TheMonthly Journal of The Indian Society for Technical Education

ISSUE 01 August 2011

this issue

P4. How two amateurs built an A-Bomb

P2.forget about glass houses, now

transparent ce-ment is the way...

P2. InFocus

How to

build your first Robot

3D

Printing

We believe in destiny.

A s we humbly start this venture, with the same passion of spirit that led

centuries of men knocking at the portals of Gyan, Vigyaan and

Pragyan, with unnerving hope that one day, each new inspiration, by inspiration,

we’ll take our campus, our society and ultimately our world to greater heights

of knowledge, awareness, skill, enterprise and development. With the debut

issue of oracle, we take our first infant steps towards our collective goal, with

confidence that one day the sparks of inspiration set alight from these pages shall

gather momentum, and energy to ignite the minds of one and many.

We Believe. ~ Editors, Amala Maheswari, Jibin Rajan Varghese

We believe in seeking the roots of our science.

When the world’s best minds come forth from the corners of the earth,

We believe in proclaiming their vision.

We share their delight, revel in their passion

and think alongside their thoughts.

New hopes… .

...new challenges.

...One undying spirit ISTE enters the new academ-ic year

…600+ participants

….5 papers of option….1 hour An epic journey to find the brightest new minds in campus ….7.5 K prize money en-dowed Abdul Kalam Scholarships!!!

Congratulations to our AKS

Winners

Govind R Thomas Mathew Parayil Archana Radhakrishnan

An engineer’s saga...

4 years>> Placements>> intern-ships>> GD’s>> GRE >> GATE >> CAT >> Civil Services >>….

Career workshop conducted

…a quarter year into the

making, we present to you..

Oracle

ISTE interviews our own

campus IAS Top Ranker

ISTE conducts mock GRE

Entrepreneurship workshop

in collaboration with NTA conducted

Techgroups to be launched

shortly after Tathva !!!

Please spare a moment to fill

our feedback form

P2.Robotics Tips P7.The man behind the Rank... Exclusive

interview

Gokul G.R. IASGokul G.R. IAS

“3D Printing”: a mission Impossible

I magine creating a solid 3D

object – a toy, a gift to your

buddy, the components and circuit

boards for your next cool project or

perhaps robot parts, with just a

mouse click! Well, this is not just an

impossible concept popped out in

Star Trek. Printing has acquired a

new dimension. With the Rapid

Prototyping/ 3D printing technolo-

gy, it is possible to transform a 3D

model from CAD software into a

real solid object by building up the

model layer by layer. With this, you

can simply run your own factory

and see your models materialize

right in front of your eyes! You

needn't go anywhere else to make

the stuffs you want.

In Rapid prototyping technology,

you first create a blueprint of the

3D object you want to make, in

CAD software. The interface

between the machine and the

software is the STL file format.

Converting the model to STL format

will transform it into a number of

thin horizontal slices which is then

fed to the prototyping machine.

This process of creating 3D objects

by laying successive layers of the

material is called additive manufac-

turing.

There are a large number of RP

technologies in use- Stereo

lithography, Fused Deposition

Modeling, Laminated Object

Manufacturing, Selective Laser

Sintering etc. Though these have

complex names they are all based

on the same theme, with variations

in the methods and materials used.

They build models out of different

materials like epoxy resins and

other polymers, ABS plastic,

plaster, paper and even metals.

The 3D printing technology spans

several industries and applications.

You can print a wide range of

consumer products, architectural

models, medical diagnostic

equipment, prosthetic limbs,

automotive materials and many

other complex parts. Other

applications include reconstructing

fossils, replicating ancient artifacts

etc. It is also being studied by

Biotech firms and academia for its

possible use in tissue engineering.

This technology has been around

for some 30 years. But it started

penetrating in India and other

Asian countries only recently.

What's more, 3D printing has gone

open source. One such open source

3D printer is the RepRap, devel-

oped by Adrian Bowyer at the

University Of Bath, UK. It is a self

replicating printer that spawns

new, improved versions of itself.

3D printing offers immense

possibilities. The ways in which

Rapid Prototyping technology could

change future manufacturing and

industrial engineering are amazing.

With 3D printing leaping forward,

you can imagine a future in which

there is a 3D printer in every home-

in the list of consumer's 'must

have' home gadgets.

Now the art of printing enters the third dimension...

@ Arun M, Suparna S Nair & Dileep R

ADDSPACE

>>

“TRANSPARENT CEMENT: forget about glass houses, now transparent cement is the way... @ Amala Maheswari

I n the general sense of the word

cement is a binder that sets and

hardens by itself. It is one of the

basic and essential materials in con-

struction. In a recent breakthrough

Italian architects have developed a new

transparent cement. It will enable

daylight to flood in and make the walls

appear like giant windows.

It was created by researches at Italce-

menti group, by bonding special resins

in a nex mix. The material called I. Light

has dozens of holes and thereby lets

light through. However it is very well

capable of retaining the structural

integrity.

On a sunny day it creates an effect

similar to light mesh filtering light

coming in. This has so far been used

only in one building, the Italian pavilion

at last years Expo in Shanghai.

It is believed that the usage of transpar-

ent cement could save considerable

amount of electricity that

would be required for

daytime lighting. Similar

effect is generated using

fibre optics cable through

concrete. However the

transparent cement made

from plastic resins is much

cheaper than one made

from optical fibres.

So friends, what's your

choice of concrete ??

Why build a robot? What are your motivations?

Do they look cool? Want to join a robotics contest

such as those in Tathva? Robotics can teach you

so much. Irrespective of your branch, you will

learn skills from electronics, mechanics, control,

programming, and even as broad as understand-

ing animal behavior and human psychology.

Following are tips from some of the experienced

pros (on and off campus)

The first robot is always the hardest. So

take KISS approach: Keep It Simple, Stupid!

Don't reinvent the wheel! Search the web for

how other people did things, and copy them!

It may be unoriginal, but on your first robot,

don't expect to develop the theory of

relativity on your first try.

Ok I am ready, what do I need to start?

Obviously the first is MONEY. Robots can get

expensive. Expect a decent budget of Rs. 5 to

6K, so form a group…(You may also approach

us @ ISTE)

The basic parts in a robot are: Body,

Microcontroller, Motors, Servos,

sensors and Wheels, Batteries etc.

Ok now you got all this stuff, but still no robot.

Now it is time to DESIGN, THEN BUILD, a robot

chassis. Every hour spent on design is one less

hour spent on construction.

This article is to be continued...

“Robotics”: tips

Tips on building your first robot

@ Jibin Rajan

Discussions: …our portal to discuss science

From now on, every issue of oracle will feature a scientific

discussion on topics, wherein the readers could send in their

views in not less than 50 words. The best entries will be

published. This time for instance we have taken a sample of

discussions from

www.absoluteastronomy.com/discussionpost/

Is_time_travel_possible_353 .htm

We're all time travelers, of course. We're all

traveling forward in time at the same rate - the question is-

is it possible to travel a lot faster or slower than this rate?

Theoretically it is possible by use of worm holes

in space , which are allowed by Einstein's theory of special

relativity...of course none have been found till now but once

upon a time black holes were ridiculed as science fantasy

hype

I think it is reasonable to assume that since we

have not been visited by time travelers from the future - time

travel will never be possible.

<you get to continue this discussion in the next issue guys>

The Google - ies

Wondering what this is all about?

You are seeing one of the first 3D generated world population

maps projected demographically onto the surface of the planet!

Powered by groundbreaking research into the new WEB, This

Google development app is an amazing presentation tool for

software developers, college students and researchers alike to

add some 3D spice to their presentations. Sources at Google

have confirmed that the source codes of the app have been

made available OPEN SOURCE for such purposes, as with other

open source offerings available from Google labs. Visit the above

website with Google ‘s Chrome browser for the complete

Web2.0 experience.

Googlies: http://data-arts.appspot.com/globe

EyeOnIt: What engineering students in India are doing now!!!

This is a good place to briefly, but

effectively, describe your product or

services..

ADSPACE!!!

Put ad here

Acyut Rocks on!!

Remember this crowd

puller of Tathva10??

It is impossible for any of

us to forget the humanoid

Acyut which enthralled us

during Tathva. Dancing to

the catchy tunes, Acyut

had become an overnight

star at NIT-C. It looks like Acyut has achieved a

lot more since Tathva10.

Humanoid Acyut4, developed by students

of BITS Pilani has won prizes at Robocup Iran

2011 and Robogames 2011. In the Robocup held

in Tehran from April 5 to 9 Acyut won a special

technical award. It grabbed silver medals both in

autonomous and non autonomous categories of

Robogames in San Francisco, conducted from

April 15 to 17. Robogames is the biggest

robotics competition in the world. Engineers

from 17 countries participate in around 50

events this year.

More achievements in the making: The BITS

Pilani team has successfully achieved a walking

algorithm that is close to human beings. The six-

axis inertial measurement unit is the technology

that helped in realizing this fete. It detects the

external forces the humanoid faces from the

environment and balance accordingly. Acyut

now runs on two microprocessors, giving it a

processing power of about 1.72GHz. One of the

microprocessors is used for processing image.

This helps the humanoid in detecting objects of

different shapes and colours. After processing

the surrounding environment the information is

passed on in the form of data packets to the

other microprocessor which decides on the

robotic movement.

@ Amala Maheswari

Kepler Mission: Quest for earth like planets. @ Amala Maheswari

Named after German astronomer Johannes

Kepler, Kepler mission was launched by NASA on

March 7, 2009. It has a mission lifetime of 3.5

years.

It is a space observatory designed to discover

Earth like planets orbiting other stars. It monitors

main sequence of stars (about 145000) in a fixed

field of view. The photometer attached takes

note of the periodic fluctuations in brightness of

these stars. This indicates the presence of planets

that cross the face of these stars. This is how the

study on extra solar planets is carried out.

Kepler 10b

Kepler 10b is the first rocky planet that was

discovered outside solar system. The discovery of

this planet is based on more than eight months of

data collected by Kepler spacecraft from May

2009 – Jan 2010. NASA said that as of now we

know little about the planet. Most of the

knowledge was gathered from he star it orbits

i.e., Kepler 10. The high frequency variation in the

star’s brightness generated by stellar oscillations

or star quakes was studied. Further analysis

shows that Kepler 10b is a rocky planet with a

mass 4.6 times that of earth with average density

of 8.8 grams per cc. However Kepler 10b is more

than 20 times closer to its star than mercury is to

our sun hence is not habitable.

Kepler is NASA’s 10th Discovery mission and is

funded by NASA Science Mission Directorate. It is

a mission under NASA’s Discovery Program of low

cost, focused Science missions.

@ Jibin Rajan

Mon Tue We Thu Fri Sat Sun

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THIS OCTOBER 2011

Upcoming Events to watch out for ...

ISTE Photoshop Techgroup : www.facebook.com/Techgroups

Follow us on Facebook : ISTE NITC Students’ Chapter

SCISTORY: How two amateurs designed an A bomb

To design an A-bomb from scratch would seem a Herculean task, but amateurs did it, 45 years ago...

D ave Dobson, now 75, is a modest

man, and once he had discovered

his vocation - teaching physics at

Beloit College, in Wisconsin - felt no need

to drop dark hints about his earlier life. You

could have taken classes at Beloit with

Professor Dobson, until his recent retire-

ment, without having any reason to know

that in his mid-20s, working entirely as an

amateur and equipped with little more

than a notebook and a library card, he

designed a nuclear bomb.

"It's a very strange story," says Bob Selden

co-partner , then a novice soldier drafted

into the army and wondering how to put

his talents to use, when he received a

message that Edward Teller, the father of

the hydrogen wanted to see him. "I went to

DC and we spent an evening together. But

he began to question me in great detail

about the physics of making a nuclear

weapon, and I didn't know anything. As the

evening wore on, I knew less and less. I

went away very, very discouraged. Two

days later a call comes through: they want

you to come to Livermore."

Today their experiences in 1964 - the year

they were enlisted into the Nth Country

Project - suddenly seem as terrifyingly

relevant as ever. The question the project

was designed to answer was a simple one:

could a couple of non-experts, with brains

but no access to classified research, crack

the "nuclear secret"? In the aftermath of

the Cuban missile crisis, panic had seeped

into the arms debate. Only Britain,

America, France and the Soviet Union had

the bomb; the US military desperately

hoped that if the instructions for building it

could be kept secret, proliferation - to a

fifth country, a sixth country, an "Nth

country", hence the project's name - could

be averted. Today, the fear is back: we

cling, at least, to the belief that not just

anyone could figure out how to make an

atom bomb. The trouble is that, 45 years

ago, someone did.

Livermore was the Livermore Radiation

Laboratory, a fabled army facility where the

institution's head offered them a job. The

work would be "interesting", he promised,

but he couldn't say more until Dobson and

Selden had the required security clearance.

And they couldn't get the clearance unless

they accepted the job. They only learned

afterwards what they was expected to do.

"My first thought," said Bob, with charac-

teristic understatement, "was, 'Oh, my.

That sounds like a bit of a challenge.'"

And thus, on April 1964, the duo—Dave

Dobson and Bob Selden were enlisted into

the A-bomb project.

They would be working in a murky limbo

between the world of military secrets and

the public domain. They would have an

office at Livermore, but no access to its

warrens of restricted offices and corridors;

they would be banned from consulting

classified

research

but, on

the other

hand,

anything

they

produced

-

diagrams

in

sketch-

books,

notes on

the backs

of envelopes - would be automatically top

secret. And since the bomb that they were

designing wouldn't, of course, actually be

built and detonated, they were to explain

at length, on paper, what part of their

developing design they wanted to test, and

they would pass it, through an assigned lab

worker, into Livermore's restricted world.

Days later, the results would come back -

though whether as the result of real tests

or hypothetical calculations, they would

never know.

The operating rules read — "A working

context for the experiment might be that

the participants have been asked to design

a nuclear explosive which, if built in small

numbers, would give a small nation a

significant effect on their foreign relations."

Dobson's knowledge of nuclear bombs was

rudimentary, to say the least. "I just had

the idea that *to make a bomb+ you had to

quickly put a bunch of fissile material

together somehow," he recalls. Bob Selden

found a book on the Manhattan Project

that culminated in America's development

of the bomb. "It gave us a road map,"

Dobson says. "But we knew there would be

important ideas they'd deliberately left out

because they were secret. This was one of

the things that produced a little bit of

paranoia in us. Were we being led down

the garden path?"

They faced one key decision, Dobson says:

whether to design a gun-style bomb, like

the one dropped on Hiroshima, that used a

sawn-off howitzer to crash two pieces of

fissile material together, or a more complex

implosion bomb, like that dropped on

Nagasaki. By now they were beginning to

enjoy the challenge, so they went for the

harder, more impressive option. "The gun

device

needed a

large

amount

of

material,

and

didn't

make a

very big

bang,"

Dobson

says.

"The

other

one was more bang, less material."

Dobson and Selden assumed that their

fictional Nth Country had already obtained

the requisite plutonium (the rules weren't

as strict then) by some means . "But the

process of designing the weapon - I'm

always careful to point out that many

people overstate how easy it is. You really

have to do it right, and there are thousands

of ways to do it wrong. You can't just

guess."

The two amateurs were ironically aided by

information published as part of President

Dwight Eisenhower's "Atoms for Peace"

program, which spread word of the

benefits of non-military nuclear power

around the world.

Eventually, towards the end of 1966, two

and a half years after they began, they

were finished. "We produced a short

document that described precisely, in

engineering terms, what we proposed to

build and what materials were involved,"

says Selden. "The whole works, in great

detail, so that this thing could have been

made by Joe's Machine Shop downtown."

Agonisingly, though, at the moment they

believed they had triumphed, Dobson and

Selden were kept in the dark about

whether they had succeeded. Instead, for

two weeks, the army put them on the

lecture circuit, touring them around the

upper echelons of Washington, presenting

them for cross-questioning at defence and

scientific agencies. Their questioners,

people with the highest levels of security

clearance, were instructed not to ask

questions that would reveal secret

information. Finally, after a valedictory

presentation at Livermore attended by a

grumpy Edward Teller, they were pulled

aside by a senior researcher, Jim Frank.

"Jim said, 'I bet you guys want to know how

it turned out,'" Dobson recalls. "We said

yes. And he told us that if it had been

constructed, it would have made a pretty

impressive bang." How impressive, they

wanted to know. "On the same order of

magnitude as Hiroshima," Frank replied.

"It's kind of a depressing thing to know,

that it could be that easy," Dobson says.

"On the other hand, it's far better to know

the truth." And the truth today, he is

certain, is that for terrorists, obtaining

sufficiently enriched fissile material could

be difficult but, when it comes to creating

the bomb, "It turns out it's not overwhelm-

ingly difficult. There are some subtleties

that are not trivial ... but an awful lot has

been published. If you were a grad student

today, and you reviewed the literature, a

lot of pieces would fall into place."

It was, relatively speaking, easy - so easy

that both Selden and Dobson seem to have

emerged from the Nth Country Experiment

deeply troubled by their own capacities.

Selden stayed in the military, and he has

since been closely involved in planning how

the US might respond to a nuclear terrorist

incident. Dobson, meanwhile, felt so

uncomfortable that he left the sector

entirely

Einstein was famously said to have

commented that if he had only known that

his theories would lead to the development

of the atom bomb, he would have been a

locksmith. Dave Dobson, having designed

one, got a job as a teacher.

Einstein said that if he had only known that his

theories would lead to the development of the atom

bomb, he would have been a locksmith.

Dave Dobson, having made one, got a

job as a teacher.

@ Jibin Rajan

Spotlight: Todays emerging technologies , innovations and discoveries

Hearing the Bang

T he ‘echo of the big bang’ is

not audible on a normal radio, cosmic

microwave background radiation peaks

at a frequency of 160GHz ,which

corresponds to a wavelength of 1mm.By

comparison .the VHF band has a

frequency of 100MHz and wavelength

of3m ,ordinary radio aerials are not at all

suitable for receiving the Big Bang’s

residual radiation.

Cyborgs already exist…

S o far, half man, half machine

creatures, such as the TERMINATOR, or

the Borg from the television serial STAR

TREK ,are still the stuff of science fiction.

However , advances in modern pros-

thetics are pointing the way for-

ward ,with mechanical limbs controlled

by brain waves already boosting the

mobility of amputees. However ,cyborgs

of an entirely different type have already

seen the light of day in a German

laboratory .Peter Fromherz of the Max

Planck Institute for biochemistry

combined living snail cells to a silicon

chip .It is possible for electric impulse to

be transmitted between this two

worlds ,and work such as this is laying

the foundations for great improvements

in prostheses.

Freezing point of water 1

atm , room temp, …

U ntil recently ,this always

seemed to be true in case of fresh

water ,although sea water only freezes

when the temperature drop slightly

lower .However Korean scientists have

now discovered that fresh water can

turned to ice even at room tempera-

ture .Water molecules inside a strong

electric field of above 100 volts per

meter arrange themselves into ice

crystals at temperature well above o

Celsius. It is believed that electric field

@ V Ruthvik

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ADSPACE Organization Name

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Feedback Form

Cut along these lines >>>

PICTURESPEAK @ jibin Rajan

Techno-mix @ Amala Maheswari

Feedback Form

Ove

rall

rati

ng

(o

ut

of

10

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____

_ W

ha

t yo

u li

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mo

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w

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ou

ld i

mp

rove

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arti

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rticl

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qu

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oin

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at

cau

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ur

att

enti

on

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er c

om

men

ts a

nd

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gg

esti

on

s __

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Techno-mix is a fun filled scramble puzzle where the first

four questions have some highlighted letter ( grey boxes )

in the answers which when rearranged gives the last

answer which is a word or a phrase.

1.Who is the current Chief executive officer of Apple Inc ?

2.Which film is the highest grossing animated franchise?

3.Who is the chief structural engineer who designed Burj

Khalifa?

4. One of the founding members of this company predict-

ed that computers would double in power and halve in

price every 18 months, which is the company?

The real problem is not whether machines

“ “

... but whether men do…

What's the answer? To find out, read our next issue ...

<<< Cut along these lines

Opportunities

Outreach: Your portal to a successful career @ Amala Maheswari

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@ Arjun R Nair When did you start your preparation for Civil Services?

I started my prepa-rations towards the end of third year. I started it in the third year End-semester vacations to be exact.

Selection of option-als is a crucial process in Civil Service exam. What did you look for while choosing an optional, or what made you choose Public Administra-tion as one of the optional subjects?

The concise and manageable syllabus was the main reason . Moreover, the optional would aid me in the career of administration too.

Another optional was physics; please tell more about that choice. What all should we take care while selecting a technical/ science topic?

Well, technical topics generally tend to lose out in the moderation stage compared to humanities. However my hard work paid off as I did well in the physics paper.

How did you strike a balance between electronics and Civil Service preparations? Did you have to sacrifice on extra-curricular activities?

I am very grateful for the support extended by my department and teachers without which things would have been difficult. I had to miss some classes

towards the end of fourth year for the preparation. However I was very active in the club activities during my college days.

Did you take the help of coaching institutes?

No I didn’t take any coaching.

How was the experi-ence in the interview?

The interview board was very cordial. We must watch out for the thin line between confidence and complacency. Be honest to the board.

How did you tackle G.S. (General Studies) which is a concern for most candidates?

G.S. syllabus is very broad. I read newspa-

per regularly giving emphasis on the relevant articles. I referred many standard books and also used Wikipedia.

What do you look forward from the job?

I am looking forward to serving the society by staying within the limits set by constitution and political elements.

Would you like to offer any advice for our juniors?

Whatever be your passion try to develop a social outlook, because at the end of the day you should serve your society.

“Whatever be your passion try to develop a social outlook, because at the end of the day

you should serve your society.”

MEET GOKUL

Meet Gokul G.R. IAS, the NITian who made us all proud by achieving the 19th rank in Civil Service Examina-

tion. An electronics and communication engineering graduate he achieved this fete in the very first attempt.

Having made his presence felt in almost all college activities during his student years; he is all geared up to

step into new shoes. He has chosen to serve the society by joining the Indian Administrative Service which

constitutes the major policy making body of our country. Oracle wishes all the very best to this 23 year old

native of Palakkad. We proudly present to our readers some excerpts from the interview with Gokul G.R.

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An initiative of ISTE NITC Students Chapter Newsletter Design: Jibin Rajan

Monthly Journal of The Indian Society for Technical Education, ISSUE 01 August 2011