Author Archives: curiouscat

Single Electron on Video

Researchers Catch Motion of a Single Electron on Video

Maris and Wei Guo, a doctoral student, took advantage of the bubbles that form around electrons in supercold liquid helium. Using sound waves to expand the bubbles and a coordinated strobe light to illuminate them, Guo was able to catch their movements on a home video camera.

A free electron repels the atoms that surround it, creating a small space, or bubble, around itself. In conventional liquids, the bubble shrinks to nothing because the surface tension of the liquid works against the repulsive force. Superfluid helium has very little surface tension, so the bubble can become much larger. The two opposing forces balance when the diameter of the bubble is about 40 angstroms – still far to tiny to see.

The researchers used a planar transducer – basically, a loudspeaker that produces flat, not focused, sound waves – to pummel the whole volume of liquid helium with sound. As each wave overtook an electron bubble, it alternately increased and decreased the surrounding pressure. Under negative pressure, the bubbles expanded to about eight microns, the size of a small speck of dust, then shrank again as the next wave of high pressure washed over them. A strobe light, synchronized to the sound pulse, illuminated the bubbles without overheating the chamber.

Running a camcorder in “super night mode,” Guo and Maris were able to record the approximately 2,000 photons they estimate were scattered by the expanded bubbles, producing a series of electron-bubble images on each frame of videotape.

Pretty amazing. My pictures are of a bit larger things.

Try to Answer 6 Basic Science Questions

The Guardian newspaper (UK) asked 8 people (including 3 scientists) answer science questions such as: why does salt dissolve in water, why is the sky blue? and roughly how old is the earth?:

Q: Is a clone the same as a twin?
Will Self No.
Iain Stewart Yes, er, I think… oh God, it’s probably not. But I think it has to be, doesn’t it?
John O’Farrell No. How could it be the same? That’s not how cloning works, is it?
Susan Greenfield Yes. An identical twin.
Daisy Goodwin As an identical twin? That’s quite interesting. No. Well, I’m not sure about that. I’d say no. But maybe yes. I’m baffled.
Kirsty Wark No. But there’s two different kinds of twin. You have to give me a point for that!
Robert Winston Well, not necessarily. It’s not genetically the same actually, no. You see, it depends on the kind of twin. Do you mean an identical twin? Identical twins are different in all sorts of ways. It’s different epigenetics and there’s different mitochondrial DNA, so it’s a different organism. Actually, what we’re beginning to understand is that the epigenetic aspects of cloning are fundamentally very important. And twins are rather more dissimilar than people imagine, too. For example, they have different fingerprints from each other, so there are quite interesting and subtle differences.
Marina Warner Yes it is. Well, identical twins are clones, not non-identical twins.
Answer: Yes, up to a point (see Robert Winston’s answer).

World’s First Commercial-Scale Subsea Turbine

Artist's impression of MCT Seagen pile-mounted twin rotor tidal turbine

Earlier this month, Marine Current Turbines confirmed the installation date for its 1.2MW SeaGen tidal current system in Northern Ireland’s Strangford Lough. SeaGen consists of twin axial flow rotors, each of 16m diameter driving a generator via a gearbox much like a hydro-electric turbine or a wind turbine. The twin power units of each system are mounted on wing-like extensions either side of a tubular steel monopile 3m in diameter which is set into a hole drilled into the seabed.

SeaGen is four times as powerful as the world’s previous most powerful turbine, SeaFlow, which Marine Current Turbines has been operating off Lynmouth in Devon since 2003; SeaGen will form the basis for the commercial projects that will follow. SeaGen, which is being assembled at Harland & Wolff in Belfast, will be connected to the local electricity grid and have the capacity to generate clean and predictable power for approximately 1000 homes.

Martin Wright, Managing Director of Marine Current Turbines said: “The new investment partners and the support of our existing shareholders re-affirm the commercial potential for tidal power in the UK and overseas, and recognise our engineering achievements in developing a world-leading technology. With SeaGen set to be deployed in August, we are moving ahead with our plans for a 10MW tidal farm, to be installed within the next three years.”

Each submerged turbines range from 750 to 1500kW per unit (depending on the local flow pattern and peak velocity). And they expect to deploy 10-20 at a time – more can be added for relatively less marginal cost allowing for incremental investment in new capacity. They expect the turbines to have an excess of a 20 year operating life.

We have also added a new energy category to the blog.

Science Focus in New UK Government

Science wins champion in shake-up

Mr Brown often warned as Chancellor that Britain needed a strong scientific base to punch above its weight in an increasingly competitive global market. By including innovation and science in the higher education brief for England the new prime minister is throwing his weight behind the sector for the long term. Although Britain’s scientific research is regarded as among the best in the world, the decline in the numbers studying science has sounded alarm bells throughout academia and industry. A string of universities have closed physics or chemistry departments in recent years because of a lack of would-be students.
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This has sparked fears that the country’s science and engineering base may not be able to cope with the ever-increasing competition from nations like China and India.

As I have stated numerous times previously I believe those countries that manage to gain (or retain) centers of science and engineering excellent will gain significant economic advantage.

Singapore Research Fellowship

Singapore National Research Foundation Research Fellowship (updated link which was broken – why can’t web site stop breaking links?) offers complete freedom and a 3-year research grant of up to US$1.5million, with possible extension for another 3 years for talented scientists and researchers at or under the age of 35 years at the date of application. This is another example of Singapore investing in creating a scientific and engineering community to strengthen their economy.

Origins of the Domestic Cat

DNA traces origin of domestic cat:

The study suggests the progenitors of today’s cats split from their wild counterparts more than 100,000 years ago – much earlier than once thought. At least five female ancestors from the region gave rise to all the domestic cats alive today, scientists believe. DNA evidence suggests that, apart from accidental cross-breeding, European wildcats are not part of the domestic moggy’s family tree. Neither are the Central Asian wildcat, the Southern African wildcat, or the Chinese desert cat.
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The earliest archaeological evidence of cat domestication dates back 9,500 years, when cats were thought to have lived alongside humans in settlement sites in Cyprus. However, the new results show the house cat lineage is far older. Ancestors of domestic cats are now thought to have broken away from their wild relatives and started living with humans as early as 130,000 years ago. The researchers focused on DNA in the mitochondria, the power plants of cells which supply energy and have their own genetic material.

Howard Hughes Medical Institute Takes Big Open Access Step

HHMI Announces New Policy for Publication of Research Articles that will require

its scientists to publish their original research articles in scientific journals that allow the articles and supplementary materials to be made freely accessible in a public repository within six months of publication.

Great news. Some, including me, would prefer a shorter time but this is the limit on the slowest time that will be acceptable not a goal. I don’t know but I wouldn’t be surprised if HHMI is the largest source of research funds outside of the federal government in the USA. This is one more sign the tactics of the old school journals are failing.

HHMI and Public Access Publishing policy

The Howard Hughes Medical Institute has long viewed the sharing of research materials and tools as a fundamental responsibility of scientific authorship. That principle also extends to ensuring that original, peer-reviewed research publications and supplemental materials are freely accessible within six months of publication

Well put; it is amazing how out of touch with the basic concepts of advancing scientific ideas the old style journals are.

More Automotive Engineering Jobs

I must say I am a bit skeptical but I am hardly an expert in forecasting automobile engineering jobs so maybe it is a good prediction, Study forecasts 300,000 more automotive engineering jobs worldwide by 2015:

According to a study by the Oliver Wyman consultancy group published in yesterday’s Die Welt newspaper, Car Innovation 2015, nearly 300,000 R&D engineering jobs will be created across the global automotive industry over the next eight years, bringing the total of such jobs to 1.1m, from the 813,000 in 2005.

Most of the new jobs will be with automotive suppliers, to whom assemblers are conferring more and more R&D responsibility, and the jobs will be concentrated in China, India, Eastern Europe and South Korea

Robotarium X – Robot Zoo

Robotarium X, the worlds first zoo for artificial life, has opened in Alverca, Portugal.

The robots are all original, created specifically for the project, representing 14 species classified by distinct behavior strategies and body morphologies. Obstacle avoidance, movement or sunlight detection and interaction with the public are some of the robots skills.

Robotarium X, the first zoo for artificial life, approaches robots very much in the way as we are used to look at natural life. We, humans, enjoy watching and studying other life forms behavior and, sadly, also to capture them. However, in this case, although the robots are confined to a cage it can be said that, not like animals, they enjoy it. In fact the Robotarium is their ideal environment with plenty of sun, smoothness, tranquility and attention. There are no fights or aggression and the only competition is to assure a place under the sunlight.

Ok, I must admit the “zoo” seems to be a bit small and primitive but imagine what similar, more advanced, exhibits we will likely see in the future. The robots really look like sushi don’t they? via: The World’s First Robot Zoo

Tracking the Ecosystem Within Us

Gut Check: Tracking the Ecosystem Within Us

For more than 100 years, scientists have known that humans carry a rich ecosystem within their intestines. An astonishing number and variety of microbes, including as many as 400 species of bacteria, help humans digest food, mitigate disease, regulate fat storage, and even promote the formation of blood vessels. By applying sophisticated genetic analysis to samples of a year’s worth baby poop, Howard Hughes Medical Institute researchers have now developed a detailed picture of how these bacteria come and go in the intestinal tract during a child’s first year of life.
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Before birth, the human intestinal tract is sterile, but babies immediately begin to acquire the microbial denizens of the gut from their environment — the birth canal, mothers’ breast, and even the touch of a sibling or parent. Within days, a thriving microbial community is established and by adulthood, the human body typically has as many as ten times more microbial cells than human cells.
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The results, said Palmer, were striking: the group found that the intestinal microbial communities varied widely from baby to baby – both in terms of which microbes were present and in how that composition changed over time. That finding, she said, is important because it helps broaden the definition of healthy microbial colonization in a baby.

Another intriguing observation, Palmer noted, was a tendency for sudden shifts in the composition of the infants’ intestinal microbial communities over time as different species of bacteria ebbed and flowed.

I find this area and this study fascinating. I’m not exactly sure why this study and the incredibly significant positive bacteria for human life news doesn’t get more notice. Oh well I guess there are not cool pictures of robots or scary stories of potential threats to those reading which makes the news less interesting to some. Still I find this stuff amazing: Energy Efficiency of Digestion – Beneficial Bacteria – Skin Bacteria – Hacking Your Body’s Bacteria for Better Health – Where Bacteria Get Their Genes