It always is interesting to me to find experiments that open up new perspectives on things. And recently, this article “Top 10 Mad Science-Worthy Chemistry Experiments” via Neatorama caught my attention. And I just couldn’t let it pass without writing a rant about it…

Do read the article and watch all videos to get some interesting new ideas and the possibilities that Chemistry opens up.

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Here’s an excerpt from the article that talks a little about the physics involved:

A number of recent papers suggested that, in at least one lithium battery class (based on LiFePO4), the problem wasn’t the speed at which lithium moved—instead, it could only enter and exit crystals of this salt at specific locations. This, in turn, indicated that figuring a way to speed up this process would increase the overall performance of the battery.

To accomplish this, the authors developed a process that created a disorganized lithium phosphate coating on the surfaces of LiFePO4 crystals. By tweaking the ratio of iron to phosphorous in the starting mix and heating the material to 600°C under argon for ten hours, the authors created a material that has a glass-like coating that’s less than 5nm thick, which covers the surface of pellets that are approximately 50nm across. That outer coating has very high lithium mobility, which allows charge to rapidly move into and out of storage in the LiFePO4 of the core of these pellets. In short, because lithium can move quickly through this outer coating, it can rapidly locate and enter the appropriate space on the LiFePO4 crystals.

The results are pretty astonishing. At low discharge rates, a cell prepared from this material discharges completely to its theoretical limit (~166mAh/g). As the authors put it, “Capacity retention of the material is superior.” Running it through 50 charge/discharge cycles revealed no significant change in the total capacity of the battery.

Here are a few links on the same topic if you are hungry to learn more about it.

1) MIT news.
2) The UK Daily mail.
3) At Technology-Review via Slashdot.
4) BBC.

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1) Universe
2) Life
3) Death
4) Free Will
5) Sex

Michael Brooks on five mysteries of the universe.

Update: In a tangential topic, here are couple of things few others are worried, about the solar system: The Unknown Solar System.

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This false-color composite image of the Stephan’s Quintet galaxy cluster clearly shows one of the largest shock waves ever seen (green arc), produced by one galaxy falling toward another at over a million miles per hour. It is made up of data from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope and a ground-based telescope in Spain.

Four of the five galaxies in this image are involved in a violent collision, which has already stripped most of the hydrogen gas from the interiors of the galaxies. The centers of the galaxies appear as bright yellow-pink knots inside a blue haze of stars, and the galaxy producing all the turmoil, NGC7318b, is the left of two small bright regions in the middle right of the image. One galaxy, the large spiral at the bottom left of the image, is a foreground object and is not associated with the cluster.

The titanic shock wave, larger than our own Milky Way galaxy, was detected by the ground-based telescope using visible-light wavelengths. It consists of hot hydrogen gas. As NGC7318b collides with gas spread throughout the cluster, atoms of hydrogen are heated in the shock wave, producing the green glow.

Spitzer pointed its infrared spectrograph at the peak of this shock wave (middle of green glow) to learn more about its inner workings. This instrument breaks light apart into its basic components. Data from the instrument are referred to as spectra and are displayed as curving lines that indicate the amount of light coming at each specific wavelength.

The Spitzer spectrum showed a strong infrared signature for incredibly turbulent gas made up of hydrogen molecules. This gas is caused when atoms of hydrogen rapidly pair-up to form molecules in the wake of the shock wave. Molecular hydrogen, unlike atomic hydrogen, gives off most of its energy through vibrations that emit in the infrared.

This highly disturbed gas is the most turbulent molecular hydrogen ever seen. Astronomers were surprised not only by the turbulence of the gas, but by the incredible strength of the emission. The reason the molecular hydrogen emission is so powerful is not yet completely understood.

Stephan’s Quintet is located 300 million light-years away in the Pegasus constellation.

One thing to remember is that because galactic distances are so vast, even though galaxies frequently collide, the actual stars in them almost never do. The pictures make it look like there should be millions of individual collisions, but in fact, collision means just passing though one another.

The gravitational effects of course can totally rip the smaller galaxy apart. There are small satellite galaxies being sucked into the milky way as we speak! Cool huh ?!

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Now, did the title catch your eye ?! It sure did that to me. I went ahead and read the article over at NS and was amazed at what i saw there. The article details about an unknown scientist’s work in Germany about an attempt to make a GUT(Grand Unification Theory) which ended up opening new realms to explore and exploit.

Hyperspace is a concept which will enable a spacecraft to reach Mars in less than 3 hours and a star 11 light years away in only 80 days. Now that, is abstract physics at its best

If you are interested, go ahead and read the article. If not comprehensible, it sure is a nice read that reminds me of ‘Star Trek’.

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Our most clicked story of 2005. The placebo effect, cold fusion, dark energy, the “wow” signal and bizarre homeopathy results – these were just a few of the mysteries that fascinated you.

2. Pentagon reveals rejected chemical weapons

The chemical “sex-bomb” designed to make enemy soldiers sexually irresistible to each other, thus destroying an enemy’s morale.

3. 11 steps to a better brain

Like a personal trainer for the brain, without the strain. We expect the IQ of our readers to be much greater now than at the start of 2005.

4. US military sets laser PHASRs to stun

The PHASR is an impressive looking beast, larger than Captain Kirk’s trusted phaser, but the risk of blinding innocent bystanders shrouded this prototype weapon in controversy.

5. Details of US microwave-weapon tests revealed

The US military raised temperatures further in 2005 by trying their new microwave weapons on a test crowd – with mixed results.

6. Failing ocean current raises fears of mini ice age

In a year dominated by climate-change fear and greenhouse gas emissions targets, the news of a 30% reduction in the warm currents that carry water north from the Gulf Stream sounded a loud note of alarm.

7. Antarctic ice sheet is an ‘awakened giant’

A slumbering giant, the massive west Antarctic ice sheet, previously assumed to be stable, started to collapse noticeably in 2005, adding extra heat to the climate debate.

8. Bionic suit offers wearers super-strength

Many kids dream of growing into a bionic adult, able to perform superhuman deeds. This dream moved one mechanical step closer to reality this year.

9. Out-of-this-world sex could jeopardise missions

Sex and romantic entanglements among astronauts could derail missions to Mars, said a top-level panel of US researchers. Their recommendation for NASA – more study of the issue.

10. Centrifugal weapon could deliver stealth firepower

Another weapon, this time a gun that spits out ball bearings after spinning them to extreme speeds – and there’s a video of the beast in action.

– My 2 cents : Do not miss to read each of the stories. All of them are very interesting. After all, they did make it to the top 10 stories of the year !

Link

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Bird flu has overshadowed the year 2005. The abominable virus claimed many bird lives in South East Asia before heading across Europe to Russia and Ukraine. However, the more scientists and officials talk about the deadly threat, the less credible it looks to people. Some people believe there is no such thing as bird flu. They think the whole story stemmed from the fights over the world market between the poultry producers. Others blame the pharmaceutical companies that are keen to spread panic and therefore make us buy more medicines. Which story should we believe in? Does the bird flu really exist? Does it pose a threat to humans? Did other threats of the worldwide proportions materialize?

It did not take long to tackle the problem; doctors found a pathogen and a vector – coronovirus and a palm cat, a viverrine animal normally used for food in China. However, the urgent measures could not stop another myth from spreading far and wide. The myth said that the SARS problem was made up to lower China’s economic growth and disrupt the exceedingly profitable tourist industry in South East Asia.

Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Lev Sandakhchiyev:

“Discovering a new more dangerous type of previously unknown coronavirus in the patients was direct evidence of a real threat. The ‘spinning’ of that epidemic stressed the importance of international cooperation. Many people did realize that humankind was destined to face new or recurrent infectious diseases. Therefore, a system of global and domestic monitoring is highly required.”

Spent nuclear fuel

Following a heated debate in 2001, the Russian president signed into law the bill on storage and reutilization of spent nuclear fuel from foreign nuclear power spent nuclear fuelplants. Specialists were unanimous while explaining to their opponents that spent nuclear fuel was not just the waste material from the nuclear industry. According to them, it is a high-tech product that can be used for extracting raw materials and energy. Despite potentially huge profits Russia could make (one ton of spent nuclear fuel costs $1 million; total estimated amount of spent nuclear fuel is 200 thousand tons), environmentalists have been relentless in their opposition to the new law.

Nikolai Shingarev, Director of the Information Center of the Federal Agency on Nuclear Energy:

“No spent nuclear fuel is being brought into Russia despite the law. We will probably sign the first contract under the new legislation for a small consignment of spent nuclear fuel from a research reactor in Uzbekistan. Today Russia is receiving nuclear waste from the nuclear plants built in the Soviet era in Ukraine ($370 thousand per 1 ton) and Bulgaria ($600 thousand per one ton). Reutilization waste materials will be stored in Russia only if the governments OKs the storage and only if fuel had been originally produced in Russia. 75% of revenues will be allocated for environmental programs and the remaining 25% will make part of local budgets.”

10 myths of the past, which never materialized

Steam-driven locomotive: serious scientists were asserting that cows would stop bearing offspring and produce milk at the sight of a locomotive. They also clamed that air would be squeezed out of train carriages at 20 km per hour and passengers will suffocate as a result.

Robot: intelligent machines will shake off dependence and take command of the world; humans would submit to the power of the machines.

Spacecraft: spacecraft were making holes in the atmosphere during the takeoff; the earth’s protective anti-radiation layer of the atmosphere will be eventually destroyed and thus the earth will be exposed to dangerous space particles.

Microwave oven: fried sausages can irradiate in the dark; radiation from food cooked in the oven will pile up in the human body and cause cancer.

Cell phone: radiation emitted by a cell phone receiver can affect the brain by liquefying it. Paradoxically, a cell phone phobia could not stop the massive spread of cellular communications all over the world.

Vaccination: the danger of vaccination is one of the longstanding fears in the world; the first objectors appeared shortly after the first vaccination campaign launched by Dr. Edward Jenner in 1796; many objected to vaccination in Russia at the end of the 1990s.

Environmental pollution: some people feared that the civilization would come to end by 2020 due to sky-high levels of industrial and communal pollution which should result in a lack of oxygen and poisonous evaporation.

Asbestos: Micro particles of asbestos cause lung cancer. Asbestos was produced in Canada and the USSR. Canadian asbestos companies went bankrupt following an anti-asbestos propaganda campaign instigated by the competitors. Russia’s asbestos makers have survived the bad times. The incidence rate of cancer in the town of Asbest does not exceed an average national incidence rate of cancer.

Global warming: industrial emissions of carbon dioxide cause the greenhouse effect that leads to overheating of the earth’s surface. Consequently, polar ice will melt away causing the global ocean level rise by one meter.

Ozone holes: Freon used in refrigerators and deodorants will destroy the ozone layer of the atmosphere, which protects Earth against the harmful effects of ultraviolet radiation. As a result, the number of cancer and other deadly diseases will grow.

via PRAVDA

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Follow the link, and check out what they have mentioned on Dec 2, 2005.

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Flooded by letters begging for a response, the British Air Ministry asked prominent physicist Robert Watson-Watt to see if a radio-wave-based death ray was feasible.

Within ten days Watson-Watt reported that such a weapon was unlikely. But using radio waves to locate an approaching bomber was a real possibility. And that’s how radar was born.

Now, seventy years later, the invention may be coming full circle, Aviation Week reports.

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I linked previously to Dr. Michio Kaku. His site is loaded with information on Theoretical physics. Here is a comment that he made on Ed Mitten. (An excerpt from the article)

“I do believe there really is a category for a genius who is a supernova — a supernova that lights up the entire scientific landscape and that is Ed Witten,” said theoretical physicist Michio Kaku, the author of “Parallel Worlds and Hyperspace.”

“I think he is as close as you are going to get to a living Albert Einstein today.”

That is so freaking cool. When people compare him with Einstein, i feel guilty of not knowing about a person of such significance. Shame on me …

Here i am, off to go read more on him and work on my research some more

Update : Found some more stories and interesting posts on the same subject. One over at Kuro5hin and some posts by physicists at their blogs – Peter Woit and Lubos Motl. Both have interesting opinions and comments. Read on.

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Humans blink every four seconds, on average. How come they never notice? University College London scientists have solved the riddle. When the eyes shut, even for a fraction of a second, the visual system of the brain shuts down too. So you cannot know that you are fleetingly in the dark, they report in Current Biology. Read more…

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Now if only i can just create a blackhole and get a computer with a mega huge cpu power to solve a billion variables accurately, i will be done …

Now read on about “A User’s Guide to Time Travel” – All it takes is a grasp of theoretical physics, control of the space-time continuum, and maybe a ball of cosmic string.

A very interesting and captivating article about some of the theories and concepts you need to know before trying to even talk about time travel to anyone ! Definitely a nice lay-man’s intro to the subject …

Also, here is the author’s site. Dr. Michio Kaku is the co-founder of String Field Theory. If you have never had the chance to read anything on Field theory, then believe me, after the basic reading i’ve done, i’d salute him a 100 times ! He’s got a great site going on, full of technical information. A nice site if you like theoretical physics and many other scientific phenomena.

Update : Saw this article “Realistic Time Machine? New design could forgo exotic ingredient” and found it interesting and relevant to the topic. While all the suggested theories seem good, nothing can be commented about them until a practical model is developed.

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• A neat site with lots of links and lots of junk news and trivia. Nice site to spend some time.
• Live, Jobs Tells Stanford Grads – I’ve seen a similar talk of his before but this one makes me think that he’s going nuts. Well but thats just me !
• Jackie and the Brain – A neat story about the evolution of an AI being !
• Who Will Google Buy Next? – If you are one of those people who love Google and are interested in what they are going to do next, then check this story. Nevertheless, it gives you lots of links to many other interesting services, free and paid which could be very helpful.
• ScienceMatters@Berkeley, June issue - Not much but if you are scientifically motivated, then watch the issues regularly. The boys at the Big school do post some nice research material here.
• The Simnuke project – Sheer craziness if you ask me but oh well, who isn’t ???
• Why We Need Friendly AI – Nice site with all the Asimov laws. Frankly, i’ve got to confess that i was blown away by the book(I Robot) and there are some other interesting perspectives in this site which are weirdly cool !
• Toll Free 800 Directory provides information about 1-800 numbers, reverse lookup and tracing 1 800 numbers – Well if you are stuck in the US, like I am, this could be a handy reference at times you never expect !
• Cool Fractals @ freaky-fractals.com – Its all about Fractals. I’ve always loved the idea behind them. Nice site.

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A substance containing no medication and prescribed or given to reinforce a patient’s expectation to get well.

Why am i even talking about something that useless ?! Well here it is.

The placebo effect

Don’t try this at home. Several times a day, for several days, you induce pain in someone. You control the pain with morphine until the final day of the experiment, when you replace the morphine with saline solution. Guess what? The saline takes the pain away.

This is the placebo effect: somehow, sometimes, a whole lot of nothing can be very powerful. Except it’s not quite nothing. When Fabrizio Benedetti of the University of Turin in Italy carried out the above experiment, he added a final twist by adding naloxone, a drug that blocks the effects of morphine, to the saline. The shocking result? The pain-relieving power of saline solution disappeared.

So what is going on? Doctors have known about the placebo effect for decades, and the naloxone result seems to show that the placebo effect is somehow biochemical. But apart from that, we simply don’t know.
Benedetti has since shown that a saline placebo can also reduce tremors and muscle stiffness in people with Parkinson’s disease (Nature Neuroscience, vol 7, p 587). He and his team measured the activity of neurons in the patients’ brains as they administered the saline. They found that individual neurons in the subthalamic nucleus (a common target for surgical attempts to relieve Parkinson’s symptoms) began to fire less often when the saline was given, and with fewer “bursts” of firing – another feature associated with Parkinson’s. The neuron activity decreased at the same time as the symptoms improved: the saline was definitely doing something.

We have a lot to learn about what is happening here, Benedetti says, but one thing is clear: the mind can affect the body’s biochemistry. “The relationship between expectation and therapeutic outcome is a wonderful model to understand mind-body interaction,” he says. Researchers now need to identify when and where placebo works. There may be diseases in which it has no effect. There may be a common mechanism in different illnesses. As yet, we just don’t know.

Also read more about the psychological theory behind it all that says “It’s all in your mind”. Sounds like “The Matrix” doesn’t it ?

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Ok before i give the actual jolt, here is a smooth intro to the whole thing ! It has not been a long time since i saw Spiderman 2, where the guy ends up creating a Fusion reactor, in mid-air ( Yeah sure ! Tell me about it !). But the beauty is that this reaction gets uncontrollable ( no surprises there ) and starts sucking in metal objects due to the increase in gravitational force as it gains mass. Well alright makes sense. But wait a minute, are you saying that you created a Black Hole right here on earth ? WTF ?!?!

Ahem, i think it is impossible. Or so i thought until i read a news article today, that states : Lab fireball ‘may be black hole’. Got very curious and started reading about it. It is actually quite interesting but way out of my league in terms of understanding the whole theory.

Here is the abstract and the actual paper which talks about this in detail). So someday, in the future, when i know enough about what i am dealing with, i will, hopefully, come here and read about it. And here is an excerpt of the article.

A fireball created in a US particle accelerator has the characteristics of a black hole, a physicist has said. It was generated at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) in New York, US, which smashes beams of gold nuclei together at near light speeds. Horatiu Nastase says his calculations show that the core of the fireball has a striking similarity to a black hole.The Brown researcher thinks the particles are disappearing into the fireball’s core and reappearing as thermal radiation, just as matter is thought to fall into a black hole and come out as “Hawking” radiation.

Awesome. Can’t say how cool this is !

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Can i bend that spoon ?! Well really. This is not a joke. Can you ? These guys say that you can. Who are they ? They are the Spoonbenders !

Fork-You

I don’t know what causes cutlery to bend, but then I don’t really know exactly why compasses point North or what causes lightning or how the Moon controls the tides, either. I know that all of these things now have scientific explanations, but it’s not too long ago in the scheme of things that we thought that sending sound and pictures through space was a bizarre fantasy. Surely the more we learn, the more we should realise how little we really know.

“Do you remember how electrical currents and ‘unseen waves’ were laughed at ? The knowledge about man is still in its infancy.”

- Albert Einstein.

I don’t claim it’s ‘psychic’ but I think physical & psychological factors certainly come into it, and I think a large part of whatever causes it is subconscious. Perhaps it uses parts of your brain that are normally just reflex. Some mystics can apparently control their heartbeat after years of practice (although whether they can do it in ‘scientific conditions’ is another matter). And though I think it’s got something to do with your brain, I’m not saying it’s paranormal. I think there’s probably a very physical explanation – biochemical, electrical, magnetic or some combination of those things that can temporarily alter the alignment of the molecules in the metal.

OK, so I have no idea as to why or how it works, but it’s still a lot of fun.

- A good read nevertheless and maybe, i could get my mind to bend spoons too. Wanna give it a try ? I am going to anyway …

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But here seems to be proof of something similar.

Welcome to “The Enigma Project” !

The history of the project, an excerpt :

On one very cold March evening in 1978, members of the Odyssey Research group gathered for an informal meeting at the north Baltimore home of John Lutz, Odyssey’s director. They were there to discuss topics of unexplained phenomena. The 15 people present had segregated into smaller groups, each spewing excited chatter in which the quickly belabored subjects changed like slides in a rushed presentation.

Read more …

Also dont forget to check out the various events that these guys have tried to decrypt and understand. hmm now where did you say Area 51 was ?!

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The Hundredth Monkey

The Japanese monkey, Macaca fuscata, had been observed in the wild for a period of over 30 years. In 1952, on the Island of Koshima, scientists were providing monkeys with sweet potatoes dropped in the sand. The monkeys liked the taste of the raw sweet potatoes, but found the dirt unpleasant. An 18 month old female named Imo found she could solve the problem by washing the potatoes in the salty ocean water, improving the taste of the potato. She taught this trick to her mother. Her playmates learned this trick and taught their mothers too. This cultural innovation was gradually picked up numerous monkeys in the troop and observed by the scientists.

Between 1952 and 1958, all the young monkeys learned to wash the sandy sweet potatoes and make them more palatable. Only the adults who imitated their children learned this cultural improvement. Other adult monkeys kept eating the dirty sweet potatoes. In autumn of 1958, something startling took place. A certain number of Koshima monkeys were already washing their sweet potatoes, the exact number is not known. The hypothetical number given was 99. Then it happened. The hundredth monkey learned to wash the sweet potatoes. The added energy of that hundredth monkey somehow created an ideological breakthrough. Almost everyone in the tribe was washing their potatoes before eating them, but a surprising occurrence was observed by these scientists. The habit of washing the sweet potato had jumped overseas. Colonies of monkeys on other islands and the mainland troop at Takaskiyama began washing their sweet potatoes.

Although the exact number may vary, this Hundredth Monkey Phenomenon means that when only a limited number of individuals knows a ‘new way’, it remains the conscious property of those individuals. However, when one more individual manifests this new awareness, the field is strengthened, a critical mass is reached, and the awareness becomes the conscious property of all. This new awareness is communicated mind to mind.

- Mind boggling it does seem but it makes so much sense. But if this were true in the way they actually observed it, by some God forbidden logic that seems impossible, then it leads to so many interesting questions and solves so many old ones in different ways. Awesome. Really liked the inclusion of the idea of critical mass in the scenario.

Hello Nuclear Reactions, here i come …

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Quantum fluctuation. Inflation. Expansion. Strong nuclear interaction. Particle-antiparticle annihilation. Deuterium and helium production. Density perturbations. Recombination. Blackbody radiation. Local contraction. Cluster formation. Reionization? Violent relaxation. Virialization. Biased galaxy formation? Turbulent fragmentation. Contraction. Ionization. Compression. Opaque hydrogen. Massive star formation. Deuterium ignition. Hydrogen fusion. Hydrogen depletion. Core contraction. Envelope expansion. Helium fusion. Carbon, oxygen, and silicon fusion. Iron production. Implosion. Supernova explosion. Metals injection. Star formation. Supernova explosions. Star formation. Condensation. Planetesimal accretion. Planetary differentiation. Crust solidification. Volatile gas expulsion. Water condensation. Water dissociation. Ozone production. Ultraviolet absorption. Photosynthetic unicellular organisms. Oxidation. Mutation. Natural selection and evolution. Respiration. Cell differentiation. Sexual reproduction. Fossilization. Land exploration. Dinosaur extinction. Mammal expansion. Glaciation. Homo sapiens manifestation. Animal domestication. Food surplus production. Civilization! Innovation. Exploration. Religion. Warring nations. Empire creation and destruction. Exploration. Colonization. Taxation without representation. Revolution. Constitution. Election. Expansion. Industrialization. Rebellion. Emancipation Proclamation. Invention. Mass production. Urbanization. Immigration. World conflagration. League of Nations. Suffrage extension. Depression. World conflagration. Fission explosions. United Nations. Space exploration. Assassinations. Lunar excursions. Resignation. Computerization. World Trade Organization. Terrorism. Internet expansion. Reunification. Dissolution. World-Wide Web creation. Composition. Extrapolation?

– This is so freaky cool. Just finished reading the e-book from the site and it was definitely worth the read. It has a different perspective of looking at the events relative to the other books i read before. Nice. Worth spending the time on a saturday morning, i am sure !

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Can you just imagine someone without whom a whole classification of a particular science might never have come into the picture at all ? Well there are several, in different fields, who have contributed so much but IMO, no one like this guy here.

He and his theories have paved the way for the evolution of nuclear science and the theory of relativity and his work on Brownian movement were so very critical for this. The article “Five papers that shook the world” gives a brief overview of his most important papers presented on 1905 and talks more about his work in general. Very nice. But there is one point which i would refute very strongly. If Einstein had never been in the picture, then there is a chance that someone else would have come up with similar papers and results. But it would definitely not have been a very flowing theory as i might phrase. You would know what i mean if you have ever been in one of those moments when designing a software or writing code, you dont have to think separately about the design and the code but the code is itself well refactored, formatted, extensible, flexible and just flows as though the fingers know what to do. And that will happen only on a string of thought and at one moment.

Eventhough each of his discoveries do seem to be a bit wide wrt one another, the basis for each of them are the same. It is to concentrate on the power of physical intuition rather than the mathematical precisions while trying to bring out new theories. We should remember that this man was contradicting everthing that was known during 1905 in Physics by giving out bold explanations and for some of which, people had to wait 20 years to prove.

I like this excerpt from the article too !

“And just in case the enormity of Einstein’s achievement is in any doubt, we have to remember that he did all of this in his “spare time”.”

What more can i say ?! Einstein still lives. And i say that, thou shall live even if mankind hath perished and joined the dust …

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