The Movie Pandora’s Promise is about nuclear power and the Earth’s future.  In the past, environmentalist believed nuclear power was unsafe. However majority of the scientists have changed their mind about nuclear power since then. This movies follow their change in opinions about nuclear power.

Nuclear gotten its bad reputation through several events where nuclear power caused damage to people and/or the environments. The first event was the Chernobyl disaster which happened in USSR back in 1986 or now the Ukraine. The town of Pripyat, closest town to the accident have to be evacuated and till now the buildings are still abandoned till this day. There is a recorded number of about 41 deaths of this accident, however only 32 from the actual accident, and the rest to be radioactive poisoning and other medical reasons.

The second event was the Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania of 1979. This incident was only a partial meltdown of the nuclear reactor. There were no results of death however since the accident was widely broadcasted it set its limit to nuclear power. It cost about $1billion and 14 years to clean up the incident.

The third event was the Fukushima nuclear accident. The cause of this incident was actually a tsunami and an earthquake of about a magnitude of 9 in Tōhoku of 2011. The tsunami and the earthquake caused equipment failure leading to radiation leakage. The placement of the plant was that of a bad idea because due to the accident the area around the nuclear power plant is inhabitable. The first thing they need was stability. But since Japan is well known for tsunami and earthquake building a nuclear power plant might not have been a good idea.

People have opinions of their own, where some think or believe it’s unsafe and dangerous to humans and the earth itself. However science has proven that Nuclear is less dangerous than coal a widely used fuel. Coal release more carbon dioxide to the Earth’s atmosphere then Nuclear power plants do. The Nuclear power plants are also helping keep nuclear war from happening by buying nuclear warheads from Russia and repurposing them to power generation. There are consequences however when using Nuclear Power. The waste from nuclear power plants takes a large amount of time to be disposed.

This movie is good way to teach people that how the evolution of science through the years have changed people’s opinion about nuclear power energy. People need to ignore the media because they accuse the nuclear power plant idea that they are unsafe but however have no scientific back ups.

I recommends this movie to anyone who are interested into nuclear power because the information presented are very interesting and also placed in a manner where it’s enjoyable.

                  A Trip to Mars has been discussed among the scientists who want to get a better understanding  of Mars and also to see sustaining life on Mars is possible which will help the human race survive. The first layer of problem they must first resolve is the travel to Mars and maybe return trip back to Earth. As we know the farthest distance between Earth to Mars is about 401 million kilometers, the shortest distance is 54.6 million kilometers, and the average distance is 225 million kilometers. The distance to Moon is 238,900 miles (384472.282 kilometers). The amount of fuel that was needed to travel to the Moon, and bring back only 3 astronauts was enormous. Mighty Saturn V fuel is separated in sections in the rocket itself. First there is the 66,770 gallons of liquid hydrogen fuel, 19,359 gallons of liquid oxygen, 260,000 gallons of liquid hydrogen fuel, 80,000 gallons of liquid oxygen, 318,000 gallons of liquid oxygen, and 203,400 gallons of kerosene fuel. This amount of fuel could possibly even triple or quadruple to go to Mars. There will be changes; however, the concept is that the cost will be quite expensive.

              There are many companies aiming to land humans on the surface of Mars. NASA, Mars One, and SpaceX. NASA’s plans is still going underway, They are not too far away from making the trip, the only problem they have right now is shortage in funds. They are currently running the ARMs mission; Asteroid Redirect Mission, which captures asteroids and place their near a stable orbit around the moon for astronauts to celebrate, it is also a stepping stone to getting to Mars. NASA’s Mars mission would use the Orion spacecraft and the new Space Launch System (which isn’t expected to be ready for a few years yet). They are hoping to land a manned spaceship to Mars by 2035.

               However SpaceX plans to do it even earlier, by 2026. They plan to use the Falcon Heavy launch vehicle which is basically the Falcon 9 but with two huge booster rockets stuck onto it. SpaceX is still however inexperienced compared to NASA. SpaceX have not landed anything on the moon or even launched a rocket. So many people even the author of the article think it possible for them to finish by 2026.SpaceX is also going to fund by themselves and also putting them in the stock market. However it is almost impossible to get enough funding as they say it will cost about $500,000 just to get one person in a manned ship to Mars.

                  Then there is Mars One, another company which is planning to have a unmanned missions to land machinery onto Mars. They plan to land a permanent settlement. It is scheduled to launch for 2024. They have created a RoadMap or a Timeline of things they set to do till 2030. Mars One was founded in 2011, they started a crew selection in 2013, the selected will begin training by 2016, they will have demos in 2020,  a rover mission launch to Mars in 2022,  cargo mission in 2024, outpost operational in 2025, the selected will departure in 2026, and land in 2027, and then a second crew will be depart in 2028. They have a long list of goals they wish to accomplished however it is solely funded and supported by the community itself, so the progress could be slower and not meet those due times they want to accomplish things by. These are the few initiatives companies have taken for the space travel to Mars. I see potential however it is possible it won’t work as they want them to.

Reference:

-“Mars One.” Mars One. Web. 23 Oct. 2015.

-“NASA Announces Next Steps on Journey to Mars: Progress on Asteroid Initiative.” Nasa. 26 Mar. 2015. Web. 23 Oct. 2015.

-“SpaceX Says It Will Put Humans on Mars by 2026, Almost 10 Years Ahead of NASA | ExtremeTech.” ExtremeTech. Web. 23 Oct. 2015.

The past week, in the freshman seminar class, we performed multiple experiments with a lego powered pulley. Using mass and power, we see the acceleration and also time it took for the pulley to complete its work. We also looked at battery discharge with other factors. We had a setup of a Lego mindstorm with the motor connected to port A. It has a attached lego wheel rim part. It had a string attached to the wheel and it goes up to a pulley. Then we have removable weights that goes on a base with a hook. We then proceed to test the program that we downloaded, to make sure  our lego mindstorm is working. After that we proceed to change variables, like the  power and the weights, as  they should change the results we get each time we run the program. The more or less power the motor put to pull the fixed weight up. The more or less weight but power doesn’t change. We saw the time it took each different set. We also took in the power discharge or remaining power left in the battery.

To begin the weight was first set to .25 kg. We ran the program and pressed the stop button when the mass was at the top. We then reset and lowered the mass to .19 kg and then .13 kg after that. I expected that the acceleration would increase because there was less mass. As expected the acceleration increases each time we lower the mass. Acceleration is measured in rpm/s or rotation per minute/seconds^2. The acceleration went from 40 rpm/s^2 to 44 rpm/s^2 to 50 rpm/s^2. However we also expected the opposite for potential energy because potential energy is mass x acceleration by gravity x height. Since height remains at .25 meters and acceleration caused by gravity is 9.8 meters/second^2, and mass is the only one changing and its decreasing, its expected that it would decrease, and the result prove that it was going down. The potential energy started from .61 joules to .46 joules and to .31 joules.

The next thing that we also measured was power level and power discharge. As we increased the power level or power used by the lego mindstorm the power discharge would increase. When we used a power level of 50 , the battery discharge was 41 mV. Then at 75 , the battery discharge was 55 mV, Lastly, at 90 , the battery discharge was 83 mV.

Here is the Data:

We looked at the Newton’s 2nd law; Does acceleration change depending on mass?As Acceleration decreases, mass increases. This therefore proves the 2nd law F=ma where F stays constants and mass increases, the acceleration must decrease to balance the mass increase.Another question was that does acceleration change depending on power level. Since F is increasing and mass remains constant, acceleration must increase to balance out.

We then looked at the Law of Conservation of energy.Since the energy is turn into potential to the mass, as mass increase, the power discharge should increase as well. That concludes my experiment with the pulley and mass with the lego motor.

On Monday, October 5, 2015, we were given a tour at the Sawyer Library to learn  about all the resources that is available to us. I learned that the there are 3 different floors. Each floor has its own level of  When looking for books its simple as using the Course name and using the number to find it. This also works online as well where it registers with the book in the library itself. Let’s say your class is ECE-###, There are books labeled under a course or major where students can easily find. The Library also have its website where you can search for many things.

Lets first start on the first floor of the library. There is the front desk, the desk to your left the moment you walk in. You return books and check out books for 2 hours there as well. Something even better is they have Kindles where you can check out for a month and bring it with you anywhere. You even get a free download. You can also check out phone chargers samsung or iPhone, or even mac and pc laptops. They have to be returned when you leave but you can use them for as long as you are there. You can also check out rooms for group projects or meeting, where you can talk a bit more without bothering others. Then there is the Reference Desk where you bring all your questions to. It can be question on where to find a book or is there a book about this subject/topic on the library. If there is a book you need but there is no copies in the library, the library themselves can get the book for you however you need to wait for it.  There is also other more general stuff, there are printers all around the library each floor have printers and even scanners. You can also find tutors here as well and that is a good resource you can use as well.

That sums up the library structure itself. Now to the online part, which is the most amazing thing. There is a search engine there where you can search for books, articles, magazines, etc that is in their database. There is something called eBooks where you can download books as a PDF instead of using a physical copy. The Books here are also labeled under subjects or course as well. So you can do a keyword search with like Electrical, Power, or marine biology, etc. That summarize the Library tour.

In the auto industry, they are aiming to make cars more efficient, from using fuel,  environment friendly, or using different materials for the car structure frame and components. This however cost money to research and experiment with. With the Obama administration, they put forth a plan that can help create more fuel efficient cars and less emissions from transportation. By using the Federal Government funding from taxpayers, they revived the General Motors and Chrysler in March 2009. This enabled them to return to the market without tearing apart the auto industry. It also gave them a chance to restructure. Federal government pushed forward the plan to help lower the greenhouse gas emissions. Firstly, they hope to increase miles per gallon to 54.5 mpg by 2025. The amount of money going to oil imports are decreasing each year. Oil usage should decrease by 2 million barrels each year and the oil consumption of the first three months of 2012 was down 124,000 barrels of oil. “The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration estimates that the new standards will save approximately 4 billion barrels of oil and 2 billion metric tons of carbon pollution over the lifetime of new vehicles sold between 2017 and 2025” (American Progress). There are now a few bills that pushes forward to better energy efficiency.

While looking into this, I also found another engineer is also trying to tackle this efficiency in another way. Jyhwen Wang, a former research engineer in the steel industry, thinks of lightening the weight of the car instead. With his previous research experience from the steel industry, a major challenge is using the new materials especially advanced varieties of steel, building the automobile body parts that the properties allow for lightweight auto bodies which are often make it difficult to process and advanced steels are also more expensive than conventional steel. Researchers are also using hydroforming; consists of a die in which the material is formed inside a negative mold after the injection of a high-pressure hydraulic fluid, thus allowing more complex shapes and producing lighter and stronger products, to shape the materials into different parts. This process involves predicting the formability of the material.

Auto industry is also starting to invest into Hybrid cars, which uses both gasoline and electricity. It’s more efficient because if you need to accelerate or decelerate you can use electricity which perform better than gasoline and when you are cruising you would use gasoline because they are more efficient at that. The pros are being able to switch between the 2 motors; combustion engine and electric motor, and it contains a hybrid battery which charges when driving and also regenerative braking. There are also the full-electricity cars which runs fully on a electric motor. The battery is recharged by plugging it into an electric grid. It also get a little power back from itself in a process called regenerative braking. In this brake system, the electric motor is reversed and used as a generator to slow the car down, this generator helps recharge the battery a little, which needs a conventional brakes. However with limited battery technology, there have been little progress of this technology, however it is still getting better as we are in the 2015 already. There are also alternatives fuel for power. One to mention is compressed natural gas or liquefied natural gas. They have lower CO2 emissions however a better energy efficiency.

So in the end the auto-industry are trying to use alternative fuel to power engines, using a electric motors, going hybrid with fuel and electric, making the structure of a car more light weighted or creating better battery technology.

References:

• Plumer, Brad. “Cars in the U.S. Are More Fuel-efficient than Ever. Here’s How It Happened.” Washington Post. The Washington Post, 13 Dec. 2013. Web. 7 Oct. 2015. <http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2013/12/13/cars-in-the-u-s-are-more-fuel-efficient-than-ever-heres-how-it-happened/>.
• Villareal, Antonio. “Lighter Cars, More Efficient Cars | 2010 | Research | College of Engineering.” Lighter Cars, More Efficient Cars | 2010 | Research | College of Engineering. Web. 7 Oct. 2015. <https://engineering.tamu.edu/research/2010/lighter-cars-more-efficient-cars>.
• “Energy-Efficient Vehicles | Science Articles | PlanetSEED.” Energy-Efficient Vehicles | Science Articles | PlanetSEED. Web. 7 Oct. 2015.
• <http://www.planetseed.com/relatedarticle/energy-efficient-vehicles>.

Tom Vales Demo

10/5/15

On September 28, Tom Vales of the Engineering Department, a professor of Suffolk University came to our Freshman Seminar Class to demo a bunch of motors and power related machines. The first thing the show us was the Mendocino solar power motor, a teaching tool instead of a actually generator. It will run at  2,000 rpm under the sun. As we can see there are silver magnet on the shaft which reacts to the magnets on the base therefore keeping the solar motor hanging in free space. It demonstrate repulsion or magnetic reactions. The solar cell gets energy from the light source then sending it through the coil and which create a magnetic field; reacting to the magnet under the motor, turning it 90 degrees and it continues that. Mendocino Motor

After showing us the Mendocino solar power motor, he showed us the rocking armature which with power rock the arm back and forth which turns the wheel. the power would go through the coil then send the power to that plate on the left which cause it to rock back and forth pulling and pushing and pulling the “arm” rotating the wheel.

After that he showed us the Stirling generator, with a cup of hot water, he placed the generator on top of the cup covering it like a lid. After a few seconds, the pistons started to move up and down. He states that the materials that have the least friction will create more power. Stirling means steam power.

After that he showed us the Tesla Coil and fluorescent tubes. Firstly  by sending energy through a coil  it create power and using a metal nail type it send it up and if you hold anything close like fluorescent tubes it will light up. Fluorescent tubes contains Neon, Argon, Krypton, or Xenon; noble gases and also mercury. It lights up in “contact” with power. In the picture it shows him holding a staff with a light bulb in the center with wires running from the tip to the end of the staff; the other end of the staff have this metal tip which attracts electricity and the other is duct taped. The power have a skin effect where it just goes through only the outer layer of the conductor AC alternating current and goes over his skin or clothing.

He then showed us the Tesla Technology Violet ray machine which was rumored to be able to cure cancer and other diseases. There were many attachment created to solve many different other problems. Their basic construction was invented prior to 1900 by Nikola Tesla.