weBITS

The new kindle stumbles
Online bookseller Amazon has launched a large-screen version of its popular kindle eBook reader. The kindle DX has a 9.7 inch screen, almost four inches bigger than the standard model, and opens up two new markets: newspapers and textbooks. It costs $489 and can store up to 3,500 books on its 3.3 GB of internal memory. Like the original kindle, this one has won kudos from a beleaguered newspaper industry and the lucrative textbook industry.

$30,000 personal computer
The new Monseual 701 Jewellry PC is designed for millionaires. The computer costs around $30,000 and is the most expensive one ever to be made in Korea, according to media reports. It consists of an impressive 3,554 crystals (Swarovski of course) and a PC case that is created out of glass and gold. It also has 500 GB of storage space thanks to the included hard disk, an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, the ATI Radeon HD 4000 and some built in speakers.

World’s fastest camera
Researchers have demonstrated the fastest imaging system ever devised. The new camera’s shutter speed is just a half a billionth of a second, and is able to continuously capture over six million images in a second, they reported in the Nature. Its “flashbulb” is a fast laser pulse dispersed in space and then stretched in time and detected electronically. The approach will be instrumental in imaging fast-moving or random events, such as communication between neurons.

The Hits and QUICKBYTE

The Hits

Night Stand
The digital clock features a customizable alarm with snooze function, time zone support for travelers and vintage graphics. It took a month to create it.

SnakeXT
This is an extreme version (extreme as in visuals, music and excitement) of the classic ‘Snake’ game. The game developed over three months, comes in two variations – Arcade and Challenge. Arcade packs in 28 levels of excitement. The game begins easily, but as one masters each level by collecting pellets, the landscape changes. Challenge consists of two tough levels where the user has to move around in an increasingly confined area without crashing into the walls or running into the snake’s tail.

QUICKBYTE

• The popular social networking site Facebook is now available in six Indian languages Hindi, Punjabi, Bengali, Telugu, Tamil and Malayalam
• Bit.ly has upstaged TinyURL as the most popular URL shortener, becoming the default on the micro blogging site Twitter.
• Princes William and Harry are to appear with a large frog in a YouTube film for their father, the Prince of Wales’ environmental crusades
• Google has hired herds of goats to mow the lawn at its Mountain View headquarters because “it costs us about the same as mowing, and goats are a lot cuter to watch than lawn mowers.”
• Blackberry Curve has finally outsold the iconic iPhone in the US, as Apple fans suspended buying decisions in anticipation of iPhone 3.0 this summer.

Carotid artery disease

The heart is not the only organ affected by atherosclerosis. One-half million Americans suffer strokes each year, which often result in death or considerable disability. Minimizing risk factor is key to preventing stroke, and a main risk factor is carotid artery stenosis, or blocked carotid arteries, which accounts for approximately 20 to 30 percent of all strokes. The carotid arteries are the pipelines carrying precious oxygen-rich blood to the brain which can be damaged by atherosclerosis.

Carotid arteries narrowed by atherosclerosis can lead to a stroke when the blockage is great enough to prevent blood flow or if an embolus (blood clot) lodges in the narrowed artery. If the carotid artery is blocked, the doctor may hear a bruit (an abnormal sound in the neck) when he listens with a stethoscope.

When one or both carotid arteries becomes blocked by atherosclerosis, the same condition that blocks vessels, causing angina (chest pain) and myocardial infraction-surgeons can sometimes scrape them clean in a procedure called endarterectomy.

However it is a surgical procedure in which an incision is made in the neck, the carotid artery is opened, and the atherosclerotic plaque is removed; it is the traditional surgical treatment for carotid artery disease. Endarterectomy carries a number of risks, however, it is not suitable for all patients. 

Symptoms of a stroke:

• Sudden weakness or numbness in the face, arm, or leg on one side of the body
  
• Abrupt deterioration of speech, vision, or sensation
  
• Dimness or impaired vision in one eye
  
• Loss or near-loss of consciousness
  
• Confusion
  
• Severe and persistent headache
  
• Sudden memory loss
  
• Unexplained dizziness
  
• Sudden falls
  
• Sensations of weakness
  
• Tingling or numbness
  
• Blind spots or blurred vision
  
• Loss of balance
  
• Poor coordination
  

Some people with carotid artery stenosis, for example, are too sick with heart disease, lung disease, or neurological instability or simply too weak from advancing age to have the procedure done. Others have already undergone endarterectomy and suffer from restenosis. Another group of people have both blocked carotid and coronary arteries, and performing both carotid endarterectomy and CABG (by-pass) surgery in them is quite risky.

Presently there are alternative procedures available for both Bypass surgery as well as Carotid artery disease without the patient have to undergo surgical procedures.