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Electric tank-car of the future? The Hinterland 1 Concept Car - an electric minivan with Prius-like aerodynamics
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It has the profile of a Toyota Prius interpreted by the late Maxime Faget, designer of the Space Shuttle. It's the Hinterland 1, a conceptual all-electric minivan with a drag coefficient of less than 0.25 (the Prius's is 0.26). And if its designers get their way, it'll become a Canadian icon on par with the CN Tower, Geddy Lee and Poutine. Existing purely as sketches, renderings, and specs at this point, the Hinterland 1 electric car looks like one part tank, one part VW bus with a pinch of bullet train added for flavor.
Chief designer of the Hinterland 1 is Matin Aube of Creative Unit, a veteran of Québec- based Bombardier Recreational Products, maker of the Sea-Doo watercraft, who says the project "combines sources of artistic, technical and scientific expertise" from recreational vehicles, electric motors and batteries, aeronautics, aluminium, plastics processing and video games. In theory, the sculpted body would comprise an aeronautical-style aluminum monocoque, fashioned by the same hydroforming process GM uses to create body panels for its curvy Pontiac Solstice roadster. A drive system proposed by electric-car startup Higgins-Aubé would involve a 43 kW-max motor (14kW continuous) powered by Li-ion or Zebra (Sodium Nickel Chloride) batteries with a maximum power of 37,000 kilowatts. Designers envision two models built on the same platform, a two-seater "Mini" and the six-person "Van." read more »
Irreversible loss: 4,500-year-old 19-square-mile ice shelf breaks away in Canada, 10x loss expected this summer
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TORONTO, Ontario (AP) -- A chunk of ice shelf nearly the size of Manhattan has broken away from Ellesmere Island in Canada's northern Arctic, another dramatic indication of how warmer temperatures are changing the polar frontier, scientists said Wednesday.
Warship now a home for fish: U.S.S. Oriskany, The Great Carrier Reef, is largest vessel ever sunk to make a reef
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PENSACOLA, Fla. - For Thom Dietmeyer, a retired naval officer, standing again on the bridge of his old ship was a dream come true, even if he was 70 feet below the surface of the ocean. “I knew exactly where I was going as soon as I got down there,” he said, recalling the dive, which took place a year ago last May on the wreck of an aircraft carrier called the Oriskany. The U.S.S. Oriskany, known as the Mighty-O, was commissioned in 1950 and served in Korea and Vietnam. The ship was sunk by the Navy in May 2006 under a pilot program to convert decommissioned vessels into artificial reefs. At 44,000 tons, 888-foot-long, it is by far the largest vessel ever sunk to make a reef.
Ron Paul addresses crowd of more than 10000 people at Minneapolis rally, counter-convention rivals RNC next door
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MINNE- APOLIS, Minnesota (CNN) -- While Republicans pow- wowed in St. Paul, sup- porters of Ron Paul threw their own party in neighboring Minneapolis. "Freedom brings people together," Paul said before a sold-out crowd at Tuesday's Rally for the Republic.
Paul, who said he entered the presidential race reluctantly, told the roaring audience, "I lost my skepticism. I hope you lost your apathy." As the congressman stepped on stage, red, white and blue confetti fell from the ceiling during a two-minute standing ovation.
Paul said he entered the presidential race not because of what he wanted to do but because of what he did not want to do. "I did not want to run people's lives. I did not want to run the economy and I did not want to run the world. I didn't have the authority to do it, and I didn't have the Constitution behind me to do it," said Paul, who has served in the House of Representatives for more than 30 years.
03 Sep 301: Saint Marinus found San Marino, one of the smallest nations and the world's oldest republic still in existence
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Saint Marinus was the founder of a chapel and monastery, in 301, from where the world's oldest surviving republic, San Marino, grew. Tradition holds that he was a stonemason by trade who came from the island of Rab, on the other side of the Adriatic Sea (in what is now part of modern Croatia), fleeing persecution for his Christian beliefs in the Diocletianic Persecution. Still known only by the single name Marinus (lit. of the sea), he became a Deacon, and was ordained by Gaudentius, the Bishop of Rimini; later, he was recognised and accused by an insane woman of being her estranged husband, so he quickly fled to Monte Titano to build a chapel-monastery and live as a hermit. There he built a chapel and monastery. Marinus was canonised as a saint, and later, the State of San Marino grew up from the centre created by the monastery. His feast day/memorial day is 3 September, commemorating the day, in 301, when he founded what became known as San Marino, which is also the state's national holiday. He is venerated solely in the Roman Catholic Church.
According to legend, he died in the winter of 366 and his last words were: "Relinquo vos liberos ab utroque homine" ("I leave you free from both men"). This somewhat mysterious phrase is most likely to refer to the two "men" from whose oppressive power Saint Marinus had decided to separate himself, becoming a hermit on Mount Titano: respectively the Emperor and the Pope. This affirmation of freedom (first and foremost fiscal franchise) from both the Empire and the Papal States, however legendary, has always been the inspiration of the tiny republic.
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Image courtesy Interesting facts about San Marino
New contender in the browser wars: Google to launch open source web browser Chrome on Tues., takes on Microsoft
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Google is launching an open source web browser to compete with Internet Explorer and Firefox. The browser is designed to be lightweight and fast, and to cope with the next generation of web applications that rely on graphics and multimedia.
Called Chrome, it will launch as a beta for Windows machines in 100 countries, with Mac and Linux versions to come. "We realised... we needed to completely rethink the browser," said Google's Sundar Pichai in a blog post. The new browser will help Google take advantage of developments it is pushing online in rich web applications that are challenging traditional desktop programs. Chrome will be an open-source product, meaning anyone can modify the software code and add features.
Google has a suite of web apps, such as Documents, Picasa and Maps which offer functionality that is beginning to replace offline software. "What we really needed was not just a browser, but also a modern platform for web pages and applications, and that's what we set out to build," Mr Pichai, VP Product Management, wrote.
Zoo Atlanta celebrates arrival of baby panda, 2nd cub of mother Lun Lun and only panda born in US in 2008 so far
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The Chengdu Giant Panda Breeding Research Base in Sichuan Province announced that 11-year-old panda Lun Lun gave birth to a cub in Zoo Atlanta in the United States at 10:11 AM Beijing time on August 31. It was her second birth since the base and the US zoo launched an international panda breeding program in 1999. Lun Lun gave birth to Mei Lan at the zoo in Sept 2006. Her second cub is the only giant panda born so far in the US in 2008, said Dennis Kelly, Zoo Atlanta's president and CEO.
The zoo is continuing to monitor Lun Lun closely for a possible second birth. Twin births take place nearly 50 percent of the time with giant pandas. A second cub could arrive as much as 12 to 24 hours after the first, according to Zhang Zhihe, chief of the base.
Lun Lun is caring for her cub, which is about the size of a human hand. The zoo's veterinary team will conduct the cub's first checkup when it is deemed possible to do so without disrupting maternal care. The zoo's animal management and veterinary teams, joined by Yang Kuixing, an official from the Chengdu base, will continue round-the-clock monitoring of the mother and cub, Kelly said. read more »
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