Strange Science
Page 10
The electron that jumps in comes from farther away from the atom’s nucleus—and has much more energy than the one that got knocked out. When it fills in the empty spot, it has to release its surplus energy—which it releases as a photon. This happens billions of times in one X-ray procedure.
A lead container surrounds the vacuum tube to absorb X-rays. A small opening in the container allows the escape of photons, which first pass through a series of filters that stop all but a pure beam of X-ray photons.
Now we take the picture. On one side of whatever is being X-rayed—say your hand—is the window through which the beam is emitted; on the other side of your hand is the film. As the X-ray photons meet the atoms in your hand, they will either pass through or be absorbed by them. The softer tissues in your body—your skin, organs, and muscles—are made up of relatively small atoms. The X-ray photons pass right through them and leave their mark as the lighter areas on the film, just like light hitting a camera’s film. The atoms in your bones—primarily calcium—are much larger, and they absorb the X-rays and stop them from reaching the film. Result: The film has captured an image of your bones.
Green City:
COPENHAGEN
POPULATION: 1.2 million
HOW GREEN IS IT? Copenhagen, Denmark, has been addressing environmental issues for decades. The result is that the water in its harbors and canals is so clean that people actually swim in them. There are also more than 186 miles of bike paths in the metro area, and residents and tourists can borrow bikes for free. Some major streets even have a “green wave” system so bike riders can speed through intersections without stopping—they hit timed green lights the entire way. Now more than half of Copenhageners bike to work or school.
The city is filled with parks, and plans are in the works to guarantee that at least 90 percent of Copenhagen’s population will be within walking distance of a park or beach. About 20 percent of the city’s electric power comes from wind turbines, hydroelectric power, and biomass (energy from organic matter like wood, straw, and organic waste), but the goal is to stop using coal altogether. The city is encouraging residents to buy electric- and hydrogen-powered cars and is investing more than $900 billion so that, by 2025, Copenhagen will be carbon-neutral.
IT’S REIGNING DINOSAURS
Test your knowledge of these prehistoric creatures.
1.Some 2,000 years ago, dinosaur fossils were discovered in Wucheng, Sichuan, China. What did people think they’d found?
2.Most scientists believe Dr. Gauthier’s theory that these modern-day animals are the descendants of dinosaurs.
3.Paleontologist Jack Horner discovered the first evidence that some dinosaurs do what?
4.In 2016 scientists confirmed that a skeleton nicknamed “Wade” is in fact a new species of titanosaur. In what country was it found?
5.How many books did Michael Crichton write in his dinosaur thriller series that was made into four movies?
6.Able to look into a six-story window, what dinosaur was likely the tallest creature to walk the earth?
7.“Sue,” sold for more than $8 million to the Field Museum of National History in Chicago, is famous because it is the most complete skeleton found of what dinosaur?
8.Who wrote, “If we measured success by longevity, then dinosaurs must rank as the number one success story in the history of land life”?
9.What dinosaur, related to Tyrannosaurus rex, was found in and named for a Canadian province?
10.Megalosaurus, the first dinosaur fossil to get a scientific identification, was discovered in 1824 in what country?
11.What dinosaur name means “fast thief”?
ANSWERS: 1. Dragon bones 2. Birds 3. Care for their young 4. Australia 5. Two: Jurassic Park and The Lost World 6. Sauroposeidon 7. Tyrannosaurus rex 8. Robert T. Bakker 9. Albertosaurus 10. England 11. Velociraptor
REAL-LIFE TIME MACHINE
A 2015 news report told of Ronald Mallett, a professor at the University of Connecticut who has dreamed of building a time machine since he was 10. That’s when his father died of a heart attack. Mallett figured that if he could travel back in time, he could warn his father to stop smoking.
Mallett’s time-machine design uses light energy (four laser beams) to warp space and time. It takes a PhD to understand the details, but according to Mallett, the beams could swirl space and time like “a spoon stirring milk into coffee.” Mallett says he’ll need about 10 years in the lab to make his time-travel dream real.
Almost all flu viruses first infect chickens, then pigs, and then spread to humans, mutating along the way. But the chicken flu of 1997 made medical news because it jumped directly from birds to humans, bypassing pigs.
“The wireless music box has no
imaginable commercial value. Who
would pay for a message sent to
nobody in particular?”
—ASSOCIATES OF NBC PRESIDENT DAVID SARNOFF
(responding to his recommendation, in the
1920s, that they invest in radio)
The Mystery of the Stradivarius
Science has finally solved a mystery that has baffled luthiers (stringed instrument makers) for decades: why does a 300-year-old Stradivarius violin sound so much more “brilliant”—a musical term describing clarity of tone—than modern instruments?
Hwan-Ching Tai, a professor of chemistry at National Taiwan University, studied several instruments made by Antonio Stradivari in Cremona, Italy, and discovered that the wood was presoaked in a chemical solution containing aluminum, calcium, copper, and other minerals (most likely to ward off fungus). That practice is long gone, and today’s violins have no such chemical additives… which is what Tai believes gives the old instruments their distinctively brilliant tones. Another factor: over the centuries, a compound in the wood called hemicellulose has mostly evaporated. That compound absorbs water, so less of it means less moisture, and a dryer wood gives a crisper sound.
So the good news is that science has finally solved the mystery; the bad news is that the only way today’s luthiers could re-create the sound of a Stradivarius is to go back in time and work alongside him.
GREENHOUSE HELMET
Some of the world’s biggest and best cities also have some of the world’s biggest and best parks, perfect for jogging or bicycling. The problem is that those big cities are often horribly smog-choked, particularly on warm, sunny days; times that are preferred for outdoor exercise are rendered toxic by air pollution. The solution: the Greenhouse Helmet.
More than just a plastic bubble protecting you and your lungs from the bad air outside, it’s a complete mini ecosystem inside. It consists of a large plastic dome that seals firmly around the head. Inside are tiny shelves outfitted with at least one plant, which, you might remember from junior-high science class, takes in the carbon dioxide humans expel, and in turn expels oxygen. This creates an environment of a constant exchange of clean air. And so you don’t have to come across as a complete weirdo, the Greenhouse Helmet comes with speakers and a microphone for communicating with people who are not inside the Greenhouse Helmet. (Note: If you make one of these for yourself, be sure to poke some holes in it so you can breathe!) Though there was a U.S. patent application filed in the 1980s, it lapsed less than 10 years later.
MANHATTANHENGE
Most of the time, the tall buildings in Manhattan block the sunset. But twice a year, above 14th Street, the sun aligns with the streets’ east–west grid pattern and sets perfectly between the buildings. It lasts only about 15 minutes, but it’s so striking that people stop on the streets to watch. As solar rays light up the towering buildings, a glowing orange light filters along the streets. The reflection off the buildings also scatters the sunshine, sending bright light along the north–south avenues. Because the phenomenon resembles sunsets seen at England’s mysterious Stonehenge ruins, astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson calls it “Manhattanhenge.”
Stonehenge was built by the ancient Celtic Druids to mark the exa
ct moment of the spring and fall equinoxes. But Manhattan’s street grid was established in 1811 for efficiency, not science, so it’s slightly off center—it’s turned 28.9 degrees from true east and west. As a result, the city’s “equinoxes” occur on different days each year. Usually, the dates are in late May and mid-July. But if you miss the exact dates, not to worry. The days before and after Manhattanhenge also create a celestial glow—it’s not quite as magnificent, but still pretty good.
According to Tyson, the best way to see Manhattanhenge is to position yourself as far east in Manhattan as possible, but ensure that when you look west across the avenues you can still see New Jersey. Clear cross streets include 14th, 23rd, 34th, 42nd, 57th, and several streets adjacent to them. The Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building render 34th and 42nd Streets especially striking vistas.
“If I had thought about it, I wouldn’t have done the experiment. The literature was full of examples that said you can’t do this.”
—Spencer Silver
(on the adhesive that led to 3-M Post-Its)
BRUSH TALKS
Shen Kuo, raised in China in the 11th century, was successful in every role he took on: engineer, financial expert, military leader, manager, inventor, mapmaker, diplomat, and imperial academician. In his spare time, he studied math and astronomy at the Imperial Palace library.
At age 58, Shen retired to his garden estate. He called it Dream Brook because it matched a beautiful place he’d repeatedly seen in his dreams. Keeping to himself, Shen set to work writing a book of observations and thoughts that contained more than 600 essays. “I had only my writing brush and ink slab to converse with,” said Shen. He titled the book Brush Talks from Dream Brook.
About a third of Brush Talks was science — biology, geography, physics, medicine, geology, archaeology, chemistry, astronomy, meteorology, and mechanics. But there were stories, too. One entry was titled “Purple Aunty Goes Down to the Mortal World.” It described the custom of inviting the toilet goddess, Purple Aunty, into one’s home on the eve of the Lantern Festival (the final day of Chinese New Year celebrations). Purple Aunty had the power to turn people into writers and poets.
Shen’s book also included some remarkable firsts. His discussion of compasses noted that magnetized needles pointed to a spot that wasn’t the exact North Pole, and he described a printing method using movable type—both 400 years before Europeans were credited with the discoveries.
The Four Ethnic Groups
Through relatively inexpensive DNA tests, people can learn valuable information about where their ancestors came from. One kind of test shows “genetic percentages” of ethnic heritage. A result of such a test might say that someone has 40% European, 40% African, 18% East Asian, and 2% Native American heritage. Or it might say 90% Native American and 10% East Asian.
The four very broad ethnic groupings determined by the test:
1.African: Peoples of sub-Saharan Africa.
2.European: This group is much broader than it appears, and includes peoples from Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.
3.East Asian: Japanese, Chinese, Mongolian, Korean, Southeast Asian, and Pacific Islander populations.
4.Native American: Peoples that migrated from Asia to populate North, Central, and South America.
•The average Egyptian mummy contains more than 20 layers of cloth that, laid end-to-end, would be more than four football fields long.
•In 1974 a scientist discovered that the mummy of Pharaoh Ramesses II, more than 3,000 years old, had a fungal infection. So it was sent to France for treatment, complete with an Egyptian passport describing its occupation as “King, deceased.”
•What’s the quickest way to tell if an Egyptian mummy still has its brains? Shake the skull—if it rattles, the brain is still in there.
•The Egyptians mummified bulls, cats, baboons, birds, crocodiles, fish, scorpions, insects, and wild dogs. One tomb had more than one million mummified birds.
•Some mummies have been discovered in coffins containing chicken bones. Some scientists believe the bones have special religious meaning, but others theorize that the bones are actually leftover garbage from an embalmer’s lunch.
TRIMETHYLAMINURIA
People with this metabolic disorder are unable to produce an enzyme used to break down trimethylamine, a compound found in many foods. That means trimethylamine builds up in the body, until there is so much that it is finally emitted through urine, sweat, and breathing. And that’s bad…because trimethylamine smells like stinky fish. In fact, it’s the very chemical compound that makes stinky fish smell like stinky fish in the first place. People with this disorder can smell so strongly that—as you can imagine—it can make social situations difficult. Trimethylaminuria is a genetic disease, and there is no cure, though the strength of the fishy odor can be reduced through diet.
EXTRA: The gene mutation that causes trimethylaminuria was discovered in 1997, but the disease has been around for a long time. The earliest known mention of it may come from the ancient Sanskrit epic the Mahabharata, a collection of Indian folk tales more than 2,000 years old. One of those tales includes a maiden who “grew to be comely and fair, but a fishy odor ever clung to her.”
Inspired by Fiction
Scientists proved they have a sense of humor when they named these four species after fictional characters.
SPONGIFORMA SQUAREPANTSII. San Francisco State University researcher Dennis Desjardin gave this mushroom species its name in 2011 because the mushroom not only resembled a sea sponge, but when viewed under a scanning-electron microscope, it looked like the ocean floor where TV cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants lives.
ERECHTHIAS BEEBLEBROXI. This moth species has a bump near its head that gives it the appearance of having two heads, just like Zaphod Beeblebrox—the two-headed character in Douglas Adams’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
ERIOVIXIA GRYFFINDORI. In 2016 researchers Javed Ahmed and Rajashree Khalap, both fans of J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books, discovered a small spider in India whose shape resembles the magic Sorting Hat that once belonged to the wizard Gryffindor in the series—and named it after him.
LEPIDOPA LUCIAE. American crustacean biologist Christopher Boyko named this marine crab in 2002. At first he wanted to name it for Charles Schulz, the creator of the Peanuts comic strip. But Schulz’s wife suggested he name it after Peanuts character Lucy instead…because she’s known for being crabby.
SPACE WOMAN
Millie Hughes-Fulford was born in Mineral Wells, Texas, in 1945; her dad ran a local grocery store. But her passion lay in science, not commerce, and she was inspired by great female scientists like Marie Curie. By 16, she could run the store on her own, but longed to go to college. So she went off to earn a PhD in radiation biochemistry from Texas Woman’s University. As if becoming a prominent medical researcher and molecular biologist weren’t enough, Fulford joined the NASA astronaut program as a payload specialist aboard the STS-40 Spacelab Life Sciences (SLS1). This nine-day mission onboard the space shuttle Columbia lifted off on June 5, 1991. During the mission, Fulford conducted scientific experiments in space that yielded critical information about bone-cell growth, osteoporosis, and cancer.
SPOT OF MYSTERY
In the early 20th century, Gold Hill, Oregon, was a small town with little gold left to mine. Sometime in the 1910s, after a rainstorm, a former gold processing office (essentially a small shack) slid off of its foundation and came to rest down a hillside. People went inside and found a place that didn’t make any sense: rocks rolled uphill, and people were able to stand on the walls.
In 1930 that shack—now called the Oregon Vortex House of Mystery—opened as a tourist attraction where visitors could see the strangeness for themselves:
•Brooms stand on end.
•People get taller or shorter as they move through the house.
•Few animals are willing to enter the area.
&nb
sp; BRING IN THE SCIENTIST
Scottish engineer John Litster came to the Vortex in 1929 to study all the strange goings-on. He reportedly even discussed what he called “abnormalities” in the area’s magnetic field with Albert Einstein. Litster thought there was something extraordinary happening, but he never shared his findings with anyone. To this day, no one really knows what he came up with. Legend has it that, before he died in 1959, he burned all his notes, but supposedly he’d written, “The world isn’t yet ready for what goes on here.”
SO WHAT’S REALLY GOING ON?
Over the years, people came up with various theories:
1.When the house fell, it moved so fast that it ripped a hole in the earth and created a “gravitational anomaly” where “high-velocity soft electrons” exit the earth. (There are no such things as “gravitational anomalies” or “high-velocity soft electrons.”)
2.There’s a giant underground magnet that’s causing the strange activity.
3.The weirdness could be caused by magnetic rocks in the area. (There is no evidence of iron or other magnetic rocks in the ground near Gold Hill.)
4.High concentrations of volcanic rocks cause the strange events. (Volcanic rocks can’t alter gravity.)
THE EXPLANATION?
The debate has raged for years. True believers point to magnetic abnormalities, or even the supernatural. But most think the tricks at the Vortex are optical illusions. The House of Mystery is tilted at a strange incline. The floor, walls, and ceiling are built at sloping angles to trick people into thinking everything looks distorted.