6 ms·

currently hugged. https://web.archive.org/web/20220624095811/https://www.anthropocenemagazine.org/2022/05/algae-powers-computer-for-a-year-using-only-light-and-

by berbec 3y ago

currently hugged. https://web.archive.org/web/20220624095811/https://www.anthropocenemagazine.org/2022/05/algae-powers-computer-for-a-year-using-only-light-and-water/ https://web.archive.org/web/20220624095811/https://www.anthr...

westurner 3y ago
From the (archived) article: > In the new work published in Energy & Environmental Science, researchers at Cambridge University harnessed algae’s ability to produce electricity during photosynthesis. They put blue-green algae, also called cyanobacteria, into a see-through case made of plastic and aluminum. Then they placed it on a windowsill and connected it to the microprocessor, which they had programmed to run for cycles of 45 minutes followed by 15 minutes of rest. "Powering a microprocessor by photosynthesis" (2022) https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2022/ee/d2ee00233g https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2022/ee/d2ee0... : > Abstract: Sustainable, affordable and decentralised sources of electrical energy are required to power the network of electronic devices known as the Internet of Things. Power consumption for a single Internet of Things device is modest, ranging from μW to mW, but the number of Internet of Things devices has already reached many billions and is expected to grow to one trillion by 2035, requiring a vast number of portable energy sources (e.g., a battery or an energy harvester). Batteries rely largely on expensive and unsustainable materials (e.g., rare earth elements) and their charge eventually runs out. Existing energy harvesters (e.g., solar, temperature, vibration) are longer lasting but may have adverse effects on the environment (e.g., hazardous materials are used in the production of photovoltaics). Here, we describe a bio-photovoltaic energy harvester system using photosynthetic microorganisms on an aluminium anode that can power an Arm Cortex M0+, a microprocessor widely used in Internet of Things applications. The proposed energy harvester has operated the Arm Cortex M0+ for over six months in a domestic environment under ambient light. It is comparable in size to an AA battery, and is built using common, durable, inexpensive and largely recyclable materials. How many wh/kg/cm3?
extrememacaroni 3y ago
what should a website do to not get hugged?
- MobiusHorizons 3y ago
  Be less interesting? Seriously though, for static content like an article, caching and cdn’s can handle fairly large traffic.
- thephyber 3y ago
  Hugged is an euphemism that describes when demand is higher than supply for server/bandwidth resources. Solution: increase supply and/or reduce demand. Reducing the dynamic content (reduce the number of HTTP requests and the time taken for the server to respond to each request) goes a long way, but CDNs are good for increasing supply if that is ultimately necessary.
  - Kamq 3y ago
    While CDNs are useful, you really shouldn't need them to handle HN traffic. Someone posted what the otherside of a hug looks like[0], and it's somewhere around a unique visitor every 1-2 seconds, which really shouldn't be too much of a problem for... well anyone. The poster themselves got through it with a $7/month heroku server (albeit not without some manual intervention). And, y'know, if sometimes a hobby project gets taken down, that's fair. You could end up getting 100 requests in a single second on a server you strung together off blog posts as a learning exercise over a weekend. But any time any professional organization gets taken down by the amount of traffic HN generates, I'm always a little embarrassed for them. [0] https://herman.bearblog.dev/the-hacker-news-hug/ https://herman.bearblog.dev/the-hacker-news-hug/
    - littlestymaar 3y ago
      Yeah, at such a load, it's almost always something like too many DB connections/queries. If you somehow use one DB connection per query and make multiple queries for every user, no wonder your website struggles under even a tiny bit of load.
      - Kamq 3y ago
        The number of times I've been bitten by an orm and the n+1 problem... Which, I guess is fine for some internal thing that needs to handle 8 requests a day. I've kinda stopped using orms at this point. The sql is usually clearer than whatever dsl has been shoved into the orm. If you ever change databases, it requires slightly more work (assuming you haven't gone too crazy with db specific functionality), but burning a day or two to update the sql in your project is usually still quicker than orchestrating the migration.

by berbec 3y ago

westurner 3y ago

From the (archived) article: > In the new work published in Energy & Environmental Science, researchers at Cambridge University harnessed algae’s ability to produce electricity during photosynthesis. They put blue-green algae, also called cyanobacteria, into a see-through case made of plastic and aluminum. Then they placed it on a windowsill and connected it to the microprocessor, which they had programmed to run for cycles of 45 minutes followed by 15 minutes of rest. "Powering a microprocessor by photosynthesis" (2022) https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2022/ee/d2ee00233g https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2022/ee/d2ee0... : > Abstract: Sustainable, affordable and decentralised sources of electrical energy are required to power the network of electronic devices known as the Internet of Things. Power consumption for a single Internet of Things device is modest, ranging from μW to mW, but the number of Internet of Things devices has already reached many billions and is expected to grow to one trillion by 2035, requiring a vast number of portable energy sources (e.g., a battery or an energy harvester). Batteries rely largely on expensive and unsustainable materials (e.g., rare earth elements) and their charge eventually runs out. Existing energy harvesters (e.g., solar, temperature, vibration) are longer lasting but may have adverse effects on the environment (e.g., hazardous materials are used in the production of photovoltaics). Here, we describe a bio-photovoltaic energy harvester system using photosynthetic microorganisms on an aluminium anode that can power an Arm Cortex M0+, a microprocessor widely used in Internet of Things applications. The proposed energy harvester has operated the Arm Cortex M0+ for over six months in a domestic environment under ambient light. It is comparable in size to an AA battery, and is built using common, durable, inexpensive and largely recyclable materials. How many wh/kg/cm3?

extrememacaroni 3y ago

what should a website do to not get hugged?

MobiusHorizons 3y ago
Be less interesting? Seriously though, for static content like an article, caching and cdn’s can handle fairly large traffic.
thephyber 3y ago
Hugged is an euphemism that describes when demand is higher than supply for server/bandwidth resources. Solution: increase supply and/or reduce demand. Reducing the dynamic content (reduce the number of HTTP requests and the time taken for the server to respond to each request) goes a long way, but CDNs are good for increasing supply if that is ultimately necessary.
- Kamq 3y ago
  While CDNs are useful, you really shouldn't need them to handle HN traffic. Someone posted what the otherside of a hug looks like[0], and it's somewhere around a unique visitor every 1-2 seconds, which really shouldn't be too much of a problem for... well anyone. The poster themselves got through it with a $7/month heroku server (albeit not without some manual intervention). And, y'know, if sometimes a hobby project gets taken down, that's fair. You could end up getting 100 requests in a single second on a server you strung together off blog posts as a learning exercise over a weekend. But any time any professional organization gets taken down by the amount of traffic HN generates, I'm always a little embarrassed for them. [0] https://herman.bearblog.dev/the-hacker-news-hug/ https://herman.bearblog.dev/the-hacker-news-hug/
  - littlestymaar 3y ago
    Yeah, at such a load, it's almost always something like too many DB connections/queries. If you somehow use one DB connection per query and make multiple queries for every user, no wonder your website struggles under even a tiny bit of load.
    - Kamq 3y ago
      The number of times I've been bitten by an orm and the n+1 problem... Which, I guess is fine for some internal thing that needs to handle 8 requests a day. I've kinda stopped using orms at this point. The sql is usually clearer than whatever dsl has been shoved into the orm. If you ever change databases, it requires slightly more work (assuming you haven't gone too crazy with db specific functionality), but burning a day or two to update the sql in your project is usually still quicker than orchestrating the migration.