Portal:Technology and applied sciences

  

The Technology and applied sciences Portal

Technology (Gr. technologia (τεχνολογία) < techne (τέχνη) "craft" + logia (λόγος); "saying") Technology is the application of developments in science and engineering to benefit humanity. It may be defined as: "Solutions for real human problems by the development and application of tools, machines, materials, goods, or information in the form of skills, knowledge, processes, blueprints, plans, diagrams, models, formulae, tables, engineering designs, specifications, manuals, or instructions."

  

Selected article

The Global Positioning System (GPS) is the only fully functional Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS). The GPS uses a constellation of between 24 and 32 Medium Earth Orbit satellites that transmit precise microwave signals, that enable GPS receivers to determine their location, speed, direction, and time. GPS was developed by the United States Department of Defense. Its official name is NAVSTAR-GPS. Although NAVSTAR-GPS is not an acronym^[1], a few backronyms have been created for it^[2]. The GPS satellite constellation is managed by the United States Air Force 50th Space Wing.

Similar satellite navigation systems include the Russian GLONASS (incomplete as of 2008), the upcoming European Galileo positioning system, the proposed COMPASS navigation system of China, and IRNSS of India.

Following the shooting down of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 in 1983, President Ronald Reagan issued a directive making the system available free for civilian use as a common good.^[3] Since then, GPS has become a widely used aid to navigation worldwide, and a useful tool for map-making, land surveying, commerce, scientific uses, and hobbies such as geocaching. GPS also provides a precise time reference used in many applications including scientific study of earthquakes, and synchronization of telecommunications networks.

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Credit: Cmmmm

Scanning tunneling microscope (STM) is a powerful technique for viewing surfaces at the atomic level. Its development in 1981 earned its inventors, Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer (at IBM Zürich), the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1986^[4]. STM probes the density of states of a material using tunneling current. For STM, good resolution is considered to be 0.1 nm lateral resolution and 0.01 nm depth resolution^[5]. The STM can be used not only in ultra high vacuum but also in air and various other liquid or gas ambients, and at temperatures ranging from near 0 kelvin to a few hundred degrees Celsius^[6].

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Selected biography

Christopher Columbus Kraft, Jr. (born February 28, 1924) is a retired NASA engineer and manager. After graduating from Virginia Tech University in 1944, Kraft was hired by the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), the predecessor organization to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). He worked for over a decade in aeronautical research before being asked in 1958 to join the Space Task Group, a small team entrusted with the responsibility of putting America's first man in space. Assigned to the flight operations division, Kraft became NASA's first flight director. He was on duty during such historic missions as America's first spaceflight, first orbital flight and first spacewalk.

At the beginning of the Apollo program Kraft retired as a flight director in order to concentrate on management and mission planning. In 1972 he became director of the Manned Spacecraft Center (later Johnson Space Center), following in the footsteps of his mentor Robert Gilruth. He held the position until his retirement from NASA in 1982. During his retirement, Kraft has consulted for numerous companies including IBM and Rockwell International, and he published an autobiography entitled Flight: My Life in Mission Control.

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Did you know...

• ... that a mercury arc rectifier converts alternating current to direct current by means of an electric arc through mercury?
• ... that only one of the 266 1076 Class steam locomotives built for the Great Western Railway was named, and the rest had only numbers?
• ... that the six Charles Tayleur locomotives ordered by Isambard Kingdom Brunel for the Great Western Railway were unsuccessful?

• ... that the intensity of a tropical cyclone (pictured) is usually determined by the Dvorak technique using only visible and infrared satellite images?

• ... that the technique of double-balloon enteroscopy allows any position along the gastrointestinal tract to be visualized in real-time?

• ... that ANTARES, a neutrino telescope under construction in the Mediterranean Sea, will find neutrinos from outer space by looking downward, into the Earth?

• ... that KATRIN is an experiment to determine the mass of the neutrino by measuring the energies of electrons given off from the beta decay of tritium?

• ... that forensic electrical engineering is a branch of forensic engineering whose primary role is to investigate whether a fire was caused by the failure of an electrical appliance?

  

Categories   (all)

Main categories: Technology and Applied sciences

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Transportation:   By country • Automobiles • Aviation • Cycling • Public transport • Rail transport • Road transport • Shipping • Spaceflight • Vehicles • Water transport

Technology timelines

  

Topics   (all)

Main articles: Technology and Applied sciences

Technological concepts and issues • Appropriate technology • Diffusion of innovations • Doomsday device • Externality • High technology • History of science and technology • History of technology • Industry • Innovation • Knowledge economy • Persuasion technology • Pollution • Posthumanism • Precautionary principle • Research and development • Strategy of technology • Superpowers • Technicism • Technocapitalism • Technocriticism • Techno-progressivism • Technological convergence • Technological evolution • Technological determinism • Technological diffusion • Technological singularity • Technology acceptance model • Technology assessment • Technology lifecycle • Technology transfer • Technology Tree • Technorealism • Timeline of invention • Transhumanism

Technologies and applied sciences • Aerospace • Agriculture, agricultural science, & agronomy • Architecture • Artificial intelligence • Automation • Automobile • Big Science • Biotechnology • Cartography • Chemical engineering • Communication • Computer science (Computing, Programming, Software engineering, List of open problems in computer science) • Construction • Dentistry • Design • Education • Electronics • Energy development • Energy storage • Engineering • Ergonomics • Family and consumer science • Firefighting • Forensics • Forestry • Free software • Health sciences • Health • Industry • Information science • Information technology • Internet • Library and information science • Machines • Management • Manufacturing • Marketing • Mass communication • Mass production • Medicine (Unsolved problems in neuroscience) • Military science • Military technology and equipment • Mining • Nanotechnology • Nuclear technology • Nutrition • Processes • Robotics • Space exploration • Technology forecasting • Telecommunications • Tools • Transport (By country) • Vehicles • Weapons

  

Lists of basic topics   (all)

Main outlines: List of basic science topics and List of basic technology topics.

Aerospace • Agriculture • Architecture • Artificial intelligence • Automation • Automobile • Big Science • Biotechnology • Cartography • Chemical engineering • Communication • Computer science (Information technology, Internet, Programming, Software engineering) • Construction • Dentistry • Design • Education • Energy development • Energy storage • Engineering • Ergonomics • Family and consumer science • Firefighting • Forensics • Forestry • Free software • Health sciences • Health • Industry • Information technology • Internet • Library and information science • Machines • Management • Manufacturing • Marketing • Military • Mining • Nanotechology • Nuclear technology • Nutrition • Radio • Robotics • Space exploration • Telecommunication (Internet) • Transport • Vehicles

  

Lists of topics   (all)

Technologies • Materials technology • Microscope technology

Agriculture • Herbs and spices • Organic gardening and farming • Sustainable agriculture

Architecture and Construction

Buildings and structures • Irish buildings • Historic civil engineering landmarks

Lighthouses and lightvessels • Belgium • Canada • France • Germany • Sweden • USA

Windmills • UK

Watermills • UK

Tallest buildings and structures in the world • Tall buildings in London

Computing and the Internet • AMD microprocessors • software bugs • computing and IT abbreviations • GNU packages • Graphics file formats • IBM products • Internet slang • Internet topics • Internet top-level domains • Intel chipsets • Intel microprocessors • machines running CP/M • microcomputers • newsgroups • open source software packages • operating systems • screen readers (assistive technology for blind people) • UNIVAC products • Unixes • Unix programs • wikis • Timeline of computing • Timeline of hacker history • digital library projects

World Wide Web • Colors  • HTML editors •

Web technologies • Java • .NET • Web 2.0 • Ajax

Computer science • Algorithms • data structures • information technology management topics • important publications in computer science • open problems in computer science • software engineering topics • terms relating to algorithms and data structures

Character sets and encodings:   ASCII • EBCDIC • ISO 646 • ISO 8859-1 • ISO 8859-2 • ISO 8859-3 • ISO 8859-8 • ISO 8859-11 • ISO 8859-15 • Unicode • UTF-7 • UTF-8 • UTF-16 • UTF-32 • Windows-1252

Programming languages • Alphabetical list • Categorical list • Chronological list • Generational list

Electronics

Engineering • engineering fields

Medical technology: (see Health and fitness above)

Military

Military strategies • Thirty-Six Strategies • List of military tactics

Air forces of the world

Military air bases:  Royal Air Force • Royal Canadian Air Force • United States Air Force • United States Army • United States Coast Guard • United States Marine Corps • United States Navy

Air force commands:  Royal Air Force • USAAF NAF Component Commands

Aircraft groups:   Royal Air Force

Aircraft squadrons:  British Army Air Corps • British Fleet Air Arm • Royal Air Force • United States Air Force • United States Army • United States Marine Corps • United States Navy

Aircraft "wings":  Royal Navy aircraft wings • United States Navy aircraft wings

Armies of the world

General lists of armies (by number) • military corps (by number • by name) • List of military divisions (by number • by name)

United Kingdom:  Regiments of Foot • British Army regiments (1881) • British Army regiments (1962) • British Army regiments (1994) • British Forces in the American Revolutionary War • Regiments of the British Indian Army (1903) • regiments of the British Indian Army (1922)

United States of America:   Armies of the United States Army • corps of the United States Army • divisions of the United States Army • U.S. Army acronyms and expressions • US defense contractors • United States military bases

Navies of the world: • fleets

Military groups in WWI and WWII

Australia:   Australian divisions in WWI • WWII

Britain:   British Army Groups in WWII • British armies in WWI • WWII • British corps in WWI • British divisions in WWI • WWII

Canada:   Canadian divisions in WWII

Germany:   Prisoner of War Camps in WWII

India:   Indian corps in WWII • Indian divisions in WWII

Poland:   Polish divisions in WWII

United States of America:   American Army Groups in WWII

Terrorists of the world:  terrorist groups • terrorist incidents

Military bases:   military bases

Military events:   battles • guerrilla movements • invasions • military missions, operations, and projects • terrorist incidents • wars

Martial arts:   : List of martial arts • : List of martial arts weapons

Weapons and miscellaneous topics

Military technology and equipment • weapons • World War II weapons • missiles • armoured fighting vehicles • NATO reporting names • Swords

List of artillery • List of artillery by country • List of World War II artillery

Military aircraft: Luftwaffe • Soviet Union and CIS • USA • British Army Air Corps • Royal Air Force • Fleet Air Arm • Israeli Air Force • Royal Australian Air Force • Royal Australian Navy • Royal Canadian Air Force • Royal Canadian Navy • Royal New Zealand Air Force and Royal New Zealand Navy • South African Air Force • Irish Air Corps • Armée de l'Air • aircraft weapons • NATO reporting names for miscellaneous aircraft • NATO reporting names for transport aircraft

Naval technology

Ships

By era/war: World War II

By type: Aircraft Carriers • Battleships • Cruisers • Destroyers • LSTs

By operator: Royal Australian Navy • Canadian Forces • Germany • Indian Navy • Japan • Netherlands • Royal Navy (United Kingdom) • Royal Fleet Auxiliary (United Kingdom) • United States Navy • Military Sealift Command (USA) • Soviet Union

Space exploration • Unmanned space missions • Human spaceflight • human spaceflights • space disasters • human spaceflights by program • astronauts by name • Timeline of astronauts by nationality

Transportation • transport museums

List of aviation topics •  • Aircraft • Manufacturers • Engines • Engine manufacturers • Weapons • By date and use

Aviation accidents • By airline • By location • By year

Airports • FR • BE • GR • JP • PL • UK • AU

Land transport

Automobiles • Manufacturers • List of truck types

List of convoy codes

Cycles:  bicycle parts

Rail transport

List of heritage railways

Light-rail transit systems • Melbourne tram routes • metro systems (subways) • London Underground stations • closed London Underground stations • Melbourne railway stations • closed Melbourne railway stations • List of famous trains • List of railway stations - UK

Road systems

Roads and highways' • : US interstates • UK motorways • Highways in Australia • List of U.S. Routes • List of state highways in the United States

Bridges • UK • USA • List of largest suspension bridges

List of tunnels • NL • NZ • UK

Nautical / Shipping technology:  ships • fictional ships • sailboat types • Marinas

Space transport:  spacecraft

  

Glossaries   (all)

Air pollution dispersion terminology • Blogging • Broadcasting • Computing and IT

(Alternative terms for free software • Computer • Internet • Legal terms • Object-oriented programming • Unified Modeling Language) • Firefighting (Equipment • Wildland fires) • Library and information science • Machine vision • Metalworking terminology • Mill machinery • Mobile phones • Nautical • Telephony • Textile manufacturing • Transport (Aviation, aerospace, and aeronautics • Automotive design • Rail (Passenger rail (NZ railfan • UK railfan • U.S. railfan))) • Woodworking (Joinery) • Winemaking

  

Related portals   (all)

Technology and applied sciences

Agronomy • Architecture (Bridges, Portal) • Artificial intelligence • Electronics • Energy • Engineering • Nanotechnology • Robotics

Information technology

Typography • Blu-ray • Computer science • Computer security • Free software • Internet • Microsoft

Transport

Aviation • Cars (Australian, Ferrari, Japanese) • Cycling • London transport • Nautical • Roads (U.S. Roads) • Spaceflight (Space tourism) • Trains (Rapid transit, UK Railways, UK Trams)

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