I read an article in the telegraph that talked about Prof Wetterichs research into how the universe may not be expanding. He says that is it is not necessary that the universe should grow to make the maths work out, growing mass could also work.
The main evidence for the growth of the universe are the red shifted measurements of light by Hubble, this was always explained by the doppler shift by which waves bunch up in front of a moving object and disperse behind which changes the frequency by an amount depending on the speed. By these measurements the speed of the universe expansion was calculated and theories of a time when the universe was all concentrated at one point, a singularity at the beginning of the universe, were formed. This is the big bang theory and it is widely accepted now.
When we look at police cars driving past us we can hear the change in frequencies which is a demonstration of the doppler shift. Apparently light is emmited by atoms and the frequency emmited depends on the mass of the particles. When we look at light from a great distance away, because the light has taken time to reach us this is light from the past. The lower frequencies than expected (we know what is expected by comparing to things we know in that area, like a supernova usually has a certain light pattern) could be due to the mass being lower in the past.
I feel like the higgs boson discoveries would be involved in either proving or disproving this theory. When I tried to research I came accross 'Quintessence' which is to do with dark matter and is considered to be a fifth fundamental force by some physicists which is both attractive and repulsive in different situations depending on the ratio of kinetic to potential energy. All I know about dark energy and matter is that it makes up all the stuff we don't know because there is less mass than there should be according to the expansion models.Neutrino's seem important in all this.
Another article described the size of things shrinking. And plays around with a shrinking gravitational feild. It's possible I'm more confused now than I originally was but it is important that these ideas don't stay to fixed in my mind. But if it isn't expanding, if there was no beginning, is there an end and were we created and if not, why are we here. It causes a whole new way of thinking. I can't help but feel insignificant again...
On the 11th of Septemer 11.30 to 12.30 Prof Wetterich is giving a talk about his theory at CERN, yup you guessed it the imaginary World Trip is making a return to CERN for that... Apologies for the train of thought style of this post.
Tuesday 20 August 2013
On track for 802,701?
I just finished reading 'The Time Machine' by HG Wells and whilst it isn't very physics based with its information, I found it an interesting read that explored the far reaches of my imagination.
Following this post about what the future holds, to use a time machine to find out the truth would be incredible. But the author chose to go further than that. To skip past the unimaginable technological advances and scientific discoveries to an alien world where humans have evolved in two different ways as products of what society required them to be. I won't ruin it the book by saying anymore here.
The book, though about time travel to the future, is a product of the society at the time of the author. It was written in 1895 and I wonder what a modern author would come up with when looking that far ahead. It was brave to consider the decay of intellect, I would find it hard to let go of that when imagining even 802,701. Its difficult, when considering social class I think of the gap closing but that is only in our country, there is a whole world out there with a very different life to what I see around me. It still stands true today that my food is grown and my clothes are made by the other people only it is even more like 802,701 now than it was in 1895 because those other people are on a whole other continent to me, there are even further from my mind. how long until they are underground.
The first chapter was probably my favorite actually, the way the time traveler describes why time travel should be possible was quite convincing. He described how not long before we could not traveling higher than a jump in the up and down dimension. But then we built machines. And that we are already travelling in the forward direction of time and why should we not build a machine to alter our speed and direction. But then of course there are all kinds of paradoxes so it would be against nature as it is against nature to travel into space which is why it is so difficult. Difficult but not impossible. Weird.
It was only a few chapter in that I remembered the big bang episode when they bought a model of the time machine.
Following this post about what the future holds, to use a time machine to find out the truth would be incredible. But the author chose to go further than that. To skip past the unimaginable technological advances and scientific discoveries to an alien world where humans have evolved in two different ways as products of what society required them to be. I won't ruin it the book by saying anymore here.
The book, though about time travel to the future, is a product of the society at the time of the author. It was written in 1895 and I wonder what a modern author would come up with when looking that far ahead. It was brave to consider the decay of intellect, I would find it hard to let go of that when imagining even 802,701. Its difficult, when considering social class I think of the gap closing but that is only in our country, there is a whole world out there with a very different life to what I see around me. It still stands true today that my food is grown and my clothes are made by the other people only it is even more like 802,701 now than it was in 1895 because those other people are on a whole other continent to me, there are even further from my mind. how long until they are underground.
The first chapter was probably my favorite actually, the way the time traveler describes why time travel should be possible was quite convincing. He described how not long before we could not traveling higher than a jump in the up and down dimension. But then we built machines. And that we are already travelling in the forward direction of time and why should we not build a machine to alter our speed and direction. But then of course there are all kinds of paradoxes so it would be against nature as it is against nature to travel into space which is why it is so difficult. Difficult but not impossible. Weird.
It was only a few chapter in that I remembered the big bang episode when they bought a model of the time machine.
Saturday 17 August 2013
£500 Phone + £0 Speaker = Logical?
I got an IPHONE!! And its possible that I am slightly obsessed, well slightly more than slightly. So I saw this design for an iPod speaker made out of a toilet roll I figured I had nothing to lose by trying it! Except maybe half an hour and some dignity when my family called me a cheapskate.
I mean it makes sense, sound is caused by the displacement of air so if you displace more air, it sounds louder right? I built this and after playing around with the drawing pin positions a bit I managed to get it to stand up on its own.
When on a quiet volume the tube did make the music louder but at the highest possible volume the tube made no noticeable difference.
I then found this design and it looked like this:
It was so fiddly I nearly gave up twice but I stuck with it. I ended up sacrificing presentation for stabilty which was a difficult but inevitable choice. This design is more portable and looks pretty cool but doesn't really work much better, probably a little worse. So now I know.
I mean it makes sense, sound is caused by the displacement of air so if you displace more air, it sounds louder right? I built this and after playing around with the drawing pin positions a bit I managed to get it to stand up on its own.
When on a quiet volume the tube did make the music louder but at the highest possible volume the tube made no noticeable difference.
I then found this design and it looked like this:
It was so fiddly I nearly gave up twice but I stuck with it. I ended up sacrificing presentation for stabilty which was a difficult but inevitable choice. This design is more portable and looks pretty cool but doesn't really work much better, probably a little worse. So now I know.
Thursday 15 August 2013
Ada Lovelace
I decided it was about time I read up about Ada Lovelace. And then it all got very complicated and now I've spent all afternoon researching her... But lets start with what she did to be so famous, famous enough to get this Google Doodle on her 197th birthday, although she only lived for 36 and maybe more importantly had a computing program named in her honour.
While translating papers about Charles Babbage's work (he is considered the father of the computer) from Italian she added notes that included an algorithm encoded for processing by a machine. The first ever program and for this she is called the founder of computing. However Charles Babbage's analytical machine (to perform arithmetic calculations, an improvement on his earlier difference engine which computed additions) was never finished and so her code for calculating Bernoulli numbers ( a number series) was never actually tested. But the concepts were revolutionary nonetheless. Modern day constructs of the machines are at the science museum, I wish I had read about this before I went!
And now a bit of background. Her father was the poet Lord Bryon and he is actually one of the few poets I have heard of since I always loved his poem 'We'll go no more a-roving' although I'm not sure I always knew what 'a-roving' was. I suppose it could still be as innocent as I first thought but I highly doubt it after reading about his life.
I find it interesting that most websites I have read consider Adas achievements to be a collaboration of her fathers literary talents and her mothers mathematical skills when her parents separated a month after she was born and her father left the country four months later. And if Wikipedia is to be believed her mother only cared for her so far as to keep custody and check she wasn't as insane as she believed Bryon to be. But I quite like the fact that Bryon called her mother the 'Princess of Parrelograms' and Babbage later described Ada as an 'Enchantress of Numbers', pretty neat nicknames right? With his poems, her work for the abolition of slavery and their daughters work in building the foundations of computer programming, the scandal should hardly be important.
But then it's almost human instinct to crave drama I suppose. But most of the story seems to have been told by Ada's mother, Annabella. I find it hard to believe that she would allow her daughter to be named after her husbands half sister if she did believe him to have had an incestuous affair with her. By all accounts she was a very intelligent woman and accusing a husband of insanity is probably one of the few reasons for divorce that would not implicate a woman in that era. That said, Lord Bryon would hardly be the first mad poet and it appears to run in the family. It was so very hard to see through the walls of a Victorian household, I could hardly guess at the truth and I'd be surprised if Ada had access to it either. Although she is reported to have said that her mothers confession that Adas cousin was her half sister only confirmed Adas own suspicions. And she certainly had secrets of her own, with affairs and gambling debts rumored. Although I could easily convince myself it was all just down to a miscalculation in her experiments... And she certainly resisted an affair with the tutor her mother sent to her house.
Anyway the 14th of October is in my calender to celebrate Ada Lovelace day. It is meant as an inspiration for all women in science by all the women in science but there's plenty to think about just looking at her alone.
Actually it turns out her and her fathers grave is just a half hour bus ride away from where I stay at university, I wonder if it is too morbid to visit... Its at the Church of Our Lady of Magdalena (NG15 7AS) . Watch this space I suppose.
While translating papers about Charles Babbage's work (he is considered the father of the computer) from Italian she added notes that included an algorithm encoded for processing by a machine. The first ever program and for this she is called the founder of computing. However Charles Babbage's analytical machine (to perform arithmetic calculations, an improvement on his earlier difference engine which computed additions) was never finished and so her code for calculating Bernoulli numbers ( a number series) was never actually tested. But the concepts were revolutionary nonetheless. Modern day constructs of the machines are at the science museum, I wish I had read about this before I went!
And now a bit of background. Her father was the poet Lord Bryon and he is actually one of the few poets I have heard of since I always loved his poem 'We'll go no more a-roving' although I'm not sure I always knew what 'a-roving' was. I suppose it could still be as innocent as I first thought but I highly doubt it after reading about his life.
I find it interesting that most websites I have read consider Adas achievements to be a collaboration of her fathers literary talents and her mothers mathematical skills when her parents separated a month after she was born and her father left the country four months later. And if Wikipedia is to be believed her mother only cared for her so far as to keep custody and check she wasn't as insane as she believed Bryon to be. But I quite like the fact that Bryon called her mother the 'Princess of Parrelograms' and Babbage later described Ada as an 'Enchantress of Numbers', pretty neat nicknames right? With his poems, her work for the abolition of slavery and their daughters work in building the foundations of computer programming, the scandal should hardly be important.
But then it's almost human instinct to crave drama I suppose. But most of the story seems to have been told by Ada's mother, Annabella. I find it hard to believe that she would allow her daughter to be named after her husbands half sister if she did believe him to have had an incestuous affair with her. By all accounts she was a very intelligent woman and accusing a husband of insanity is probably one of the few reasons for divorce that would not implicate a woman in that era. That said, Lord Bryon would hardly be the first mad poet and it appears to run in the family. It was so very hard to see through the walls of a Victorian household, I could hardly guess at the truth and I'd be surprised if Ada had access to it either. Although she is reported to have said that her mothers confession that Adas cousin was her half sister only confirmed Adas own suspicions. And she certainly had secrets of her own, with affairs and gambling debts rumored. Although I could easily convince myself it was all just down to a miscalculation in her experiments... And she certainly resisted an affair with the tutor her mother sent to her house.
Anyway the 14th of October is in my calender to celebrate Ada Lovelace day. It is meant as an inspiration for all women in science by all the women in science but there's plenty to think about just looking at her alone.
Actually it turns out her and her fathers grave is just a half hour bus ride away from where I stay at university, I wonder if it is too morbid to visit... Its at the Church of Our Lady of Magdalena (NG15 7AS) . Watch this space I suppose.
Wednesday 7 August 2013
Physics Dates
As well as learning plenty of Physics this last year I have also started exploring the world of romance. Well I say world but its more like a very small corner. And I say exploring but I still haven't taken off my lifejacket or stabalisers, I'm not very adventurous I'm sure you're unsurprised to hear. And actually I say I'm just starting now but even that isn't even particularly true... You see that thing is, I never told you about a date I went on a couple of years ago. Yep, I kept a secret.
The first physics date I went on was with an actual Physicist. I say actual but obviously he wasn't qualified or anything. I wasn't a 17 year old dating a 60 year old and that was why it had to be a secret and I've been traumatised this whole time which is why I keep avoiding the subject and getting carried away. That's not what happened. But maybe it did kind of traumatise me. Having a really awkward uncomfortable date can affect you before every date for the rest of your life....Anyway, I met him on the week I was at the Queen Mary summer school. I kind of had a few conversations with him and then a couple of months later when he asked if I wanted to go to Greenwich observatory I took 2 weeks to reply. But we went and I'm sure I would have enjoyed the observatory a lot if I wasn't trying to think of things to say or wishing the ground would swallow me up. Actually I think I'd like to go back at some point because the park is really pretty around there and the line marking Grenwich mean time is there which is cool.
The second physics date I went on was with a guy I actually like and have no problem talking to. That said he isn't a physicist... But he also isn't 60 so I guess he's alright. We went to the science museum and played on the interactive games that are meant for kids and learning but chasing each other with bird shadows is fun at every age. He answered a quiz and found out that he had a feminine way of thinking which I personally find to be a positive outcome though he was less convinced, There was a way to see what you will look like when you're older too and to be honest, the future him is not half bad looking at all ;)
I suppose there actually was a kind of a date in between the second and first. Well I thought it was a date at the time but I'm not sure he or the other people who joined us for lunch thought so...
Ah and there was a guy who would send me the cutest physics jokes which always made laugh! Unless I had already heard them in which case I politely pretended to laugh... He was chemist which kind of sucks for him, mostly because there aren't as many good jokes but also because he has to wake up in the morning to do chemistry *shudders at the thought*
The Phoenix Lander
So I found this pattern to build a model of Phoenix Lander Model so how could I really resist making it? The balloon helps it fly but my landing is considerable less smooth than the demonstration on the internet..
But considering the actual Phoenix Mars Lander looks like this, I'm not sure I did such a great job anyway!
NASA has a long term Mars exploration program and this lander is one of many that have visited Mars. In August 2007 this one was sent to the northern arctic plain to test the soil and ice that had previously been found there. On the 14th of August 2008 it actually took the picture below which you can see a morning frost that reportedly disappeared around 6am when the sun came up.
Sources: NASA.
I Have No Idea
I was chatting to my friend the other day about how communications have changed. I forgot than when I first made friends with her 8 years ago, I hardly spoke to her outside of school at all. I had a pay as you go sim card and only a shared family computer at home. And now I have a laptop, an Ipod touch, a mobile phone with unlimited texts and I have several conversations with people everyday. And that seems normal to me.
And then I wondered where we will be in 8 years time. I mean I know I personally will be on a beach somewhere having my third holiday of the year, playing around with some formulas, with my husband who also got a Nobel prize for our work in some obscure field of physics. Ok now I'm singing 'I wanna do maths on the beach' Vengaboys remix... Where was I going with this?
What I think I meant was, where technology and knowledge will be by then. I also worry about the state of the world but that always feels very far out of my hands. Maybe one day I will be amazing but right now I just feel very ordinary. And so I wonder what an ordinary life will be like and what will seem normal by that point.
Usually the unknown scares me but right now I'm just excited.
It's easy to see how things I learn in nanophysics lectures will affect things like data storage but then the implications of that are huge. Saving weight in space crafts means you can go further. Smaller components means you can investigate deeper into the body. Custom made materials can get very science fictiony and the possibilities are endless. And my excitement over this just makes module choosing very difficult, I was supposed to be a medical physicist...
Then today I found this website which is very sleek and looks at different aspects of life and where they are headed. There's a post on data collection which is interesting because obviously I know it happens, its obvious what with personalised adverts and targetting tesco vouchers but I didn't realise terrorism task forces actually checked up on suspicious searches.I really like this website.
And then I wondered where we will be in 8 years time. I mean I know I personally will be on a beach somewhere having my third holiday of the year, playing around with some formulas, with my husband who also got a Nobel prize for our work in some obscure field of physics. Ok now I'm singing 'I wanna do maths on the beach' Vengaboys remix... Where was I going with this?
What I think I meant was, where technology and knowledge will be by then. I also worry about the state of the world but that always feels very far out of my hands. Maybe one day I will be amazing but right now I just feel very ordinary. And so I wonder what an ordinary life will be like and what will seem normal by that point.
It's easy to see how things I learn in nanophysics lectures will affect things like data storage but then the implications of that are huge. Saving weight in space crafts means you can go further. Smaller components means you can investigate deeper into the body. Custom made materials can get very science fictiony and the possibilities are endless. And my excitement over this just makes module choosing very difficult, I was supposed to be a medical physicist...
Then today I found this website which is very sleek and looks at different aspects of life and where they are headed. There's a post on data collection which is interesting because obviously I know it happens, its obvious what with personalised adverts and targetting tesco vouchers but I didn't realise terrorism task forces actually checked up on suspicious searches.I really like this website.
Tuesday 6 August 2013
Physics Blunders
So a years worth of social interaction, there are bound to be plenty of embarrassing stories from that right? Although I did have the sudden realisation at some point this year than no matter how awkward I feel or how much social anxiety I get there are lots of people who are much much worse. Where to begin?
This one makes me cringe the most. There was a competition to build a device to transport an egg as far as you could in a team of 10. So precompetition I made a few group message faux pas but nothing too serious. Then there's the awkwardness of two members of the group liking each other but not liking them and both telling me all about it like I have the faintest clue what either of them are actually thinking. But that's nothing compared to getting up in front of everyone with this pathetic cart with a driving system that acted as a break and the only reason we didn't go backwards was that gravity just so happened to be on our side. If one of the carts hadn't caught fire I'm pretty sure we would have come last. And to be the only group using fire, I think we know who the real winner was. That said we had a cape on our egg.
I went on nearly every physics social but the barcrawl I wore the 'Particle Physics Gives Me a Hadron' to was something special. The only other night that tshirt made it out was as a forfeit for one of my block friends. It was an interscience social so I got tricked into a whipped cream competition in the name of physics... I also had a few awkward encounters with a chemist who didn't deal well with rejection and ran to the next bar away from a love struck physicist who I spoke to once before but who somehow knew I was perfect in every way... The playzone social was sober and a lot easier to handle! There was a Christmas barcrawl that I predrank for and so have the excuse to not quite recall all the embarrassing things I said on that one. But I made it home with an inflatable guitar so there's something to be proud of that night.
Then there was that second year who asked me out on a date, I hesitated and he said 'you can say no if you want' but apparently that wasn't a genuine escape clause and he was surprised when all I said was 'no'. But that was quite early on in the year, I like to think I would react nicer now... However I really thought my comebacks were getting better until a vaguely attractive guy tries to banter me and I just freeze over and squeak...
Oh there was this other time that me and Charlotte were crying with laughter at something she found on facebook in a lecture. The lecturer stopped the lecture and told the girl in the scarf to be quiet or she would be thrown out at the speed of light and everyone laughed. I wasn't wearing a scarf but I was dying of embarrassment and so all my friends text me to laugh at me again, as only true friends do.
Thinking predrinks was the time to play the physics playlist on my laptop. Turns out there really never is a group of people to share that with!
Thinking predrinks was the time to play the physics playlist on my laptop. Turns out there really never is a group of people to share that with!
I still don't know if lab guy genuinely thinks I'm a complete idiot or just really enjoys sarcasm. Either way his impression of me when I bumped into him on a night out was ridiculously far off, I have never asked him how electricity works in a high pitch voice thankyou very much. That said there have been plenty of embarrassing moments in labs such as not being able to find the on off button, getting lost on the way back from the taps, trying to blag my way through the verbal explanation marks and backing myself into a corner.
I feel like there would be more to add to this list if I wasn't so comfortable around with my physics friends that anything particularly silly I do they just laugh and tell me about the time it happened to them.
Robot Friends, Lab Meat and Nuclear Leaks - the Future now
It's funny, I was just like 'ohh lets do one of those 'What's in the News' posts', I click over to BBC news and see lab grown burgers, Fukushima instability and talking robots in space, it feels like I'm looking at the news from a year ago still. I talked about the nuclear power station here and growing meat and robots that learn here.
So Fukushima update... Basically the site is still dangerous, now due to groundwater leaks the Pacific Ocean is being contaminated with radioactivity making it incredibly dangerous to life on a large scale. Apparently ti's been an issue for months but only coming out now. I read somewhere the other day about sunflower heads being very good at absorbing radiation actually. But this is on such a large scale and they need to stop the leaks first of all. Actually in the new Wolverine movie there was a scene with the atomic bomb and it was quite disturbing, all of his skin burnt off but the guy under the metal door was fine.
And now the burger! They can still only make small amounts of meat because otherwise they would need to create artificial circulatory systems but obviously the larger the bulk they can make the cheaper it will be. Google is one of the main backers at the moment which surprised me. What also surprised me was the use of stem cells for the research which I know is controversial. It does raise many issues still over unknown sideeffects and what it would mean for vegetarians on religious grounds. But then world hunger is such a strong counter argument its hard not to hope this goes well.
The robot is kind of slightly disappointing... It seems to be more of a psychological study rather than doing any particular task. The description of its twin being on earth makes me feel like this is a Disney cartoon just waiting to happen and actually the design was modeled on Astro boy so that's not far off.
So Fukushima update... Basically the site is still dangerous, now due to groundwater leaks the Pacific Ocean is being contaminated with radioactivity making it incredibly dangerous to life on a large scale. Apparently ti's been an issue for months but only coming out now. I read somewhere the other day about sunflower heads being very good at absorbing radiation actually. But this is on such a large scale and they need to stop the leaks first of all. Actually in the new Wolverine movie there was a scene with the atomic bomb and it was quite disturbing, all of his skin burnt off but the guy under the metal door was fine.
And now the burger! They can still only make small amounts of meat because otherwise they would need to create artificial circulatory systems but obviously the larger the bulk they can make the cheaper it will be. Google is one of the main backers at the moment which surprised me. What also surprised me was the use of stem cells for the research which I know is controversial. It does raise many issues still over unknown sideeffects and what it would mean for vegetarians on religious grounds. But then world hunger is such a strong counter argument its hard not to hope this goes well.
The robot is kind of slightly disappointing... It seems to be more of a psychological study rather than doing any particular task. The description of its twin being on earth makes me feel like this is a Disney cartoon just waiting to happen and actually the design was modeled on Astro boy so that's not far off.
Computing: Nightmare or Actually Kind of OK
Last year I had a computing module which at times I absolutely hated and at other times found genuinely enjoyable.
The things I enjoyed:
- I got like 90 something percent overall (that's involving fortnightly coursework and an end of year class test)
- I had friends in the workshop on a Monday afternoon which was a lovely break from lectures
- There's a moment of anticipation in the break between writing a code and running it where you are hoping beyond hope it works and sometimes it does and you can be all smug and proud of yourself
- Sometimes I got it and my friends didn't. I mean I'm not competitive and we always helped each other but when you feel dumb in all your other modules, starting new like everyone else and doing alright is encouraging
- Being friends with the guy who lost 50% on his coursework because his friend thought it would be funny to put a picture of a nude man eating grapes at the bottom of his code before he submitted and not tell him. He was right, it was funny
- Asking MatLab 'why?' and then finding out that Math students weren't told about that quirk and knowing I made the right degree choice
Things I hated:
- There's a moment of anticipation in the break between writing a code and running it where you are hoping beyond hope it works and sometimes it doesn't and you have literally no idea why
- It's the night before handing in coursework and you're going out in a couple of hours so really shouldn't leave it to finish in the morning because you'll be tired but you've spent hours and hours rerunning code and you just have no idea. Then you see you read the question wrong all along and fix it in 2 seconds but you can't even be pleased it's fixed you're so fed up with it.
- Thinking you get it and then talking to friends who are writing fractal programmes and Ipod Apps...
Quantum Tunelling: Fusion, Movies and Crystals
This piece of Physics is one of my favorites from this year because it is a bizarre concept that I would gradually grow to understand and then suddenly be like, wait that's crazy! But I did an experiment using the theory in a lab session so I have seen proof but then again it goes against everything I see around me. This is probably one of the hardest things I learnt this year and I haven't really done the explainy thing for a while so you'll have to bear with me.
The concept is quantum tunneling. To understand this we need to look at things on a nano scale. At this level the laws of Physics are very different to things at the size that we are used to. But things that happen on a tiny level affect what we can see at the size of us and at the size of galaxies.
Take an electron at the surface of a material. An electron is a fundamental particle and so is one of the smallest things we know. This electron can move freely in any conducting material like metal but cannot move through insulating material like air. So a layer of air will act as a barrier preventing movement through it. In our everyday life you know that you can cross a barrier such as a wall or hill but it takes energy to get over it. And now I'm going to tell you that it's different for an electron, an electron doesn't have to have enough energy to cross the barrier, it can tunnel through it. But that phrase is kind of misleading, the electron doesn't dig through the barrier it just is there.
You can explain this with wave functions and probabilities but that is even stranger conceptually. That relies on wave particle duality which still makes my head spin so we'll just focus on this for now I think.
Actually this phenomena is how fusion occurs in the Sun. In the Sun protons are combined to create larger elements and lots of energy but it takes energy to get two protons over a barrier and close enough to combine, the kind of energy the Sun just doesn't have. The protons tunnel together.
So an electron can appear on the other side of a barrier with the same amount of energy it had on the other side and we know this is true because of a method called Scanning Tunnel Microscopy (STM) which uses quantum tunneling to make images of atoms. The smaller the width of a barrier the easier it is for an electron to pass the barrier. The flow of electrons is the definition of an electron current and so the current passing through a gap of air indicates how wide that gap is. A probe passes over a surface tracking this current and a computer maps out the height of the surface and it is at such a small scale that what you see are the atoms that make up the surface. Pretty cool huh? It gets even cooler when you then use a probe to move an atom across a surface and then you are building crystals with whatever properties you want or storing unimaginable amounts of data on tiny chips. That's how they made this movie which is the smallest motion picture ever made:
The concept is quantum tunneling. To understand this we need to look at things on a nano scale. At this level the laws of Physics are very different to things at the size that we are used to. But things that happen on a tiny level affect what we can see at the size of us and at the size of galaxies.
Take an electron at the surface of a material. An electron is a fundamental particle and so is one of the smallest things we know. This electron can move freely in any conducting material like metal but cannot move through insulating material like air. So a layer of air will act as a barrier preventing movement through it. In our everyday life you know that you can cross a barrier such as a wall or hill but it takes energy to get over it. And now I'm going to tell you that it's different for an electron, an electron doesn't have to have enough energy to cross the barrier, it can tunnel through it. But that phrase is kind of misleading, the electron doesn't dig through the barrier it just is there.
You can explain this with wave functions and probabilities but that is even stranger conceptually. That relies on wave particle duality which still makes my head spin so we'll just focus on this for now I think.
Actually this phenomena is how fusion occurs in the Sun. In the Sun protons are combined to create larger elements and lots of energy but it takes energy to get two protons over a barrier and close enough to combine, the kind of energy the Sun just doesn't have. The protons tunnel together.
So an electron can appear on the other side of a barrier with the same amount of energy it had on the other side and we know this is true because of a method called Scanning Tunnel Microscopy (STM) which uses quantum tunneling to make images of atoms. The smaller the width of a barrier the easier it is for an electron to pass the barrier. The flow of electrons is the definition of an electron current and so the current passing through a gap of air indicates how wide that gap is. A probe passes over a surface tracking this current and a computer maps out the height of the surface and it is at such a small scale that what you see are the atoms that make up the surface. Pretty cool huh? It gets even cooler when you then use a probe to move an atom across a surface and then you are building crystals with whatever properties you want or storing unimaginable amounts of data on tiny chips. That's how they made this movie which is the smallest motion picture ever made:
Monday 5 August 2013
Destination Switzerland Done
One of the cool things that happened this year was that I WENT TO GENEVA! This was one of the places I had written about dreaming going to and hey I did it. I went with Nottingham Physoc so we had one day touring around the LHC. There was a museum and exhibition and then we had a guided tour around this big warehouse type room looking at prototypes and maps getting to grips with how it all works and what they aim to achieve. We had a 3D movie of the detector but unfortunately didn't get to see the big detector itself, that's reserved for people who know people and we were just on an ordinary tour. That was a bit of a disappointment if I'm honest but it was still really interesting and fun so can't really complain.
Geneva was so beautiful and I had a great time exploring the old town and lake when we were there. Honestly an amazing holiday that I will remember forever.
Tycho Friggin Brahe
When trying to think of cool things we learnt this year one of the first things that comes to mind is this guy:
The magnificent Tycho Brahe. He's pretty darn awesome but he was introduced to me by my favourite lecturer so I may be slightly biased I don't know. He is almost on a par with Tesla
I guess most importantly not only did he revolutionise astronomical instruments, he made accurate astronomical measurements which provided the foundations for Keplers discoveries later.
But then there are just these cool eccentric details of his life. Like his nose was cut off in a duel with a fellow student over a mathematical formula and he wore a gold false nose.He also had a pet elk who fell down the stairs and died after drinking too much at a party... I heard that he died when his bladder burst because at a dinner with the king he drank too much wine and was not allowed to leave the table in the presence of the king to relieve himself. However his grave was recently reopened and an autopsy performed that found traces of mercury which suggests poison although the motives for his murder are pure speculation.
Although born in Denmark he died and was buried in Prague where I actually visited his grave in the Chruch of Our Lady of Tyne.
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I checked my facts by this page which has some hilariously sarcastic footnotes.
I guess most importantly not only did he revolutionise astronomical instruments, he made accurate astronomical measurements which provided the foundations for Keplers discoveries later.
But then there are just these cool eccentric details of his life. Like his nose was cut off in a duel with a fellow student over a mathematical formula and he wore a gold false nose.He also had a pet elk who fell down the stairs and died after drinking too much at a party... I heard that he died when his bladder burst because at a dinner with the king he drank too much wine and was not allowed to leave the table in the presence of the king to relieve himself. However his grave was recently reopened and an autopsy performed that found traces of mercury which suggests poison although the motives for his murder are pure speculation.
Although born in Denmark he died and was buried in Prague where I actually visited his grave in the Chruch of Our Lady of Tyne.
.JPG)
Chopsticks
I had this thing where I would do everything I intended to. Like I'd stop stopping myself, it was supposed to be liberating or whatever. But then I used chopsticks and I was like, I should only ever use chopsticks. And then that seemed impractical. Then I remembered I've had a month and a half of summer and still not blogged yet. So here I am. And I will use chopsticks for the next week. Even though this week involves a trip to Leeds...
Basically I've been up to so much this last year and barely had a minute to myself, let alone enough time to catch up with my back log of posts even though I have so much to say. I've had such a good time studying Physics at Nottingham at this year. I wrote here all about my decision process and honestly it was the best decision I could possibly have made. The department is so good. Honestly it's things like mock exams, marked coursework every week, resources on a reliable site, friendly approachable staff and a strong society that just make life as easy as it should be. I have met so many people and made strong friendships and really been able to make the most of the experience both socially and academically. Actually I'm hoping to help give tours next year to help other people see how great Nottingham is. I understand how different people need different things but for people like me it's perfect. The campus is beautiful too and I think I'll miss it when I live in a house next year although that will also bring many other advantages I'm sure.
So yeah, a year away: I still love Physics, I definitely love Nottingham, I'm a little older and wiser but probably twice as silly, I know so many more Physicists and some more Physics and my calculator still doesn't have a lid but no major catastrophe occurred. Oh and I got a first in first year Physics which was quite nice actually.
So yeah, a year away: I still love Physics, I definitely love Nottingham, I'm a little older and wiser but probably twice as silly, I know so many more Physicists and some more Physics and my calculator still doesn't have a lid but no major catastrophe occurred. Oh and I got a first in first year Physics which was quite nice actually.
Monday 7 January 2013
Unayyyy
Heya!! wow erm... so this is weird! A lot has happened since I lasted posted and this time I seriously a lot!
I went to uni!! I went to uni and everything was okay. Well, better than ok because I absolutely LOVE university! And all my worries and fears were of course natural and necessary but totally unfounded. I have actual friends, I don't get awful marks, I actually enjoy going out to clubs etc. But I'm very busy, even in Christmas holidays but I'm avoiding revising because its just harder to do when they are only mocks...
I went to uni!! I went to uni and everything was okay. Well, better than ok because I absolutely LOVE university! And all my worries and fears were of course natural and necessary but totally unfounded. I have actual friends, I don't get awful marks, I actually enjoy going out to clubs etc. But I'm very busy, even in Christmas holidays but I'm avoiding revising because its just harder to do when they are only mocks...
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