Zeitgeist revealed the most queries that Google received in 2012 worldwide. It lists the most searched celebrities, politicians, athletes, food, beer, jobs, videos, etc. You may also click the “select a country” button to limit your query to a specific country to see the difference. Montreal is the second city that was mostly searched on Google Maps in 2012 (when switching to Canada).
Queen’s University’s School of Computing, Plastic Logic and Intel Labs recently revealed a tablet computer, PaperTab, which “looks and feels just like a sheet of paper”. It is interactive by a plastic touchscreen and can work with ten or more displays simultaneously.
Read more at here.
“Media reports are full of doom and gloom about the increasing frequency of strange or extreme weather events and their effects: lack of food security, pollution, invasive species, economic recession, rising incidences of tropical diseases and superbugs, cancer and other catastrophes.
Instead of feeling overwhelmed or helpless by all this bad news, we should be asking: How can we clean up the mess we are leaving for future generations? Can my help really make a difference to leave planet Earth a better place? Is it my problem?”
Environmental expert Professor Nigel Roulet will give a lunch and learn session to address these issues and answer your questions.
Date/Time: Friday, February 1, 2013 12:30 PM to 1:30 PM
Location(s): Room 232, Robert Vogel Council Room, Leacock Building, McGill University
RSVP/Pre-Register: required
Contact: Event Registrar at campuscommunity@mcgill.ca
Image: Earth in flames from Microsoft Images
For those who are interested in exploring how much people’s lives have been affected by global warming, I would recommend this source where you could find Dr. Mauro and his team’s research findings over the past few years.
Dr. Mauro was also the filmmaker of Qapirangajuq: Inuit Knowledge and Climate Change, the first Inuktitut-language film on people’ experience of adapting into global warming.
Image from Microsoft Images
Researchers from the James Hutton Institute and the University of Abertay Dundee have created a transparent soil which allows the roots to grow “as exactly as they would in normal soil.” The advantage of this new soil is that observers are able to study roots in detail through this “see-through” soil. It was anticipated by the researchers that this soil would have an impact on many disciplines that are associated with interactions of plant roots and soils.
Read more at As clear as mud: Researchers unveil transparent soil that really could change the way we look at plants
Image from Microsoft Images
This year I’ve spent a lot of time at Department of Geography and the Geographic Information Center on the 5th floor of Burnside Hall. While helping students find maps, data, and literature, I received a common question from people outside of Geography. That was, “I am not quite interested in my subject and this [the application of GIS data and software to her research] makes it exciting…Should I switch to Geography?” I am not a geographer, so I cannot tell you exactly what a geographer does and what makes this profession appealing. However, I was lucky enough to come across the following video which might be able to answer your question.
Are you wondering what it is in this image? It is “a spiral arm of the Whirlpool Galaxy grazes the light of a smaller companion galaxy that’s slowly being torn apart by its neighbor’s gravity.”
This photo won Australia’s Martin Pugh top prize in the 2012 Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition run by the U.K.’s Royal Observatory Greenwich. Also wonder what the blue, pink, and reddish things are in the big arm? Read more at here.
April recently wrote a post about designing your own applications for iphone. On the lately released Windows 8, getting apps is more like the way we use for an Apple device. Instead of the Apple store, we get apps from the Microsoft store either for free or for a payment. Read more at here.
If you are interested in learning more about Windows 8, here is a review.
This week Google Maps announced that the indoor floor plans are available for selected locations on Google Maps for the desktop. Many airports, train stations, shopping malls, and libraries have provided their floor plans on Google Maps. That means, you may be able to choose the restaurant that you would like to eat in an airport or plan your Black Friday itinerary in a shopping mall before you leave home.
Although a number of places worldwide have joined this project, the only location in Canada that made its indoor maps available is West Edmonton Mall in Edmonton. If you were a venue owner, would you submit your floor plans to Google Maps?
I recently came across PRISM, a magazine published by American Society for Engineering Education. I was very interested by the content.
My favorite section is First Look which reports on recent innovations and “breakthroughs” in the world of industry and research institutions. Each story was written in non-technical language and lends a space to be explored further.
If you haven’t found an appropriate topic for your term paper in one of the science or engineering courses, you may want to read these briefings.