Scientists boost the accuracy of optical microscopes to image microdroplets in flight and apply the method to analyze the concentration of plastic nanoparticles.
Sneezes, rain clouds, and ink jet printers: They all produce or contain liquid droplets so tiny it would take several billion of them to fill a liter bottle.
Measuring the volume, motion and contents of microscopic droplets is important for studying how airborne viruses spread (including those that cause COVID-19), how clouds reflect sunlight to cool the Earth, how ink jet printers create finely detailed patterns, and even how a soda bottle fragments into nanoscale plastic particles that pollute the oceans.
By improving the calibration of a conventional optical microscope, researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have for the first time measured the volume of individual droplets smaller than 100 trillionths of a liter with an uncertainty of less than 1%. That is a tenfold improvement over previous measurements.
Before and after comparisons don’t tell the full story of chemical reactions in flowing fluids, such as those in a chemical reactor, according to a new study from a collaboration based in Japan.
The researchers published their paper on May 6 in the Journal of Physical Chemistry B, a journal of the American Chemical Society. The results were featured on the journal’s cover.
The team examined how a solution of dissolved polymers changed after the addition of Fe3+ solution. These types of solutions are used to better control variables in several fields, including manufacturing. In automobile manufacturing, for instance, the solutions help achieve a thorough evenness of paint coverage and control over how much a material expands or contracts under various temperatures.
Traditionally, researchers examine a solution before a reactant, such as Fe3+solution, is added, and again after the reaction takes place.
Many lessons learned in life are learned from trees. Stand firm. Good things take time. Bend, don’t break. But metaphors aside, our stately arboreal neighbors offer a wealth of scientific wisdom—and we have a lot to learn.
Simply by existing, trees are nature’s first materials scientists. Like many plants, they have vascular systems, networks of tube-like channels that transport water and other vital nutrients from root, to branch, to leaf.
A research team at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology developed a chemical process to create foamed polymers with vascular systems of their own, controlling the direction and alignment of the hollow channels to provide structural support and efficiently move fluids through the material.
Their work, “Anisotropic foams via frontal polymerization,” was published in Advanced Materials.
Latest visual experiment by LuluxXX utilizes video style transfer to slow-motion footage of splashy fluid dynamics (soundtracked with Boards Of Canada):
using slowmo and fluid footage with artistic style transfer.
original footage from french group Paradis original sound from Board of Canada I used software from Manuel Ruder and deepflow to generate optical flow.
Perfect standing wave on a computer-controlled wave pool
If you, like me, did not know what a standing wave looks like, please keep watching this until about halfway through when the whole pool is synced. It’s eerie and cool af
Surface tension of water as revealed by a paperclip.
The paperclip has been placed over a surface marked with parallel lines. The water in contact with the paperclip forms a meniscus, as the water molecules are attracted to the molecules of the metal clip. This makes the water around the paperclip slightly thicker, which refracts the light passing through it, distorting the appearance of the parallel lines.
The cohesive forces between molecules in a liquid are shared with all neighboring molecules. Those on the surface have no neighboring molecules above and, thus, exhibit stronger attractive forces upon their nearest neighbors on and below the surface.
Water molecules want to cling to each other. At the surface, however, there are fewer water molecules to cling to since there is only air above. This results in a stronger bond between those molecules that actually do come in contact with one another, and a layer of strongly bonded water.
This surface layer (held together by surface tension) creates a considerable barrier between the atmosphere and the water. In fact, other than mercury, water has the greatest surface tension of any liquid. -USGS-
Perfect standing wave on a computer-controlled wave pool
If you, like me, did not know what a standing wave looks like, please keep watching this until about halfway through when the whole pool is synced. It’s eerie and cool af
You’d be forgiven for thinking that the star-nosed mole looks funny. Its distinctive star-shaped nose is a highly-sensitive organ, but the mole doesn’t just use it for finding its way through the underground tunnels it lives in. These moles can actually sniff underwater. By exhaling a bubble and then re-inspiring it, the moles collect scent particles that they can use to locate food. In experiments, both star-nosed moles and water shrews could use this technique to successfully follow a scent trail, demonstrating exploring and pausing behaviors similar to terrestrial sniffing as they did. To learn more about this impressive mammal, listen to the latest episode of Science Friday, where research Ken Catania describes his work with them. (Image credits: K. Catania; via Science Friday)
Perfect standing wave on a computer-controlled wave pool
If you, like me, did not know what a standing wave looks like, please keep watching this until about halfway through when the whole pool is synced. It’s eerie and cool af
