- published: 19 Feb 2014
- views: 1912488
Bulletproofing is the process of making something capable of stopping a bullet or similar high velocity projectiles e.g. shrapnel. The term bullet resistance is often preferred because few, if any, practical materials provide complete protection against all types of bullets, or multiple hits in the same location.
Bullet designs vary widely, not only according to the particular firearm used (e.g. a 9x19mm Parabellum caliber hollowpoint handgun cartridge will have inferior penetration power compared to a 7.62x39mm rifle cartridge), but also within individual cartridge designs. As a result, whilst so-called "bullet-proof" panels may successfully prevent penetration by standard 7.62x39mm bullets containing lead cores, the same panels may easily be defeated by 7.62 x 39 mm armor piercing bullets containing hardened steel penetrators.
Bullet-resistant materials (also called ballistic materials or, equivalently, anti-ballistic materials) are usually rigid, but may be supple. They may be complex, such as Kevlar, Lexan, and carbon fiber composite materials, or they may be basic and simple, such as steel or titanium. Bullet resistant materials are often used in law enforcement and military applications, to protect personnel from death or serious injuries.
Coffee is a brewed beverage with a bitter flavor prepared from the roasted seeds of the coffee plant. The beans are found in coffee cherries, which grow on trees cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in equatorial Latin America, Southeast Asia, South Asia and Africa. Green (unroasted) coffee is one of the most traded agricultural commodities in the world. Coffee can have a stimulating effect on humans due to its caffeine content. It is one of the most-consumed beverages in the world.
Wild coffee's energizing effect was likely first discovered in the northeast region of Ethiopia. Coffee cultivation first took place in southern Arabia; the earliest credible evidence of coffee drinking appears in the middle of the 15th century in the Sufi shrines of Yemen. From the Muslim world, coffee consumption and cultivation spread to India, to Italy, and on to the rest of Europe, Indonesia and the Americas.
In East Africa and Yemen, coffee was used in native religious ceremonies that competed with the Christian Church. As a result, the Ethiopian Church banned its secular consumption until the reign of Emperor Menelik II of Ethiopia. The beverage was also banned in Ottoman Turkey during the 17th century for political reasons and was associated with rebellious political activities in Europe.