Cyberpage 8743

How much for that engineer?

Ever wonder if you are underpaid or, God forbid, overpaid? Then http://www.salary.com can answer that question. Click on the Salary Wizard button and fill out the boxes. The site also offers a plethora of other tools and information to help you get what you're worth in today's economy-calculators for your total worth, tips on negotiating for a better salary or benefits, bonuses, and stock options, and other featured advice. You can also check where employers are laying off or hiring in the News section, read and ask advice from experts in the Salary Talk section, and check several other career resources links. Salary.com even features a dream jobs section-would you believe that "rocket scientist" (aerospace engineer) made it? How about roller coaster designer?

The path of least resistance

With beginner's information explaining just what a superconductor is, a pretty awesome glossary of superconductor terms, current and future uses of superconductors, and new superconductor material being tested in labs today, http://www.superconductors.org answers just about any question you may have. And if you want to build a superconductor in your garage, there are links to several companies selling kits, as well as links to tons of other research groups, manufacturers, and conferences.

R is for rocket

Practikal and Impractikal Rocertry Made Easy at http://www.fortunepaint.com/rockets.htm lets you take a look at rocket plans and other gizmos and doohickeys to check out for those interested in rocketry. Although a personal site, it was loaded with lots of interesting stuff, including a register of rocketeers from the past, hybrid rocket motors, basics of solid rockets, a descent rate calculator for parachutes, and lots of links to other hot spots in rocketing.

S is for space

Or even Space Station, as in International Space Station. PBS has an interactive site in conjunction with their two-part documentary series on the ISS at http://www.pbs.org/spacestation . There are fact sheets on the station, the experiments planned, and the components. You'll also find links to other ISS and space sites, as well as videos from the series, anda link to track the flight path and take a virtual tour. For die-hard fans, there's even wallpaper to download for your computer.

Not a sandwich but submarine that is faster than the Concorde? New Scientist magazine featured an article (http://www.newscientist.com/features/features_224813.html ) recently on a "supercavitating submarine" in which only the nose of a craft will cause any significant drag because it's the only part of the vessel in contact with the water. But because water only flows along the nose of the craft (behind it is a gas envelope), conventional propellers won't work-but rockets should. Researchers at the U.S. Naval Undersea Warfare Center have tested several designs (http://www.nuwc.navy.mil) and they are dealing with a couple problems-how to launch it and what happens if it slows down too much?

T is for Tutorial

The International Engineering Consortium now offers an online tutorial on the Introduction to Optical Transmission in a Communications Network. This tutorial covers the basic concepts to understand synchronous and optical transmission, as well as a view of a telecommunications networking including things like switching, synchronous digital hierarchy, synchronous optical networking, and optical layers. The site also features more than 130 other free Web ProForums at http://www.iec.org .