Final Links Dump for forty days, give or take. Physicists watch chemistry in slow motion – physicsworld.com “Physicists in the US have observed chemical reactions taking place at such low temperatures that they are dominated by quantum effects, rather than thermal collisions. The researchers showed that diatomic molecules containing potassium and rubidium are much less […]
Month: February 2010
The Faulty Fluid Dynamics of Hotel Environmentalism
Boskone this past weekend was held at the Westin Waterfront in Boston, which has these funky double showerheads that they charmingly call the “Heavenly(R) Shower” (hype aside, they are very nice showers). The picture at right is courtesy of lannalee on Twitter, as I didn’t bring a camera. Why am I telling you this? Because […]
Links for 2010-02-16
Penultimate Links Dump (for a while) US LHC Blog » Let’s draw Feynman diagams! “There are few things more iconic of particle physics than Feynman diagrams. These little figures of squiggly show up prominently on particle physicists’ chalkboards alongside scribbled equations. The simplicity of these diagrams a a certain aesthetic appeal, though as one might […]
See You in Forty Days
I’m giving up reading blogs for Lent. The proximate cause of this is Bora’s latest blame-the-media post, which is just deja vu all over again, because I’m pretty sure this exact conversation has gone on ten times before (the fact that scientists find other scientists compelling speakers does not mean that scientists are good at […]
Recent SF Reading
Since I’m at Boskone, talking and listening to people talking about science fiction and fantasy literature, it seems appropriate to do a quickie post listing notworthy genre stuff I’ve read recently. There isn’t that much of it, as I’ve been doing a lot of non-fiction reading, and also slightly preoccupied with book promotion. Still, I’ve […]
Links for 2010-02-13
WINTER OLYMPICS: Robert Teklemariam will raise Ethiopia’s flag | Richmond Times-Dispatch “On Monday in Vancouver, Robel Teklemariam will compete for Ethiopia in the 15-kilometer cross country skiing event. This will be his second Olympics but the first with his mother in attendance. To qualify, he traveled the world on a shoestring budget, chasing down qualifying […]
Amazing Laser Application 4: Optical Tweezers!
What’s the application? Optical tweezers use focused light beams to trap small particles in the focus of the beam, and drag them around by moving the beam. What problem(s) is it the solution to? 1) “How do we move these tiny little things around without touching them?” 2) “How do we measure the forces exerted […]
Entanglement Happens
There have been a bunch of stories recently talking about quantum effects at room temperature– one, about coherent transport in photosynthesis , even escaped the science blogosphere. They’ve mostly said similar things, but Thursday’s ArxivBlog entry had a particular description of a paper about entanglement effects that is worth unpacking: Entanglement is a strange and […]
How to Teach Physics to Your Dog: Obsessive Update
Miscellaneous stories and links about How to Teach Physics to Your Dog: — There’s a nice review by Margaret Fisk (who has been reading it for a while, and mentioning it on her blog, which kept turning up in the vanity search): Orzel does a wonderful job of finding physical parallels to explain quantum concepts […]
Links for 2010-02-12
The Mid-Majority : Last Man “For the past 20 years or so, I’ve played my own game every year at this time. It’s called The Last Man In America To Know Who Won The Super Bowl, or just “Last Man.” It’s a game heavily reliant on tactics, organizational skill, and evasive procedures. The object is […]