Google Body, Earth's waters, Olivetti Programma 101

[Nostromics Newsletter]

Nostromics Newsletter

Nostromics science gifts product news, educational resources & science tidbits

Nostromics Newsletter, 9 February 2011 - You are welcome to share this mail

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Google Body

Chrome is a free, advanced and fast web browser developed by Google. It supports a number of important web standars including HTML5, the latest version of HTML, and WebGL, for taking advantage of the accelerated graphics cards available in most PCs. To showcase the HTML5 and WebGL capabilities of Chrome they created Google Body, an online educational tool for exploring the human body in 3D.

The main Google Body view displays a human body. Click and drag the mouse to move around it, or use the arrow buttons at the top left. The "+" and "-" buttons let you zoom in or out. By clicking icons in the left vertical toolbar you can display or hide anatomical layers showing organ systems. If you enter the name of an organ or body part in the search box at the top right, e.g. "liver", Google Body shows it.

Google Body requires an HTML5 and WebGL compliant browser like the free Chrome or Mozilla Firefox 4 Beta. If you don't have this software, see a review of Google Body.

Earth's waters

The Earth's Waters Mousepad in the Space section of Nostromics Store dramatically and beautifully demonstrates the most distinctive feature of our planet: most of it is covered with water. The image shows the Pacifc Ocean's blue waters and white clouds, below which part of the North American continent can be seen.

This design features a photo-like view of the Earth's globe against the blackness of space, based on images taken by NASA's Terra Earth observation satellite (image credit: Earth Observatory/NASA). Water in both liquid and solid form covers about 75% of our planet's surface. About 96.5% of liquid water is in the oceans, 1.7% in lakes, rivers and other ground water.

More science gifts and products at Nostromics Store.

The Olivetti Programma 101 calculator

Some consider the Olivetti Programma 101 electronic calculator the first personal computer. It may not have been, but it was an innovative computing machine ahead of its time.

Designed by Olivetti engineer Pier Giorgio Perotto, Programma 101 was manufactured since 1964 by Italian business machines manufacturer Olivetti. It featured ergonomical Italian styling by architect and designer Mario Bellini. Programma 101 was an advanced programmable calculator with a magnetic card reader for storing programs and data, and a printer.

This award-winning machine enjoyed a great success. About 40,000 units were sold, 90% of which in USA. It also faced competition, and electronics giant Hewlett-Packard was forced to pay almost one million $ for using in one of its products some of the solutions developed in Programma 101.

-- Paolo Amoroso & Mauro Arpino (Nostromics), science educators - Milan, Italy

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Copyright (C) 2011 by Paolo Amoroso and Mauro Arpino