Engineers- RSS Feeds from EVilliage 2!

With your CSULB ID and Library Pin, you have access to EVilliage 2 which provides access to over 5000 engineering journals!

EVilliage also allows you to set up RSS feeds of any search you want, so your feed reader (such as My Yahoo or Pluck) will be updated weekly with new articles that fit your search!

Read Engineering Village 2 - Help to learn more about EVilliage RSS feeds.

PS You can also read this blog in your RSS reader, use this URL: http://www.csulb.edu/~coutten/scifeed.xml

Ever wanted to time travel? Maybe you can!

Read:
Remembrance of Things Future: The Mystery of Time - New York Times
Visit:
NOVA Online - Time Travel
Howstuffworks - Time Travel
And even donate to future civilizations in hopes that they will come back to retrieve you!
Time Travel Fund (This should not be taken as an endorsement, or even encouragement, to give this website money! Just something fun to look at!)

ASEE Conference Blog

Didn't make it to the Amercian Society of Engineering Educators conference in Portland? You can read the blog at http://www.asee.org/blog/index.cfm.

Now is the time to request materials for Fall semester!

Now is the perfect time for you to contact your librarian about materials you need or want for your Fall classes. Materials such as books, videos, etc, can be purchased, and made available to ALL of your students through our E-Reserves. Contact Cathy for more information on Science, Math and Engineering materials.

Is Alaska Melting?

In the New York Times: The Race to Alaska Before It Melts - New York Times
Visitors to Alaska are finding less and less when they get there, less glaciers that is. Global warming? Keep up to date on global warming news at http://www.globalwarm.com/

Open Access journal in Computational Biology

The Public Library of Science (PLoS) announced its latest open access (free, peer-reviewed) journal entitled, PLoS Computational Biology.

"What motivates us to start a new journal at this time? Computation, driven in part by the influx of large amounts of data at all biological scales, has become a central feature of research and discovery in the life sciences," said the founding editors including Philip E. Bourne, a professor in the Department of Parmacology at the University of California San Diego.

Tip: Sign-up to receive e-mail notice of new articles and issues.

Why pay if you can get it for free?

Tech Support Alert has published the 46 Best-ever Freeware Utilities. Includes best free browser, best free anti-virus software, best free adware/spyware/scumware remover, best free firewall, best free software suite and much more.

San Diego State University Detects Fires

"Researchers at San Diego State University are leading a $1.2 million project at SDSU’s Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve to test an early warning fire sensor network they say has the potential to significantly improve wildfire detection and response in San Diego and other high-risk communities." Read more.

Experience Mars

For the young, or young at heart, the Discovery Science Center in Santa Ana has a new exhibit, Space: Next Stop Mars from now until September 11th. Explore hands-on astronaut suits, a life size replica of the Mars rovers, planetary landscapes, Mars in 3D and much more.

Solar Spacecraft Crashes

The Cosmos 1, set to be the first solar sail spacecraft, seems to have crashed minutes after take off due to apparent booster rocket failure.
Read about it from Reuters

Opting Out in the Debate on Evolution - New York Times

The debate continues on...

Opting Out in the Debate on Evolution - New York Times

See these sites (mentioned in the article) for evolution facts:

http://www.aaas.org/

http://nationalacademies.org/evolution/

Solar Sailing

On Tuesday (June 21st), the Cosmos 1 spacecraft (FAQs) will be launched using a rocket from a Russian submarine in the Barents Sea. Once in space, it will open a bank of 49-foot Mylar sails and will be relying on light (photons) reflecting off the sails to power its movement. This project was developed by non-governmental organization, The Planetary Society. Read about viewing the Comos 1 as it orbits Earth.

Visit the real Madagascar

Have you seen the Dreamworks movie Madagascar? Take a Virtual Tour of Madagascar from Conservation International. Learn about lemurs, plants, animals and the Malagasy people. Also play Lemur Match.

Did you feel it, again?

Another earthquake struck Southern California at about 1:53pm. It has a preliminary magnitude 5.3 and is centered near Yucaipa, CA. It is the third significant earthquake since Sunday.
Check out Earthquakes from USGS-Caltech Seismic Net
You can also report your account.

SDSU chemistry lab used to produce meth

A chemistry graduate student, with a troubled past, was arrested after a joint DEA and San Diego State University police investigation for using a campus chemistry lab to make methamphetamine, Ecstasy and a powerful anesthetic.
read about it in the San Diego Union-Tribune

Modeling the Brain?

Researchers from IBM and the EPFL in Switzerland announced they would begin building a simulation of the neocortical column of the human brain on the Blue Gene/L IBM supercomputer. The neocortical column contains over 10,000 nerve cells and makes up "grey matter." The computer "consists of enough independent processors for each to be programmed to emulate an individual nerve."
read more in the June 9th issue of the Economist

Are your students using the best resources available?

Would you like your students to use the the best resources available for your assignments? Bring your class to the library for a specialized library instruction session. Believe it or not, professors are already signing up for Fall classes.

So as you plan your syllabus for Fall, be sure to include a session of library instruction.

To reserve your session use this form, or contact the science librarian.

Engineering Case Studies for education

Ever needed an example for class? Try Engineering Cases for real-world case studies! "This is a collection of information on engineering cases. These are accounts of real engineering projects that are written for use in engineering education. The accounts are not highly technical, and are quite readable by those with the appropriate interest."
It has a catalog of cases-obtained by writing to the Center. Most helpful are information about writing Engineering Case Studies and how to to use the effectively in the classroom.
Also see our Case Studies, Ethics, Disasters & Failures Research Guide.

Updating Computer Science Education

In the June 2005 issue of "Communications of the ACM," Jacques Cohen, professor at Brandeis University gives his viewpoint for updating CS education.

• "I urge CS educators to help prepare their students to manipulate huge amounts of data and make sure they gain experience in using, modifying, and combining complex programs available on the web."
• "CS educators should thus consider the following recommendations: scripting capabilities, data volume, complexity of algorithms, and probability and statistics."
• "The general tendency toward outsourcing has a significant effect on how CS educators should prepare their students."

To read the full article go to ACM Digital Library and type "Updating computer science education" in the top search box.

Did you feel it?

The magnitude 5.6 Anza Eathquake occurred at 8:41am on Sunday June 12, 2005 with an epicenter about 20 miles south of Palm Spring, CA. Learn more about it from the Southern California Seismic Network or check the Index Map of Recent Earthquakes from the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program.

Fireworks from NASA on July 4th

NASA announced that the Deep Impact spacecraft will be sending a 1-meter-wide impactor to hit the Tempel 1 comet on July 4th. "The potentially spectacular collision will be observed by the Deep Impact spacecraft, and ground and space-based observatories."
Check out the encounter animation and video simulation.

Geographic Distribution of Major Hazards in the US

The USGS has created a, "set of six maps...to emphasize areas in the contiguous 48 states where there is a relatively high risk...of four hazards (floods, earthquakes, landslides and volcanic eruptions)...plus hurricanes and tornadoes." There is also an animation of all maps together.

Large quake predicted again for Indonesia

A researcher from the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland predicts more earthquakes to follow the devastating magnitude 9.1 earthquake in December of 2004 and the magnitude 8.7 earthquake in March 2005. The researchers found the stress levels have not decreased after these earlier earthquakes. (read about it from National Geographic)

Academic Press Journals

Did you know the CSULB library has access to Academic Press journals through ScienceDirect? At least the last five years of each journal should be available full-text.

They can be accessed through ScienceDirect.

Go here: ScienceDirect - Academic Press Journals to see a list of available journals.

If that link doesn't work (it may only work on campus computers), just enter ScienceDirect (Click Here) , and search for the journal title you are interested in.

Designing for the Virtual Interactive Classroom

This article from Campus Technology discusses current projects and software offerings for three main types of higher education online collaboration: small group meetings (fewer than 10), interactive class meetings (fewer than 100), and large class meetings. It also quotes a survey from the Sloan Consortium that says, "a majority of academic leaders believe that online learning quality is already equal to or superior to face-to-face instruction."
What do you think?