Shih, University of Baltimore, Maryland, performs an experiment that confirms the quanglement effect (quantum information transferred through entanglement)

In the mid-1990s, the assets of the major American investment banks amounted to $2 trillion. By 2007, they’d reach $22 trillion. Hedge funds, meanwhile, rose from $100 billion to $30 trillion. The total value of all derivatives in 2007 would reach $600 trillion, or 10 times global GDP. Then the bubble would burst.

International tourism: arrivals amount to 550 million people annually. This figure will rise to 1.2 billion people annually in 2015.

Major privatizations in Italy: mobile and landline telephony, electricity, hydrocarbons, highways, airplanes, airports, railways, etc.

Network Access Points (NAP) are permanently replacing the Internet backbone

In the United States, it is now possible to patent software and software algorithms “that produce a useful, concrete, and tangible result.” This move was made possible by President Bill Clinton’s appointment of a Software Publishing Industry lobbyist to head the Patent Office.

Nerve gas in the Tokyo subway. During the morning rush hour, fanatics from the Aum Shinrikyo religious sect converged on the Kasumigaseki station of the Tokyo subway and released a lethal gas, sarin, into the air. After taking an antidote, the terrorists fled, while passengers, blinded and gasping, ran toward the exits. Twelve people died, and over 5,000 were hospitalized, many in a coma. After the attack, police raided Aum Shinrikyo’s headquarters, arresting hundreds of followers, including leader Shoko Asahara. The sect, which practiced a blend of Buddhism, yoga, and Christian apocalyptic philosophy, was already under investigation for a similar attack in 1994 that had killed seven people, and for the assassinations of several political opponents.

The Banana Equivalent Radiation Dose is coined. Gary Mansfield writes to Radsafe, arguing that it is impossible to achieve zero radiation levels, since even bananas are radioactive, containing small doses of the highly radioactive isotope Potassium-40 (one of the radioactive components that heats the Earth’s core). The text of the email, which is worth reading in full, is: re: The Radiation Dose from a “Reference Banana.” Some time ago (when I almost had time to do such things), I calculated the dose one receives from the average banana. Here’s how it goes: On page 620 of the CRD Handbook on Rad Measurement and Protection, the concentration of K-40 in a “Reference Banana” is listed as 3520 picocuries per kilogram of banana. For those of us who are stuck in certain unit rules, this is equivalent to 3.52E-6 microcuries of K-40 per gram of banana. An average “Reference” banana weighs (masses) about 150 grams (I think.) So, the ICRP Reference Banana contains about 5.28E-4 microcuries of probably deadly K-40. Federal Guidance Report #11 lists the ingestion dose (committed effective dose equivalent) for K-40 as 5.02E-9 Sv/Bq or (again, for those of us who are “unit-challenged,” 1.86E-2 rem per microcurie ingested.) Thus, the CEDE from ingestion of a Reference Banana is 5.28E-4 x 1.86E-2 = 9.82E-6 rem or about 0.01 millirem. I have found this “Banana Equivalent Dose” very useful in attempting to explain infinitesmal doses (and corresponding infinitesmal risks) to members of the public. (Interestingly, the anti-nukes just HATE this, and severely criticize us for using such a deceptive concept.) Would love to go into more detail, but have to get back to our DEADLY Human Radiation Experiments (ie, eating bananas.) The same table in the CRC Handbook lists 3400 pCi/kg for white potatoes and 4450 pCi/kg for sweet potatoes – so you could carry through the same sort of calculation for Reference Potatoes. Interestingly, raw lima beans come in at 4640 pCi/kg, “dry, sweet” coconut comes in at 6400 pCi/kg, and raw spinach (yum!) comes in at 6500 pCi/kg. Considering the fact that the DOE has officially stated that “there is no safe dose of radiation” my advice to you all is to stop eating immediately. Oh yes! Almost forgot. Regarding K-40, go into your local grocery store, buy some salt-substitute (there are two common brands, and the one in the white and orange labeled container works best) spread some

David di Vincenzo of IBM Research shows how to build a Deutsch Gate with combinations of only two-qu-bit gate inputs (and outputs, being reversible)

Steve Fosset completes the first round-the-world balloon flight (using jet streams)

President Clinton signs Executive Order 12951, “Release of Imagery Acquired by Space-based National Intelligence Reconnaissance Systems.” This concerns classified imagery from the CORONA spy satellites.

Netanya, Israel. A Palestinian attack kills 22.

In Fiuggi, from the ashes of the Italian Social Movement, National Alliance was born, with 1507 votes in favour out of 1679.

Earthquake magnitude 7.2 in Osaka and Kobe (6,394 deaths, $99 billion in damage)

Ramzi Yousef and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed plot a large-scale attack in the Philippines, known as Operation Bojinka. The attack was planned with Abdul Hakim Murad, also Pakistani, and the Afghan financier, Wali Khan Amin Shah. It unfolded in three phases: 1) the assassination of the Pope on January 15, 1995, in a suicide attack; 2) the downing of 11 American airliners with nitroglycerin on January 21, 1995; and 3) a suicide attack with a plane piloted by Murad against the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. On January 6, 1995, a fire (possibly started by the police) hit the terrorists’ Manila apartment. They fled, pursued by the police, leaving behind their computers and the plans for the attacks. All were captured in the following months, except for Mohammed, who would later be among the organizers of the September 11, 2001, attacks.

The complete genome of Haemophilus influenzae is decoded

Los Alamos Nat’l Labs researchers test a ceramic superconductor (YBCO – yttrium, barium, copper, oxygen) that delivers 1 million amps at 77K.

Ward Cunningham, a Purdue graduate from Indiana, created what he calls a “wiki,” a web page that users can edit by clicking directly on the page. “wiki” is the Hawaiian term for “fast.” His web pages are called WikiWikiWeb. The idea is based on the concept that “people are generally good,” a typical optimistic, joyful vision of the American Midwest. But it worked, for example, for a subsequent development: Wikipedia.

With the sudden collapse of the USSR in August 1991, even its flagship was at risk of being dismantled: the military-industrial complex with 600,000 workers, engineers, and scientists. The $4 billion budget in 1989 collapsed to $0.7 billion in 1994, and thousands of prestigious technicians emigrated to the West. Worse still, Oleg Baklanov, head of the space industry, had the brilliant idea of joining the group that carried out the attempted coup in 1991. The obvious consequence was a certain government distrust of the space industry. But the sector did not disappear; on the contrary, it recovered, and today Russia remains one of only three nations that can send people into space.

Russia. The Rockot (diamond) launcher is derived from the Soviet SS-19 ICBM (Vladimir Chelomei’s UR-100). In the USSR, there were 360 SS-19 Stilettos ready in silos, and another 144 were launched as tests. The first orbital mission took place on December 26, 1994. It launched 2 tons into LEO for $14 million. It used UDMH (hypergolic hydrazine). The launch sites at Baikonur were all silos, which caused enormous noise and vibration during launch. They were therefore moved to Plesetsk. In 1995, Khrunichev formed a company with Daimler-Benz, called Eurockot, and then Astrium GmbH, a shareholder of Arianspace, joined in 2000. It can reignite its final stage six times, deploying multiple satellites. It will be retired after the last launch on December 26, 2019, after 34 launches and 31 successes.

The USAF during the intervention in Bosnia-Herzegovina lost on average one aircraft every 17,000 missions, in Vietnam it was one every 1240 missions, during the Second World War it was one every 95

NATO intervention in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the subsequent Dayton Peace Accords, Ohio

War in Chechnya between Russian troops and independence rebels (20,000 dead)

Exodus of 25,000 rafters from Cuba to Florida and Guantanamo Bay

Andrew Wiles proves Fermat’s Theorem with a 130-page proof that focuses on the proof of the Shimura-Taniyama Conjecture (Fermat’s Last Theorem: a^n + b^n differs from c^n for all n > 2). The proof will be published in the May 1995 issue of Annals of Mathematics and represents a revolution in number theory, a giant leap for algebraic number theory.

Linus Pauling dies in California at age 93.

The largest (fragment G) of the 21 fragments from Comet Shoemaker-Levy crashes into Jupiter. The dark “crater” in Jupiter’s clouds is the size of Earth. Fragment G causes an explosion of 6 million megatons: 600 times the power of all the nuclear bombs humanity has ever built!

Anti-Semitic attack on AMIA (Jewish Mutual Aid Association) in Buenos Aires: 86 dead

The first of 21 fragments from Comet Shoemaker-Levy crashes into Jupiter. They reach speeds of 60 km/s! The impact temperatures are 23,700°C, as measured by the Galileo probe orbiting Jupiter. It’s also the 25th anniversary of the first lunar landing, and Neil Armstrong himself mentions it in a speech marking the occasion. Eugene Shoemaker, one of the three discoverers of the comet, had also been an instructor for the Apollo astronauts during the geology portion of their mission.

The presidents of Rwanda and Burundi are killed in the downing of their plane in Rwanda. The genocide of the Tutsis begins in Rwanda, but eventually the Tutsi forces prevail and Hutu refugees pour into Zaire.

North Korea’s “great leader” dies. Kim Il Sung, dictator of North Korea since 1948, dies of a heart attack at the age of 82. In the 1930s, he fought against the Japanese invasion and, at the recommendation of Soviet authorities, traveled to the USSR for political and military training. A convert to communism, he joined the Red Army and fought in World War II. In 1945, Korea was divided into two spheres of influence, American and Soviet, and in 1948, Kim became the first president of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea). Hoping to reunify the country by force, Kim ordered an invasion of the South in 1950, sparking the so-called Korean War, which ended in 1953 with no results. For the next 40 years, Kim ruled the country in profound isolation, even distancing himself from his former communist allies, and tensions with the South continued unabated. Through repression and a personality cult, the “great leader” maintained power until his death. He was succeeded by his son Kim Jong Il.

The Galileo probe is the only direct witness to the impact of Comet Shoemaker-Levy on Jupiter.

The Ulysses probe makes its first flyby of a solar pole.

Comet Shoemaker-Levy slams into Jupiter with 12 1-million-megaton impacts

The Food and Drug Administration approves the marketing of CalGene’s FlavrSavr tomato, the first genetically modified crop to be commercialized; FlavrSavr has been engineered to rot much more slowly.

Ayrton Senna crashed his Williams at the exit of a corner at Imola and died a few days later.

Nelson Mandela of the African National Congress is elected President of the Republic of South Africa

Mathematicians Arjen Lenstra and Mark Manasse, using the Internet and distributed computers, crack RSA129 with the Pomerance quadratic sieve. The smallest number that still resists decomposition now has over 160 digits.

Silvio Berlusconi returns to government after the Polo delle Liberta’s victory in the elections.

The Netscape browser was launched by Marc Andreessen and Jim Clark.

NATO’s first military action. In the first military action in NATO’s 45-year history, U.S. fighters downed four Serbian warplanes violating the Bosnian no-fly zone on a bombing mission. Founded in 1949 to prevent Soviet aggression, in 1994 NATO offered to enforce UN resolutions aimed at ending three years of conflict in the former Yugoslavia. In 1995, NATO deployed 60,000 troops to the troubled region in implementation of the Dayton Peace Accords, signed in Paris by the leaders of the former Yugoslavia.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) announced that four Network Access Points (NAPs) will be built to replace the existing Internet backbone; they will be located in San Francisco (PacBell), Chicago (BellCore and Ameritech), New York (SprintLink), and Washington, DC (Metropolitan Fiber System).

Earthquake in Los Angeles, 7.0 on the Richter scale, 50 dead

The American probe Clementine detects the first clear signs of the abundance of water ice in the shadowed parts of the craters at the lunar South Pole

In Afghanistan, the extremist Islamic militia Taliban is formed and conquers Kandahar.