off oil. Vegetable oil is also a renewable resource that has almost a zero chance of being depleted.

Image:

http://www.ecofriend.org/entry/fuelpod2-cheap-clean-fuel-to-power-your-automobiles/

All About Seahorses

 What's Hot  1 Response »
Feb 222011
 

The horses of the ocean, the seahorse gets its name from its facial similarity to the horse, with a long snout. There are over 50 different types of seahorses, yet the seahorse is still an endangered species. They are captured in the hundreds and used in Chinese, Japanese and Korean medicine.

The Seahorse is classified as a hippocampus. Hippos is Greek for horse, and kampos means sea monster. In ancient Greek mythology it was told that the sea Gods rode around on creatures that were half horse half fish. The imagery associated with them is that of the modern day seahorse.

The Seahorse, however, is much too small to ride. Measuring anywhere from an inch centimeter to 12 inches. They are a vertebrae fish, with a hard outer covering, fins, and gills. The Seahorse looking unlike most fish was first mistaken to be an amphibian or even an insect. The seahorse eats mostly shrimp, plankton, and worms. The seahorse has no teeth so it cannot must eat soft invertebrate. The seahorse itself is covered in interlocking bones that act as an armor.

Unlike most species, the male seahorse is responsible for carrying and nourishing the eggs for reproduction. The mating process of the seahorse is a prolonged process of courtship in which the seahorse couple will spend days mimicking each other’s movements and following one another. On a full moon, the female will release her eggs of which the male will pick up and store in a pouch on his chest to fertilize and nourish. A litter of seahorses is usually large between 200 and 600 are released yet it is estimated that only .5% will survive. Like many animals the males will fight for the attention of the female hitting one another with their tails and even biting (don’t worry the seahorse bite doesn’t hurt much).

The seahorse life span is roughly four years. Starting out at no more than a millimeter in length the reproductive age for a seahorse is 6 months to death. Seahorses are traded readily both alive and dead, for medicine and souvenirs. If humans are not careful they could soon lose the horses of the sea.

Images:

http://montereybayaquarium.typepad.com/sea_notes/seahorses/

http://www.allposters.com/-sp/Yellow-Seahorses-Hippocampus-Guttulatus-Mediterranean-Posters_i2634128_.htm

Green Ballistics. Seed Bombing Pt. 2

 What's Hot  2 Responses »
Feb 212011
 

Last Friday I wrote an article entitled “Seed Bombing” The subject of this article was little balls of compost rolled up with seeds. These seed bombs are being used to guerilla garden places were vegetation is scarce in cities. The balls can be bought from vending machines in the street and can be used to grow a garden almost anywhere. The idea was based off of the original seed bomb comprised of  a “condom filled with fertilizer, water and wildflower seeds.” (Delana)

Today I am still writing about seed bombing, but this time the bomb has changed from a little ball of dirt to a full-sized ballistic missile. Jin Wook- Hwang came up with the idea to fill a missile with hundreds of tiny casual-like-pills containing seeds.

The pills contain a seed and a small amount of compost. Just like a medicinal pill the capsule itself will soon dissolve after the seed is germinated inside. The capsule up to the degration point acts as a greenhouse for the seed inside.

The missile, filled with capsules is then dropped like a bomb over areas needing vegetation. The pills are spread, and within months new greenery will grace the landscape.

So who ever said you couldn’t drop bombs for peace hasn’t heard of the green ballistic bomb.

Sources: http://www.virtualherbarium.org/gardenviews/GoingBallistic.html

http://webecoist.com/2010/01/30/urban-seed-bombs-next-generation-green-ballistic-missiles/

Seed Bombing

 What's Hot  1 Response »
Feb 182011
 

Buy It, Bomb It, Grow It, Watch It

A new grassroots movement is spreading the nation, and it involves bombing, with seeds. The compact balls are as their name would indicate, bundles of seeds that will spring to life when given a home or “bombed” in soil.

The seed bombers have taken old gumball and other candy vending machines and converted them into green bomb vending machines. So that the general public can purchase so the seeds and bomb a new garden into existence.

The idea of green bombing is intended to give un-expected beauty to otherwise vacant spaces. Hundreds of secret gardeners buy these bombs and plant them around cities were natural life may be sparse.

The seed bomb not only contains seeds but also it’s own compost in case the terrain where it is left is harsh. This allows the seeds to germinate and have a better chance of survival where other plant life has neglected to thrive.

Learn more about green bombing at http://www.facebook.com/greenaidvending and join the bombing movement.

Sources:

http://www.anthropologie.com/anthro/catalog/productdetail.jsp?id=073025&navAction=jump&navCount=

http://ecosalon.com/greenaid-for-change-guerrilla-gardening-and-the-seed-bomb/

http://www.facebook.com/greenaidvending

Images:

http://www.re-nest.com/re-nest/gardening/candy-dispensers-retrofitted-to-share-seed-bombs-120837

http://beijaflornaturals.com/blog/Topics/green-business-love

The White Goat

 What's Hot  2 Responses »
Feb 172011
 

Office Paper In, Toilet Paper Out

I have been writing a lot about innovations coming out of Japan recently and I have another one for you today.

It is a machine that turns waste office paper into toilet paper. That’s right, now you can wipe your butt with your office memos, talk about two birds one stone. It takes 18,000 sheets of office paper to make two rolls of toilet paper, the process takes about two hours.

The machine dubbed the “White Goat” is made by the Japanese company Nakabayashi Co. and costs $95,000.

While the machine is a noble idea and a notable sustainable innovation, it is not necessarily practical for an everyday office. For one, it cost $95,000 a price you will probably not save in toilet paper cost unless you run it all day. And two, it takes eight pounds of paper to create one single roll of toilet paper. Not to mention the machine itself is massive, weighing 1,320 pounds.

If the machine were left running 24 hours it could create 48 rolls of toilet paper a day. That is something that the city of Newark, New Jersey, is counting on as it purchases its very own White Goat. The $95,000 dollar cost will be offset by the money saved keeping the city’s TP stocked for all its workers while recycling the city’s paper waste.

So if you are liberal with your TP, you might want to invest in a community White Goat to offset your consumption. Imagine, the neighborhood White Goat where children go to drop off their “C” grade papers and take home daddy a new roll of the good stuff. Authors could dispose of their failed manuscripts and wipe their bottoms with it in disgrace. Scorned romantics go to dispose of their letters of love past only to show them what its worth…

The White Goat is just one more creative, sustainable innovation THE Greencupboards Community would like to share.

Sources:

http://craziestgadgets.com/2009/06/01/office-toilet-paper-making-machine-turns-waste-paper-into-paper-for-your-waste/

http://inventorspot.com/articles/office_paper_recycler_turns_trash_toilet_paper_28683

http://www.flashnews.com/news/wfn03100730fn32492.html

Images:

http://www.geekologie.com/2010/01/quick_empty_the_printer_this_b.php

http://technabob.com/blog/2010/02/01/white-goat-eats-paper-poops-toilet-paper/

Plastic to Oil Conversion Machine

 What's Hot  8 Responses »
Feb 172011
 

Plastic is made from oil.

Oil is in high demand.

Landfills are filled with plastic debris.

Solution: Machine that turns plastic back into oil.

Q: Does it exist? A: Yes.

A few weeks ago I did an article on Daniel Burd, who had created a method of biodegrading plastic bags. This week I am writing about a machine converts plastic back into oil from which it is made.

Akinori Ito is the proud inventor of the Envion Oil Generator (EOG), which converts petroleum based waste back into oil. The total overhead cost puts a barrel of oil at just $10. This synthetic oil can be is just like crude oil, it can be used for fuel, or put back into plastic.

About 2.2 pounds of plastic can be converted into 1 liter of oil, using just one kilowatt of electricity with the EOG. The process of changing the plastic back into oil is accomplished by burning the plastic, C02 is released then captured by the machine. The chemicals are converted into a substance much like crude oil.

Currently there are about 90 machines in use in Japan. Unfortunately this technology has not yet come to America, but when it does the EOG can be used in both in households and in factories.

“If we burn the plastic, we generate toxins and a large amount of CO2. If we convert it into oil, we save CO2 and at the same time increase people’s awareness about the value of plastic garbage,” The inventor Akinori Ito had to say.

With innovations like Daniel Burd’s and Akinori Ito’s it makes me hopeful for a very green future to come when products, and technology like this are fully embraced by consumers and corporations alike.

Sources:

http://motherboard.tv/2010/8/22/a-machine-that-turns-plastic-back-into-oil–2

http://www.gizmag.com/envion-plastic-waste-to-oil-generator/12902/

http://ourworld.unu.edu/en/plastic-to-oil-fantastic/

Page 1 of 3 1 2 3