Australia commits to hosting giant radio telescope

Happening

Last Updated on Sunday, 18 March 2012 06:28 Sunday, 18 March 2012 05:27

CANBERRA: Australian Science Minister Chris Evans says his government remains committed to beating South Africa in a close tender process to host the world’s largest and most sensitive radio telescope.

A consortium of 20 countries will announce as early as next month whether South Africa or a joint bid from Australia and New Zealand will be chosen to host the 1.5 billion euro ($2 billion) radio telescope comprising 3,000 antenna dishes.

Evans said Wednesday that Australia is ”still absolutely committed to winning the bid.”

The telescope will be used for research into fundamental unanswered questions about the universe, including how galaxies evolve and how the first black holes formed.

The telescope is being paid for by 67 organizations in 20 countries.

Cassini spacecraft glimpses new views of moon Rhea

Happening

Friday, 16 March 2012 09:41

PASADENA, California: The pockmarked surface of Saturn’s second-largest moon has come into sharper focus in new images released by NASA.

The space agency on Monday released the new views of the moon Rhea, which were captured by the international Cassini spacecraft during a recent flyby. One of its cameras spied two huge impact basins and other geologic features on Rhea’s icy surface from 26,000 miles (41,841 kilometers) away last week.

Cassini, funded by NASA and the European and Italian space agencies, was launched in 1997. It reached Saturn in 2004 and has been studying the ringed planet and its numerous moons.
__
AP

Ufone offers low priced BlackBerry plans

Happening

Monday, 12 March 2012 18:54

Owing to the increasing number of young BlackBerry users, Ufone has devised a ‘Blackberry Social Service’ plan to meet their everyday communication needs.  The user will also have unlimited access to browse the BlackBerry Internet Browsing Service (BIBS), including data usage on Umail. Furthermore the user will be able to access social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter & MySpace as well.

At just Rs 350 per month the BlackBerry Social Service enables the user to create and use one BlackBerry email address (e.g. This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ) and offers unlimited access to the BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) service.

The second package ‘BlackBerry Complete’ has been specifically devised for entry level professionals and SMEs. At just Rs 600 per month the ‘BlackBerry Complete Service’ offers one BlackBerry email address (e.g. This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ) and the user can also integrate and use one third party email account such as Gmail, Yahoo, Windows® Live Email etc.

The user will also have unlimited access to the BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) service and will be able to browse the BlackBerry Internet Browsing Service (BIBS), including data usage on Umail. Users of BlackBerry complete will have unlimited access to Social Networking Services (e.g. Facebook, Twitter & MySpace ) and also have  access to Instant Messaging Services such as Google Talk, Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo Messenger & AOL Messenger.

Customers can easily join Ufone’s network by dialing 03312361236 and start saving Rs. 650 every month whilst extracting maximum use of their BlackBerry devices!

While discussing the new BlackBerry packages, Akbar Khan, Chief Marketing Officer at Ufone said that these packages are a need of today’s tech-savvy BlackBerry using generation.  He further said that Ufone has been a market leader in offering cost effective and affordable packages that have met the ever evolving needs of its customers. He stressed that smart organizations constantly innovate to keep up in the race to keep their customers satisfied, and Ufone aims to do just that!

Source: thenewstribe.com

NUST Launches Pakistan’s Fastest Supercomputer

Happening

Last Updated on Friday, 09 March 2012 00:12 Thursday, 08 March 2012 23:49

User Rating: / 2
PoorBest 

National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST) inaugurated its fastest supercomputing facility in a ceremony held on Tuesday at its Research Centre for Modeling and Simulation (RCMS).

The supercomputer installed in NUST is the fastest GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) based parallel computing system operating in any organization/academic institution in Pakistan till date.

The supercomputer can perform parallel computation at a peak speed of 132 Teraflops (132 Trillion Operations per second).  It is equipped with multi-core processors and graphics co-processors with inter-processor communication speed of 40 Gbps.

Techinical Specifications:

• Computer’s Cluster configuration:
  • 66 NODE supercomputer with 30,992 processor cores
  • 2 Head Node (16 Processor Cores)
  • 32 Dual Quad Core Computer Nodes (256 Processor Cores)
  • 32 Nvidia Computing Processors
  • Each processor has 960 Processor Cores (30,720 processor Cores)
• QDR Infiniband Interconnection
• 21.6TB SAN storage

Imaginational ceremony was presided over by Chairman Higher Education Commission (HEC) Dr Javaid Laghari.

Speaking at the ceremony, Principal RCMS Engr Sikandar Hayat highlighted some of the unique features of this state-of-the-art computing facility recently acquired by Nust through financial grant by Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST).

Hayat said that besides the supercomputer’s extensive utilisation in the computation-intensive research projects in the areas of Fluid Dynamics and Biosciences, this massively parallel facility can also be utilized to handle huge data processing applications of social sciences such as Flood and Weather Forecasting, Oil and Gas Exploration, energy efficient building designs and national transportation management.

Addressing the event, Laghari appreciated the efforts of the entire team associated with the project and encouraged all institutions to come forward and benefit from the facility acquired by Nust. He assured HEC’s full support in this regard.

Rector Nust Engr Muhammad Asghar, in his welcome address, sharing his vision, specifically mentioned that the acquisition of the supercomputing facility would be a source of inspiration for PhD scholars, abroad, to return to Pakistan.

“This will give an impetus for collaborative research between universities and other research organisations within the country and abroad.”

Dr Imran Akhtar, the key note speaker, gave a highly motivating and thought provoking speech on the occasion, encouraging young researchers to come forward and utilize the facility in solving national challenges in the areas of engineering, bio-informatics, political science, psychology and social sciences.