The Guild of Scientific Troubadours

Future: 2008 Energy Breakthroughs

The Memebox FutureBlogger rings in the New Year with the top 10 energy breakthroughs from 2008:

There is still a lot we do not know about the basics of energy systems dealing with photons, carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, enzymes and metals. Our current first phase efforts to design nanoscale materials used in energy production, conversion and storage are certain to yield systems that will change how we live in the world in the decades ahead.

Remember, only a century ago, coal and wood were king, magical ‘electric’ light intimidated the general public, only a few could see the potential of oil, rockets and nuclear science were beyond our imagination, and the vision of a tens of millions of ‘horseless carriages’ reshaping the urban landscape was a ridiculous proposition.

So what seemingly novel ideas could shape the next century?

The list runs from hydrinos (very small) to planetary fusion (very big). There are a few surprising things along the way.

Entered on 31 December 2008 at 22:10 in the Science file | Care to make an observation? |  Print

Science Art: Fennec, Webster’s New International

A desert-dwelling fox of North Africa.

For Foxing Day.

From Webster’s New International Dictionary of the English Language, 1911, G & C Miriam Co. Springfield, MA, [found here.]

Entered on 27 December 2008 at 6:03 in the Science Art file | Care to make an observation? |  Print

Cell Phone Blood Scanner

Bet your iPhone can’t do this…. UCLA scientists have found a way to rig an ordinary cell phone, an LED, a light filter and some wiring together, Wired reports, into a cheap and easy blood scanner that can detect HIV and malaria, among other diseases:

UCLA researcher Dr. Aydogan Ozcan images thousands of blood cells instantly by placing them on an off-the-shelf camera sensor and lighting them with a filtered-light source (coherent light, for you science buffs). The filtered light exposes distinctive qualities of the cells, which are then interpreted by Ozcan’s custom software.

Found [via].

Entered on 25 December 2008 at 6:56 in the Science file | Care to make an observation? |  Print

Future By Colani.

Here, something pretty for your Yule: How Luigi Colani designed the future.

^{A Colani-designed semi-trailer.}

From steam trains to flying boats.

Spacecraft like ginger flowers and orange peels.

You can see more of Colani’s biodesign on his Swiss web site (warning: the main page launches a flurry of pop-ups) or the German one, or just read about him here or here.

from www.colani.ch:
“Whenever we talk about biodesign we should simply bear in mind just how amazingly superior a spider’s web is to any load-bearing structure man has made – and then derive from this insight that we should look to the superiority of nature for the solutions. If we want to tackle a new task in the studio, then it’s best to go outside first and look at what millenia-old answers there may already be to the problem.”

Entered on 24 December 2008 at 6:23 in the Science Art file | Care to make an observation? |  Print

SONG: Isopods In My Aquarium.

SONG: “Isopods In My Aquarium” _{(To download: double right-click & “Save As”)}

ARTIST: grant.

SOURCE: “Antarctica Has More Species than Galapagos”, LiveScience, 2 Dec 2008, as used in the post “Life On Ice.”

ABSTRACT:
I remain amazed at how many different things thrive deep under the ice.

There are no polychaetes
and isopods
in my aquarium today

The bryozoans and
the isopods
are probably happier that way.

Given more time to work on this song, I’d simply layer on more vocal tracks. Many more.

Entered on 23 December 2008 at 6:55 in the Songs file | Care to make an observation? |  Print

Smart Soldiers Die First.

Sounds grim, but New Scientist says it’s true. The more intelligent soldiers were the most likely to die in combat:

The unprecedented demands of the second world war – fought more with brains than with brawn compared with previous wars – might account for the skew, says Ian Deary, a psychologist at the University of Edinburgh, who led the study. Dozens of other studies have shown that smart people normally live longer than their less intelligent peers.

“We wonder whether more skilled men were required at the front line, as warfare became more technical,” Dear says.

His team’s study melds records from Scottish army units with results of national tests performed by all 11-year-olds in 1932. The tests assessed verbal reasoning, mathematics and spatial skills.

“No other country has ever done such a whole-population test of the mental ability of its population,” Deary says.

It may be that higher IQs translated to better speaking ability – which led to battlefield promotions. Or, it could be that intelligent soldiers tried to do everything just right, which meant they were likelier to wind up in dangerous situations.

I can easily picture the kind of obsessed problem solver who aces IQ tests sitting in a bunker frantically assembling a detonator exactly right without realizing the tanks are only 10 feet away and everyone else has split.

There’s more on the study at the journal Intelligence.

Entered on 21 December 2008 at 6:38 in the Science file | Care to make an observation? |  Print

Science Art: Nicotiana alata upper leaf surface, showing tricomes and stomates.

^{Click to embiggen vastly}

This Lovecraftian landscape is jasmine tobacco. Not waving, photosynthesizing.

From Louisa Howard at the Dartmouth Electron Microscope Facility.

Entered on 20 December 2008 at 6:27 in the Science Art file | Care to make an observation? |  Print

Electric Plonk.

New Scientist gives us a recipe for converting cheap wine to the good stuff:

It is backed by a decade of research, the results have been published in a peer-reviewed journal and the end product has passed the ultimate test- blind tasting by a panel of wine experts. No fewer than five wineries have now invested in the technology.

The secret this time is an electric field. Pass an undrinkable, raw red wine between a set of high-voltage electrodes and it becomes pleasantly quaffable. “Using an electric field to accelerate ageing is a feasible way to shorten maturation times and improve the quality of young wine,” says Hervé Alexandre, professor of oenology at the University of Burgundy, close to some of France’s finest vineyards.

…

During ageing, wine becomes less acid as the ethanol reacts with organic acids to produce a plethora of the fragrant compounds known as esters. Unpleasant components precipitate out and the wine becomes clearer and more stable. Red wines mellow as bitter, mouth-puckering tannin molecules combine with each other and with pigment molecules to form larger polymers, at the same time releasing their grip on volatile molecules that contribute to the wine’s aroma.

…

The results were striking. With the gentlest treatment, the harsh, astringent wine grew softer. Longer exposure saw some of the hallmarks of ageing emerge- a more mature “nose”, better balance and greater complexity. The improvements reached their peak after 3minutes at 600 volts per centimetre: this left the wine well balanced and harmonious, with a nose of an aged wine and, importantly, still recognisably a cabernet sauvignon.

Entered on 19 December 2008 at 6:39 in the Science file | Care to make an observation? |  Print

Flying Lasers.

We’re one step closer to living in a Flash Gordon serial, New Scientist reports, as engineers prepare to unleash a brilliant barrage of airborne death with fleets of flying lasers:

Although the Airborne Laser (ABL) was fired from a stationary plane at a target on the ground just a few metres away, the test marked a milestone for the weapon, developed by aerospace firms Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman.

The laser was 12 years in the making and cost $4.3 billion, putting it vastly over budget. The US Missile Defense Agency (MDA) calls it the answer to “rogue states” or terror groups who equip themselves with intercontinental ballistic missiles, such as Scuds.

Yet the ABL may soon be used to shoot down a much wider range of devices – including aircraft – and is just one of a number of laser weapons now being readied for military use.

The idea behind the ABL programme is that at times of international tension, the airborne weapons will patrol the skies within hundreds of kilometres of the missile silos or launchers of a region of interest. Then, if the heat signature of a rocket launch is detected via satellite or an early warning aircraft, the ABL will track it and fire its laser at the missile while the latter is still getting off the ground and beginning to accelerate. In theory, the heat from what Boeing calls the “megawatt class” laser beam – the precise power level is classified – should cause the pressurised part of the missile to warp, bend and buckle, resulting in the missile’s complete disintegration.

More at Boeing’s site. Although there are a few fun pictures, alas, no videos. Yet.

Entered on 18 December 2008 at 16:32 in the Science file | Care to make an observation? |  Print

A 2,000-Year-Old Brain

Archaeologists found a surprise inside the severed skull of a man who lived in Britain before the Romans came. As PhysOrg reports, it had Britain’s oldest pickled brain inside:

The old brain is unlikely to yield new neurological insights because human brains aren’t thought to have changed much over the past 2,000 years, according to Chris Gosden, a professor of archaeology at Oxford University unconnected with the find.

He confirmed it was the oldest brain found in Britain. He noted that far older preserved brains, thought to be approximately 8,000 years old, were found in 1986 when dozens of intact human skulls were uncovered buried in a peat bog in Windover Farms in Florida.

“It’s a real freak of preservation to have a brain and nothing else,” Gosden said. “The fact that there’s any brain there at all is quite amazing.”

They only realized the brain was in there when the person cleaning the skull felt something thump inside. They think the guy might have been decapitated and ritually buried as a human sacrifice.

Entered on 17 December 2008 at 6:30 in the Science file | Care to make an observation? |  Print