0-60 in just 3.1 seconds

A hyper fast lithium based electric car that seems to blow the pants of any thing else in featured on Popular mechanics.Seeing is believing.

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nenpimania : Ninja Hybrid Hackers

A new wave of Japanese hackers who squeeze more out of their Petro Electric Hybrids have hit the scene. They compete with each other and one thing they have in common is that they seem to beat the toyota engineers in the quest for hybrid nirvana. Bloomberg.com reports :
Toya, a 56-year-old manager for a tofu maker in central Japan, puts special tires on his Prius, tapes plastic and cardboard over the engine and blocks the grill with foam rubber. He drives without shoes and hacks into his car's computer -- all in the pursuit of maximum distance with minimum gasoline.

Toya is one of about 100 nenpimania, Japanese for ``mileage maniacs,'' or hybrid owners who compete against each other to squeeze as much as 115 miles per gallon out of their cars. In a country where gasoline costs more than $4 a gallon, at least $1 more than the U.S. price, enthusiasts tweak their cars and hone driving techniques to cut fuel bills and gain bragging rights.

``My wife thinks I've joined some strange secret society,'' Toya said in January at a nenpimania gathering in Nagoya in central Japan.

Mileage maniacs aren't alone in pushing the limits of hybrid vehicles. As U.S. automakers General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. race to introduce their own models, first rolled out by Japanese companies in 1997, engineers at Toyota and Honda Motor Co. are trying to boost hybrid performance to maintain their advantage.

``With higher oil prices and tightening environmental regulations, people will focus more on hybrid technology,'' said Koji Endo, an auto analyst at Credit Suisse First Boston in Tokyo.

Hybrid Power

Hybrids combine a conventional gasoline engine with an electric motor. The motor powers the vehicle at low speeds, and the gasoline engine kicks in as the car accelerates. The motor uses the motion of the wheels to recharge the batteries.

Toya said he switched to a hybrid after years of driving sports cars, trading muscle ``for the fun of maximum mileage.'' Nicknamed ``The Shogun,'' Toya said he drove 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) on a single 13-gallon (49-liter) tank 17 times last year, an average of 79 mpg. At the advertised efficiency rate, a driver would get 715 miles per tank.

Toya isn't the best, though. A woman from Akita prefecture, nicknamed ``Teddy-Girl,'' is cited on mileage maniac Web sites as getting almost 116 mpg. That's enough to drive from New York to Wichita, Kansas -- 1,386 miles -- without refilling.

By comparison, a 2007 two-wheel drive Ford F-150 pickup running at peak efficiency burns through five times as much gasoline over the same distance.

LED lighting in Cadillac CTS sedan

Rear of the Cadillac CTS, showing vertical LED light tubes next to the vertical rear light (containing multiple red LEDs). Below this is a white backup (reversing) light comprising two high-power white LEDs. A horizontal strip of red LEDs run above the badge, and comprises the center high-mounted stop lamp (CHMSL).
The beauty of light is its interpretation by the human brain. This seems to be the meme driving auto designers who are increasingly using LED accent and niche lights to visually enhance the overall automotive experience. While Daimler and Audi have been the leaders in this (the high end S class, not your pedestrian C class :) the yankees seem to have woken up to the possibilities of using LED's in auto lighting (this is happening even in India and my firm is neck deep in auto-LED projects). From LED Mag

Cadillac focused on new lighting systems to make the 2008 CTS sport sedan as recognizable at night as its new styling does in the light of day, according to an article in the Detroit Free Press.

A total of 127 LEDs illuminate the CTS's interior and exterior, creating a unique look that builds on the brand's heritage of innovative lighting and design, according to Cadillac product director John Howell.

LED light pipes -- clear tubes that direct light -- for the CTS's brake, turn, backup and running lights are the latest example of the vertical tail lamps that have distinguished Cadillacs since 1948.

"Lighting is one of the last frontiers to differentiate cars," said CTS design director John Manoogian, adding that "countless hours and days" went into designing the CTS's stacked vertical lights. "We decided to make lighting a key element of the car's appearance and character."

The interior also uses white ambient LED lighting in the door pulls, foot wells and recessed between the upper and lower instrument panels. The result, says Cadillac, is a dramatic effect similar to recessed lighting used in contemporary homes.

Kiwi boffins achieve PV breakthrough

In an exciting development Massey Univ in Kiwiland have perfected a new Titanium dioxide based syntethic dye that replaces Si in PV panels. this could be a major beakthrough as the blurb seems to indicate that the technology uses amorphous crystals (an oxymoron) and will work in low light conditions. From Stuff

New solar cells developed by Massey University don't need direct sunlight to operate and use a patented range of dyes that can be impregnated in roofs, window glass and eventually even clothing to produce power.

This means teenagers could one day be wearing jackets that will recharge their equivalents of cellphones, iPods and other battery- driven devices.

The breakthrough is a development of the university's Nanomaterials Research Centre and has attracted world-wide interest already - particularly from Australia and Japan.

Researchers at the centre have developed a range of synthetic dyes from simple organic compounds closely related to those found in nature, where light-harvesting pigments are used by plants for photosynthesis.

"This is a proof-of-concept cell," said researcher Wayne Campbell, pointing to a desktop demonstration model.

"Within two to three years we will have developed a prototype for real applications. "The technology could be sold off already, but it would be a shame to get rid of it now."

The key to everything is the ability of the synthetic dyes to pass on the energy that reaches them - something that mere coloured water could not do.

"We now have the most efficient porphyrin dye in the world," said the centre's director, Ashton Partridge.

"It is the most efficient ever made. While others are doing related work, in this aspect we are the world leaders."

The development of the dyes has taken about 10 years and was accomplished with funding from the Royal Society of New Zealand for fundamental work and the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology in the later stages.

Now the team is seeking extra funding to go commercial.

"This particular technology does not require the large infrastructure required for silicon chips and the like," said Professor Partridge. It lends itself to being taken up by local and New Zealand industries.

Other dyes being tested in the cells are based on haemoglobin, the compound that gives blood its colour.

Dr Campbell said that unlike silicone-based solar cells, the dye- based cells are still able to operate in low-light conditions, making them ideal for cloudy climates.

They are also more environmentally friendly because they are made from titanium dioxide - an abundant and non-toxic, white mineral available from New Zealand's black sand.

Titanium dioxide is used already in consumer products such as toothpaste, white paints and cosmetics.

"The refining of silicon, although a very abundant mineral, is energy- hungry and very expensive," he said.

Sharks in trouble

Sharks have been in trouble for a while now as they are apex predators in thier environment and have a very slow reproduction rate. I personally gave up eating sharks (except on very rare occasions) more than 5 years ago. This was due to the fact that immature sharks were coming into the market. George monbiot has this to say on shark conservation.

Sharks deserve the conservation status we give to the giant panda


Marine predators are on the verge of extinction, but the fishing industry still rips the environment to shreds with impunity

If these animals lived on land there would be a global outcry. But the great beasts roaming the savannahs of the open seas summon no such support. Big sharks, giant tuna, marlin and swordfish should have the conservation status of the giant panda or the snow leopard. Yet still we believe it is acceptable for fishmongers to sell them and celebrity chefs to teach us how to cook them.

A study in this week's edition of Science reveals the disastrous collapse of the ocean's megafauna. The great sharks are now wobbling on the edge of extinction. Since 1972 the number of blacktip sharks has fallen by 93%, tiger sharks by 97% and bull sharks, dusky sharks and smooth hammerheads by 99%. Just about every population of major predators is now in freefall. Another paper, published in Nature four years ago, shows that over 90% of large predatory fishes throughout the global oceans have gone.

Tata inks deal for Indonesian coal

Tata Power has neatly bought a 30 % stake in PT Kaltim Prima Coal (KPC) and PT Arutmin Indonesia for US$1.3 billion. While the rest of the world is worried about the Asian twins (India and China) eating into the golbal oil reserves, these deals slip under the scanner. Coal is and will remain the mainstay for power generation for a long time to come. This includes china and the US. What is interesting is that India has enormous coal reserves of her own. Read more in the Jakarta post

LED cityscape lighting

Survey shows LEDs improve public’s perceptions of city safety. From LED Mag

When Raleigh, NC, the first "LED City", and Cree, Inc. turned on LEDs in the municipal parking garage, people’s opinion of the quality of the lighting improved threefold.

Raleigh exchanged the previous garage fixtures and their dull orange light for LED fixtures with bright white light, and people felt safer. The number of respondents who perceived the garage as "very safe" increased by 76% after the LED fixtures were installed, according to a survey by Mindwave Research of Austin, TX.

Cree (Nasdaq: CREE) produces LEDs that provide a source of energy efficient light which can serve as the foundation for cost-effective lighting solutions. Lighting Science Group Corporation (OTCBB: LSGP) of Dallas, TX, supplied the LED fixtures installed in the Raleigh garage.

"LED technology provides a clear benefit to municipal infrastructure, as well as to the citizens it serves," said Charles Meeker, mayor of Raleigh. "This survey shows that LEDs can do more than improve light quality. In addition to the proven environmental and energy efficiency benefits the city has already documented, the survey shows that LEDs’ bright white light can help improve public feelings of safety in city spaces."

The survey results showed that the parking garage generated a more positive reaction from most of the respondents after the addition of LED fixtures:

* Both men and women felt significantly safer post-installation: 74% rated the garage as feeling "very safe," while only 2% did not. These figures contrast with the pre-installation numbers: only 42% felt "very safe" with the original lighting, and 13% did not.
* The percentage of respondents who gave the garage an overall rating of "excellent" increased by 100%. The number of people who rated it as "poor" decreased from 8 to 1%.
* The lighting quality of the garage was "excellent" according to 86% of the respondents, a 258% increase from pre-installation respondents. The number of people who rated it as "poor" decreased from 18 to 2%.
* The cleanliness of the parking garage was perceived as "excellent" by 76% of the respondents, while only 58% rated it this way before the LEDs were installed, showing a 31% increase.

This announcement comes shortly after Raleigh agreed to become the nation's first LED City. The LED City initiative focuses on installing LED lighting, based on Cree's LEDs, throughout the city to save energy and money, and boost the quality of life for its residents by using the best lighting technology commercially available. As a result, the city has conserved energy and improved the lighting of its municipal city parking facility, the first of a series of projects aimed at delivering the environmental and economic benefits of LED lighting throughout Raleigh’s "living laboratory."

US Supreme court asks EPA to regulate Auto emmisions

A landmark case and a surprising judgement given the lobbying power of the US auto industry and the EPA's own reluctace to do so (wonder why). Excerpt below

Supreme Court Declares EPA Reasons for Not Regulating Carbon "Arbitrary, Capricious"

This is a landmark case, or at the least the beginning of a series of landmark cases: in a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court today sent the issue of whether or not the EPA can regulate carbon dioxide back to the lower courts, declaring the EPA's decision not to regulate carbon emissions "arbitrary, capricious or otherwise not in accordance with law."

The EPA had previously declared that the Clean Air Act does not give it the authority to regulate carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases.

Monbiot on biofuels - 2

Monbiot has more to say on biofuels and this time around has hard data to substantiate his argument. As ever he is right... From the Guardian op-ed.

It used to be a matter of good intentions gone awry. Now it is plain fraud. The governments using biofuel to tackle global warming know that it causes more harm than good. But they plough on regardless. In theory, fuels made from plants can reduce the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by cars and trucks. Plants absorb carbon as they grow - it is released again when the fuel is burned. By encouraging oil companies to switch from fossil plants to living ones, governments on both sides of the Atlantic claim to be "decarbonising" our transport networks. So what's wrong with these programmes? Only that they are a formula for environmental and humanitarian disaster. In 2004 I warned, on these pages, that biofuels would set up a competition for food between cars and people. The people would necessarily lose: those who can afford to drive are richer than those who are in danger of starvation. It would also lead to the destruction of rainforests and other important habitats. I received more abuse than I've had for any other column - except for when I attacked the 9/11 conspiracists. I was told my claims were ridiculous, laughable, impossible. Well in one respect I was wrong. I thought these effects wouldn't materialise for many years. They are happening already.

Since the beginning of last year, the price of maize has doubled. The price of wheat has also reached a 10-year high, while global stockpiles of both grains have reached 25-year lows. Already there have been food riots in Mexico and reports that the poor are feeling the strain all over the world. The US department of agriculture warns that "if we have a drought or a very poor harvest, we could see the sort of volatility we saw in the 1970s, and if it does not happen this year, we are also forecasting lower stockpiles next year". According to the UN food and agriculture organisation, the main reason is the demand for ethanol: the alcohol used for motor fuel, which can be made from maize and wheat.

Monbiot's previous mentions in this blog

battle-with-entropy
Bio fuels 1
Idiot science

The greaseball challenge

The Greaseball Challenge is a charity biofuel car rally from the USA to Central America. Inspired by the tradition of the classic car race, Greaseball is a cross-continental adventure promoting sustainability on a shoestring using renewable fuels.

The inaugural Greaseball Challenge departs on April 1, 2007. Armed with nothing but a sense of adventure and some cheesecloth, five teams will drive 4,500 miles on grease power from the USA to Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.

Rudolf Diesel, who invented the diesel engine, demonstrated one of his first engines running on peanut oil at the World Fair in 1900. He said at the time "The use of vegetable oils for engine fuels may seem insignificant today. But such oils may in the course of time become as important as petroleum…”.

Despite his prediction, veggie oils have remained on the “specials” menu ever since, along with just about every other renewable fuel source. Veggie car enthusiasts make a distinction between waste vegetable oil (WVO) discarded from restaurants and straight vegetable oil (SVO). Filtering waste grease is a must or bits of fried chicken will clog up your fuel lines.

Read More here.

11 MW solar plant in sunny Portugal

One of the world's largest solar energy plants, covering the hills of a valley dotted with olive groves in southern Portugal, started delivering electricity to about 8,000 homes on Wednesday.

The solar panels, which are raised around 2 meters off the ground, cover an area of 60 hectares (150 acres) and produce 11 megawatts of electricity in one of Europe's sunniest spots -- Portugal's poor agricultural Alentejo region.
The plant, which has 52,000 photovoltaic modules, is near the town of Serpa, 125 miles southeast of Lisbon.

The scheme fits into Portugal's plans of reducing its reliance on imported energy and cutting output of greenhouse gasses that feed global warming.

Portugal's emissions have surged about 37 percent since 1990, one of the highest increases in the world.

By bringing modern technology to one of western Europe's poorest regions, the $75-million plant is expected to bring alternative development to the Alentejo.

Castro and US dept of energy sing the same tune

Strange allies in the global race for energy emerged today when both Fidel Castro and U.S. Deputy Energy Secretary Clay Sell agreed that corn ethanol is a stupid idea. Reuters reports :

Output of U.S. ethanol, which is mostly made from corn, is expected to jump in 2007 from 5.6 billion gallons per year to 8 billion gpy, as nearly 80 bio-refineries sprout up.

Corn prices have doubled over the last year as the Bush administration, seeking to reduce oil imports while boosting output of fuels believed to cut greenhouse gas emissions, offers millions of dollars in incentives to boost ethanol production.

The corn prices, the highest in a decade, have spurred thousands of people in Mexico to protest over the price of tortillas, a national staple made from corn. The spike has also lead to worries that meat and dairy prices could eventually rise.

Sell said the future of biofuels is cellulosic ethanol, made from microbes that break down woody bits of non-food crops into sugars that can be fermented into fuel.

Cellulosic, and other new biofuels such as biobutanol, which can be made from petroleum as well as biomass, could begin to feed the commercial fuel market within six to 10 years, he said. They could also be part of a larger program to cut greenhouse gases, he added.

In a related incident El Commandate has condemed the use of food to produce automotive fuel. An excerpt from a conversation beween Chavez and Castro published by the BBC is below.
BBC: The following is the transcript of the conversation between Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez and Cuban leader Fidel Castro. It has been edited for brevity.

...Chavez: Do you know how many hectares of corn are needed to produce one million barrels of ethanol?

Castro: To do what?

Chavez: To produce one million barrels of ethanol?

Castro: Ethanol. I believe you told me about that the other day. Somewhere around 20 million hectares.

Chavez:[Laughing] Just like that.

Castro: Go ahead, remind me.

Chavez: Indeed, 20 million. You are the one with an exceptional mind, not me.

Castro: Twenty million. Well, of course. The idea of using food to produce fuel is tragic, is dramatic. No one is sure how high the price of food will rise when soy is being used for fuel, with the need there is in the world to produce eggs, milk, to produce meat. It is a tragedy. One of many today.

Nano art

Humans are getting better at smaller things. This nano guitar modeled after a stratocaster is a about 10 microns long and is actually playable. The pick you will have to use is an atomic force microscope ! Made my the mavens at Cornel.

Rebel with a cause

Lumileds (Philips now) has finally released the latest and greatest in low form factor power led's. The high efficacy (upt 72 lm/W) LED boasts a high Tj of 150 deg C. This is quite an innovation and can provide a much needed shot in the arm for LED general illumination space. Alternate Lighting (where i work) has already created some reference designs that will use this semiconductor. Currently this led is seen to have a large potential in the solar lighting and AC dowlighting (MR16, 11 etc) markets.

From the article in LED mag
The Rebel contains a 1x1 mm2 chip and has a footprint of just 3mm x 4.5mm, considerably smaller than rival power LEDs. The chip is mounted on a ceramic substrate and has a hemispherical silicone lens. The Rebel is engineered for operation between 350 mA and 1000 mA, and is the first power LED to offer guaranteed minimum performance (many datasheets for other LEDs specify typical performance values). Lumileds says that its minimum performance specifications enable greater design and manufacturing consistency, and allow customers to purchase the light output performance appropriate for each application.

The Rebel white binning structure includes a CCT range from 2670K to 3500K for warm-white, 3500K to 4500K for neutral-white, and 4500K to 10000K for cool-white. Sampling of the warm-white and neutral-white products begins immediately with volume production later this year.
For each CCT range, there are several bins with different minimum performance; 40, 50, 70 and 80 lm at 350 mA for cool- and neutral-white. With a forward voltage of 3.15 V, the highest bin has an efficacy of around 72 lm/W.

At higher drive currents, the datasheet shows that the top bins deliver 145 lm at 700 mA in cool- and neutral-white (57 lm/W), and 110 lm for warm-white (43 lm/W).

Typical color-rendering index (CRI) is 80 for warm-white, 75 for neutral-white, and 70 for cool-white.

The package's small footprint and low profile of just 2.1mm should enable significantly reduced color mixing and diffusion depths. This will allow luminaire designs that are significantly thinner than those using alternative power LED packages.

Misplaced priorities

This blog has tried to maintain a pragmatic view of Life, the universe and everything. Yet one glaring issue that no one (especially environmentalists) want to talk about is population. The real degradation of the planet is caused by uncontrolled human breeding. Those of us in India see the manifestations and repurcussions of this everyday. The "green revolution" managed to nudge the population to explode with wild abandon. After all precreation is the only recreation for most here. The limiting factor was food and with subsidized, oil fed agriculture we have a king size problem today. The Hindu has this nice opinion piece that hits the nail on the head. From the article.
While the green lobby tells us to fiddle with our standby buttons and low-energy light bulbs, no one is willing to address the accelerating growth in the world's population.

IN THE time it takes you to get to the end of this sentence, seven people have been added to the population of the world. At this rate, the United Nations estimates the number of people on the planet will nearly double by the middle of this century. Even with significant reductions in birth rates, the population is expected to increase from 6.7 billion now to 9.2 billion by 2050.

These figures are staggering. Yet there is hardly a mention of them in discussion of global warming and ensuing climate change.

The U.K., for example, last week unveiled its Climate Change Bill promising to cut emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases blamed for global warming by 60 per cent from 1990 levels by 2050. Suggested policies to achieve this ranged from banning standby buttons on electrical equipment and old-fashioned, inefficient light bulbs to "capture and storage" of pollution from coal-fired power stations. Others want to limit air travel — a small but fast-growing source of greenhouse gases.

These have been well-intentioned, if not always convincing, ideas. At an Oxford, England, conference, scientists argued against the "Hollywoodisation" of the problem, that it is being promoted beyond the science. And still, everybody is talking only about one half of the equation: the emissions we generate, not how we generate them. All the standby buttons and low-energy light bulbs are dwarfed by the pressure of a global population rising by the equivalent of Britain every year.

Cree anounces improvement to XLAMP

Cree has announced a significant performance increase in its warm-white LEDs, which are now qualified to operate at 700 mA and can produce well in excess of 100 lm.
Cree has announced that it is shipping warm white XLamp LEDs that produce up to 124 lumens at a correlated color temperature (CCT) of 3,000 K when driven at 700 mA.

The company claims that this represents the industry's first demonstration of "lighting class" warm-white LEDs.

100 Million years without sex

Times online reports on a creature that has turned the current orthodoxy in evolutionary biology around. Apparently this small rotifer family is all female. Shot in the arm for Lesbian groups :) From the article A tiny creature that has not had sex for 100 million years has overturned the theory that animals need to mate to create variety.

Analysis of the jaw shapes of bdelloid rotifers, combined with genetic data, revealed that the animals have diversified under pressure of natural selection.

Researchers say that their study “refutes the idea that sex is necessary for diversification into evolutionary species”.

The microscopic animals, less than four times the length of a human sperm, are all female, yet have evolved into different species that fill different ecological niches. Two sister species were found to be living together on the body of a water louse. One of them specialised in living around the louse’s legs and the other stayed close to the chest.

Genetic analysis showed that the two creatures were distinct, a fact backed up by observations that each type had differently shaped jaws.

Asexual animals and plants usually die out quickly in evolutionary terms but the ability of bdelloid rotifers to diversify may explain why they have survived so long.

A specimen trapped in amber has shown that the animals were living at least 40 million years ago and DNA studies have suggested they have been around for 100 million years. Modern Man has notched up about 160,000 years.

It had previously been recognised that asexual animals and plants can evolve through mutations into another species, but only into one species and at the cost of its original form. Bdelloid rotifers have displayed the ability to evolve into many different forms.

The study of several bdelloid rotifers, published in the journal PLoS Biology, was carried out by an international team including researchers from Imperial College London, the University of Cambridge and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. “These really are amazing creatures, whose very existence calls into question scientific understanding,” said Tim Barraclough, of Imperial College.

He added that the two species of bdelloid rotifer almost certainly arrived on the louse as one species and later evolved to take better advantage of the environment.

There are many examples of asexual species of animals and plants, including some dande- lions. Asexuality is most common in invertebrates, such as aphids, but it is also found in a number of fish and frogs.

The end of incandescents

In a decade, the incandescent light bulb might only exist as a museum
exhibit of "how life used to be." Energy specialists, environmental
activists and Philips Lighting North America recently announced that
they are working together to eliminate the incandescent light bulb in
10 years.

This is a interesting case of a company trying to kill its own product. Read more here.

For some strange reason

This blog made the VJ times in bangalore. Must be the bikini's...

ELectrifying bikinis!

Praise the lord! Optics.org reports that A bikini stitched from solar panels generates enough electricity to charge an MP3 player, allowing the wearer to multi-task leisure activities while reclining on the beach. The photovoltaic panels stitched directly on the bikini put out 6.5 V.The multi-function swimwear made its catwalk debut at the end of 2006 at the Interactive Telecommunications Program students' final show at the Tisch School of the Arts, a part of New York University.

"The suit is a standard medium-sized bikini swimsuit retrofitted with 1x4 inch photovoltaic film strips sewn together in series with conductive thread," developer Andrew Schneider told optics.org. "The cells terminate in a female USB connection and a 5 V voltage regulator to optimise the output."

"There is no way I couldn't do this project," he said. "Once I realized it could be done, it had to be done. I also wanted the opportunity to work with renewable and solar energy in a fun, kitsch and yet consumer-oriented way."

"I decided to go with a female suit because of the sleeker form. The demographic I can foresee actually becoming interested in the solar bikini would be those people who enjoy mobile culture, hanging out, music, and kitsch - a demographic not unlike that to which the Apple Corp. seems to preach."

Relax, guys!

Men who are interested in adapting their swimwear into a mini-power station will not be left out. The male version of the Solar Bikini is coming soon and will be called the iDrink. With a greater surface area (!) it is expected to deliver a higher output voltage. This additional juice will be sufficient to power a 1.5 A peltier junction to cool a can of beer (or soda) in a custom coozy. "That's what I call double cool," Schneider added.

"The iDrink solar swimwear line will be perfect for those who want to go the beach, listen to music, and enjoy a cold beverage, but who don't want to get wet! You've got tunes, you've got beer, you've got sun, and you've got each other in swimwear. The rest is up to you."

Whether the multi-tasking beach babes and bums will actually be able to swim in the new costumes without receiving a shock in a sensitive area was not revealed. But optics.org guesses they'll probably be too busy dancing, drinking or charging up their toothbrushes to take a dip.