Solar Energy: Interesting and Useful Facts for Consumers

Solar Energy: Interesting and Useful Facts for Consumers

This is a collection of interesting and educational facts about Solar Energy that consumers and people in general should know about!

1. One kilowatt-hour (kWh) equals the amount of electricity needed to burn a 100 watt light bulb for 10 hours. 

2. A 1 kilowatt home solar system installed costs about US$9,000 (before any rebate programs). 

Prices up to $15,000 are also possible as are lower prices depending upon: a) the kind of PV System, b) country of purchase, c) how the system is purchased, and d) the surface to which the system is attached. Convert from US dollars to your local currency to find an approximate equivalent cost in your country.

3. A 1-2 kilowatt (1000-2000 watts) system takes between one and two days to install. 

4. An installed system costing $9 per watt peak, means about 25-30 U$ cents per kilowatt hour in a sunny climate. 

5. The solar module ("solar panel") itself accounts for between 40-50% of the total cost of an installed solar energy system. 

6. A sunny location (like Los Angeles, USA) receives approximately 5.5 hours per day of sunlight on average throughout the year. 

7. A cloudy location (like Hamburg, Germany) receives approximately 2.5 hours per day of sunlight on average throughout the year 

8. The typical main components of a solar home system are the solar module, an inverter, a battery, a charge controller and a su 

9. A typical silicon cell Solar Module will have a life in excess of 20 years. 

Its electric generating capacity may degrade gradually between 0-20% over its useful life.

10. Although solar modules are often warranted for 20 years or more, the warranty on the overall system is 5 years 

11. A Solar Energy System can provide electricity 24 hours a day. 

How? The solar electric modules are combined with batteries in one integrated energy system.

The Great Wall Myth

The Great Wall Myth
It is common mistake to say that The Great wall of China is visible from outer space. It is too thin to be noticed from such a great distance. There are no man made structures that are visible from space or moon. Man made objects start to disappear after 300 miles up. From that distance you can barely see the outline of the Great China Wall. If we consider that distance from Earth to Moon is around 384,403 kilometers/238,857 miles then we can draw reasonable conclusion that it would be impossible to see any man-made structures from such a distance. Astronaut Alan Bean said: "The only thing you can see from the moon is a beautiful sphere, mostly white (clouds), some blue (ocean), patches of yellow (deserts), and every once in a while some green vegetation. No man-made object is visible on this scale. In fact, when first leaving earth's orbit and only a few thousand miles away, no man-made object is visible at that point either."

Accept Challenges in life

NEVER MISS FIRST OPPORTUNITY !!

 

A young man wished to marry the farmer's beautiful daughter. He went to the farmer to ask his permission. The farmer looked him over and said, "Son, go stand out in that field. I'm going to release three bulls, one at a time. If you can catch the tail of any one of the three bulls, you can marry my daughter."  The young man stood in the pasture awaiting the first bull. The barn door opened and out ran the biggest, meanest-looking bull he had ever seen. He decided that one of the next bulls had to be a better choice than this one, so he ran over to the side and let the

bull pass through the pasture out the back gate. The barn door opened again.

 

Unbelievable. He had never seen anything so big and fierce in his life. It stood pawing the ground, grunting, slinging slobber as it eyed him. Whatever the next bull was like, it had to be a better choice than this one. He ran to the fence and let the bull pass through the pasture, out the back gate. The door opened a third time. A smile came across his face. This was the weakest,

scrawniest little bull he had ever seen. This one was his bull. As the bull came running by, he positioned himself just right and jumped at just the exact moment. He grabbed... but the bull had no tail!

 

Life is full of opportunities. Some will be easy to take advantage of, some will be difficult. But once we let them pass (often in hopes of something better), those opportunities may never again be available. So always grab the first!

 

Did you Know:

 

·        Did you know that books can breathe? People visiting the British Museum complained of getting headaches. This was because books seem to absorb or "breathe" in air and "breathe" out smells of their own. There was so many old books in the Museum that there was no fresh air left which meant people got headaches from breathing in bad air

 

·         The plastic things on the end of shoelaces are called aglets

List of phobias

Friday, lucky or not

In pagan times Friday was the luckiest day of the week because it was ruled by the planet Venus, the symbol of love and fortune. In fact, Friday is named in honor of Freya, goddess of Love. But for Christians, Friday has not been a good day. Adam and Eve is said to have eaten the forbidden fruit on a Friday and died on a Friday. Jesus was crucified on a Friday.

For centuries sailors refused to set sail on a Friday. It is told that when the reluctance of seamen to set sail on a Friday had reached such proportions that it interfered with naval operations, the British Admiralty decided to prove once and for all that it is a fallacy. They laid the keel of a new vessel on a Friday, named her H.M.S. Friday, and launched her on a Friday. On her first voyage, setting sail on a Friday, she was commanded by Captain James Friday. She left the harbor and nothing has since been heard of her or her crew. The identical story has also found its place in American lore. But – fear not – it is a myth.
The fear for traveling on a Friday continued until the early 20th century where in Europe bus and train travel was lowest on a Friday. But before you say “Thank Goodness, it’s Friday!” consider that, FBI statistics show, most robberies take place on a Friday.

The number 13

It is believed that the fear for the number 13 stems from primitive man being unable to count past 12. Numbers beyond 12 do now have an individual and independent name but are a combination of the first 12 numbers. With 12 being the end of the line, 13 was moving into unknown territory.

In Norse mythology the 13th number led to the death of Baldur, the beloved of the gods. When the 12 gods gathered for a banquet in Valhalla, Loki gatecrashed the party, increasing the number to 13, which led to the death of Baldur. It also happens that in Tarot cards, 13 is called “Death.”

The baker’s dozen

The “unlucky 13″ is the reason why the thirteen loaves that bakers once supplied were never called by the number, but described as “a baker’s dozen.” The thirteenth loaf was regarded as a special bribe for the devil not to spoil the sale or the bread.
The lucky number 13

But 13 is not unlucky for all. The Mayas worshiped the 13 gods of the upper world. The Aztecs climbed 13 steps to their sacred places. Buddhists paid homage to 13 Buddhas. In Jewish faith, God revealed Himself by 13 attributes of bountiful mercy (Exodus 34: 6-7). The orthodox Jewish prayer book hold the Thirteen Principles of Faith. Jewish boys celebrate their Bar Mitzvah at age 13.

The number 13 in Greek is triskaideka and the fear of the number 13 is called triskaidekaphobia.

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1907

Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1907 was awarded to Alphonse Laveran "in recognition of his work on the role played by protozoa in causing diseases".

Mona Lisa Smile

Mona Lisa Smile, a painting which has become famous world wide is an art work created by Leonardo da Vinci. People have been gazing at Leonardo da Vinci's Portrait of the Mona Lisa with a sense of bafflement for nearly 500 years. It portrays a real woman of flesh and blood. Her enigmatic smile has seduced millions of art lovers. This painting became famous because of the fact that it looks lively.

If any one gets a glimpse of the picture, the first thing that strikes him is the amazing degree to which Lisa looks alive. She really seems to look at us and to have a mind of her own. Like a living being, she seems to change before our eyes and looks a little different every time we come back to her. First she is smiling. Then the smile fades. A moment later the smile returns only to disappear again. Even in photographs of the picture we experience this strange effect. Sometimes she seems to mock at us, and then again we seem to catch something like sadness in her smile. All this sounds rather mysterious, but its true. He is a great observer of nature and created this painting in such a way that he left something for the beholder to guess.

Many questions were raised by the observers of this painting like, what is with this lady's face? How did the great painter capture such a mysterious expression and why haven't other artists copied it? Many tried to answer these questions which gave birth to number of theories but Leonardo, the great observer of nature certainly knew how he achieved this effect, and by what means. Some gave a scientific explanation of how the eye and brain deal with different levels of contrast and illumination. Others explained how the human visual system is designed. Recently, scientists attributed the weird behavior of this painting to visual noise.

In any painting, if the outlines are not quite so firmly drawn, if the form is left a little vague, as though disappearing into a shadow, the impression of dryness and stiffness can be avoided. This is Leonardo's famous invention which the Italians call sfumato - the blurred outline and mellowed colors that allow one form to merge with another and always leave something to our imagination.

In the painting of Mona Lisa, Leonardo used the means of his 'sfumato' with the utmost deliberation. Everyone who has ever tried to draw or scribble a face knows that the expression of the picture rests mainly in two features: the corners of the mouth, and the corners of the eyes. Now it is precisely these parts which Leonardo has left deliberately indistinct, by letting them merge into a soft shadow. That is why we are never quite certain in what mood Mona Lisa is really looking at us. Her expression always seems just to elude us. It is not only vagueness, of course, which produces this effect. There is much more behind it. Leonardo has done a very daring thing, which perhaps only a painter of his consummate mastery could risk. Hats off to the wonderful work created by Leonardo! The people who had a close look at the picture notice that two sides do not quite match. This is most obvious in the fantastic dream landscape in the background. The horizon on the left side seems to lie much lower than the one on the right. Consequently, when we focus on the left side of the picture, the woman looks somehow taller or more erect than if we focus on the right side. And her face, too, seems to change with this change of position, because even here, the two sides do not quite match. One really admires the way in which he modelled the hand, or the sleeves with their minute folds. Leonardo could be as painstaking as any of his forerunners in the patient observation of nature.

Long ago, in the distant past, people had looked at portraits with awe, because they had thought that in preserving the likeness the artist could somehow preserve the soul of the person he portrayed. Now the great scientist, Leonardo, had made some of the dreams and fears of these first image-makers come true. He knew the spell which would infuse life into the colors spread by his magic brush.

Random Facts about the Sun

Random Facts about the Sun

The sun's average distance from the earth is about 91,500,000 miles. Since the orbit of the earth is elliptical, and the sun is situated at one of its foci, the earth is nearly 3,000,000 miles further from the sun in aphelion than in perihelion. As we attempt to locate the heavenly bodies in space, we are immediately startled by the enormous figures employed.

The first number, 91,500,000 miles, is far beyond our grasp. Let us try to comprehend it. If there were air to convey a sound from the sun to the earth, and a noise could be made loud enough to pass that distance it would require over fourteen years for it to come to us.

Suppose a railroad could be built to the sun. An express train traveling day and night at the rate of thirty miles an hour, would require 341 years to reach its destination. Ten generations would be born and would die; the young men would become gray haired, and their great-grandchildren would forget the story of the beginning of that wonderful journey, and could find it only in history, as we now read of Queen Elizabeth or of Shakespeare; the eleventh generation would see the solar depot at the end of the route.

Yet this enormous distance of 91,500,000 miles is used as the unit for expressing celestial distances--as the foot-rule for measuring space; and astronomers speak of so many times the sun's distance as we speak of so many feet or inches.
 

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1907

Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1907 was awarded to Alphonse Laveran "in recognition of his work on the role played by protozoa in causing diseases".

25 Interesting Facts

25 Interesting Facts

1. A vulture will never attack a human or animal that is moving.

2. About 75% of the people in the U.S. live on 2% land.

3. According to a recent survey, more Americans lose their virginity in June than any other month.

4. Adult Northwestern American Grizzly Bears can bite through steel as thick as one half inch.

5. After spending hours working at a computer display, look at a blank piece of white paper. It will probably appear pink.

6. All polar bears are left-handed.

7. Almonds are the oldest, most widely cultivated and extensively used nuts in the world.

8. Al Capone's business card said he was a furniture dealer.

9. Americans are responsible for about 1/5 of the world's garbage annually. On average, that's 3 pounds a day per person.

10. An ant's sense of smell is as good as a Dog's.

11. Abe Lincoln's mother died when the family dairy cow ate poisonous mushrooms and Ms. Lincoln drank the milk.

12. According to Playboy, more women talk dirty during sex than men.

13. Americans drink over a billion pounds of coffee every year and around five million bottles of soda.

14. After they are roasted, and when the coffee beans begin to cool, they release about 700 chemical substances that make up the vaporizing aromas.

15. Americans, on average, eat 18 acres of pizza in one day.

16. An eagle can kill a young deer and fly away with it.

17. An elephant's trunk contains more than 50,000 muscles.

18. An eyelash lives about 5 months.

19. Ancient Egyptians shaved off their eyebrows to mourn the death of their cats.

20. According to Hammurabi's Code, the penalty for medical malpractice was to cut off the doctor's hands.

21. An Octopus has 3 hearts!

22. According to Playboy, more women talk dirty during sex than men.

23. A whale's penis is called a dork.

24. An ear of corn always has an even number of rows because of the genetic formula which divides the cells.

25. Americans eat more bananas than any other fruit: a total of 11 billion a year.

Amazing Brain Facts

Amazing Brain Facts

The brain is a monstrous, beautiful mess. Its billions of nerve cells - called neurons - lie in a tangled web that displays cognitive powers far exceeding any of the silicon machines we have built to mimic it. - William F. Allman in Apprentices of Wonder. Inside the Neural Network Revolution, 1989.

The brain is the most amazing and complex organ in this universe and its research continues to throw up new facts that surprise’s us. The brain is capable of being modified or improved even as we age. It is never used to its full capacity.
1. The human brain has about 100,000,000,000 or 100 billion neurons. From the age of 35 years about 7000 neurons are lost daily.
2. During early pregnancy the neurons in the fetus can multiply at a rate 250,000 neurons/minute.
3. Brain is composed of 75 to 80% water. Dehydration can affect proper functioning of brain.
4. Brain consists of 60% White matter and 40% Grey matter. White is the supporting matter and Grey is the thinking matter of the brain. If the brain was a computer the grey matter would be the computer itself and the white matter its cables.

5. Adult brain weighs about 3 pounds or 1300 to 1400 Grams. This is about 2% of the body weight if you weigh 150 pounds or 70 kgs. Sperm whale’s brain weighs 7800 gms.

6. Although the brain only accounts for 2 percent of our body weight but it consumes 20% of the oxygen that we breathe and roughly 20 percent of our daily calories.

7. 15-20% of all blood pumped out of the heart goes directly to the brain.

8. All the thinking in the brain is about electricity and chemicals. The brain is more active and thinks more at night than during the day.

9. The brain itself is incapable of feeling pain. Once the skull is opened it is possible to operate on the brain with the patient awake.

10. You can’t feel your own tickle either. The brain is smart enough to neutralize the sensation. The cerebellum sends a signal to rest of the brain of your intentions and as a result the sensation is ignored.

Chocoholic Jokes

Chocoholic Jokes

REASONS WHY CHOCOLATE IS BETTER THAN SEX 

You’re never too old to enjoy chocolate.
It’s safe to have chocolate while you’re driving. 
You never feel guilty after chocolate.
You can make chocolate last as long as you want. 
You can ask a stranger for chocolate without getting your face slapped.
With chocolate – satisfaction’s guaranteed.


REASONS WHY CHOCOLATE IS BETTER THAN MEN 

No one’s ever been jilted by a chocolate gateau.
After telling your chocolate bar all your worries you can simply eat it.
You can share chocolates with your best friend.
A bar of chocolate doesn’t bore you by constantly talking about football.
Your mother will never disapprove of your choice of chocolate. 



REASONS WHY CHOCOLATE IS BETTER THAN WOMEN 

Chocolate never keeps you waiting.
Chocolate doesn’t get jealous when you look at another chocolate bar.
You never have to buy a box of chocolates for a box of chocolates.
Chocolate doesn’t talk incessantly while you’re watching the football.
It doesn’t expect you to remember the anniversary of the first time you met.
Chocolate never tries to chat up your best friend.
Chocolate isn’t looking for a long term commitment.

Sorry for eating the peanuts

A man visits his aunt in the nursing home. It turns out that she is taking a nap, so he just sits down in a chair in her room, flips through a few magazines, and munches on some peanuts sitting in a bowl on the table.

Eventually, the aunt wakes up, and her nephew realizes he's absentmindedly finished the entire bowl. 'I'm so sorry, auntie, I've eaten all of your peanuts!"That's okay, dearie," the aunt replied. "After I've sucked the chocolate off, I don't really care for them anyway."

All About Your Eyes

Few people could argue that without our 5 senses life would be pretty dull. All our senses are extremely important but I think if you asked most people which sense would they least like to lose they would probably say their vision. As with most of our abilities, our vision is something that many of us take for granted. If you stop and think for a moment, you will realize that just about everything we do in our day to day life involves our vision. During this article I am going to try and see if I can get you to start thinking a little bit more about your eyes. Listed below is my top 10 list of weird and wonderful things you didn’t know about your eyes

10. Everyone needs reading glasses as they get older

This is assuming that you already have perfect distance vision. If you are currently reading this article and are under 40 years of age with perfect distance vision, I can say with absolute certainty that you will need reading glasses at some point in the future. For about 99% of the population the age that you will first start needing reading glasses is between 43 and 50 years old. This is because the lens in your eye slowly loses its focusing ability with age. In order to focus things near to you, your lens has to change from a flat to a more spherical shape and it loses the ability to do this as you get older. As you get to around 45 years old you will start to hold things further away from you to keep them focus.

9. The lens in your eye is quicker than any camera lens

Just behind the pupil sits the eyes natural lens, whose function is to focus on the object you are looking at. Just take a minute to glance around the room and think about how many different distances you are focusing at. Every time you do this, the lens in your eye is instantly changing focus without you even being aware of it! Compare that with a camera lens which takes a few seconds to focus between one distance and another. Just be thankful that the lens in your eye is as quick as it is, otherwise things would be continually going in and out of focus.

8. Your eyes are fully developed by the age of 7 years old

By the age of 7 years old our eyes are fully developed and are physiologically the same as adult’s eyes. It is for this reason that it is vitally important to pick up a lazy eye before we reach this age. The earlier a lazy eye is diagnosed, the greater the chance it will respond to treatment, as the eyes are still developing and capable of an improvement in vision. Beyond 7 years old no amount of treatment will result in any improvement in vision.

7. You blink approximately 15,000 times each day

Blinking is a semi- involuntary function meaning we do it automatically, but can also choose to blink if we so require. Blinking is an extremely important function of your eyes as it helps remove any debris on the surface of your eye, by spreading fresh tears over them. These tears help to nourish your eyes with oxygen and also have important anti bacterial properties. You can think of the function of blinking as being similar to the action of the windscreen wipers on your car, cleaning and removing everything to keep you seeing clearly.

6. Everyone gets cataracts as they get older

People don’t realize that cataracts are just a normal consequence of getting older and everyone gets them at some point in their life. You can think of cataracts as being similar to getting grey hair, in that it is just a normal natural age change. The average age people first get cataracts is about aged 70 years old and by 80 years old you are guaranteed to have cataracts. In the same way that you could not find any aged 80 years old without grey hair, it would be equally impossible to find anyone over 80 years old without cataracts. Cataracts refer to a gradual clouding of the lens in your eye and typically take about ten years from onset to them needing treatment.

5. Diabetes is often first detected during an eye test

People who suffer from type 2 diabetes (the type you develop later in life) are often symptom free, meaning they often don’t even know that they have it. This type of diabetes is commonly picked up during an eye test as it can be seen as tiny haemorrhages from leaking blood vessels at the back of your eye. This certainly is good reason to get your eyes tested regularly.

4. You see with your brain and not your eyes

The function of your eyes is to collect all the required information about the object you are looking at. This information is then passed from your eye to the brain via the optic nerve. It is the brain (visual cortex) where all this information is analyzed to enable you to ‘see’ the object in its finished form. This is not to say that your eyes don’t play an important role as they certainly do.

3. Your eyes can adapt to blind spots in your vision

Certain eye conditions such as Glaucoma and certain general health conditions such as having a stroke, can lead to you developing blind spots in your vision. This would be extremely debilitating if it wasn’t for your brain and your eyes ability to adapt to make these blind spots disappear. It does this by suppressing the blind spot in your affected eye and letting your other good eye ‘fill in the gaps’. It is adaptation like this that makes your eyes so resilient.

2. 20:20 vision is not the best vision you can have

When people hear the phrase 20:20 vision they assume that this is the best vision possible. However this is not true as 20:20 vision refers to what the average adult should be able to see. If you imagine a typical eye test chart the 20:20 vision is probably only the line second from the bottom. The line below it is even smaller than 20:20 vision and would mean you have 20:16 vision. So don’t be so impressed next time someone tells you they have 20:20 vision!

1. Your eyes water when they are dry

I know this might sound crazy but this is one of strange facts about your eyes. Your tears are made up of 3 different components and they are water, mucus and fat. If these 3 components are not in exactly the right quantities, your eyes can become dry as a consequence. Your brain responds to this dryness by producing extra water and hence your eyes water.

SOBRIQUETS

PRIMARY NAMES	SOBRIQUETS
Aberdeen, Scotland	The Granite City
Africa	The Dark Continent
Amristsar, India	The City of the Golden Temple
Atlantic Ocean	The Herring Pond
Australia	The Land of the Golden Fleece, The Land of the Kangaroo
Bab-el-mandab	The Gate of Tears
Banrain	Island of Pearls
Bangalore, India	The Garden City of India
Belgium	The Cockpit of Europe
Belgtade, Yugoslavia	White City
Bombay, India	The Gateway of India
Broadway, New York	The Great White Way
Burma (Mayanmar)	The Land of the Golden Pagoda
Calcutta, India	The City of Palaces
Canada	The Land of Lilies, The Land of Maple
Chicago, USA	Windy City
Cochin, India	The Venice of the East, The Queen of the Arabian Sea
Cuba	The Pearl of the Antilles
Egypt	The Gift of the Nile
Finland	The Land of Thousand Lakes
Gibraltar	The key of the Mediterranean
Guinea Coast	White Man's Grave
River Hwang Ho, china	The Sorrow of China
Ireland	The Emerald Island
Jaipur	The Rose Pink City

SOBRIQUETS

Famous People with disabilities

ABBOTT Bud, 1900-1974, (epilepsy),
American Comedian of Abbott & Costello comedy team. Starred in over 35 films with partner Lou Costello from 1940-1965. Famous for the baseball classic comedy routine "Who’s on First?"
{16,27,32}
ABBOTT Jim, 1967-present, (no right hand),
Major league baseball pitcher. He played Little League and later with his high school team. He attended the University of Michigan and then pursued his baseball career. Won the Golden Spikes Award as the finest amateur baseball player in the US. Played on the 1988 U.S. Olympic Baseball team and pitched a gold medal for the US team. He played baseball for the California Angels and was traded to the New York Yankees.
{43}
ABERCROMBIE Neil, 1938-present, (epilepsy),
United States Representative from Hawaii (1986-1987). Served on the Honolulu City Council (1988-1990). Sought the Democratic Nomination for US Senate in 1970. First elected to the House on November 6, 1990. Last elected to House on November 8, 1994.
{27}
ALDRIDGE Lionel, 1941-present, (mental disorder),
A defensive end for Vince Loumbardi’s legendary Green Bay Packers of the 1960’s. He played in two Super Bowls. In the 1970’s he was diagnosed with schizophrenia and was homeless for 2 1/2 years. Now gives inspirational talks about his battle against paranoid schizophrenia.
{58}
ALDRIN Edwin Eugene Jr [Buzz], 1930-present, (bipolar disorder),
United States Astronaut-second person to set foot on the moon. He and Neil Armstrong landed there in the Apollo Lunar Module on July 20, 1969. He was also the pilot of the Gemini 12 space flight in 1966.
{85}
ALEXANDER Grover Cleveland, 1887-1950, (epilepsy),
Professional baseball player (Old Pete) (Alex the Great). He was a pitcher who won 28 games in his rookie season. He was deaf in one ear. He was also an alcoholic and epileptic. Over his lifetime he won 373 games. He was a 30 game winner three years running. He pitched 90 shutouts/struck out 2198 batters-completed 436 games and earned a 1.22 ERA and .642 winning percentage.
{27,57}
ALEXANDER the Great,356-323BC, (physical impairment) (epilepsy),
King of the Macedonians and was one of the greatest generals in history.
{85}
ALFRED the Great,849-901?, (epilepsy)
West Saxon King and Scholar. Old English literary prose. King of the West Saxons in Southwestern England. He saved his kingdom-Wessex from the Danish Vikings and laid the basis for unification of England under the West Saxon Monarchy. He was such an outstanding leader in war and peace that he is the only English king known as the Great
{27,70,85}
ALI Mohammad, 1942-present, (neuromuscular)
American heavyweight boxing champion. Ali was born Cassius Marcellus Clay but in 1964 he adopted the Black Muslim Religion and changed his name. As an adult was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.,
{36,85}
ALONSO Alicia, 1921-present, (visual impairment),
At 16 she married Fernando Alonso and moved to New York City from Cuba. Due to detached retinas she lost her sight. She still continued to dance in ballet. In 1948 she and her husband returned to Cuba. She opened Cuba’s first major ballet company.
{43}
AMBROSI Gustinus , 1893-1975, (hearing impairment),
Working primarily in bronze and marble he created sculptures in the classical tradition. He was also the master of the portrait bust. As sculptor, poet, graphic artist and philosopher Ambrosi symbolized to many a Renaissance man who had surmounted his fate. Shortly before this seventh birthday he was stricken with meningitis resulting in deafness. In 1912 he received both the National Prize for Sculpture and the Felix Von Weingartner Medallion.
{30}
ANDERSON Hans Christian, 1805-1875, (learning disability),
Denmark's most famous author(writer). His fairy tales are among the most widely read works in world literature.
{85}
ANDERSON Harry, 1952-present, (attention deficit disorder),
Actor who played Judge Stone on Night Court has attention deficit disorder and has managed to con and charm his way through school. He had an extraordinary memory and could remember anything at 16. He was Valedictorian but, he could barely read to rehearse his lines. He is also a magician and writer.
{4}
ARAFAT Yasir [Mohammed Abdel-Raouf Arafat-al-Qudwa-al- Hussseini], 1929-present, (neuromuscular),
Politician and Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in 1969. He acquired the nickname Yasir which means easy going as a teenager. In 1994 Arafat shared the Nobel Peace Prize for peace efforts with Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres. In 1996 he was elected president. Diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease later in life.
{85}
ARISTOLE,384-322 BC, (epilepsy),
Greek philosopher/scientist. Aristotle was a student of Plato. In 343 BC he began tutoring the young Alexander the Great. In 334 BC he lectured at a public gymnasium called the Lyceum. He is considered one of the two great philosophers of antiquity along with Plato. He wrote on many subjects from biology to astronomy to rhetoric and literary criticism.
{26}
ARMES Jay J., 1938-present, (physical impairment),
Born [Julian Armas] but changed his name to Jay J. Armes. He was born in Ysleta Texas. In 1949 at the age of 12 he was involved in an accident that resulted in both of his hands being amputated and hooks were placed as artificial hands. Some people say he’s the best private eye in the world.
{33,43}
ARNOLD Hillis, 1910-present, (hearing impairment),
American sculptor and teacher who lost his hearing at six months of age due to spinal meningitis. He taught sculpture and ceramics for 32 years at Monticello College in Godfrey IL now Lewis and Clark Community College. He is an advocate of symbolism and his art reveals a debt to expressionism.
{43}
ASHLEY Jack, 1922-present, (hearing impairment)
Politician. Jack is probably the only totally deaf member of any legislature in the world. His story is an inspiring record of coping with restricted education and vocational opportunities and with the impact of total deafness. His career was threatened in 1968 when he became totally deaf after a supposedly minor operation for the repair of the perforation of his left ear. His autobiography (Journey into Silence) 1973 describes his feelings on returning to Parliament following this disaster.
{43}

Murphy's Laws

Murphy's Laws

Everyone has heard of Murphy's first law: "If anything can go wrong, invariably it will." But hardly anybody has even a foggy idea of who Murphy was.

The search for Murphy's notebooks led to a garage in Toledo, Ohio; an inventor's junk loft in Aliquippa, Pennsylvania; and the home of a retired female blackmailer in Sarasota, Florida. It was learned that Murphy had no first name, that he never could hold a job, and that his writings were returned by the post office for insufficient postage.

It seems everything Murphy wrote about had some explanation for why things go wrong. Consider a few more Murphy classics:

• Nothing is ever as simple as it first seems.
• Everything you decide to do costs more than first estimated.
• Every activity takes more time than you have.
• It's easier to make a commitment or to get involved in something than to get out of it.
• Whatever you set out to do, something else must be done first.
• If you improve or tinker with something long enough, eventually it will break.
• By making something absolutely clear, somebody will be confused.
• You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time, and that's sufficient.

Women and the Nobel Prize

Which highly distinquished Jewish, English-speaking, woman-author was born in South Africa, was fiercely political in her writings and whose most widely read novels included, 'The Conservationist' and 'Burger's Daughter'?

Nadine Gordimer. She was born in 1923 and grew up in the difficult conditions of apartheid, which she resented immensely. However, even though she would not identify with the White minority, she had difficulty identifying with the Black majority, whom she supported. In her writings she was totally committed to exploring and exposing the social inequities of apartheid for all of the people of South Africa. Her earlier novels included, 'Which New Era Would That Be?'and 'Is There Nowhere Else Where We Can Meet?' She was named Nobel Laureate in Literature in 1991.

Which famous, highly honored German-American woman, with extensive training in mathematics and physics, demonstrated that the atomic nucleus has a structure containing successive proton-neutron shells held together by highly complex forces?

Maria Goeppert Mayer. Maria Goeppert was born in 1906 in Kattowitz, Germany (now Poland) and was educated at the University of Gottingen, Germany. She married an American physicist, Joseph E. Mayer, in 1931 and they immigrated to the United States. She shared the Nobel Prize in Physics with Hans D. Jensen. She became the second woman to be named Nobel Laureate in Physics and the third to be named a Nobel Laureate in the science categories.

Which famous, very highly honored woman won the Nobel Prize twice, but in two different categories?

Marie Sklodowska Curie. Marie Sklodowska was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1867. She studied mathematics, physics and chemistry in Paris, France. She married Pierre Curie and as a team they studied radio-active substances and discovered radium and polonium. For those discoveries she and her husband shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1903. In 1906 her husband, who was ill from over exposure to radiation, died in an accident. Marie Curie continued her studies and isolated the radium element and described its unusual characteristics. For that work she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1911.

Which famous, highly honored woman was a prominent suffragist, social reformer and founder of the Hull House in Chicago, Illinois?

Jane Addams. Jane Addams was born in 1860 in Cedarville, Illinois. She was educated in The Rockville Female Seminary, one of the earlier all women colleges. She suffered several episodes of severe clinical depression that interrupted her social work. After a two year trip to Europe, she and a close friend became mutually interested in social reform and the advancement of women's rights, including the right to vote. She was the founder of the famous Hull House in Chicago. In 1931 she was named Nobel Laureate in Peace.

Which famous noble woman was the founder of a new field of science called, 'Protein Crystallography' and with her family, worked for more than 30 years in programs for World Peace?

Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin. Dorothy Crowfoot was born in Cairo, Egypt in 1910, the first of four daughters of John and Grace Crowfoot. She and her entire family were strong protagonists for world peace. Her marriage to Mr. Hodgkin was totally unsuccessful and thus her interests in science dominated the rest of her career. Using X-ray diffraction on crystals of biological substances, she developed the process of 'Protein Crystallography'. Using this new procedure she worked with cholesterol, penicillin, Vitamin B-12 and insulin. She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1964. Due to the 'Cold War' she was not able to obtain a U.S. Visa until 1990 at which time she was 80 years of age. Althouigh, severely crippled with {arthritis;} she toured many U.S. scientific institutions as a lecturer on the examination of insulin using Protein Crystallography. She died of a stroke in 1994.

Which famous woman, in concert with her team at Burroughs-Wellcome Pharaceutical Company, synthesized 6-mercaptopurine and 6-thioguanine (2 anti-leukemia {drugs);} allopurinol (for the treatment of {gout);} and acyclovir (for the treatment of herpes virus diseases)?

Gertrude Elion. She was born in 1918, entered Hunter College at age 15 and graduated Summa Cum Laude, In 1944 she joined Bulloughs-Wellcome(Now Glaxo) and quickly synthesized the two anti-leukemia drugs. She then discovered 'Imuran' which blocked the body's rejection of foreign tissues. Imuran plus other drugs enabled the successful transplant of kidneys from unrelated donors, without rejection. During her lifetime she received 25 doctorate degrees from different Universities. In 1988 Gertrude Elion shared the Nobel Prize for Medicine or Physiology with George Hitchings, her colleague of 40 years, and with Sir James Black.

What is the name of the world famous, Albanian-born, Catholic nun, who trained in Dublin, Ireland and Darjeelig, India and founded the 'Missionaries of Charity' organization?

Mother Teresa. Mother Teresa was born in 1910 and christened Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhin. She joined the Order of the Sisters of our Lady of Loretto in Ireland at 18 years of age. In 1937, while in India, she took her religious vows. She then dedicated her life to caring for the unwanted people of her community, those who were sick, crippled or dying. In 1952 she opened the Nirmal Hriday (Pure Heart) Home for the dying. She extended her efforts to five continents.She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979. On September 5, 1997 she died at age 87 years.

Which highly motivated woman dedicated her time, efforts and career to banning and clearing anti-personnel land mines?

Jody Williams. Jody Williams was working at a temporary job in Washington, DC. in 1981 when she was handed a leaflet that described the major problem of undetonated or defused world-wide anti-personnel land mines. This changed her from a lower level office worker to a global human rights activist. Working with Veterans Organizations and many others she recognized that 'When the war is over, the dying from land mines doesn't stop'. The huge number of land mines left behind by the military forces were killing and maiming thousands of civilians returning to their homelands. Together with Shawn Roberts she co-authored the book. 'After the Guns Fall Silent: The Enduring Legacy of Landmines'. In 1992 she led an international movement that created 'The International Campaign to Ban Landmines'. She personally travelled to war torn countries and risked her own life in mine fields. She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997.

Which famous, highly honored woman, whose first language was Chinese, wrote 'East Wind, West Wind' as her first novel in 1925, which started her on a very successful writing career?

Pearl Buck. Pearl Comfort Sydenstricker was born in West Virginia in 1892 the 4th of seven daughters of two Presbyterian missionaries. After her birth the family returned to Chinkiang, China. Pearl returned to the United States in 1910 and graduated Phi Betta Kappa from Randolph-Macon Woman's College, Lynchburg, Virginia. She returned to China and in 1917 she married John Lossing Buck. Her only child, a daughter, was severely disbled by a genetic disorder and the marriage ended in divorce. Once again she returned to the U.S. to study at Cornell University. She wrote more than 100 books or articles but probably her most well-known book is 'The Good Earth'. She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1938. She had married Richard Day and they adopted six children. They lived at his Country Farm home and she continued writing until her death in 1973.

Which German-Swedish woman initially wrote romantic poems but then her writings changed to a Jewish theme, inspired by the tragedies of Jewish history?

Nelly L. Sachs. Nelly Leonine Sachs was born in Berlin, Germany in 1891. With the rising threat of Nazism she moved to Sweden in 1940, One of her great collections was entitled: 'O The Chimneys', which included the play, 'Eli'. She shared the 1966 Nobel Prize in Literature with Israel writer Shmuel Yosef Agnon.

Which famous Italian-American woman was affiliated with the Institute of Cell Biology, Rome, Italy and made a major contribution to the understanding of the action of human growth hormone on peripheral nervous tissue?

Rita Levi-Montalcini. Rita Levi-Montalcini was born in Turin, Italy in 1901. She was educated in the University of Turin Medical School. She majored in biology and studied the actions of human growth hormone. In 1986 she shared the Nobel Prize in Medicine or Physiology with her student, Stanley Cohen. She moved to the United states in 1947 and became a citizen of the U.S. in 1956.

Which Northern Irish-British woman was co-founder of an organization now known as, 'The Community Peace People'?

Betty Williams. Betty Williams was born in 1948 in Northern Ireland, U.K. Mrs. Betty Williams, Cravan McKeown and Miss Mairead Corrigan were the founders of the 'Northern Ireland Peace Movement' (renamed The Community of Peace People) She was awarded the the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize. Ironically, in 1977 she was fined {$} 55.00 for disorderly conduct at the Heathrow Airport, London, England.

Which famous woman, in partnership with Dr. Solomon Berson, developed a new analytical methodology called, 'Radioimmunoassay' and among other discoveries showed that in some adult diabetic patients, insulin was being blocked by the person's own immune system?

Rosalyn Sussman Yallow. Rosalyn Sussman was born in the Bronx, NY in 1921 of poor uneducated Jewish parents. She graduated from Hunter College with honors in physics and chemistry. Being Jewish and a woman she was unable to obtain admission to a medical school or get a scholarship from Purdue University. She took a job as teaching assistant in physics at the University of Illinois. In 1943 she married A. Aaron Yallow, a fellow physics student. From 1946 to 1950 she taught physics at Hunter College. Her unusual abilities were soon recognized and she went from an assistant in radioactive services to Head of the RIA laboratory to Research Professor at Mt. Sinai Hospital. She was the first woman to be awarded the prestigious Albert Lasker Prize. She became a Nobel Laureate in Medicine or Physiology in 1977.

What Nobel Prize category was the last to include a woman recipient?

Economics & Economic Science. Mathematics and Psychology are not Nobel Prize categories. The category of Economics was added in 1968 and there were no women Nobel Prize recipients in Economics until Elinor Ostrom won in 2009.

How many women have been named as a Nobel Laureate from the beginning in 1901 through the year 1999?

29. The Nobel Prize has been awarded to two (2) women in {Physics;} three (3) women in {Chemistry;} nine (9) women in {Literature;} six (6) women in Medicine or Physiology and ten (10) women in Peace. That adds up to {30;} but, Marie Curie is in two categories, Therefore, only 29 different women have received the Nobel Prize and many of those were shared with a man.

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1906

Camillo Golgi

Santiago Ramón y Cajal

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1906 was awarded jointly to Camillo Golgi and Santiago Ramón y Cajal "in recognition of their work on the structure of the nervous system"

Interesting facts about inventions

Before invention of the thermometer, brewers used to check the temperature by dipping their thumb, to find whether appropriate for adding Yeast. Too hot, the yeast would die. This is where we get the phrase " The Rule of the Thumb".

Sliced bread was patented by a jeweller, Otto Rohwedder, in 1928. He had been working on it for 16 years, having started in 1912.

Joseph Niepce developed the world's first photographic image in 1827. Thomas Edison and W K L Dickson introduced the film camera in 1894. But the first projection of an image on a screen was made by a German priest. In 1646, Athanasius Kircher used a candle or oil lamp to project hand-painted images onto a white screen.


Interesting Facts is that The Sumerians invented writing.

The Sumerians, who lived in the Middle East, invented the wheel in about 3450 BC.

Karl Benz invented the first gas powered car. The car had only three wheels. The first car with four wheels was made in France in 1901 by Panhard et LeVassor.

JOSEPH RECHENDORFER was the first person to think of putting a piece of rubber onto the top of a pencil which makes it real easy to rub out mistakes.

Chess (Shataranja or AshtaPada) was invented in India.


Interesting Facts is that India invented the Number System. Zero was invented by Aryabhatta.

Bulletproof vests, fire escapes, windshield wipers, and laserbprinters,all were invented by women.

In Scotland, a new game was invented. It was entitled Gentlemen Only Ladies Forbidden.... and thus the word GOLF entered into the English language.

The first rocket was invented by the Chinese in the 13th century.

False eyelashes were invented by the American film director D.W. Griffith while he was making his 1916 epic, "Intolerance". Griffith wanted actress Seena Owen to have lashes that brushed her cheeks, to make her eyes shine larger than life. A wigmaker wove human hair through fine gauze, which was then gummed to Owen's eyelids. "Intolerance" was critically acclaimed but flopped financially, leaving Griffith with huge debts that he might have been able to settle easily - had he only thought to patent the eyelashes.

Shakespeare invented the word "assassination" and "bump."

The fortune cookie was invented in 1916 by George Jung, a Los Angeles noodlemaker.

Mr. Peanut was invented in 1916 by a Suffolk, Virginia schoolchild who won $5 in a design contest sponsored by Planters Peanuts.

Everyone thinks it was Whitcomb Judson who invented the zipper but it was really Elias Howe. Elias was so busy inventing the sewing machine that he didn't get around to selling his zipper invention which he called a "clothing closure".


Interesting Facts is that The oiuja board was invented by Isaac and William Fuld, and was patented July 1, 1892.

The hamburger was invented in 1900 by Louis Lassen. He ground beef, broiled it, and served it between two pieces of toast.

In 2003, scientists managed to create a material dense enough to stop light mid-way through it, allowing them to observe static light.

The Can opener wasn't invented until 48 years after the can.

Nobel Prize resulted from a late change in the will of Alfred Nobel, who did not want to be remembered as a propagator of violence-he invented dynamite.

Diet Coke was only invented in 1982.

Dry cereal for breakfast was invented by John Henry Kellogg at the turn of the century Inventor Samuel Colt patented his revolver in 1836.

The bagpipe was originally made from the whole skin of a dead sheep.

TRANSISTOR...Invention

Fascinating facts about the invention of Transistors by John Bardeen, Walter Brattain, and William Shockley in 1947. TRANSISTOR
Almost every piece of equipment that stores, transmits, displays, or manipulates information has at its core silicon chips filled with electronic circuitry. These chips each house many thousands or even millions of transistors. The history of the transistor begins with the dramatic scientific discoveries of the 1800's scientists like Maxwell, Hertz, Faraday, and Edison made it possible to harness electricity for human uses. Inventors like Braun, Marconi, Fleming, and DeForest applied this knowledge in the development of useful electrical devices like radio.
Their work set the stage for the Bell Labs scientists whose challenge was to use this knowledge to make practical and useful electronic devices for communications. Teams of Bell Labs scientists, such as Shockley, Brattain, Bardeen, and many others met the challenge.--and invented the information age. They stood on the shoulders of the great inventors of the 19th century to produce the greatest invention of the our time: the transistor. The transistor was invented in 1947 at Bell Telephone Laboratories by a team led by physicists John Bardeen, Walter Brattain, and William Shockley. At first, the computer was not high on the list of potential applications for this tiny device. This is not surprising—when the first computers were built in the 1940s and 1950s, few scientists saw in them the seeds of a technology that would in a few decades come to permeate almost every sphere of human life. Before the digital explosion, transistors were a vital part of improvements in existing analog systems, such as radios and stereos. When it was placed in computers, however, the transistor became an integral part of the technology boom. They are also capable of being mass-produced by the millions on a sliver of silicon—the semiconductor chip. It is this almost boundless ability to integrate transistors onto chips that has fueled the information age. Today these chips are not just a part of computers. They are also important in devices as diverse as video cameras, cellular phones, copy machines, jumbo jets, modern automobiles, manufacturing equipment, electronic scoreboards, and video games. Without the transistor there would be no Internet and no space travel. In the years following its creation, the transistor gradually replaced the bulky, fragile vacuum tubes that had been used to amplify and switch signals. The transistor became the building block for all modern electronics and the foundation for microchip and computer technology.

Fascinating facts about Ernst Alexanderson inventor of the Alexanderson alternator in 1909.

Fascinating facts about Ernst Alexanderson inventor of the Alexanderson alternator in 1909.	Ernst Alexanderson
AT A GLANCE: Electrical engineer and inventor Ernst Fredrick Werner Alexanderson developed pioneering technological concepts during the early 20th century that contributed to the birth of the broadcasting industry. Alexanderson's numerous discoveries formed the basis for the technology that would make the transmission of voice, music, and pictures possible; his more than 340 patents and affiliations with some of the world's foremost scientists and business executives made him a central figure in the early years of broadcasting and earned him a place on the list of the most prolific U.S.-based inventors of all time. He designed the Alexanderson alternator, a high-frequency generator for longwave transmission, which made modulated (voice) radio broadcasts practical. Source: Inventor of the Week Inventor: Ernst Fredrick Werner Alexanderson Criteria: First to invent. First to patent. First practical. Birth: January 25, 1878 in Uppsala, Sweden Death: May 14, 1975 in Schenectady, New York Nationality: Swedish Invention: Alexanderson alternator Function: noun / alternator named after its inventor Definition: A rotating machine for the generation of high frequency alternating current up to 100 kHz, for the purpose of radio communication. Patent: 1,008,577 (US)  issued, November 14, 1911

Female Nobel Laureates in Physiology or Medicine

Female Nobel Laureates in Physiology or Medicine

Of the 196 individuals awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, only ten are women. Of these eight, Barabara McClintock is the only one who has received an unshared Nobel Prize.
1947 - Gerty Cori
1977 - Rosalyn Yalow
1983 - Barbara McClintock
1986 - Rita Levi-Montalcini
1988 - Gertrude B. Elion
1995 - Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard
2004 - Linda B. Buck
2008 - Françoise Barré-Sinoussi
2009 - Elizabeth H. Blackburn and Carol W. Greider

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1905

Robert Koch

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1905 was awarded to Robert Koch "for his investigations and discoveries in relation to tuberculosis".

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1904

Ivan Petrovich Pavlov

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1904 was awarded to Ivan Pavlov "in recognition of his work on the physiology of digestion, through which knowledge on vital aspects of the subject has been transformed and enlarged".