Why a Hybrid Car?

Kenneth Cortes Barreto

A hybrid car is a mix technology. It combines the power of a gasoline engine with the power of an electrical motor and battery (a rechargeable energy storage system). Hybrid cars automakers claim that its cars can give you 20 or 30 more miles per gallon than the standard automobile. There are a lot of hybrid car models, and most automobile manufacturers have announced plans to manufacture their own versions in the future.

Besides the increased price of gasoline in the past months, there are other considerations and reasons to buy a hybrid car. Gasoline is a byproduct of petroleum, a chemical substance rich in hydrocarbons which are considered harmful to the environment and a great contributor to the “greenhouse effect” and global warming.   Global warming, as defined, is a significant increase in the Earth's climatic temperature over a relatively short period of time as a result of the activities of humans. This climatic effect is found in 

warmer summers and colder winters, flooding and droughts around the globe. In short, it causes unbalances in the climatic system of the Earth. Ocean temperatures have increased causing all kind of issues; glaciers are melting causing the sea level to rise and beach erosions. Hurricanes in the tropics are becoming more intense and increased in quantity.

So gas price is not the main consideration in buying a hybrid car, if you are really into nature conservation for the future.

In the concept, as it is not a matter of sitting in front of a wheel and push pedals, you needto understand the technology and how it works and how to drive a hybrid car for maximum efficiency. We have seen through history many hybrid vehicles like the locomotives, which are diesel-electric hybrids, submarines which some are nuclear-electric hybrids; and the precursor, the mo-ped a motorized pedal hybrid that you can imagine seen on eastern countries.

Hybrid electric vehicles were first introduced in late 1990s by Honda (Insight) and Toyota (Prius). The combination of an internal combustion engine that generate electricity via an electrical generator to charge its battery; and the use of an internal electrical motor, produce the power to move the vehicle. When the vehicle is moving and goes to a stop, it uses the kinetic energy involved to charge its battery. The scientific name for this process is “regenerative braking”. This is the similar concept used in some watch makers to wind the mechanism of a watch. Still the regenerative braking needs to be helped by the traditional friction braking to stop the car.

The future is to eliminate the use of hydrocarbons and its dependency not only for its origin, but for the damage that this source of energy causes to the environment. Now the world is concentrated in “fuel cells” and “full electric” cars. Today Honda produces the “Clarity” which its propelled power is based on “fuel cells”. According to a conference session held on 2009 ( World Congress in Detroit), were officials from Toyota, Nissan, NREL, GM, Daimler, Honda and Bosch stated that hydrogen fuel cell vehicles would be an important part of the total vehicle mix by 2050. In fact, the internal combustion engines are expected to still be an important part of the mix in 2050. No matter how much we talk about the consequences of using hydrocarbons in internal combustion motors, automakers will still build them. The majority of the auto industry sees hybrid and electric cars viability for small, short range commute. Not as a power train for America’s truck and SUV culture. For these vehicles, the US auto industry are looking for more efficient internal combustion engines and hydrogen fuel cells engines in the future.

My hope is that a more conscious people will look at the environment because, if we continue destroying our environment our “spaceship earth”, as EPCOT defines our planet, will not last for the people of the future. Hybrid cars were just a start in this journey for a cleaner environment safe means of transportation. The future, as I have mentioned, lies on the shoulders of those looking at renewable means of energy to produce power.  Global warming was once an uncommon term used only by a few scientists, now the concept is well known, but not well understood …we only complain about these hotter days… and for a better future the hybrid cars are the solution.

Albert Einstein’s life

Christine D. Cortes

Albert Einstein was a German theoretical physicist born on March 14, 1879 and died on April 18, 1955. He was the son of Jewish parents Hermann Einstein, who was a salesman and an electrical engineer, and Pauline Einstein. Although the Einsteins were Jewish, they didn’t practice this religion and they put Albert in a Catholic elementary school. Here Albert was a top student nevertheless his speech difficulties at those years. At age five, his father showed him a compass and this experience made a strong impression because he then started thinking that there had to be something in space that made the needle move. When he was six his mother made him take violin lessons, although he hated them and quitted after some years, he later enjoyed Mozart’s violin sonatas. While still a kid, Albert built mechanical devices and demonstrated his abilities in math.

When Albert was ten years old, Max Talmud, a family friend and medical student, presented Albert science, math and philosophy texts. Among them was Euclid’s “Elements”. This latter Albert called the “holy little geometry book” and with it he learned deductive reasoning and two years later he had learned Euclidian geometry. At age fifteen, in 1894, his father’s company Elektrotechnische Fabrik J. Einstein & Cie, from which products were made for Direct Current, failed against the Alternating Current electrical products. Their family moved to Italy but left him to finish High School, but a year later he dropped out of school. Einstein decided to go to the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (the Zurich Polytechnic) and was required to take entrance examination test because he didn’t have the High School Certificate. He got very good scores in math and physics but was unable to pass the test. During this time was that he visualized himself traveling alongside a beam of light. His parents then sent him to Aarau, Switzerland to finish school and when he graduated at age 17, he renounced German citizenship in order to avoid military service. In 1896 he got accepted in the Zurich Polytechnic.

In the Zurich Polytechnic he studied mathematics and physics. Along with him were 5 other students including one of the first women to study physics and mathematics in Europe, and Albert’s first wife Mileva Maric (1875 - 1948). In 1900 Einstein got his diploma in mathematics and physics, but Maric didn’t pass the examinations. A year later Maric found out she was pregnant. She went to Novi Sad, Serbia and had her baby girl Lieserl Einstein in 1902. The fate of the baby is unknown; she may have died or given for adoption. Einstein and Maric got married in 1903. They had two sons, Hans Albert (1904-1973) which was a Civil engineer concentrated in Hydraulic engineering and Eduard (1910-1955). Eduard was a music talented student and wanted to become a psychoanalyst, but at the age of twenty he was diagnosticated with schizophrenia. His mother cared for him until her death, he later died at the at the University of Zurich psychiatric hospital "Burghölzli". In June 1919, Albert Einstein married his cousin Elsa (1876 - 1936) with whom he started a relationship while still being married to his first wife in 1912. Elsa had two daughters of from her first marriage, Ilse and Margot who became Einstein’s stepdaughters. Albert raised the girls as if they were his own, and had a better father relationship with them than with his two sons.

In 2006, Einstein’s letters, which he wrote to his family, were revealed. This was not done before because of his stepdaughter Margot’s request to do so after 20 years of her death (she died on 1986). These letters didn’t revealed any new information related but to his personal life. They describe how he was a womanizer and wasn’t faithful to his wives. He even mentions that because of his second’s son schizophrenia he’s son should have never been born. In the letters he explains that more than half of his Nobel Prize money, which he promised full to his first wife Maric, instead was invested in the US and later much of it was lost in the Depression.

Albert Einstein was a genius, bright and extremely intelligent man, but when it came to relationship with family and faithfulness, well he wasn’t good at it. We are all human and it’s in our nature to be imperfect.

References:

- http://www.phy.hr/~dpaar/fizicari/xeinstei.html

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mileva_Maric

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Albert_Einstein

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eduard_Einstein

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsa_Einstein

- http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5168002.stm

- http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles

/2006/07/11/einstein_letters_reveal_a_turmoil_beyond_science/

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