oscar 2009 awards

"Mercedes-Benz HYBRID preparing for U.S. debut this summer"

As we can see that in this fashionable world competetion is upto its most orthodox level,in every field their's a competetion and so is the case with automobiles.Every automobile company wants to satisfy their customers by giving comfort and luxury such that their needs are marked positive throughout,thus by having the view of this competetion "Mercedes is going to launch its S 400 BlueHYBRIDin U.S by this june 2009"
The basic characterisics and features of this hybrid are
1.Mercedes-Benz Talks Batteries, Hybrid and EV Plans: Mercedes-Benz is preparing to transform its flagship S-Class sedan into an "economy" car offering gas mileage comparable to that of the Honda Accord, and that will be only the beginning of the car's fuel consumption makeover, the company promises.
The key change: incorporating a new lithium-ion battery that Mercedes-Benz parent Daimler AG has been developing since the early 1990s.Due largely to technology advances achieved in the last six years, Mercedes-Benz engineers say, the battery is now ready for mass production and will be used first in the S400 BlueHybrid , a new gasoline-electric S-Class sedan slated to go on sale after the summer of 2009.Mercedes-Benz S400 BlueHybrid is first production lithium ion hybrid
2.Superior Quality Replacement Parts: Reviving Old Mercedes Benz' Luster:No other name in the automobile industry has ever matched Mercedes Benz' prestige and high reputation. Through the years, Mercedes Benz has always been an icon for luxury and high performance cars and accordingly, every vehicle that carries a Mercedes Benz badge is an explicit representation of what every person desires to drive. It is Mercedes Benz' tradition to build cars of excellent design, outstanding engineering and top quality auto parts to give it users high level of driving satisfaction—a tradition which it had cultivated for more than a century now.if you have ever seen an old model of Mercedes Benz, you need to be extra careful of your car since it is more prone to car problems. No matter how solid its construction is, sooner or later it will wear out. Exterior parts need to be checked as well-hood doors,bumpers may have cracks, dents and holes. Replacing it with new and more stylish parts can also give your car a fresh new look. Finding replacement auto parts for Mercedes used to be a problem since Mercedes Benz is one of those automakers that hardly approve the use of non-OEM replacement parts. Available aftermarket Mercedes Benz Parts offered were usually high in price. catalytic converter, tail lights, wheels, window regulator, grille guards, headlights, mirror, spoiler and radiator. If you want great savings for your Mercedes Benz E-Class Parts, Mercedes Benz C-Class Parts and Mercedes Benz SL-Class Parts, visit Auto Parts Wholesale, the home of top quality automotive parts for various car makes and models, including Mercedes Benz. Auto Parts Wholesale is among the leading suppliers of high quality automotive parts for Mercedes Benz. So don't worry now about restyling, upgrading and improving old Mercedes Benz.
3.Reducing cost of gas with hybrid cars:The first successfully designed, engineered and launched hybrid car was by Ferdinand Porsche all the way back in 1899. How surprisingly long ago it has been since the first hybrid car and only of recent years have we been able to find a way to bring hybrid cars to the home users. With the continual rise in the cost of gasoline, most consumers welcome the new breed of cars in the form of hybrid cars. Hybrid cars use multiple propulsion systems to provide power. It combines the use of gas and also electric to power up the car. Hybrid cars are comparatively smaller than the usual internal combustion engines and have been known to save consumers quite a bit of money every month on gas. One question lingers on...how can a hybrid car save me, the consumer, money? Well, the basic reason is because hybrid cars don't use as much gas as the normal cars we see on the road. When the hybrid car is being driven or in use, they are recharging their batteries. And when the hybrid car is cruising or stationary, it also charges the batteries. Of course, we've heard of the all-electric cars which use nothing but electric which requires one to charge the car up whenever not in use through an external source and we've also heard of the range extending trailer. But if convenience, safety and money are important to you, consider the hybrid car as a complete life saver. Although not completely certified to be so because the hybrid car continues to use gas (which is not environmental friendly), the hybrid car, when compared to the conventional car, is more environmentally-friendly. In fact, the fuel economy advantage provided by hybrid cars is good enough for the US Government because they provide a tax credit of up to $3,400 for owners of hybrid cars. How can a hybrid car save me money? Because the use of self-charging electrical components within the car means that the hybrid car uses less fuel. Because the internal combustion engine in a hybrid car is much smaller than the conventional car. Therefore, it is not only smaller, but it is much lighter and more efficient than any other cars we've known. Because when the car is moving, is idle or stationary or when the car brakes, it is a chance for the batteries to recharge itself. The more electricity it uses from the batteries, the less fuel it uses. Simple and logical.
4.Next hybrid for Mercedes Benz will be a diesel-electric M-Class:Mercedes Benz will launch its first ever hybrid model with the introduction of the all-new S400 BlueHYBRID, a petrol-electric hybrid based on the S-Class sedan, later this year. Its next hybrid, however, will reportedly be a more advanced diesel-electric model based on the M-Class SUV.According to a new report, the M-Class hybrid will go on sale in the second half of the year. The vehicle will feature the same dual-mode hybrid system found in the S400 BlueHYBRID but in the SUV it will be mated with a 3.2L low-emission Bluetec turbodiesel engine and AWD system.
The new Mercedes-Benz E-Class Coupe which will replace the old CLK made its official debut this week and will be revealed to the world at this year’s Geneva Motor Show. The new vehicle will include the following gasoline engine options: a 204bhp turbo 1.8-liter four-pot in the E250 CGI, a 292bhp 3.5-liter V6 in the E350 CGI, and a 388bhp 5.5-liter V8 in the E500.
5.
Mercedes hybrid leads the charge:Mercedes already has a fleet of fuel-cell A-Classes running around in daily use, and this F600 research car has a fuel-cell stack that's 40 per cent smaller, simpler, more efficient, a lot cheaper and more robust in cold temperatures than that one. Which is all good stuff to bring production closer - and Mercedes said at the show it's aiming for 'production maturity' of fuel cells (though not in exactly this vehicle) between 2012 and 2015.The F600 runs with a hybrid-drive system: the fuel cell output is pretty steady, and a battery buffers the supply of electricity to the drive motor as needed: in acceleration fuel cell and battery supply current in tandem, but in gentle cruising or deceleration the motor acts as a generator and recharges the battery. By using a hybrid drive and a lithium-ion battery, total system power peaks at 115bhp. And it's claimed to have a 250-mile range on its compressed hydrogen tanks. The result, says Mercedes, is its first fuel-cell car to be comparable in all important performance measures with a petrol car - even though all we've actually seen is it driving onto the stage at the motor show unveiling.

Antarctic Expedition Prepared Researchers For Mars Project

About half a year before the robotic arm on NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander began digging into soil and subsurface ice of an arctic plain of Mars, six scientists traveled to one of the coldest, driest places on Earth for soil-and-ice studies that would end up aiding analysis of the Mars data.

They used duplicates of some of the Phoenix spacecraft's instruments, plus other methods, in the Antarctic Dry Valleys where breaks in the south polar ice sheet leave windswept rocky terrain exposed. Their two-week expedition, overlapping New Year's Day 2008, was part of the International Polar Year, a multipronged scientific program focused on the Arctic and Antarctic from March 2007 to March 2009.

"We wanted to gain experience with our Phoenix instruments in one of the most Mars-like environments on Earth," said Leslie Tamppari of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. She is the project scientist for Phoenix and principal investigator for the Antarctic Dry Valleys expedition, though pregnancy kept her from making the trip to Antarctica.

Like the Martian plain where Phoenix landed, the Antarctic Dry Valleys have permafrost and experience cycles of expansion and contraction that have formed the terrain into a pattern of polygons slightly higher at the centers than at the edges. Some of the valleys visited by the expedition, such as University Valley, even have Mars-like "dry" permafrost, where the soil above the ice table never warms above freezing. This makes it even more Mars-like than "wet" permafrost in Earth's Arctic and in lower-elevation dry valleys in Antarctica, where ice in the upper layer of soil thaws in the summer.

Antarctic Test of an Instrument for Mars

Beacon Valley in Antarctica provides one of the best sites on Earth for environmental conditions comparable to high-latitude regions of Mars. Like the landing site of NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander, Beacon Valley has a water-ice table beneath the surface and dry soil above the ice that rarely, if ever, gets warm enough for ice to melt.

Members of the science team for the Phoenix mission took instruments for Beacon Valley during a three-week expedition in December 2007 and January 2008. The results have helped them understand and interpret results from the Phoenix mission.

In this image, expedition member Doug Ming of NASA's Johnson Space Center, Houston, uses a field version of an X-ray diffraction and fluorescence instrument called CheMin, part of the science payload for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory mission slated for launch in 2011.

Image Credit: NASA "Those upper valleys are the best analog for the Phoenix site," said Peter Smith of the University of Arizona, Tucson, principal investigator for the Phoenix mission. "The soil temperatures are always well below freezing, ice is stable about 15 inches below the surface, and the extreme conditions challenge life forms to the maximum. This is as close as we can get to Martian conditions."

Sam Kounaves of Tufts University, Medford, Mass., took a working copy of the Phoenix lander's wet chemistry laboratory experiment. He collected soil samples from different depths and used that instrument to assess the concentrations of many soluble nutrients, such as calcium, magnesium and potassium. He also used other methods back at his lab to check for the same ingredients and found essentially the same concentrations. "This helps us validate the results from the wet chemistry laboratory, and gives us more confidence in the data we obtained from Mars," Kounaves said.

The wet chemistry laboratory was one of the tools Phoenix carried for investigating whether the permafrost environment on Mars has ever offered a favorable chemical environment for microbial life. It found several soluble soil nutrients in concentrations comparable to fertile soils on Earth. That's one plus for habitability. Other key factors in evaluating the site's habitability include whether the water-ice ever thaws enough to become biologically available, whether the site has a supply of carbon-based chemicals that are building blocks for life, and whether the site has an energy source organisms could use.

Midnight Sunlight on Antarctic Camp

Broad daylight at midnight illuminates a camp of researchers in Antarctica's Beacon Valley in January 2008. Scientists affiliated with NASA Phoenix Mars Lander mission traveled to the site and other Antarctic valleys for studies that aided analysis of data they later got from Mars. They used field versions of instruments on Phoenix, plus other methods, to investigate an environment that, like the Phoenix landing site, has dry soil year-round above an underground layer of water ice.

Phoenix landed on far-northern Mars on May 25, 2008, which was late spring in the northern hemisphere of Mars. For most of the three-month prime mission following the landing, the lander received round-the-clock sunshine. In Antarctica as at the Phoenix site, winter includes a long period with no direct sunshine at all.

Image Credit: NASA Results from the Antarctic expedition are helping the Phoenix team interpret results from some of the spacecraft's tools assessing those other factors, too.

Doug Ming of NASA Johnson Space Center, Houston, brought back to Houston soil samples from different depths of about a dozen trenches dug in Antarctic Dry Valleys. Some of the samples will be analyzed in an engineering model of the Mars lander's oven instrument that heats samples and identifies the volatile gases driven off by the heating. This instrument on Phoenix served to study the minerals in the soil and check for carbon-containing organic compounds.

"We've kept the samples frozen and sterile since they were collected," Ming said. The analysis continues.

Phoenix used a fork-like probe, inserted into Martian soil, to study changes in the soil's humidity, electrical and thermal properties. Aaron Zent, of NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif., brought one of these thermal and electroconductivity probes to the Antarctic Dry Valleys.

"You have to use the probe in undisturbed soil, not a soil sample that you've dug up," Zent said. "We got some measurements that demonstrated the functionality of the instrument."

The instrument, which was operating at temperatures some 20 Celsius degrees (36 Fahrenheit degrees) warmer than the highest temperatures Phoenix experienced on Mars, also found changes in soil electrical properties that reflected small changes in soil water over the course of the Antarctic day.

Zent is using weather records from the dry valleys, similar to the temperature and humidity data from the conductivity probe, to refine models of the Antarctic and Martian climates and the presence of thin films of unfrozen water in the soil. Soil adjacent to the ice table in the dry permafrost of University Valley does not get warmer than about minus 10 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit). That is a warmer temperature than the soil at the Phoenix landing site reaches currently, but would be a closer match to conditions at the Phoenix site a few millions years ago, when the rotation axis of Mars had a greater tilt and the poles got warmer. At such orbital configurations, conditions in the Martian high arctic might closely parallel conditions in Earth's Antarctica.

The expedition included two biologists -- Chris McKay of NASA Ames Research Center, and Susanne Douglas of JPL. Among other studies in the Antarctic Valleys, the team checked whether any microbes live close to the ice in the dry permafrost of University Valley, which had never been done before. The results of these studies, still in review, could add new understanding of the Earth's own extreme environments. If living microbes are found in the dry permafrost, this would bring us one step closer to understanding the potential habitability on Mars.

"There's no other place on Earth that combines the dryness and the coldness of the Antarctic Dry Valleys, a combination that presents a difficult challenge to life," Douglas said.

India honing edge in auto design, R&D software

High-end software like 3D, PLM, and V5 provided by software majors like Dassault Systemes, Siemens and IBM have revolutionised the way new models of vehicles are designed, tested, and manufactured. The advantages of using Indian software talent are obviously in costs. Indian engineering talent is 45 per cent cheaper than an American counterpart.

The savings in time and money gained by using high-end software are also obvious. "We are aware of anything between 25 and 40 per cent savings in time achieved by auto majors when launching a 'concept to manufacture' programme," said Vivek Marwah, country marketing head, Siemens PLM.

In high performance motorsport, where turnaround time is essential, applications like PLM have reduced design time. Toyota Motorsport uses Dassault Systemes' PLM solutions to reduce aerodynamics design time by 80 per cent and achieve the first-physical assembly of the car in only two days, compared to three weeks previously. For an F1 racing team, time saved off the track is crucial.

Costs saved in building and testing models are equally substantial. "Earlier, we used to build 50 vehicles for crash tests. Now after using virtual crash tests, we use only about 40 units," explains Dr Arun Jaura, chief technology officer, Mahindra & Mahindra.

The costs saved in tests like these vary depending upon the skill sets of engineers and the country's regulatory agency requirements. Another testing expert said most new car models launched in Europe now undergo only one physical crash test, while the rest are simulated. The costs of constructing test prototypes can be enormous.

Despite a significant amount of contribution from Indian engineers in the development of models like the Swift, Dzire and SX4, Maruti Suzuki still relies on Suzuki, Japan for training its engineers, though the automaker plans to increase its R&D strength to 1,000 by 2010.

And players like Argentum hope to offer the same in India through its tie-up with France's Dassault Systemes. "Through this tie-up, we hope to train engineers who will produce engineering solutions, and not software people to do the same," said S D Pradhan, CEO, Argentum Engineering Design.

Currently, India enjoys a reputation as a provider of low-end research work that revolve around small cars. The current challenge is to change that perception. "The country has had a reputation for low-end design work. In setting up the Mahindra Research Valley, we would demonstrate to become the epicentre of engineering design and development for high-end work. We have the potential," said Dr Jaura.

India's journey to becoming the world's hub for automobile design and development may not be easy. "Opportunities are plenty, but competition abounds. China, Latin America, East Europe... each one with certain natural advantages," said R Srinivasan, executive vice-president, Avtec, a Hindustan Motors subsidiary.