Thursday, June 30, 2005

Win cool stuff for your school!

Hey, educators! Show that you can “Teach in Motion” by entering this snazzy contest. All you have to do is create a 2-minute video showing how NEC video projectors would help your classroom or school.
Get an entry form right here!

By Adrienna

Monday, June 27, 2005

ICCSA / IADC / DMRB / DDoPS-05

National University is hosting the 2005 conferences for ICCSA, IADC, DMRB, & DDoPS from today through June 30. This morning there were welcome addresses delivered by Dr. Howard Evans, Dean of SOET, and Dr. A. Cathleen Greiner, Provost and Vice-President, Academic Affairs, National University.

The keynote address Enterprise Architecture at the Walt Disney Company was delivered by Steven P. Davis, Vice-President of IT, Walt Disney Studios.

Today’s panel discussions were on Development and Deployment of Product Software, New Trends in Wireless Communications, and Challenges in Software Architecture.

Friday, June 24, 2005

Ed Guiles and Christine Kehoe


Ed Guiles, Chairman & CEO, SDG&E pictured with The Hon. Christine Kehoe, California State Senator, District 39, immediately following the ribbon cutting ceremony.
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Solar Shades


Savy Hak, of Asia Media (Left) and Jesse of Kyocera pictured standing under the shade of the Solar Grove prior to the Grand Opening.
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Green Power: The Solar Grove

Kyocera hosted the grand opening of their “Solar Grove” in Kearney Mesa today. The “grove” (Imagine a large car port) is actually an array of 25 “solar trees” generating 220 kilowatts of electric power that feeds directly into the SDG&E power grid serving Kyocera. A total of 1,400 solar photovoltaic modules and 200 custom “skylight” designed modules generate 421,000 kilowatt hours or enough power to service the needs of 68 average San Diego homes. Although the Solar Grove is a very green form of energy it remains fairly pricey. After taking into consideration the Public Utilities Commission’s “Self Generation Incentive Program,” which covered 36% of the system’s purchase and installation costs; plus federal and state tax credits and a 5 year accelerated depreciation it will still take over 12 years to recover the costs.

Adriana Alcaraz, KSWB News at Ten anchor acted as emcee for the ceremony. Also on the podium were Rod Lanthorne, President of Kyocera International, Inc.; Ike Yukawa, Managing Executive Officer of Kyocera Corp.; The Hon. Christine Kehoe, California State Senator; Tom Blair, Deputy Director, Energy Conservation & Management for the City of San Diego; Ed Guiles, Chairman & CEO of SDG&E; and Bob Noble, CEO, Design Principal of Tucker Sadler Architects.

Dr. Howard Evans, Dean of the School of Engineering and Technology for National University and I spoke with Ed Guiles and Rod Lanthorne and met many other new faces including Christine Kehoe. Jeff Calabro, National Sales Manager-Grid Tie for Kyocera was most informative. Savy Hak, with Asia: The Journal of Culture Commerce was also interesting to speak with.

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger sent his warm greetings via a letter and The City of San Diego has proclaimed June 24, 2005, to be “Kyocera Solar Grove Day.”

Part of the festivities included a ride on a Solar Grove charged Segway.

The $11 billion Kyocera Corporation (NYSE: KYO) is a leading supplier of solar energy systems, telecommunications equipment, semiconductors packages, electronic components, laser printers, copiers and industrial ceramics.

I must say they have come a long way from making ceramic knives.

Thursday, June 23, 2005

The Chaos Game: Play It

http://tomcat.gdickinson.com/fractals/

This particular design is named after a Polish mathematician, Waclaw Sierpinski, who described various properties of this pattern in 1916.In this demonstration you are able to choose where to place the three vertices, labeled X, Y, and Z. You also choose where to place the starting point, or seed, anywhere inside or outside of the triangle that you wish. For a speedy demonstration the computer then randomly selects which of the three vertices to work with and draws an imaginary line from the seed point you started with to the randomly selected vertices and places a dot at the midpoint of this line. The dot becomes the next starting point or seed. The computer then randomly selects the next vertices, draws a line, and places a dot at the midpoint. The computer completes this process for many thousands of iterations to achieve the triangle but if you follow this same procedure by hand you will get a similar result. As you are beginning to realize, the elegant order of Sierpinski's Triangle is, in this construction, fundamentally dependent on randomness; the randomness that plays a central role in our experience of the universe.

Wednesday, June 22, 2005

Molecular Sieves

Yesterday I came across molecular sieve zeolites and did a bit of research on them. Zeolites are crystalline aluminosilicates with fully cross-linked open framework structures made up of corner-sharing SiO4 and AlO4 tetrahedra often used as industrial pollution control processes. The name zeolite comes from the Greek words Zeo (to boil) and Lithos (stone). Molecular sieve zeolotes can be designed and synthesized using templates into various sizes according to shape, reactant shape, product shape or transition-state selectivity. The most important application of molecular sieves is as catalysts. I wondered if molecular sieves could be used as an emergency containment system for absorbing CBR (Chemical, Biological, Radiation) materials. From what I could find the answer is….they can probably be useful in absorbing CBR discharges from weapons. Zeolites can also be used to deliver water, fertilizer, herbicides, and act as nano-sensors for soil quality and plant monitoring.

Thursday, June 16, 2005

Jerry Sanders for Mayor of San Diego

Last night my wife and I had the privilege of meeting San Diego Mayoral candidate, Jerry Sanders, at a fund raiser held in his behalf at the home of Chancellor Lee, the head of the National University System. After being introduced by Chancellor Lee, Mr. Sanders gave a brief summary of his career, and then offered his vision of the future of San Diego. Mr. Sanders clearly identified the need for “structural change” in order that San Diego can support a healthy, safe, and prosperous future. San Diego needs your help to support the efforts of Mr. Sanders in his bid for mayor and the best way to help is for each individual to give the maximum allowable by law of $300.00. All information necessary can be found at: http://jerrysandersformayor.com .

Let’s make San Diego the perfect place to live….register and vote for Jerry Sanders for Mayor on July 26th.

Monday, June 06, 2005


CEO San Diego/Imperial Counties Chapter of the Red Cross and Retired Rear Admiral Veronica (Ronne) Froman with Dr. Howard Evans.
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Rear Admiral Veronica (Ronne) Froman

Today, Dr. Evans and I had a delightful lunch with Retired Admiral Ronne Froman at La Vache, a French Bistro near the Red Cross office where Ronne currently serves as the CEO of the San Diego / Imperial Counties Chapter. During lunch Dr. Evans summarized his professional background at IBM and 3M prior to becoming the Dean of SOET. Ronne told us that IBM inadvertently caused her to enter the Navy. After graduating from college and during an interview, an IBM recruiter told Ronne that she had no experience and then asked what her plans were now that she would not be getting a position with IBM? Ronne replied, “I am going to join the navy.” Admiral Froman’s story is a fascinating portrayal of a woman making it to the top of a male dominated environment armed with her wits and will. Thank you Ronne for all your service to this country!

Saturday, June 04, 2005

JPS

This morning I enjoyed another outstanding conversation with Jean-Philippe, the owner of Jean-Philippe Salon, while he re-engineered my hair. For some it might be just a haircut but with Jean-Philippe it becomes an experience as his artful scissors controlled by skillful hands sculpt my hair. During this occasion, as with most, we talk about various issues from M-theory to politics. Today we discussed blogs and I promised that I would mention him in a post.