A history of claiming to be the first Egyptian to conquer an incredible feat, Omar Samra decided that he would become the first Egyptian to travel to space...
Solar cells have greatly improved over the years. Back in the 1950s, solar cells converted only 6% of sunlight into electricity. Today, solar cells can now convert up to 22% of sunlight into electricity. Unfortunately, the efficiency of today’s silicon-based solar cells are nearly maxed out. However, this doesn’t mean that we can no longer improve our solar cells. Enter perovskite.
A group of materials called perovskites are being used to create the next generation of solar panels, which could eventually be twice as efficient as current models, and flexible enough to wrap around entire buildings.
[...]
Researchers at Oxford PV, a company spun out of the University of Oxford, made a major breakthrough in 2018. By coating silicon with perovskite they achieved 28% efficiency. The company believes it can eventually reach 40%, or higher.
Improved solar cell efficiency will enable installations to pump out more power with fewer panels, reducing costs, and the amount of land, labor and equipment needed to operate them.
Learn more about perovskite over at CNN.
(Image Credit: CNN)
It doesn’t seem that the pandemic will disappear soon. Some people are buying a lot of items and appliances to decorate or add more life to their homes for the winter holidays spent at home. During the early months we saw people flock to the shelves to buy toilet papers, disinfectants, fitness equipment, and bicycles. However, the trend has shifted, and people are now focused on buying kitchen equipment and decorations that can spark joy or calm the nerves. Check out The New York Post’s list on what people are buying for the winter. Maybe you can get an idea for what you can get for yourself this holiday season!
Image via The New York Post
There may be danger in the chemicals mixed with the commercial cleaners and disinfectants we find handy during the pandemic. While these products can help us sanitize areas in our home (or other places) that can keep us safe from COVID-19, they also pose a threat to our own health. The chemicals that give disinfectants and sanitizers their pleasing scents are linked to cause headaches, skin rashes, asthma, immune system dysfunction, and heart trouble.
Check the full piece here.
Image via Medium
There’s a charm to the emptied-out malls, beaches, museums, and other tourist spots where a lot of people would be if it weren’t for the pandemic. These once busy venues are now shadows of their former selves. As sad as that may sound for the businesses and workers that will lose money this year, it is for everyone's safety. Stacker compiled 50 photos showing how COVID-19 has affected the tourism trade. Check out Press of Atlantic City’s full piece on these gorgeous yet uncanny and calm photos here.
Image via Press of Atlantic City
This image taken by NASA’s Hubble Telescope shows the birth of a new star in the Cassiopeia constellation. Isn’t it amazing that we can get a glimpse of how the universe works outside the Earth? What seems like a lovely photo for us commoners tells astronomers a lot of things about how stars form in these stellar nurseries called Free-floating Evaporating Gaseous Globules (frEGGs).
(via LightStalking)
Image via LightStalking
Avee Shabazz of Birmingham, Alabama, wanted to help his daughter achieve her own financial freedom, so he bought her a three-bedroom, two-bathroom home for her thirteenth birthday. I only got a birthday cake for my thirteenth birthday, and Ajala Shabazz gets a house, wow (congrats to her though, a house is such a big deal!). Her dad wanted her to be comfortable as she grows up, as Atlanta Black Star details:
“The objective is to be comfortable,” said Shabazz. “Whatever that means to her is what it means to her. She determines that, right? If she’s cool with having a house without paying bills and working a job, that’s her choice, right? But if she wants to grow it into a multi-million- dollar empire, that’s her choice.”
Ajala says she was excited to receive the big gift, but she also admits she was a little scared.
“I felt like I was too young, you know?” Ajala said. “Like, people always say you’re too young to do this or do that and my dad just gave me a house when I was 13.”
She says she instantly thought of all the things that could possibly go wrong.
“I’m not very good when it comes to responsibility,” she admitted. “And when I’m given responsibility, I suddenly feel anxious and nervous. Am I going to screw this up? Is something bad going to happen? I just think of all the possibilities.”
But her dad stepped in to offer her some encouragement. He believes she is ready and responsible enough. Shabazz is a real estate investor and says Ajala simply needs to do what she’s watched him do over the years.
Image via Atlanta Black Star
Movies go through a lot of changes from the original concept to the finished product. For those that become big hits or go on to become classics, those changes are mostly for the better. Only years afterward do we find out what could have been -and by then the early ideas seem just plain bad.
Let's just be glad these horror films turned out the way they did -mainly because we can't imagine them as anything else. See how your favorite horror movie could have been very different in a pictofacts list at Cracked.
California — As helicopter pilot Dan Alpiner helped conduct water drops over the Creek Fire, he witnessed what he describes as an “unheard of” scene: an owl boarding the chopper mid-flight.
Dan was worried that the owl might fly around the cockpit, a scenario which would put both him and the bird in danger. But that didn’t happen, fortunately. The owl rode the chopper with him calmly for a few minutes, and it flew back out the window the same way it did when it entered the chopper — “safe and announced.”
I wonder what the owl was thinking. What do you think?
(Image Credit: Sky Aviation/ CBS 47/ UPI)
The ad for Kyrö Distillery features Mikko Koskinen, one of the company founders, naked in a sauna, explaining Finland and his company's products while things go on in the background that you'll want to pay attention to. Yeah, you might need to watch this more than once, as his English can be difficult at times, and you'll also see things you missed the first time around. This ad is one continuous take with no professional actors. Contains NSFW language. -via reddit
I made a killer Zoom Meeting costume for my daughter. #Halloween2020 pic.twitter.com/bdKbgGZcA5
— Greg Dietzenbach (@GregDietzenbach) October 21, 2020
Greg Dietzenbach made a clever and timely Halloween costume for his 12-year-old daughter Ada. She's a Zoom meeting! Or, as the label says, a "Gloom meeting." He built a board showing a Zoom meeting with nine participants. Seven of them are photographs of Ada dressed as various monsters. The middle square is a hole, which Ada looks through while wearing the costume. The square at the center top (labeled "next victim") is an iPad that shows whoever is looking at her! Here's a video with more details.
This is another in a long line of creative Halloween costumes Dietzenbach has crafted for his family. See more of them at Mashable.
New research suggests that making people follow a huge amount of “eco-friendly” tips makes them less likely to do anything about climate change. There are better ways to convince people to be more mindful of their habits that can potentially damage the Earth in the long run. We don’t need to be nagged or guilt-tripped to do something, right? Researchers at Georgia State University surveyed 2,000 people online to see how they responded to different messages about climate change, as Grist detailed:
Some saw messages about personal sacrifices, like using less hot water. Others saw statements about policy actions, like laws that would limit carbon emissions, stop deforestation, or increase fuel efficiency standards for cars. The messenger — whether scientist or not — didn’t make much of a difference.
Then the respondents were asked about their thoughts on climate change. The people who read advice about individual action were less likely to report that they believed in human-caused climate change, supported climate-friendly political candidates, or would act to reduce their own emissions.
While the advice about personal behavior spurred a negative response from people across the political spectrum, the effect was much stronger among Republicans than Democrats, said Risa Palm, a professor of urban geography at Georgia State and the lead author of the study.
On the other hand, “when the message was linked with policy issues, it didn’t have this kind of negative effect,” she said. Palm’s study reinforces previous research that people prefer wide-scale changes that don’t require them to change their own behavior. They simply don’t feel like anything they could do would make much of a difference.
Image via Grist
One of the worst problems that parents can have with their kids is picky eating. For kids who have sensory issues, it is difficult for them to eat foods with certain textures. How should parents deal with such kids? Cheryl Butler provides us with some tips over at QDT. Here is one of them:
My number-one tool to ease your journey with a picky eater might surprise you. Are you ready? It's you!
As parents, we'll do anything to make sure our kids feed our kids nutritious foods. We prepare leafy green salads and whole grain pasta topped with fresh veggies and low-salt marinara sauce, opt for the leanest proteins, and even encourage dairy alternatives like almond milk.
But what do we do when our best efforts don't cut it with our kids?
No, we don't force them to eat what we've made. We do the opposite—let them decide if they'll give it a try.
Check out the tips over at the site.
(Image Credit: avitalchn/ Pixabay)
Nitrous oxide, which is also called laughing gas, can be used in many ways. Dentists use it to reduce the anxiety of their patients. The chemical compound is also used as fertilizer. But too much of anything is bad, and it seems that we’re generating too much nitrous oxide.
While carbon dioxide (CO2) is responsible for about 10 times more warming than nitrous oxide, laughing gas is 300 times more potent and stays in the atmosphere for a century or more. To get serious about the matter, an international team of scientists from 48 research institutions banded together to investigate the impact of this versatile chemical compound. The team have called the study the most comprehensive picture to date of N2O emissions.
For the study published in Nature, the team measured natural and human-caused N2O emissions between 1980 and 2016. Overall, global N2O levels have risen by 20 percent from pre-industrial levels, with a surge in the last half-century.
These emissions are increasing at a faster rate than the goal set by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to limit warming by less than 2°C (3.6°F), with an ideal scenario tightening that limit to less than 1.5°C (2.7°F). Instead, emissions are in line with a scenario that is above 3°C (5.4°F) from pre-industrial levels.
Where does this large amount of nitrous oxide emission come from? How can we reduce the emission?
Answers over at IFL Science.
(Image Credit: barskefranck/ Pixabay)
Is it really possible to compose a great piece by relying on chance? It turns out, it is possible. This composition method, called ‘aleatoric’ or ‘chance’ music, was made popular in the 20th century by composers like Charles Ives and John Cage, but its roots can go back as far as the 18th century, at the time of Mozart.
Today, there are still a few musicians who use this method in composing their music. One such man is Edward Chilvers.
Read about his story over at Classic FM.
(Image Credit: erik_stein/ Pixabay)
