Greetings, all!
Come down to my new blog site for my new book reviews! The Worlds of Brandon Hill
And for all my video reviews, remember to come to my YouTube page here: DecKrash's YouTube Page!
For my first book review, I present to you, A Confusion of Princes, by reknowned author, Garth Nix. Like interstellar action and intrigue? You're in for a treat.
Happy reading!
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I wrote a book. I started it six years ago and just self-published it. Not a big deal, it happens all the time, I know. I wrote it because at the time i started, I wasn't seeing much diversity in the realm of sci-fi/speculative/fantasy etc outside of Butler (whose work I find fantastic).
I decided to try and write something, ostensibly for my daughter so she would know there were books out there for people who look like her. The book is not a kids book - not at all - there's sex and violence and some doom and gloom. Over the past few years, I've found a lot more, but I'd already started the project and wanted to see it through, even though it was so far outside of my own perspective. I am a huge proponent of diversity, and like infusing it in every aspect of my life and work.
I'm glad that I came across this site, it gives me a lot more resources.
Here's a link to the book - I probably got a helluva lot wrong.
Jasmine Cowl and the Salagi Talking Stick
Fig. 1. One of the first annihilations of an antiproton observed at the Bevatron with a photographic emulsion. The antiproton enters from the left. The fat tracks are from slow protons or nuclear fragments, the faint tracks from fast pions.
Image credit: O Chamberlain et al. 1956 Nuo. Cim. 3 447.
Topics: High Energy Physics, History, Particle Physics, Theoretical Physics
You may be familiar with the term "antimatter," especially if you've followed any fiction on star ships that latched on to the phrase. The discovery of the antiproton is coming up to its 60th birthday, and the authors from CERN, Claude Amsler and Christine Sutton - where the Higgs Boson was discovered - do a good job recounting the history and characters that discovered what is now common in our lexicon.
Sixty years after the discovery of the antiproton at Berkeley, a look at some of the ways that studies with antiprotons at CERN have cast light on basic physics and, in particular, on fundamental symmetries.
On 21 September 1955, Owen Chamberlain, Emilio Segrè, Clyde Wiegand and Tom Ypsilantis found their first evidence of the antiproton, gathered through measurements of its momentum and its velocity. Working at what was known as the "Rad Lab" at Berkeley, they had set up their experiment at a new accelerator, the Bevatron – a proton synchrotron designed to reach an energy of 6.5 GeV, sufficient to produce an antiproton in a fixed-target experiment (CERN Courier November 2005 p27). Soon after, a related experiment led by Gerson Goldhaber and Edoardo Amaldi found the expected annihilation "stars", recorded in stacks of nuclear emulsions (figure 1). Forty years later, by combing antiprotons and positrons, an experiment at the Low Energy Antiproton Ring (LEAR) at CERN gathered evidence in September 1995 for the production of the first few atoms of antihydrogen.
Over the decades, antiprotons have become a standard tool for studies in particle physics; the word "antimatter" has entered into mainstream language; and antihydrogen is fast becoming a laboratory for investigations in fundamental physics. At CERN, the Antiproton Decelerator (AD) is now an important facility for studies in fundamental physics at low energies, which complement the investigations at the LHC’s high-energy frontier. This article looks back at some of the highlights in the studies of the antiworld at CERN, and takes a glimpse at what lies in store at the AD.
CERN Courier: In the steps of the antiproton
Claude Amsler, Albert Einstein Center for Fundamental Physics, University of Bern, and Christine Sutton, CERN.
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| Image Source: Argonne National Laboratory |
Topics: Alternative Energy, Green Energy, Green Tech, Photosynthesis, Solar Power
Refined by nature over a billion years, photosynthesis has given life to the planet, providing an environment suitable for the smallest, most primitive organism all the way to our own species.
While scientists have been studying and mimicking the natural phenomenon in the laboratory for years, understanding how to replicate the chemical process behind it has largely remained a mystery — until now.
Recent experiments at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory have afforded researchers a greater understanding of how to manipulate photosynthesis, putting humankind one step closer to harvesting “solar fuel,” a clean energy source that could one day help replace coal and natural gas.
Lisa M. Utschig, a bioinorganic chemist at Argonne for 20 years, said storing solar energy in chemical bonds such as those found in hydrogen can provide a robust and renewable energy source. Burning hydrogen as fuel creates no pollutants, making it much less harmful to the environment than common fossil fuel sources.
Argonne National Laboratory:
Making fuel from light: Argonne research sheds light on photosynthesis and creation of solar fuel, Jo Napolitano
Figure 1. To squeeze liquid deuterium into its metallic phase, researchers discharged the 2160 capacitors of Sandia National Laboratories’ Z machine and sent a precisely shaped 1-μs current pulse that delivered 2 MJ of energy to a target at the machine’s center. The power transmission cables, as big around as small cars, are submerged in oil or deionized water, which serves as an insulator. Electrical arcs that play over the device during discharge, shown here, make for a dazzling display. (Photo by Randy Montoya/Sandia National Laboratories.)
Citation: Phys. Today 68, 9, 12 (2015); http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/PT.3.2899
Topics: Condensed Matter Physics, Electrical Engineering, Materials Science, Solid State Physics
The world’s strongest pulsed-power source takes a shot at an 80-year-old condensed-matter-physics problem.
Hydrogen is the simplest and most abundant element in the universe. But that simplicity belies its often unpredictable nature. A case in point: Unlike the alkali metals that sit below it on the periodic table, hydrogen, even in its solid phase, remains a molecular insulator down to the lowest temperatures.
In 1935 Eugene Wigner and Hillard Huntington predicted that squeezing solid hydrogen to a sufficiently high pressure could cause it to shed its molecular bonds and transform into an atomic metal. The race to find the insulator-to-metal transition in hydrogen was on, but it’s turned out to be a marathon rather than a sprint.
High-pressure experiments are notoriously difficult, and ones on hydrogen even more so. Diamond-anvil cells, the go-to equipment for static-compression experiments, are hampered by hydrogen’s tendency to penetrate into the diamond and cause cracks. Dynamic experiments using shock compression reach higher pressures, but they heat the sample to high temperatures and only access specific values of pressure and temperature that depend on the system’s initial state. Still, experimentalists have subjected hydrogen to pressures of 320 GPa using static techniques and 500 GPa using dynamic methods but have not found the metallic phase.
Physics Today: Liquid deuterium pressured into becoming metallic, Sung Chang
Going to do a SPECIAL Special for my birthday!!! The first 3 people to sign up for this deal today by noon can get it for $300! That's 12 months of advertising for just $300!!! Inbox me for payment details. PLEASE SHARE WITH YOUR FRIENDS WITH BUSINESSES OR BOOKS!
Then after that it is back to this until midnight: This is a special VERY limited time deal! Let's see if business people respond! You will receive everything listed on the flyer plus guaranteed 7 ads during the weekly HBCU broadcast and you will get this package for an entire year!!! That's right 12 months of advertising for $400. Monday August 31st at 11:59pm...the end of my birthday!!!! Trust me you want to get in now because things changed today!!!
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| Graphene turns into a superconductor when decorated with lithium atoms. (Courtesy: Shutterstock/Inozemtsev Konstantin) |
Topics: Condensed Matter Physics, Graphene, Materials Science, Nanotechnology, Phonons, Semiconductor Technology, Superconductors, Solid State Physics, Quantum Mechanics
THIS changes the game! The application to longer life batteries is the first thought that comes to mind. Within semiconductors, we could supplement the physical limitations we're butting up to at the Moore's Law limit with a neat change in the material chemistry used to build the circuitry. A step before and enhancement of carbon nanotubes when they eventually replace them. Exciting times!
The "wonder material" graphene has another significant quality to add to its impressive list of electrical and mechanical properties: superconductivity. Physicists in Canada and Germany have shown that graphene turns into a superconductor when doped with lithium atoms – a result that could lead to a new generation of superconducting nanoscale devices.
Graphene exhibits a range of remarkable properties, thanks to its special structure – a one-atom-thick hexagonal lattice of carbon atoms. It is far stronger than steel while also flexible, and is an excellent conductor of both electricity and heat. In its pristine form, however, it is not a superconductor.
Neither is pure graphite, but in 2005 physicists showed that graphite could be made to superconduct when chemically treated, so as to create bulk materials consisting of graphene alternated with one-atom-thick layers of another element. The best performing material thus created, calcium graphite (CaC6), has a superconducting transition temperature of 11.5 K. Theorists identified the underlying mechanism for that superconductivity as electron–phonon coupling. Phonons are vibrations in a material's crystal lattice that bind electrons together into "Cooper pairs" that can travel through the lattice without resistance – one of the hallmarks of superconductivity. It was then realized that such electron–phonon coupling might occur not just in bulk graphite compounds but also by depositing atoms of a suitable element on to single layers of graphene.
Physics World: 'Decorated' graphene is a superconductor, Edwin Cartlidge
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| Architecture About.com: What is a Levee? |
Topics: #BlackLivesMatter, African Americans, Architectural Engineering, Civil Engineering, Civil Rights, Climate Change, Global Warming, History, Politics
© 21 September 2005, The Griot Poet
Inspired by the article from Dr. Cornel West: “Exiles from a city and from a nation,” 11 September 2005.
Note: I corrected the spelling of levee in the title and text (it was originally "levy" as a double entendre). On reflection of the carnival barking political times we're in and to avoid the appearance of xenophobia, a preposition and country name were both exchanged from their original versions. The piece still hits powerfully, and clarifies instead of stereotypes, origin of the demand for drugs in this country is this country in total, and no one group in particular.
Dedicated to my cousin from New Orleans, John (Gus) Holmes, Jr., his beautiful family, and the survivors of Hurricane Katrina (note: they're all fine, and relocated to another state).
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“When you live so close to death”
You create songs in the French Quarter on Slave Sundays that follow no pattern.
Rhythm set by clap and tambourine; washboard and kettle drum,
Old people hum in accompaniment to a Constantine Christian jubilee celebration of no cotton bailed; no backbreaking labor toiled.
The one suit you own is spoiled from overuse, and your children’s children carry on the tradition of “dress up” to anesthetize their pain.
“When you live so close to death”
The Mississippi delta builds a sediment foundation for your tragicomic pain:
“Laughing to keep from crying” births the blues!
“When you live so close to death”
People of your hue fought and escaped the French back in the day, and each day are turned away each year as they try to escape the death-hole now known as… Haiti.
“When you live so close to death, you live (life a little) more intensely,”
You create order out of chaos, from Massa raping your sisters and mothers to slaves tipping with another man’s lover: “hey baby, can we JAZZ around a little bit”?
Fighting fiercely in mock duels modeled after “southern gentlemen,” feeling disrespected, passing it down from Jazz procreation to your Hip Hop great-grandchildren’s generation as being “dissed”: with the same deadly consequences.
“When you live so close to death”
What are scraps from Massa’s table become culinary creations:
- Craw dads;
- Jambalaya;
- Gumbo;
- Shrimp Creole
- And Etoufée!
“When you live so close to death”
Lead and pollutants they allowed for your kind to warp your minds & drive the I.Q.s of your babies down scarred your psychology
BEFORE the levees broke;
BEFORE the drug flights to America!
“When you live so close to death”
You are not counted; clouded – an invisible majority under the all-mighty shadow of insignificance: exiles in your own country, resembling from years of neglect more “third world” than ninth ward or US citizenry
Hence, their news media in their quest for a ratings spree mislabeled you “refugees.”
Now, suddenly they are on our side, “shocked and awed” back to the reality of their sacred duty to inform the citizenry of a democracy… neglected for five years.
Shocked by the sight of dead bodies marred by dogs and crocodiles, piled in stairwells like logs… floating downstream! It seems perceptions change once you’re beyond a sheltered, suburban political haze, and find YOURSELF for many days
Breathing the stench,
Your own eyes seeing,
Your own ears hearing the gunshots and screams… in this country,
You cannot believe you could stay reasonably SANE…
Living so close to death!
One of the most difficult items to right is a paradox that does not go too far awry - Here is my offering to that beast.
The Paradox Hallway
I dreaded walking down that hallway it was wide enough for four abreast and well lit but it was just eerie, like something out of a bad "B" movie. I always thought that dramatic music would be playing in the overhead speakers. I had met myself in the hallway several times now from my future and from my near present and near past. In fact those events of meeting the me from now have been occurring more frequently.
Just the other day I told myself not to go to the casino boat with Steve, then on the way back down the hallway I met myself again and I told me to bet on the Tigers and The San Fran Giants to go to the World Series next year and to take the Giants in 5 games or less or take the long shot Giants in 4 and in game 1 bet that they will cover the spread. Its June and both the Tigers and Giants are hot but I didnt I tell myself who would win the world series this year. Did I just meet myself before October? If that were true how come I know about October 2012? Maybe another me told me... I mean him... The future me - Whatever, In order to get it straight I just need to loiter for a little bit and wait for another me to show up, hopefully together I can clear up this World Series thing.
I lingered in the hallway just waiting for something to happen; I could hear footsteps approaching the corner where the paradox always began. I could tell from the footfalls that something was different and I wasnt wearing dress shoes I must have been wearing sneakers. I straightened up to meet myself, this was the first time that I had loitered to meet me on purpose, all of the other times it had occurred as a coincidence. I found myself quoting Yuko Ichihara: " There are no coincidences in this world only the inevitable... If you are going to do something or not do something, that is a promise to yourself. And the one who keeps the promise, or breaks the promise, is you. No one else can be burdened with holding you to a promise that’s made to yourself." --- Good stuff to remember.
I turned the corner to meet me. I met the me that was about 9 years old, I dont remember this happening to me, this is going to give me a raging headache later. "Mister, where is this place, where am I?" I was stunned I was almost unable to answer myself, in every instance where I had met my youngest selves I had not recalled the meeting until after it had occurred, my memory centers would grow exponentially causing severe headaches as the new old memories bombarded the temporal lobes. The short term stuff was easy to handle as the hippocampus unfolded much easier in these meetings and it was more instant recall than long term. This time I could feel that it was different my cerebral cortex started recalling the old memories immediately. I remember this meeting the man made me feel creepy and a little scared. In my young mind I called him Stranger Crow and I imagined that he would come to my home at night and just sit in my room throwing stones at me. Funny I guess this stranger in the short black jacket has been with me all of my life. A smirk slid across my lips and I remembered thinking originally that he was an incarnation of Ga-Gorib and I was an incarnation of Heitsi-eibib. I remember thinking something else about this Ga-Gorib.
I took steps to alleviate the fear of a child in myself by trying to be nice. "Whatcha doin here kid?"
"Mister, I am lost and I dont know how I got here, is this where you go when you go to wait to get to heaven?"
"Why would you think this is heaven kid? Why do you think you're dead kid? Cause I am sure as heck not an angel?
"Mister the last thing I remember I was standing at 2nd base waiting for Yusef to hit me in with an RBI. I saw the pitch and the last thing I saw was Yusef swing so I started for 3rd then I felt something hot on the back of my neck, next thing I know I am getting off of the elevator."
I wanted to tell the younger version of me that I remembered that day; Yusef was in tears when I came to cause he thought that the police were going to put him in jail like they had his cousin Kalif cause of an accident. I knew that I could not give my younger self these details but I could make a few things easier for the kid me to deal with what was happening. "Kid, I tell you what while we are here together I will answer a question or two for you, ask me anything." Although I remember this meeting in general a lot of the particulars were lost on the adult me today.
Being the eternal master of the non sequitur I asked myself the 64 thousand dollar question: "Why do some girls hit you and run but when you catch them they cry?"
Kid I am older than you and I still dont have a solid answer to that question but that Gail is going to eventually let you catch her and not cry.
I looked up at myself with amazement and wonder; I had a very suspicious look on my little face sort of like how did I know he had a crush on Gail with the pretty light brown eyes. I said nothing back to me about the Gail comment.
"Okay Kid that was one question what else you got?"
I hesitated for a moment then the kid logic went into overdrive: "Mister, if I am not dead then is this a dream?"
"Sort of kid sort of, good news it can end when you want it to end."
"How Mister?"
"All you have to do kid is get back on the elevator."
"Thanks, Mister but not yet I got two more questions."
I was always an honest sort and I can see it started early because the kid version of me could have easily said I had only asked two real questions and been close to right. I had to force myself to remember that I was talking to a younger version of myself, but I also had to admit that I liked this kid, even if it was me or not.
"Mister do you know what will happen to me when I grow up?"
I looked down at me and realized that I was quite the forward thinker at a tender age too. I almost did not want to answer myself to enthusiastically, it was hard to resist. "Yes, I know what happens to you in the future; at least part of your future."
"Mister how long will I live? Will I be rich?"
"Kid that is a compound question and that puts you one over but I will answer it for you this once. You will live for quite awhile and you will live a rich life filled with friends and love. You will have a special relationship and understanding of yourself like no one else you know will ever have. You will become special and that could lead to you becoming financially rich." We arrived at the elevator, I let my kid self press the button to summon the elevator. The kid version of me entered the metal box as the door was closing he leaned to the side and asked...
"Are you a super hero?"
I remember asking the Stranger that question and he did not answer he just smiled as the door shut and I woke up on the baseball field with Yusef looking down at me with tears in his eyes and the coaches crowded around me. Coach Tarver had his cell phone out whoever he was talking to on the phone he was telling them that I was coming around but he still needed an ambulance. I went back to sleep on the baseball field.
I woke up in a hospital room with the TV going and my mom was there, it felt like I had been here before. Just then the door opened and the Stranger walked in dressed like a doctor, he spoke with my mom and then walked over to me and told me that I would be alright. "Kid you're one lucky kid, a knock on the head like that could have been worse but you will be okay in a few days." He headed for the room door as he stood there with it open he looked back over his shoulder and said to me "You know that the same thing happened to me when I was your age exactly." The Stranger walked out of the room and now today I understand I finally met me the first time I walked into the hallway after being hit running from second to third by a baseball in the back of the head by my friend Yusef.
Loitering in the hallway had done me I mean us some good, now I know how it started perhaps one of me will find out why it keeps happening to us in the future.
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| This diagram details how the VASIMR plasma rocket works. Credit: Ad Astra Rocket Company © all rights reserved |
Topics: Diversity, Diversity in Science, Hispanic Americans, Latino Americans, Mars, NASA, Space Exploration, Spaceflight
Note to a certain presidential candidate: Isn't it ironic our journey to Mars will have been engineered by a Hispanic/Latino immigrant (see #P4TC link below)?
A potential advancement in the United States' electric propulsion capability for the future of spaceflight is being underscored by a new NASA contract to support work on the VASIMR project – short for the Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket.
VASIMR works with plasma, an electrically charged gas that can be heated to extreme temperatures by radio waves and controlled and guided by strong magnetic fields.
Ad Astra Rocket Company announced today that it has completed contract negotiations with NASA on the group's Next Space Technology Exploration Partnerships (NextSTEP) award and are now entering the execution phase of the project. [How to Launch Superfast Trips to Mars]
Space.com: Plasma Rocket Technology Receives NASA Funding Boost, Leonard David
#P4TC: Dr. Franklin Ramón Chang Díaz...
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| This NASA image shows the moon coalescing from debris created when a Mars-size object slammed into the early Earth. Carbon found in lunar samples suggests that the moon's surface composition was very similar to Earth's. Credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight |
Topics: Moon, Planetary Science, NASA
The ancient lunar surface once erupted with geysers of lava — and now, scientists think they know what caused those fiery fountains.
Current research suggests that the moon formed when a Mars-size object barreled into Earth in the early solar system, and for a long time, its surface was much different from the staid, unmoving landscape present today. Rather, the moon's surface was hot and active, and magma often bubbled up from below and broke the surface in fiery fountains — like a molten-hot version of Old Faithful. Until recently, researchers were unsure of the driving force behind those explosions, which could reveal more about conditions on the early moon.
But now, scientists may have found a possible culprit for the molten explosions: carbon monoxide. [Watch: How the Moon Was Made]
"The carbon is the one that is producing the large spectacle," said Alberto Saal, a geologist at Brown University in Providence and co-author of the new study. "With a little bit of water, with a little bit of sulfur — but the main driver is carbon."
This finding suggests the early moon's makeup was very close to early Earth's, Saal told Space.com. "All these volatile elements … are in concentrations that are very similar to the lava that formed the ocean floor of the Earth," he said.
Space.com: Fire Fountains of the Ancient Moon Explained, Sarah Levin
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| Image Source: Alibaba group's offices in Hangzhou, China. (Courtesy: Alibaba group) |
Topics: Computer Science, Research, STEM, Quantum Computer
The global effort to develop practical quantum computers got a boost this month with the inauguration of a dedicated laboratory in Shanghai, China. The new lab – a joint venture between the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and the Chinese online retail giant Alibaba – aims to develop a general-purpose prototype quantum computer by 2030.
The new CAS–Alibaba Quantum Computing Laboratory's interim goals include the coherent manipulation of 30 quantum bits (qubits) by 2020, and quantum simulation with calculation speeds equivalent to those achieved by today's fastest supercomputers by 2025. This ambitious series of five-year plans will be supported by an annual injection of $5m from Alibaba's cloud-computing subsidiary, Aliyun, over the next 15 years.
Physics World: Joint quantum-computing venture is a first for China
Xin Ling is a science writer based in Beijing
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| Image Source (and sound): Dark Matter Sound System - Band Camp |
Topics: Black Holes, Dark Matter, General Relativity, Heliophysics, Humor, Quantum Cosmology
First of all, from the astrophysics classes I've taken, accretion is attributed to stars diffusing material around it, usually to create things like planets. This is a novel way to look at the pursuit of dark matter and I found the paper intriguing.
What teachers will hate me for: since everyone knows what a black hole looks like, and it really didn't coincide with the paper (abstract below), I did find a techno metal group that has a whole unique take on combining the two subjects (link below above image). As always, I get no gratuities for sharing this, but hopefully like me, it makes you grin for many of you, the first day of school (at least in Texas). Think of it as your "hook," but don't dwell on it very long...the students will catch on you're enjoying it too much.
Abstract
Searches for dark matter imprints are one of the most active areas of current research. We focus here on light fields with mass mB, such as axions and axion-like candidates. Using perturbative techniques and full-blown nonlinear Numerical Relativity methods, we show that (i) dark matter can pile up in the center of stars, leading to configurations and geometries oscillating with frequency which is a multiple of f=2.51014 mBc2/eV Hz. These configurations are stable throughout most of the parameter space, and arise out of credible mechanisms for dark-matter capture. Stars with bosonic cores may also develop in other theories with effective mass couplings, such as (massless) scalar-tensor theories. We also show that (ii) collapse of the host star to a black hole is avoided by efficient gravitational cooling mechanisms.
Physics arXiv: Accretion of dark matter by stars
Richard Brito, Vitor Cardoso, Hirotada Okawa
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| Add caption |
Topics: Condensed Matter Physics, Green Energy, Green Tech, Materials Science, Metamaterials, Nanotechnology
Otherwise known as Two-Dimensional, Ordered, Double Transition Metals Carbides (MXenes), the title of the actual paper, and quoting the article (link below): "A technique for fusing different elements in layers to make a uniform and stable composite with predictable properties could open up routes to faster, smaller and more efficient energy storage devices, supercapacitors and wear-resistant and tough armored materials, according to a team at Drexel University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. Babak Anasori and his colleagues at Drexel and Linköping University, Sweden, have demonstrated how to sandwich together two-dimensional sheets of molybdenum, titanium and carbon that would otherwise not stick together."
Abstract
The higher the chemical diversity and structural complexity of two-dimensional (2D) materials, the higher the likelihood they possess unique and useful properties. Herein, density functional theory (DFT) is used to predict the existence of two new families of 2D ordered, carbides (MXenes), M′2M″C2 and M′2M″2C3, where M′ and M″ are two different early transition metals. In these solids, M′ layers sandwich M″ carbide layers. By synthesizing Mo2TiC2Tx, Mo2Ti2C3MTx, and Cr2TiC2Tx (where T is a surface termination), we validated the DFT predictions. Since the Mo and Cr atoms are on the outside, they control the 2D flakes’ chemical and electrochemical properties. The latter was proven by showing quite different electrochemical behavior of Mo2TiC2Tx and Ti3C2Tx. This work further expands the family of 2D materials, offering additional choices of structures, chemistries, and ultimately useful properties.
Materials Today: Metal sandwich solution, David Bradley
Thanks to Jarvis I'm going to offer the members of BSFS a $50 advertising deal! You can get 75 audio ads and 25 video ads on my network for $50!!! Gotta do it by Noon tomorrow Sunday August 23rd!!!
If you aren't ready to advertise now...no worries! You can buy the package and pick which month you want to use it in over the next 12 months!!!
Make payments via PayPal to: Info@myjbn.com put BSFS Deal in the subject!
I wanted to THANK everyone for the support with the BLEED 2039 Kickstarter campaign that exceeded the goal objective by 115%!!!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/291655160/bleed-2039
THIS IS JUST THE BEGINNING FOR ALL THE STRONG TITLES COMING FROM AHR VISIONS!!!
Thank you again...and you haven't seen anything yet!!!
~ AHR
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| Skip Sterling for Quanta Magazine |
Topics: Biology, Diversity, Diversity in Science, DNA, Women in Science
Note: I'm in a process integration class for work, August 20 and 21st. I will also take some time offline to celebrate my youngest son's 23rd birthday. Taking a "human" break celebrating my own version of new genes; resuming Monday.
Emerging data suggests the seemingly impossible — that mysterious new genes arise from “junk” DNA.
Genes, like people, have families — lineages that stretch back through time, all the way to a founding member. That ancestor multiplied and spread, morphing a bit with each new iteration.
For most of the last 40 years, scientists thought that this was the primary way new genes were born — they simply arose from copies of existing genes. The old version went on doing its job, and the new copy became free to evolve novel functions.
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| Olena Shmahalo/Quanta Magazine; source: Tautz and Domazet-Lošo, _Nature Reviews Genetics_, 2011. New genes appear to burst into existence at various points along the evolutionary history of the mouse lineage (red line). The surge around 800 million years ago corresponds to the time when earth emerged from its “snowball” phase, when the planet was almost completely frozen. The very recent peak represents newly born genes, many of which will subsequently be lost. If all genes arose via duplication, they all would have been generated soon after the origins of life, roughly 3.8 billion years ago (green line). |
Certain genes, however, seem to defy that origin story. They have no known relatives, and they bear no resemblance to any other gene. They’re the molecular equivalent of a mysterious beast discovered in the depths of a remote rainforest, a biological enigma seemingly unrelated to anything else on earth.
Quanta Magazine: A Surprise Source of Life’s Code, Emily Singer
As a way to raise some funds so that I can stay in Canada, now that my work permit has expired, I am turning my planned animated series into a novel and releasing it chapter by chapter at Patreon.com/chasevapor where people can essentially sponsor me to write it.
When I was 5 I remember myself listening to the news, and the fight of the oppressed Kenyans for freedom impressed me. I was 5-6 years old, a nerdy boy.
Today I received this email highlighting this historic moments.
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| Physicists installing the Borexino detector. Some of the detector's many photomultiplier tubes are visible in the cupola above the workers. These detect the flashes of light created when antineutrinos collide with the detector. (Courtesy: INFN) |
Topics: High Energy Physics, Neutrinos, Particle Physics, STEM, Theoretical Physics
The first confirmed sightings of antineutrinos produced by radioactive decay in the Earth's mantle have been made by researchers at the Borexino detector in Italy. While such "geoneutrinos" have been detected before, it is the first time that physicists can say with confidence that about half of the antineutrinos they measured came from the Earth's mantle, with the rest coming from the crust. The Borexino team has also been able to make a new calculation of how much heat is produced in the Earth by radioactive decay, finding it to be greater than previously thought. The researchers say that in the future, the experiment should be able to measure the quantities of radioactive elements in the mantle as well.
According to the bulk silicate Earth (BSE) model, most of the radioactive uranium, thorium and potassium in our planet's interior lies in the crust and mantle. Accounting for about 84% of our planet's total volume, the mantle is the large rocky layer sandwiched between the crust and the Earth's core. Heat flows from the interior of the Earth into space at a rate of about 47 TW, but one of the big mysteries of geophysics is how much of this heat is left over from when the Earth formed, and how much comes from the radioactive decay chains of uranium-238, thorium-232 and potassium-40.
Physics World:
Physicists isolate neutrinos from Earth's mantle for first time, Hamish Johnston
