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Your iPhone Is Running on What? - Scientists Power Mobile Phone Using Urine
You May Soon Be Able To Power Mobile Devices With Batteries Made From Wood
iPad: The Must Have Tablet
Give Me Back My iPhone! - Android Is A Wonderful Operating System, But Most Android Phones Are Crap
iPad 5 Release Date, Rumours And Leaked Images Central
LifeRoll Will Make You Love Your Camera Roll Once Again
Lender Customizes Innovative “My New Home” App To Help iPad Users In Their House Hunt
Zillow Digs Brings Color Search and Match to iPad App
What's That Color Called? Find Out With Colors: Live! For iOS
Your iPhone Is Running on What? - Scientists Power Mobile Phone Using Urine
A Relaxnews story posted by CTV reports that British Researchers from the University of Bristol and Bristol Robotics Laboratory, in a study published in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics, say they've created a fuel cell that uses bacteria to break down urine to generate electricity, and were able to charge a mobile phone with enough electricity to send texts and surf the Internet.
Engineer Ioannis Ieropoulos is cited observing: "One product that we can be sure of an unending supply is our own urine," he added. The U. of Bristol team grew bacteria on carbon fibre anodes and placed them inside ceramic cylinders. The bacteria broke down chemicals in urine passed through the cylinders, building up a small amount of electrical charge which was stored on a capacitor.
Unfortunately the urine-powered cell is currently the size of a car battery, but now that the concept has been tested and it works, the next step is to develop and refine the process.
For the full report, visit here:
http://goo.gl/3H44t
You May Soon Be Able To Power Mobile Devices With Batteries Made From Wood
Taking inspiration from trees, scientists have developed a battery made from a sliver of wood coated with tin that shows promise for becoming a tiny, long-lasting, efficient and environmentally friendly energy source. Their report on the device -- 1,000 times thinner than a sheet of paper -- appears in the journal Nano Letters, entitled: "Tin Anode for Sodium-Ion Batteries Using Natural Wood Fiber as a Mechanical Buffer and Electrolyte Reservoir"
In the report abstract (http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/nl400998t), Liangbing Hu, Teng Li and colleagues point out that today's batteries often use stiff, non-flexible substrates, which are too rigid to release the stress that occurs as ions flow through the battery. They knew that wood fibers from trees are supple and naturally designed to hold mineral-rich water, similar to the electrolyte in batteries, so decided to explore use of wood as the base of an experimental sodium-ion battery. Using sodium rather than lithium would make the device environmentally friendly.
They note that Sodium (Na)-ion batteries offer an attractive option for low cost grid scale storage due to the abundance of Na. Tin (Sn) is touted as a high capacity anode for Na-ion batteries with a high theoretical capacity of 847 mAh/g, but it has several limitations such as large volume expansion with cycling, slow kinetics, and unstable solid electrolyte interphase (SEI) formation. In this article, we demonstrate that an anode consisting of a Sn thin film deposited on a hierarchical wood fiber substrate simultaneously addresses all the challenges associated with Sn anodes. The soft nature of wood fibers effectively releases the mechanical stresses associated with the sodiation process, and the mesoporous structure functions as an electrolyte reservoir that allows for ion transport through the outer and inner surface of the fiber. These properties are confirmed experimentally and computationally. A stable cycling performance of 400 cycles with an initial capacity of 339 mAh/g is demonstrated; a significant improvement over other reported Sn nanostructures. The soft and mesoporous wood fiber substrate can be utilized as a new platform for low cost Na-ion batteries.
Lead author Hongli Zhu and other team members describe lab experiments in which the device performed successfully though 400 charge-discharge cycles, putting it among the longest-lasting of all sodium-ion nanobatteries. Batteries using the new technology would be best suited for large-scale energy storage applications, such as wind farms or solar energy installations, the report indicates.
Source American Chemical Society (2013, June 19). Environmentally friendly battery made from wood:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/06/130619122205.htm
For more on wood-based batteries, see:
http://goo.gl/taemC
iPad: The Must Have Tablet
iAppsReviewer notes that while there are many different variations of tablets on the market, there really isn’t even one that stands out except for the iPad, which, with its super smooth configuration and operating system and ease of use, provides a great experience for the user, and although it's more expensive than the other options, it really is worth it.
For the full review visit here:
http://ipadappsreviewer.com/blog/ipad-the-must-have-tablet/
Give Me Back My iPhone! - Android Is A Wonderful Operating System, But Most Android Phones Are Crap
Slate's Farhad Manjoo acknowledges there's there’s no question that Android has helped lower the prices of smartphones across the globe, which can only help Google’s ad business, and that it's hard to call Android anything other than a resounding success.
Except for one small thing. Most Android phones are crap.
As part of a New Year’s resolution, Manjoo promised to trade in his beloved iPhone 5 for an Android phone sometime in 2013, reasoning that as a tech writer, he should spend more time with the world’s most popular operating system. Consequently, over the last few months, though, he's been testing two of the most expensive, most advanced Android phones on the market - Samsung's Galaxy S4 and the HTC One, using two versions of each of these phones.
Based on this experience, Manjoo observes that Android’s basic problem is that while Google makes a fine mobile operating system and some phone manufacturers make attractive, powerful Android handsets, the phone makers and the world’s cellular carriers snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, ruining the phones’ potential with unnecessary features and apps that lower the devices’ battery life, uglify their home screens, and make everything you want to do extra annoying.
Manjoo has decided that New Year’s notwithstanding, he's sticking with Apple.
For the full report visit here:
http://goo.gl/sVxP4
iPad 5 Release Date, Rumours And Leaked Images Central
Macworld UK's Malcolm Wilde reports that the site has posted a new iPad 5 release date, rumours and leaked images article where they plan to do everything that the title suggests, posting everything they know about the new iPad 5 release date so you can know exactly when the new iPad 5 is coming out as well as relaying a few of the juiciest spec rumours that are flying round the web's most trusted tech websites too. Finally they have some ideas of how the iPad 5 will look, and will include any leaked iPad 5 images in this article, which is to be updated regularly.
You can check it out at:
http://goo.gl/AIQOy
LifeRoll Will Make You Love Your Camera Roll Once Again
Sqwady Ltd. has released LifeRoll 1.1.3, an update to their innovative iPhone app. LifeRoll will make you love your camera roll once again. It automatically groups similar photos together, letting you browse through a 20% shorter roll. LifeRoll also allows you to put aside the boring photos; find portraits and group-shots; view images by tag, date & favorite; & share multiple photos easily. Version 1.1.3 introduces automatic grouping of similar photos, easier tagging, Faces photos album & more.
Shortly after getting a new mobile device, every visit to your camera roll is fun. You get another chance to look at your precious photo collection - your life's instant memories. However, this experience is getting more and more frustrating when your roll is filled up with similar photos of the same scene, document scans and some other documentary "boring" images.
It is well known that people tend to take several photos of the same scene, trying to catch a smile, focus on the subject, etc. We found out that about 20% of the scenes are being shot more than once. Actually, the average is between 2 to 3 photos per scene. This sums up to about 40% of the photos (The data is based on daily usage of iPhone users).
LifeRoll, an innovative iPhone app, will make you love your camera roll once again. It automatically groups similar photos together, letting you browse through a 20% shorter roll. LifeRoll also allows you to put aside the boring photos; find portraits and group-shots; view images by tag, date and favorite; and share multiple photos easily. It even creates albums in the native Photos app so you can access videos and photos with faces instantly when you need them in other apps.
Device Requirements:
(*) iPhone 3GS, 4, 4S, iPhone 5, iPod touch and iPad
(*) Requires iOS 6.0 or later
(*) 5.4 MB
Pricing and Availability:
Clean up your mess with LifeRoll and rediscover your photos! LifeRoll 1.1.3 is only $0.99 USD (or equivalent amount in other currencies) and available worldwide exclusively through the App Store in the Photo & Video category.
LifeRoll 1.1.3:
http://www.liferollapp.com/
Purchase and Download:
https://itunes.apple.com/app/liferoll/id642317535
Facebook Profile: http://www.facebook.com/
Twitter Profile: https://twitter.com/LifeRollApp
Trackback URL:
http://bit.ly/13Q0Gxi
Lender Customizes Innovative “My New Home” App To Help iPad Users In Their House Hunt
Chase has announced good news for iPad users: It has customized the popular Chase My New HomeSM app for the Apple tablet – and added features to make it even better.
More than 250,000 house hunters have downloaded the innovative Chase My New Home app to their smartphones since it debuted last fall. It’s the only app on the market that guides users through the home-buying process from start to finish.
“As more consumers feel better about the U.S. economy, they are relying on Chase My New Home to help them find and finance their next home,” says Lisa Foradori, head of marketing and product at Chase Mortgage. “Our app gives them the tools to make smart decisions.”
My New Home’s repertoire of tools –from searching home listings by ZIP code to calculating monthly payments– provide real-time help at each step of the home-buying process.
Consumers can:
- search and rate homes using their own criteria
- record notes
- take photos and videos of the houses
- calculate payments and
- access more than 4,000 local Chase mortgage bankers.
The new iPad app gives users more details about financing and about desired neighborhoods, including listings and neighborhood information - such as the school district and property history -- about a specific area.
Users of the iPad app also can access the new My New Home YouTube channel directly from the app. The videos offer practical advice from both homebuyers and the experts they will meet throughout the home buying-process. Viewers can learn about a wide variety of subjects from key mortgage terms and how to select the right real estate agent to what to expect at closing.
The My New Home mobile app continues Chase’s innovation in helping consumers manage their banking so they can spend more time doing what they want. Chase QuickDeposit(SM), Chase QuickPay(SM) and Chase Mobile® for Business have helped Chase serve 10 million active mobile users. Chase Mobile has earned multiple awards, including top rankings in Forrester’s Mobile Banking Functionality Rankings and Keynote’s Mobile Banker Scorecard in 2012.
For more information, visit:
http://www.chase.com
Zillow Digs Brings Color Search and Match to iPad App
Zillow, Inc., a real estate and home-related information marketplace, has added mobile color search and match to its growing home improvement business, ZillowDigs.
Now, from the Zillow Digs iPad App, consumers can browse photos of more than 100,000 spaces by color family, select virtual paint chips to find additional photos with those colors and use the app to find real paint colors in stores. The Zillow Digs iPad App is the first home improvement app that allows users to filter photos by color and budget, and view related photos for additional color inspiration.
"Zillow Digs now offers consumers a revolutionary new way to find spaces they love, connect with home improvement professionals who match their style or locate the perfect paint color. Home improvement professionals spend $6 billion annually in advertising, and this new feature gives them a new and creative way to reach consumers who are expected to spend nearly $150 billion on home improvement projects this year[ii]," says Spencer Rascoff, Zillow CEO.
Color is an important part of home improvement and is a great way to freshen up a room or add a focal point. From painting walls to tables and chairs, selecting the perfect color to reflect personal style and decor often can be a challenge. Zillow Digs' internally developed color-matching feature teases out the amount of color in a photo and then looks for the most prevalent colors to find virtual paint chips that consumers can use to find real colors available in stores. Now, using the Zillow Digs iPad App, homeowners can get ideas, discover paint colors and make a dream color a reality.
Zillow Digs launched just five months ago and since then, home improvement professionals and consumers have contributed more than 49,000 photos to Zillow Digs, representing 236 percent growth since launch.
Zillow Digs users can browse tens of thousands of photos from Zillow's database of more than 110 million U.S. homes, or those provided by home improvement professionals and homeowners, and see Zillow's proprietary Digs Estimates for the estimated cost of the actual bathrooms and kitchens they are viewing. They can create, save and share boards of ideas and decor they love, and browse more than 105,000 boards created by others, comment on photos and follow people with similar interests. And, they can connect with local home improvement professionals for help – for free, on iPad and the Web.
For more information, visit:
http://www.zillow.com/mobile/IPadSplash.htm?return=%2F
And:
http://www.zillow.com/
Notes:
Source: Borrell Associates
[ii] Source: Leading Indicator of Remodeling Activity, Remodeling Futures
Program at the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University, April 2013.
What's That Color Called? Find Out With Colors: Live! For iOS
Instantly find the name of any color. Indie Developer Kevin Yavno today introduces Colors: Live! 1.0, a live real-time eye dropper utility designed exclusively for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch devices. This utility app allows you to sample any color visible through the camera on your device, live, and in real time. This app is perfect for artists, interior decorators, graphics and web designers, scrapbookers, and anyone who loves color. This is utility app is specially designed for iOS, and capable of recognizing over 1000 colors, Colors: Live! allows you to sample any color visible through the camera on your device...live, and in real time.
With over 1000 built-in color names (and more added with each update), you can instantly find the name of any color. But what if the color you are attempting to identify is not built-in? Colors: Live! will happily display the closest possible match. This app is a useful tool for artists, interior decorators, graphics and web designers, scrapbookers, and anyone who loves color.
Using Colors: Live!, you'll find live real time color sampling. Simply tap anywhere on the screen (or on the sample buttons for iPad) and receive instant color information. Slide the bottom panel up and find identification of color name, Hex, RGB, CMYK, and HSV Values. Perfect for any graphic and web designers. This app is easy to use, with an intuitive interface and it takes up minimal space on your iOS device.
Device Requirements:
(*) iPhone 3GS/4/4S/5, iPod touch (3rd/4th/5th generation), and iPad
(*) Universal app optimized for display on all iOS devices
(*) Requires iOS 5.0 or later
(*) 1.8 MB of free space
Colors: Live! 1.0 is $0.99 USD (or equivalent amount in other currencies) as a limited time introductory price and available worldwide exclusively through the App Store in the Photo & Video category.
Colors: Live! 1.0:
http://colorslive.kevinyavno.com
Purchase and Download:
https://itunes.apple.com/app/colors-live!/id670665472
Trackback URL:
http://bit.ly/15og2EV
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