Imagine if you will, the ultimate video game.

I’m talking about what you wish someone in the industry would make.

You are probably envisioning this game being played on a screen, large in high definition. You would be wrong.

Where the future is headed is total immersion. That’s right, Virtual Reality, VR, as in ‘Put this visor on and be transported to whatever environment you see fit to create for yourself.’ And Oculus Rift, will supply it for you. 

Awarded Best in Show at the Consumer Electronics Show 2014 for the second year in a row, the ‘Crystal Cove’ prototype is getting geeks gawking.

It promises to be the first functional virtual reality system to take immersion to a whole new level.  The two majors breakthroughs include positional tracking and an increased refresh rate. This enables your to comfortably live in a VR environment for extended periods of time and not get sick.

So how long before this wonderful world changing technology is brought to the masses? Nobody is sure since Oculus developers keep what they are doing under very tight wraps, but if this German Facebook ad is any indicator, it could very well be this summer.

That’s right, a major “game-changing”  tech breakthrough coming within the year, and still nobody seems to know about it? 

Maybe that will all change now that games developers are getting involved.

A few weeks ago, EVE Online, makers of the hugely popular space based MMO announced that their dog fighter game, Valkyrie, will have Oculus Support.

And so will The Elder Scrolls Online, the fantasy MMO based off of the Elder Scrolls series by Bethesda.

Considering how people react to a really basic roller coaster simulation, it’s going to be interesting to see reactions to Oculus’s awesome immersive graphics, whether it be a high definition spaceship fighting game or a battle through a dungeon with your friends. 

To help navigate these games experiences, there has also been new exciting developments in the technology of game controllers.. Thalmic’s Myo Armband, a phenomenal piece of technology with an enormous number of potential uses is something that the Oculus team is already looking to harness. The Virtuix Omni is another great example of what the future of controlling games might look like.

But the true potential of the Oculus does not lie entirely, or even mostly in video games.

The advent of VR creates enormous new opportunities for Hollywood.  Nobody really knows what filmmakers are going to do with this type of technology, but the potential is mind blowing.

But the prospects for VR don’t stop there.

VR has the potential to change the way that we train military personnel, doctors, the way we teach in the classroom and almost everything else in our society. 

When this technology is available, you can create a virtual avatar based on your own image, and travel about on the internet in chat rooms that actually appear as rooms.

You could speed date without ever having to leave the comfort of your living room.

Take actual tours of homes or cars before buying them, take your child on field trips anywhere in the Universe, or take a walk with your friend in the Alps. 

These and who knows what other technologies are bearing down us quickly, are you ready? 

If you want to keep up with the latest oculus based news (you do), check out their subreddit. 

Israel is home to three of the world’s most diverse marine systems – the Mediterranean, Red and Dead Seas. Although found in rare and remarkable proximity, each is distinguished by unique oceanography, biology, flora and fauna, making Israel a particularly extraordinary destination for students of marine and environmental sciences.

This summer, from June 22 to July 6, Yonathan Zohar, chair of UMBC’s Department of Marine Biotechnology, will lead students on an intensive study of the three Israeli seas at the Ruppin Academic Center, in Netanya, Israel, on the Mediterranean coast. Students will be exposed not only to the diverse biology of the three seas, but also to leading marine and environmental scientists from around the world. “Exploring Three Seas: Med, Red and Dead” – which will explore such topics as marine and environmental biology, oceanography, marine and estuarine ecology, microbial ecology, marine flora and fauna, coastal geology and limnology through hands-on field trips and laboratories – is the latest offering from an emerging model of focused, shorter-term study abroad programs at UMBC.

“Exploring Three Seas: Med, Red and Dead” is a part of a long-term research and educational partnership between UMBC and the Ruppin Academic Center’s School of Marine Sciences. Expanding on UMBC’s commitment to marine and biotechnology, faculty from UMBC and the Institute for Marine and Environmental Technology (a joint University System of Maryland research institute) have taught intensive, one-week courses at the Ruppin Academic Center for the past five years. Many of these same faculty members helped to develop the graduate program at the School for Marine Sciences. “This summer program is what we hope to be the beginning of broadening the partnership between Ruppin Academic Center’s School of Marine Sciences and UMBC,” says Zohar.

International study and research are part of the culture at UMBC, allowing students to build their global outlook and cross-cultural skills. Shorter, intensive, professor-led trips, such as Zohar’s are a unique and increasingly popular prototype for study. Rather than the traditional mold of study abroad, which typically focuses on classroom-style learning and touring the regions of a country, these focus more intensely on experiential learning and fieldwork.

"These programs enable students to learn a great deal in a condensed time period – not only about themselves and their academic interests, but also about the world around them," says Katherine Heird, assistant director of Study Abroad at UMBC. "Because students are accompanied by their UMBC peers, faculty and staff, faculty-led programs are often an easier and less intimidating introduction to living and studying in a foreign country than other, more independent program models."

UMBC’s International Field Research Program is considered a pioneer of such innovative experiential study programs. Each spring, a small group of students from the Health Administration and Public Policy (HAPP) program spends the semester preparing for a seven-day summer trip to Switzerland, where they conduct individual field research to better understand how culture, policy and practice interact to achieve a sustainable and healthy society.

Shorter programs often allow students whose schedules would otherwise not allow full semester travel to experience international and cross-cultural study – and professors are being encouraged to consider this model. Maggie Holland, professor of Geography and Environmental Systems, is traveling with students from across four majors to Costa Rica for an international study in sustainable development and conservation. This innovative study abroad experience will involve a mix of field research and service learning. Over the course of 15 days, students will meet with community groups, engage in service learning, gain experience in field research techniques, participate in focus group discussions and contribute to mapping.

"We feel strongly that our department’s offering of a field course should be designed to offer students a rich experience at relatively low-cost, and with a shorter time commitment than a full semester," says Dr. Holland, who believes that academic, financial and family reasons often prevent students from taking a full semester abroad. "Offering this class as an early summer session course opens the program more broadly to UMBC students, as their perspectives and skills could lend substantially to the overall experience.”

Rising junior and senior undergraduates (BIOL 499) and graduate students (BIOL 601) interested in “Exploring Three Seas: Med, Red and Dead” are encouraged to apply by the deadline of March 10.

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(3/4/2014)

courtesy of washingtonpost.com

There’s no question that the Russian invasion of Crimea has been an extreme turn of events.

But how would you say it compares to Hitler’s aggressive expansions in 1930s Europe?

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and early frontrunner for the 2016 Democratic nomination for president, thinks the comparison is valid. Speaking in Los Angeles Tuesday night, Clinton said:

Now if this sounds familiar, it’s what Hitler did back in the 30s. All the… ethnic Germans, the Germans by ancestry who were in places like Czechoslovakia and Romania and other places, Hitler kept saying they’re not being treated right. I must go and protect my people and that’s what’s gotten everybody so nervous.

Regardless of the appropriateness of the comparison between Putin and Hitler, it seems to come from a long tradition of American leaders comparing foreign rivals to Nazi Germany, as the Washington Post documented.

President Johnson on Vietnam:

Nor would surrender in Vietnam bring peace, because we learned from Hitler at Munich that success only feeds the appetite of aggression. The battle would be renewed in one country and then another country, bringing with it perhaps even larger and crueler conflict, as we have learned from the lessons of history.

President Clinton on Yugoslavia:

What if someone had listened to Winston Churchill and stood up to Adolf Hitler earlier? How many people’s lives might have been saved?

Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld on Iraq:

Think of the prelude to World War II. Think of all the countries that said, ‘Well, we don’t have enough evidence.’ Mein Kampf’ has been written. Hitler had indicated what he intended to do. Maybe he won’t attack. Maybe he won’t do this or that. There were millions of people dead because of the miscalculations.

President Obama on Syria:

I’m not drawing an analogy to World War II, other than to say when London was getting bombed, it was profoundly unpopular, both in Congress and around the country, to help the British. It doesn’t mean it wasn’t the right thing to do.

Do you think the current situation is reminiscent of the 1930s? Or are we suffering from a nauseating number of Nazi comparisons?

A roundup of the most interesting stories from other sites, collected by the staff at MIT Technology Review.

The Indian Sanitary Pad Revolutionary
This story of an Indian man’s obsessive quest to develop a less expensive sanitary napkin must be read to be believed.
—Linda Lowenthal, copy chief