December 11, 2006, 5:10 AM CT

At the Bucharest Luxury Show 2006

The Rich Romanians could satiate their taste for luxury cars at the Bucharest Luxury Show 2006, as it is flooded with a jing-bang of Automotive Luxury at its best/worst. There are many things, which make a car standout from the crowd to get a dubbing of a luxurious Saloon. It could be the highest variants from any range of BMW, Mercedes, Rolls- Royce, Buggati Veyron etc. It could also be a high-price tag, although I do not support this convention but this is the way luxury is defined by Baron Roth's elsewhere. Apart from these two ways to define luxury ,there is another one thatthough unconventional but still has the potential to turn the heads of few Richie-Riches.

How about gold plating your cars, well it is does not sound startling to me as we recently ran you guys through a diamond studded Merc. but then there is the difference of the material used this time around.This years Bucharest Luxury Show is hosting cars that are Gold Plated , courtesy : Real Gold Company. Following are few pictures of such gold plated cars, which were unveiled at the aforesaid venue.

These pictures may portray stupidity to a conventional Auto Geek but they would certainly allure the Rich, you can have my word on that as I have seen them owning stranger cars than this, such is the dexterity level of those rich people as they thrive on hype and such strange things definitely add to their hype feed!........

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December 8, 2006, 5:12 AM CT

Electronic Medical Record Triples Rate Of Osteoporosis Screenings

Use of the Electronic Health Record tripled the rate of osteoporosis screenings in women who are at risk for the disease, according to a study conducted recently by a team of Geisinger Health System researchers.

About half of those who were screened were considered high-risk for the disease, the study found.

An estimated 10 million Americans suffer from the disease and the nation collectively spends about $18 billion per year on bone fractures related to osteoporosis.

EHR-screening programs can help improve those numbers, make patients' everyday lives less painful and save doctors time and resources, said Dr. Eric Newman, Geisinger's Director of Rheumatology.

The EHR was used to identify women who had not had bone density screens for osteoporosis in the last two years. Those women were sent letters and received telephone calls if their records were flagged.

"This is pretty significant," said Dr. William Ayoub of Geisinger Medical Group-Scenery Park, State College, one of the study's authors. "The EHR is streamlining the screening process and letting people know about a potential health concern before it becomes a major problem".

The EHR screening program was started in two Geisinger family practice clinics near State College, Pa. It was so successful that there are now plans to implement the program at other sites throughout the Geisinger system, Newman said.........

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December 6, 2006, 8:02 PM CT

Nike Plus iPod Sport Kit

This holiday season, gift-givers may unwittingly give their favorite athlete a workout accessory that can double as a tracking device. Researchers in computer science and engineering at the University of Washington say there are serious privacy breaches posed by the gadget, which is marketed to runners but may be equally attractive to stalkers and thieves.

"It is easy for someone to use the Nike+iPod as a tracking device," says Scott Saponas, a doctoral student in computer science and lead author of a technical report and video posted online on Nov. 30. "It's an example of how new gadgetry can erode our personal privacy".

The researchers suggest that people who own a Nike+iPod Sport Kit turn it off when they're not exercising so that it stops emitting signals.

Saponas is an avid runner and had originally bought the device to use in his workouts, before he started wondering about potential security risks. Now, he and his colleagues have built a range of low-cost devices that use information from his Nike+iPod to monitor his whereabouts. Other researchers on the report are UW graduate students Jonathan Lester and Carl Hartung, and Yoshi Kohno, assistant professor of computer science and engineering.

Since its August release, retailers have sold more than 450,000 Nike+iPod Sport Kits, according to industry publication AppleInsider. The $29 item consists of two parts. One piece is a chip the size of a dinner mint that acts as a pedometer, which runners slip into their shoe. The other piece is a receiver that fits into an iPod Nano and stores information beamed from the person's foot. After their workouts, high-tech runners can upload the data and use a Nike software program to track their distance, speed and calories burned.........

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December 5, 2006, 9:13 PM CT

Feeling sad about Iraq?

The United States' involvement in Iraq has generated a lot of debate about the potential impact on American businesses abroad. Yet, very little systematic research has addressed the effect of geo-political conflicts on consumer decision-making. Now, a new study appearing in the recent issue of the Journal of Consumer Research, explores how our range of reactions to political events may affect purchasing. Notably, the researchers found that not all negative feelings towards a country will lead to product evaluations based on country of origin.

While research has been done on how general mood affects purchases, Durairaj Maheswaran (New York University) and Cathy Yi Chen (Singapore School of Management) are the first to analyze specific emotions in this case, frustration, anger, and sadness. They found that angry people try to punish a country by not buying its products, while people saddened by a countrys actions believe the event is beyond human control and this emotion does not affect their purchasing.

"For example, American Express, by virtue of its brand name association to the United States, may be unfavorably evaluated if a segment of the current users in the Middle East attribute the conflict to the United States. Alternately, if the attribution were to be made to the situation, then American Express is not likely to be affected," explain Maheswaran and Chen.........

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December 5, 2006, 8:05 PM CT

DaimlerChrysler Car-2-X Communication

Car accidents have been a major problem for the motorists and have led to so much damage. For years, the attempts are being made to reduce this risk by implementing new technologies that enable drivers to sense the danger and avoid it. Vehicle-to-Vehicle Communication System is one of them. DaimlerChrysler has introduced a similar but much efficient system "WILLWARN". The system uses "Car-2-X Communication" to transmit radio details collected by on-board sensors. The system can warn the following cars about the fog, black ice or obstacles on the road such as broken-down vehicles well in advance providing the driver with enough time to adjust the speed of the vehicle to avoid accidents.

The system is beneficial over other systems as expensive, fixed-installation transmitting and receiving devices are not required, since the cars themselves act as both transmitters and receivers. The cars can setup an ad-hoc radio network to send any information to the other vehicles within the network and for the vehicles outside the network the car acts as a relay passing on the warnings further.

The system can be implemented with cooperation of other car manufacturers and permission from relevant authorities to set up a radio network in desired frequencies. Radio beacons at the side of the road are required in order to ensure that the first vehicles to be equipped with such a system benefit immediately. The system will ensure the safety of vehicles and reduce the accident rate to a great extent.........

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December 5, 2006, 7:34 PM CT

Everyone Enjoys Mysteries

Not everyone enjoys a murder mystery with a surprise ending, new research suggests.

People who have lower levels of self-esteem prefer crime and detective stories that confirm their suspicions in the end, while those with higher self-esteem enjoy a story that goes against expectations.

"Personality plays a role in whether a person wants to be confirmed or surprised when they read mysteries," said Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, co-author of the study and assistant professor of communication at Ohio State University.

"People with low self-esteem like to feel they knew all along who committed the crime, probably because it makes them feel smarter".

But everyone seemed to enjoy mysteries where there were no strong hints of how the story would end, the study found.

Knobloch-Westerwick conducted the study with Caterina Keplinger of the Hanover University of Music and Drama in Gera number of. Their research was published in a recent issue of the journal Media Psychology.

Scientists know very little about what makes various forms of crime fiction popular or appealing to consumers, Knobloch-Westerwick said. This study is an attempt to find out more about how a classic genre of fiction appeals to different kinds of people.

The mystery and crime fiction genre draws large audiences, for example, with the "Law & Order" TV series and best-selling novels by John Grisham or Mary Higgins Clark.........

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December 5, 2006, 4:43 AM CT

Dreaming Of A Nanotech Christmas

Will parents put an iPod Nano or Head Nano Titanium tennis racket under the Christmas tree for their children this year? Will holiday revelers hang a Nano-Infinity stocking on their fireplace mantle for Santa Claus to fill? Just what does compel shoppers to either buy nanotechnology products, or avoid them because of real or imagined risks?

With over 350 manufacturer-identified nanotechnology consumer products available for purchase this gift-giving season (see: www.nanotechproject.org/consumerproducts), and with $2.6 trillion in manufactured goods incorporating nanotechnology expected by 2014, there is a lot at stake in how these questions are answered.

The results of the first large-scale empirical study of how consumers consider risks and benefits when deciding whether to purchase or use specific nanotechnology products will appear in the December 2006 issue of the journal Nature Nanotechnology. The article's lead author, Steven C. Currall, University College London and London Business School, and a co-author, Neal Lane, Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy and former U.S. Presidential Science Advisor, will report their findings at a program and live webcast on Tuesday, December 5th at 2:00 p.m. in the 5th Floor Conference Room of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (www.wilsoncenter.org/directions). The Nature Nanotechnology article is embargoed until December 5th at 2 p.m. U.S. Eastern Time.........

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December 5, 2006, 4:26 AM CT

Sony Launched Its Blu-ray Player, Just in Time for Christmas

With the ability to play back just about all Blu-ray format discs (together with store-bought, write-once, and rewritable media) and featuring 1080p and HDMI outputs, the BDP-S1 player can play the DVDs as well. You will be able to own the hot Blu-ray player for about $600 (or $500 for the lower version).

If you are not in a mood to spend a big amount for the new arrival, PlayStation 3 can also play back Blu-ray movies presenting 1080p as well as HDMI. Therefore, it is up to you, whether you want to view movies on original Blu-ray format or PlayStation 3 turned Blu-ray. Choice is yours!........

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December 4, 2006, 5:04 AM CT

Test Fans the Flames for High-Rise Fire Safety

The blow-torch-like flames erupting from the windows of an abandoned, 16-story Chicago apartment building on Nov. 10 were certainly dramatic to watch from the street below. However, for a team of researchers from the Chicago Fire Department (CFD), the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the real excitement was what was happening to the environment inside the building's corridors and stairwells.

The controlled fires on the third, 10th and 15th floors of the Windy City high-rise were part of a real-world laboratory experiment to study the effectiveness in multistory buildings of positive pressure ventilation (PPV). PPV is the use of powerful fans during fires to force smoke and heat from corridors and stairwells so that they stay passable and safe for both escaping occupants and entering emergency responders. In past events-such as the October 2003 blaze in a government building in Chicago where six people died-fire flow into corridors and stairwells often has resulted in tragedy.

Eleven NIST scientists worked with more than 70 CFD and CHA staff for the two weeks previous to the experiment to prepare the building. All 16 floors were equipped with temperature and pressure monitors while the three burn floors also included cameras, heat flux gauges and typical apartment furnishings. The entire setup was connected to the data acquisition center by seven miles of cable.........

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December 1, 2006, 4:54 AM CT

Glucocorticoid, Skin Abnormalities And Stress

Inhibiting glucocorticoid, a type of steroid, can prevent skin abnormalities induced by psychological stress, according to a new study from the recent issue of the American Journal of Physiology-Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology. The new study also shows how psychological stress induces skin abnormalities that could initiate or worsen skin disorders such as psoriasis and atopic dermatitis.

The study, "Glucocorticoid blockade reverses psychological stress-induced abnormalities in epidermal structure and function," was carried out by Eung-Ho Choi, Marianne Demerjian, Debra Crumrine, Barbara E. Brown, Theodora Mauro, Peter M. Elias and Kenneth R. Feingold of the Veterans Affairs Medical Center, San Francisco and the University of California at San Francisco. Choi is also associated with Yonsei University Wonju College of Medicine, Wonju, Korea. The American Physiological Society published the study.

Previous research has shown that psychological stress increases glucocorticoid production. In addition, it is well recognized that psychological stress adversely affects many skin disorders, including psoriasis and atopic dermatitis.

"In this study, we showed that the increase in glucocorticoids induced by psychological stress induces abnormalities in skin structure and function, which could exacerbate skin diseases," Feingold explained. This provides a link for understanding how psychological stress can adversely affect skin disorders. Blocking the production or action of glucocorticoids prevented the skin abnormalities induced by psychological stress.........

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