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By Alice Rawsthorn
May 20, 2012
When their prototype cooking stove passed its first trial with flying colors in Ghana, the American designers Jonathan Cedar and Alex Drummond expected it to be equally successful in the next round of tests in India. But then they discovered that very different types of food would be cooked on it.
“The staple dish in Ghana is banku, a starchy mass of corn or cassava dough, and luckily it suited our stove,” Mr. Cedar recalled. “Where we got stuck in India was with flat breads, which need a very hot, very diffuse flame. When people saw the stove, they were like: ‘Oh no, no, no.’”
There was a simple solution: designing different tops for the stove to suit the cooking requirements of various regions. But other problems have proved less tractable … Mr. Cedar and Mr. Drummond started to develop a zero-emissions wood-burning stove, initially to be used for camping, five years ago when they were employed by Smart Design, a New York design consultancy. They worked on it in their spare time, although Smart allowed them to use its resources. Not until they entered their design in a “clean stove” competition, which it won, did they realize that it could be adapted for use in off-grid communities in developing countries, where it would have far greater impact.
The technological key to their design is a thermoelectric device, which converts the heat produced by burning wood or other organic fuel into electricity. Most of the electricity powers a fan that makes the stove more efficient, thereby saving fuel. The rest can be used to charge portable devices like cellphones and L.E.D. lights. Typically, it takes 20 minutes of charging to produce an hour of talking time on a phone.
“You are not the boss of me, and you can’t tell me not to wear nail polish.”
Downton Abbey Television References (Part 1)
(Source: chasethememories)
286 notes (via ephemeralness & chasethememories)
The Wallflowers “One Headlight” from Bringing Down The Horse (1996)
48 notes (via allrightfine & benriddell)
Sara Bareilles - Stay
Once Upon Another Time - EP (2012)
14 notes (via wiigipedia & feysus)
![World’s Subways Converging on Ideal Form | Wired Science | Wired.comBy Brandon KeirnMay 15, 2012
After decades of urban evolution, the world’s major subway systems appear to be converging on an ideal form … [Statistical physicist Marc] Barthelemy and National Center for Scientific Research complex systems analyst Camille Roth focused a network analysis lens on the aforementioned cities’ subways, along with Barcelona, Beijing, Berlin, Chicago, Madrid, Mexico, Moscow, Osaka, Paris, Seoul and Tokyo … Patterns emerged: The core-and-branch topology, of course, and patterns more fine-grained. Roughly half the stations in any subway will be found on its outer branches rather than the core. The distance from a city’s center to its farthest terminus station is twice the diameter of the subway system’s core. This happens again and again.
“Many other shapes could be expected, such as a regular lattice,” said Barthelemy. “What we find surprising is that all these different cities, on different continents, with different histories and geographical constraints, lead finally to the same structure.”
Subway systems seem to gravitate towards these ratios organically, through a combination of planning, expedience, circumstance and socioeconomic fluctuation, say the researchers … The convergence “is a sign that there are some basic, profound mechanisms that drive the development of urban systems,” said Barthelemy.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m4hckvYqGV1qzok36o1_500.jpg)
World’s Subways Converging on Ideal Form | Wired Science | Wired.com
By Brandon Keirn
May 15, 2012
After decades of urban evolution, the world’s major subway systems appear to be converging on an ideal form … [Statistical physicist Marc] Barthelemy and National Center for Scientific Research complex systems analyst Camille Roth focused a network analysis lens on the aforementioned cities’ subways, along with Barcelona, Beijing, Berlin, Chicago, Madrid, Mexico, Moscow, Osaka, Paris, Seoul and Tokyo … Patterns emerged: The core-and-branch topology, of course, and patterns more fine-grained. Roughly half the stations in any subway will be found on its outer branches rather than the core. The distance from a city’s center to its farthest terminus station is twice the diameter of the subway system’s core. This happens again and again.
“Many other shapes could be expected, such as a regular lattice,” said Barthelemy. “What we find surprising is that all these different cities, on different continents, with different histories and geographical constraints, lead finally to the same structure.”
Subway systems seem to gravitate towards these ratios organically, through a combination of planning, expedience, circumstance and socioeconomic fluctuation, say the researchers … The convergence “is a sign that there are some basic, profound mechanisms that drive the development of urban systems,” said Barthelemy.
Continuing our series celebrating National Short Story Month, my pick is The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis.
Rick Moody once called Lydia Davis “The best prose stylist in America.” Dave Eggers says Davis “Blows the roof off of so many of our assumptions about what constitutes short fiction.” What I love about Lydia Davis’s writing is her ability to pack a punch in a few sentences. Her stories are concise but never frivolous. Her observations, subtle, are often unsettling and her wit, sharp. This collection is perfect for a commute to work, those moments in between, or a gloomy Sunday on the couch.
The Thirteenth Woman
In a town of twelve women there was a thirteenth. No one admitted she lived there, no mail came for her, no one spoke of her, no one asked after her, no one sold bread to her, no one bought anything from her, no one returned her glance, no one knocked on her door; the rain did not fall on her, the sun never shone on her, the day never dawned on her, the night never fell for her; for her the weeks did not pass, the years did not roll by; her house was unnumbered, her garden untended, her path not trod upon, her bed not slept in, her food not eaten, her clothes not worn; and yet in spite of all this she continued to live in the town without resenting what it did to her.
The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis, pg. 155 (Picador 2010)
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