Fall Color in Cambridge Cemetery [General]

Cambridge Cemetery is located right on cross street of my apartment. Everyday I passed by the park but never though about going in. Today when I drove by, I was attracted by its beautiful fall color. I decided to go in and take a look.

Today's weather is very bad (it's a big storm and very windy). But it's getting quiet close to the sunset. The park is very quiet. The good thing is that you can drive freely in the park.

It's hard to believe that I can find this beautiful fall color so close to my place!

Weiwei posted @ 17:21:05 || Cambridge, MA || Comments (0)

Scallop Diving in Cape Ann [    ]

There is scallop diving at the end of the October - the season to harvest scallops. This is the first I join the trip. In the past, I was always scared of the cold weather.But there is no exception this year. The weather is pretty cold today. But the worst is the wind - it's reported that the wind gust can reach 40 mph.

I am thinking this is probably the last diving of the season. It's been a while since my last dive. I have to admit that I don't look sharp. First of all, I gained a lot of weight (I am taking action to stop it), which makes my wetsuit really really tight. I felt choked when I got into water. Moreover, I forgot to turn on the computer. I had both of my diving computers but neither of them worked. Fortunately they were both working in my second dive. Well even though I believe i am experienced, good preparation is still a must!

The diving is great! There are lots of scallop down there. To me the most important experience is that now I know scallop and of course how to shovel it!

Weiwei posted @ 15:11:48 || Cambridge, MA || Comments (0)

Forever Young [General]

Weiwei posted @ 08:44:27 || Cambridge, MA || Comments (0)

Life Through Time - Frans Lanting [Photography]

I came across the website of Frans Lanting's new exhibition - Life, a Journey Through Time.

Mr. Lanting is one of my favorite phographers. His pictures, all about nature and wildlife, always deliver unsual impact. There is cool photoslide show in the new exhibition. Check it out!

Weiwei posted @ 19:52:25 || Cambridge, MA || Comments (0)

Surface Science in NOVA [General]

I watched the story The Viking Deception on NOVA. The story is about a map at Yale showing that Viking people found Vinland before Columbus's voyage. More and more evidence, however, points to the fact that the map is a 20th-century fake. Among all the scientific debates, the most important evidence was provided by surface scientists.

The challenge is to analyze the composition of the ink on the map. If it has anatase, one composit in modern ink, then the map is most likely fake. The scientists used Raman spectroscopy. The laser incidents the map in a glancing angle and the spectra gave the composition of different areas on the map. There is anatase only presented in the ink but not the paper.

I just found it's very interesting that I could see some applications of surface science in this way. You can find more details of the story at NOVA.

Weiwei posted @ 11:09:59 || Cambridge, MA || Comments (0)

Seminar [Research Seminar]

    Stefan W. Hell
    Max Planck Institut
    4pm Octorber 12, 2006, Pfizer Lecture Hall

Research Interest
Dr./Prof. Hell made huge contribution to break the diffraction barrier through the so called reversible saturable optical fluorescence transitions. And most importantly, the concept was applied to Stimulated Emission Depletion (SED) and Ground State Depletion (GSD) microscopy, which have shown wide application in biophysical research. (more...)

Seminar Highlights
1. The basic concept of reversible saturable optical fluorescence transitions. And how important it is to break the diffraction barrier.
2. The huge improvement from SED and GSD on biophysics research - highly improved resolution.
3. The seminar gave an example that a new concept is applied to a technique and further improves our understanding of unknown world.

Related Resources
More about NanoBiophotonics

Weiwei posted @ 19:28:37 || Cambridge, MA || Comments (0)

Seminar [Research Seminar]

    Firtz B. Prinz
    Mechanical Engineering Department, Standford University
    1pm Octorber 12, 2006, Pierce Hall

Research Interest
Design and fabrication of micro and nanoscale devices for energy and biology. Examples include fuel cells and bioreactors. He is interested in mass transport phenomena across thin membranes such as oxide films and lipid bi-layers. His research group studies electro-chemical phenomena with the help of Atomic Force Microscopy, Impedance Spectroscopy, and Quantum Modeling. (more...)

Seminar Highlights
1. Fuel cell technology and the impact to the energy shortage issues.
2. Solid oxide fuel cell - oxygen ions through membrane and vacancy conduction.
3. Fuel cell tech provides big variaty of choosing materials/oxides/dopant materials.
4. Bio-system has advantages of energy converstion(mitochondria, chloroplast, thylakoid membrane). Therefore coupling with these systems becomes interesting topics.

Related Resources
Global Climate & Energy Program at Stanford

Weiwei posted @ 08:32:13 || Cambridge, MA || Comments (0)

An Update [General]

I haven't updated my journal for a while. Recently anything other than research stuff is not my main focus. I feel like there is a lot to do for my work and obviously taking pictures and diving are not the first priority right now.

Autumn is coming and it is almost one year since I came to Harvard. I think I did a lot of things in the past year and there is still a lot to do. Especially as a post-doc, time is terribly valuable.

But anyway, I should keep up with my jounal!

Weiwei posted @ 19:08:19 || Cambridge, MA || Comments (0)