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Watch the three videos and complete the sentences.
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Watch the three videos and complete the sentences.
https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=sunZ9OCAOBA
1) The problem that had been bothering scientists since 1964 studying the CBR was…
2) It is impossible to study CBR from the ground because….
3) COBE is …..
4) With the help of COBE scientists hoped to reveal….
5) The Big Bang theory states that…. and scientists believe that at the beginning the Universe was…., but while evolving with time it…
6) COBE was launched by…. and, when it was placed at….. miles from Earth, it began ….. and deployed its…... In a week it ejected…… to begin its mission.
7) COBE carried instruments, developed and refined for almost ……. years, to measure …….., which are……. of the resulting radiation.
8) The instruments were to be cooled to ….. (temperature) because …… To keep this temperature, engineers ….. Besides keeping the temperature low, one more challenge appeared…..
9) COBE found what may be the answer to the scientists’ question about the inhomogeneity of the Universe: …..
10) The curious thing of the Universe is that ……, which scientists found but not identified.
11) As a result of the discovery, physicists …… and cosmologists now believe that…..
12) However, the discovery doesn’t allow astronomers……
13) COBE project scientist dr. John Mather: ”……. ”
COBE scientist dr. Michael Hauser: ”….. ”
Unit 7
Giant Magnetoresistance
The Nobel Prize in Physics 2007 — Press Release
October 9, 2007
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2007 jointly to Albert Fert Unité Mixte de Physique CNRS/THALES, Université Paris-Sud, Orsay, France, and Peter Grü nberg
Forschungszentrum Jü lich, Germany, " for the discovery of Giant Magnetoresistance" .
Nanotechnology gives sensitive read-out heads for compact hard disks
This year's physics prize is awarded for the technology that is used to read data on hard disks. It is thanks to this technology that it has been possible to miniaturize hard disks so radically in recent years. Sensitive read-out heads are needed to be able to read data from the compact hard disks used in laptops and some music players, for instance.
In 1988 the Frenchman Albert Fert and the German Peter Grü nberg each independently discovered a totally new physical effect — Giant Magnetoresistance or GMR. Very weak magnetic changes give rise to major differences in electrical resistance in a GMR system. A system of this kind is the perfect tool for reading data from hard disks when information registered magnetically has to be converted to electric current. Soon researchers and engineers began work to enable use of the effect in read-out heads. In 1997 the first read-out head based on the GMR effect was launched and this soon became the standard technology. Even the most recent read-out techniques of today are further developments of GMR.
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A hard disk stores information, such as music, in the form of microscopically small areas magnetized in different directions. The information is retrieved by a read-out head that scans the disk and registers the magnetic changes. The smaller and more compact the hard disk, the smaller and weaker the individual magnetic areas. More sensitive read-out heads are therefore required if information has to be packed more densely on a hard disk. A read-out head based on the GMR effect can convert very small magnetic changes into differences in electrical resistance and therefore into changes in the current emitted by the read-out head. The current is the signal from the read-out head and its different strengths represent ones and zeros.
The GMR effect was discovered thanks to new techniques developed during the 1970s to produce very thin layers of different materials. If GMR is to work, structures consisting of layers that are only a few atoms thick have to be produced. For this reason GMR can also be considered one of the first real applications of the promising field of nanotechnology.
(http: //www. nobelprize. org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2007/press. html)
Exercises
1) Answer the questions using the following word combinations and phrases from the text
to read data, it is thanks to this technology that…, to miniaturize hard disks, to discover smth independently, to give rise to major differences, the perfect tool for reading data, to be converted to electric current, to become the standard technology, further developments of GMR, to retrieve information, to pack information more densely on a hard disk, to convert very small magnetic changes into differences in electric resistance, one of the first real applications of nanotechnology
a) What has Giant Magnetoresistance made possible?
b) Who discovered this effect?
c) What does a GMR system consist of?
d) How does it work? What is the future of GMR?
2) Translate the text in writing
Speed Read 
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