Major Developments Major Developments by Calendar Year

October 9, 2009

Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2007

Filed under: 2007,Nobel Prize — Tags: — Winson @ 9:02 AM

The Nobel Prize in Chemistry, 2007 was awarded to Gerhard Ertl, for his entire work that laid the foundations for modern surface chemistry. He had spent the most part of his life studying reactions on surfaces.

Surface chemistry is a very common phenomenon in the industrial and even everyday processes. From producing nitrogen to the destruction of ozone layer each process has a key step where in a deep understanding of the physical and chemical processes underlying the overall reaction plays a vital role in obtaining a higher yield of the product.

Prof Ertl’s work with the Haber-Bosch process was the highlight of the Nobel prize achievement. The process is used to create ammonia from nitrogen and hydrogen in the presence of iron. Though the discovery of the process spawned Nobel prizes for both Haber(1918) and Bosch(1931), the reaction mechanism was unknown until Ertl’s work. To study the reaction mechanisms Ertl made use of a number of techniques, such as generating idealized iron surfaces, introducing precise amounts of gas at low pressure, using a litany of spectroscopic techniques that probed molecules at the surface, and also studying the reverse reaction of the process using heavy hydrogen as a tracer molecule. Prof Ertl discovered that the splitting of the triple bond in the Nitrogen molecule was the slowest step in the Haber-Bosch process. So, to speed up the production of ammonia, the nitrogen molecule cleavage had to be fastened.

Ertl’s work also included the detailed study of carbon monoxide being converted to carbon dioxide over platinum. This reaction – or the one that doesn’t use platinum- is the one that is used by catalytic converters in cars today to reduce the harmful emissions. The detailed and controlled methodology that Ertl used has given rise to modern surface chemistry and earned him the Nobel Prize.

October 8, 2009

Nobel Prize in Physics 2007

Filed under: 2007,Nobel Prize — Tags: — Winson @ 9:01 AM

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2007 jointly to Albert Fert of France and Peter Grunberg of Germany. It is been awarded for their discovery of an entirely new physical effect known as Giant Magnetoresistance or GMR in 1988. The two scientists had independently discovered the effect in the same year that led to far reaching applications in the field of electronics and nanotechnology.

GMR is a quantum mechanical magnetoresistance effect observed in thin films that are composed of alternating ferromagnetic and nonmagnetic layers. It manifests itself as a significant decrease (typically 10-80%) in electrical resistance in the presence of magnetic field. In the absence of an external magnetic field, the direction of magnetization of adjacent ferromagnetic layers is anti-parallel due to a weak anti-ferromagnetic coupling between the layers resulting in high-resistance magnetic scattering due to electron spin. On applying an external magnetic field, the magnetization of the adjacent ferromagnetic layers is parallel resulting in lower magnetic scattering and lower resistance.

A system of this kind is the perfect tool for reading data from hard disks when information that is coded magnetically should be converted into electric current. In 1997, the first read out head that was based on the GMR was launched and that became the standard technology. A hard disk stores information in the form of microscopic small areas magnetized in different directions. The information is retrieved by a read out head that scans the disk and registers the magnetic changes. If the hard disk is smaller and more compact then it would require a more sensitive read out head to read the information on the disk. A read out head can convert very minute magnetic changes into differences in electrical resistance resulting in changes in the current emitted by the read-out head. The current is the signal from the read out head representing the ones and zeros. GMR can also be considered as one of the first real applications of the promising and evolving field of nanotechnology.

October 7, 2009

The Clash of the Titans- Fedex vs Pistol Pete

Filed under: 2007,Sports — Tags: — Winson @ 11:19 AM

Retired former World No 1 Pete Sampras stunned the world after he had defeated reigning World No 1 Roger Federer in a friendly match played on November 24, 2007 at Macau. Sampras won 7-6,6-4 and proved once again that his serve and volley tactics were as sharp as they used to be. The American might have turned his back on professional tennis but then he still managed to upset Federer, who failed to win even a break point during the contest on a fast carpet surface. The American lost their only competitive match in Wimbledon in 2001, was not carried away, and dismissed any talks about his comeback. Federer claimed that he wasn’t bothered by the defeat and that Sampras would still be in the top five if he had been playing. Federer also said that he was happy that Sampras beat him and would like to win back against him.

Brazil to host 2014 FIFA World Cup

Filed under: 2007,Sports — Tags: — Winson @ 11:18 AM

The FIFA Executive Committee has named Brazil as the Host Nation for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. The South American country was the only one to bid for the tournament, which was to be staged on the continent according to FIFA’s rotation system. Brazil, have won the tournament a record five times, hosted the tournament once before in 1950, but were beaten 2-1 in the Final by Uruguay.

Now they have the opportunity again, with FIFA President Joseph S. Blatter saying that he had been impressed by Brazil’s plans for 2014 despite the fact they were the only bidders following Colombia’s withdrawal.

Blatter said that the task was not easy – for it was a real big challenge to have the same list of requirements and the same conditions for only one candidate than if they were two and perhaps raising the bar higher than if they were two, said Blatter. The 2014 World Cup would have such a big social and cultural impact in Brazil.
The Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said that the nation was looking forward to the “huge task” of preparing for this unique sporting event.

Marion Jones pleads guilty

Filed under: 2007,Sports — Tags: — Winson @ 11:17 AM

Marion Jones who was born on October 12, 1975 in Los Angeles, California, is a former world champion track and field athlete known for her doping offenses. She won five medals at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, Australia but has since agreed to forfeit all medals and prizes dating back to September 2000 after admitting to the fact that she had taken performance-enhancing drugs.

In October 2007, Jones had admitted that she had taken steroids before the Sydney 2000 Summer Olympics and acknowledged that she had, in fact, lied when she previously denied steroid use in press statements, to various sports agencies, and—most significantly—to two grand juries. One, which was impaneled to investigate the BALCO “designer steroid” ring, and the other was impaneled to investigate a check fraud ring involving many of the same parties from the BALCO case. As a result of these admissions, Jones had accepted a two-year suspension from track and field competition, and announced her retirement from track and field on October 5, 2007.

The United States Anti-Doping Agency stated that the sanction also required disqualification of all her competitive results obtained after September 1, 2000, and forfeiting of all medals, results, points and prizes. On October 5, 2007, Jones formally accepted the charges levied against her and pled guilty to lying to federal agents in the BALCO steroid investigation in the U.S. District Court. On January 11, 2008, Jones was sentenced to serve 6 months in jail. She began serving her sentence from March 7, 2008 and was released on September 5, 2008.

« Newer PostsOlder Posts »

Powered by WordPress