November 6, 2006, 8:31 PM CT

Sony K320i: Your Everyday Business

K320i is a slim camera phone with everything you need to do business on the move.

Synchronize your PC contacts, calendar and tasks with your phone and have what you need wherever your are.

A Bluetooth- headset makes long calls comfortable and when you're on the road, it makes in-car calling safe.

As well as text and picture messaging, K320i has support for push email. Read and write email on the move and enjoy Internet access with RSS feeds for news as it happens.

Key features

Text and picture messaging and push email.

RSS feeds - news as it happens.

PC synchronization - calendar, contacts and tasks.

Bluetooth- technology - connecting without cables.........

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November 6, 2006, 8:21 PM CT

Pseudo French iPod Cases

What to do if you feel your cool factor on the wane? Get your Francophilia on. Le Pod by Your Sister's Mustache is a kicky little iPod holder with four designs to choose from. But be forewarned: none of them has anything to do with France, French culture, or anything remotely French-related. Or at least I don't think so. (hmm). Seriously though, who cares about the throwaway Franglish used to promote this product.

The important thing is you will feel that special je ne sais quoi when, instead of scrounging in your bag for your iPod, you slide it out of one of these colorful holders conveniently tucked around the strap of your cooly ironic, yet sartorially astute hipster handbag or tote.........

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November 6, 2006, 8:17 PM CT

Productive fun with Wacom's Cintiq

Kevin Kelley recently picked up a 21 inch Cintiq drawing display, and he's in love with it. The Wacom Cintiq is an LCD monitor with a touch screen sensor embedded over the image. Essentially it's a cross between a graphic artist's drawing tablet and an LCD monitor. Differing from standard touch screen monitors is the 1024 levels of pressure sensitivity that the input area is able to discern, and the unique "pen on paper" texture of dragging a pen across the surface. Kelly bought his $2,500 Cintiq on the recommendation of artist Scott McCloud who has said that the input method made him more productive, and completely eliminated the symptoms of his hand strain malady.

Wacom released the first Cintiq tablet seven years ago. It was a 15 inch flat panel touch screen display, and a lot of geeks discounted it as a one shot gimmick. Personally, I thought that it was a glorious evolution in computer hardware, and I remember dreaming of when the technology would be the standard for all computers. Sadly, prices of desktop tablet monitors have remained high enough that only professional interests, such as design houses and graphic artists, can justify the expense. I'd love to install one at home, but it's a hard sell when I didn't even spend $2,500 on my tricked out desktop!

We're just now sorting through the interface issues of tablet computing, but progress is being made. slowly. Some industries will have an easier time making a move to an alternative input scheme: video game controls are well suited to this type of human interface. The Nintendo DS has been an overwhelming success in part because of the novelty and utility of the touch screen, and the hands-on Starcraft video floating around is nothing short of sexy. Ben Kuchera disagrees with me, but I think that this is the direction that all computer interfaces will move towards if the public can ever afford to adopt the hardware en mass.........

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November 6, 2006, 8:13 PM CT

Laser Scanner to Convert Real-life Object into a 3D Model

ZCorporation has come up with its ZScanner 700, an accurate handheld laser scanner to convert any real-life object into a 3D model, which may fulfill your dream to become a computer graphics artist. The handheld scanner can capture almost any object from any angle, and wherever you want.

All you have to do is connect the system to your laptop with FireWire-, add the reflective targets to the object, attune without wasting any time and start scanning. Plug-and-play set-up saves your precious time. You may carry the portable, lightweight and mobile system anywhere you need.

Presenting Laptop computer, ZScan- software, Calibration plate validation, Carry-on case and Ergonomic support, the ZScanner 700 offers 0.1 mm (0.004 in) Z Axis resolution, weights 980 grams (2.1 lbs) and comes in 160 x 260 x 210 mm (6.25 x 10.2 8.2 in) dimension.

You may have to dig your pockets deep to get the ZScanner for $39,900.........

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November 6, 2006, 8:09 PM CT

How to disassemble iPod Shuffle 2

iFixit recently published a complete guide on how to disassemble the world smallest MP3 player - iPod Shuffle 2. All you need are just a spudger and a Philips screwdriver #00.

Well, let skip all the dissassembling process. What I want to know is what the heck inside this tiny thing!

On the top of its circuit logic board, you can see five button sensors, ARM chip and data cable ribbon. No idea about the ARM chip, but it has the number: 337S3300 844A N05WDK01 0642 ARM.

The bottom of the board has a Li-ion polymer battery and headphone jack plug, which is most impressive part of iPod Shuffle 2. The plug is multi-modal and switches between USB, analog audio, and possibly power modes.........

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November 6, 2006, 7:49 PM CT

Dried Plums As A Meat Preservative

To help satisfy consumer demand for more natural food products, researchers at Texas A&M University are investigating dried plums as a meat preservative.

"We found that dried plums, when pureed, actually have a very good antioxidant capacity," said Dr. Jimmy Keeton, professor of animal science and leader of the research at Texas A&M.

"We've been experimenting with dried plums and plum juice in different types of products such as pre-cooked pork sausages, roast beef and ham to see which of those products will respond most effectively as antioxidants," he said. "We found that pre-cooked and uncured products like sausages and roast beef actually respond the best".

Antioxidants retard oxidation of fatty acids that make up fat, he said.

"If these are unsaturated fatty acids, they can oxidize more and produce off-flavors and cause shelf life problems," he said.

Synthetic products called BHA (butylated hydroxyl anisole) and BHT (butylated hydroxyl toluene) have long been used as antioxidants. The natural product, extract of rosemary, is also used.

Dried plums can enhance the flavor of some products, frankfurters in particular, Keeton said.

"We've actually had consumers tell us they prefer the flavor of products with the dried plum ingredient," he said.........

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November 6, 2006, 4:52 AM CT

Hospital Costs For Children With Flu

Going into another flu season, a new study reports that hospitalizing children for influenza may cost up to three or four times the previously accepted estimates. Pediatric researchers from The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia say their finding strengthens the economic justification for broadly vaccinating children against flu.

"We found the cost of influenza-related hospitalizations in children was about $13,000 each--compared to most prior studies that estimated the cost at three to four thousand dollars," said study leader Ron Keren, M.D., M.P.H., a pediatrician at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. "This suggests that annual influenza vaccinations for children, especially for those with certain high-risk conditions, may be more cost-effective than previously thought".

The study appears in the recent issue of Pediatrics.

The researchers analyzed billing data for 727 patients up to age 21 who were admitted to Children's Hospital with laboratory-confirmed influenza over four consecutive flu seasons, from 2000 to 2004. The study team statistically adjusted the direct medical costs to account for geographic variations in those costs.

"We found a broad range of hospital costs in the study, from approximately $7,000 each for patients treated only on the ward, to nearly $40,000 each for children cared for in the intensive care unit," said Dr. Keren. Children with low-risk conditions had hospital costs averaging $9,000 each, compared to those with high-risk conditions, whose costs averaged $15,000 each.........

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November 6, 2006, 4:48 AM CT

Who Would Cut The Cake?

Suppose a cake is to be divided between two people, Alice and Bob. A fair procedure is to have Alice cut the cake and then have Bob choose whichever piece he prefers. Alice has an incentive to cut the cake exactly in half, since she will be left with whichever piece Bob does not take.

This "you cut, I choose" method, known since time immemorial, has been used in dispute resolutions ranging from land division in the Bible to children's squabbles over birthday cake. An article to appear in the December 2006 issue of the Notices of the AMS draws on the power and precision of mathematics to show there are even better ways to cut a cake.

The three authors of the article, Steven J. Brams, Michael A. Jones, and Christian Klamler, point out that the cut-and-choose method has the desirable property of "envy-freeness": Neither person envies the other, because each knows he has gotten at least half the cake. But the method lacks another desirable property, that of equitability: The subjective value that the two people place on the pieces they get might not be the same. For example, suppose one half of the cake is frosted with vanilla icing and the other with chocolate icing, and suppose Alice values chocolate icing twice as much as vanilla. It is possible that Alice's valuation of the piece she gets will be less than Bob's valuation of his piece, making these the two valuations inequitable.........

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November 6, 2006, 4:39 AM CT

School Bus Safety Decreasing

Each year in the United States, 23.5 million children travel 4.3 billion miles on school buses. A study out of the Center for Injury Research and Policy (CIRP) in the Columbus Children's Research Institute at Columbus Children's Hospital is the first to use a national sample to describe nonfatal school bus-related injuries to children and teenagers treated in emergency rooms across the country.

According to the study, published in the recent issue of Pediatrics, from 2001 to 2003 there were an estimated 51,100 school bus-related injuries that resulted in treatment in an U.S. emergency room. That is about 17,000 injuries annually.

"The findings from this study indicate that motor vehicle crashes are the leading mechanism of nonfatal school bus-related injury for children in the U.S.," said CIRP Director Gary Smith, MD, DrPH, one of the study's authors and a faculty member of The Ohio State University College of Medicine. "In addition, this study identified several other important mechanisms of school bus-related injury. Further research is needed to determine the relative contributions of structural and operational components of the school bus, supervision, and rider behavior to the occurrence of these injuries and the effectiveness of occupant restraint systems and other strategies to prevent these types of injuries".........

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November 6, 2006, 4:34 AM CT

Children's Belly Fat Increases More Than 65 Percent

Abdominal obesity increased more than 65 percent among boys and almost 70 percent among girls between 1988 and 2004. The finding of growing girth is significant because abdominal obesity has emerged as a better predictor of cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes risk than the more usually used Body Mass Index, a weight to height ratio that can sometimes be misleading.

As the first nationally representative study to document the increase in children's belly fat, the study in today's Pediatrics paints a bleak picture for these children who have a higher risk of heart disease, adult-onset diabetes and metabolic syndrome. The good news is that, for children and adolescents, the health effects are often reversible through improved lifestyle for weight loss.

"Kids, teens and adults who have early stages of atherosclerosis in their arteries can have a healthy cardiovascular system again," said Stephen Cook, M.D., an assistant professor of Pediatrics at the University of Rochester Medical Center's Golisano Children's Hospital at Strong and an author of the study about childhood abdominal obesity. "Elderly adults who have plaque build up have a much harder battle, particularly if the plaque has calcified".

Measuring waist circumference is not a "vital sign" normally taken in a visit to the doctor. A BMI is usually calculated at a well visit, but there are limitations to those measurements. A very muscular person may register a high BMI score, even if he is very healthy and has an average waist circumference. On the flip side, a sedentary child may not register a very high BMI score, but if he carries a lot of fat around his middle, he may be at a higher risk for health problems than other children with the same BMI score.........

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