If You Dropped A Water Balloon On A Bed Of Nails, You’d Expect It To Burst Spectacularly. And You’d

Who is more humble? The scientist who looks at the universe with an open mind and accepts whatever the universe has to teach us, or somebody who says everything in this book must be considered the literal truth and never mind the fallibility of all the human beings involved?

Carl Sagan

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Stephanie Kwolek was born #OTD in 1923. She’s most famous for inventing the bulletproof polymer Kevlar: wp.me/p4aPLT-3dv

R.I.P. Dr. Vera Rubin

As I write this, reports are spreading rapidly through the astronomy community of the death of Dr. Vera Rubin on December 25, 2016. If you don’t know who she was, or what she worked on, come sit by me and let me tell you a story about this lady.

It was at one of the first meetings of the American Astronomical Society I attended. I was a graduate student and giving a talk about outreach and amateur astronomy. I was scared to death because, hey, it was me, a lowly student giving a talk to all these exalted astronomers. A woman sat in the front row and smiled at me as I shuffled the papers on the podium. The room filled and then the session chair gave me the signal that my 10 minutes had started. I plunged into my talk.

At the end, a few people asked questions, everyone clapped politely, and the next person stepped up to the podium. I fled the room to catch my breath. The woman followed me out and asked if I’d like to get a cup of coffee. At the same moment my advisor came out and said, “Oh, I see you’ve met Vera Rubin”, and he proceeded to introduce me to her before being collared by someone else for a chat. Dr. Rubin and I went to get coffee, and for the next 30 minutes or so she asked me all about my work and what I hoped to do when I graduated. It was a wonderful experience.

Over the years we met here and there, and I learned more about her work with galaxy rotation studies and the existence of dark matter. I found it fascinating, as so many people do, and followed her research with interest. When I was asked to write a book about astronomy, one of the directions I got from the editors was to include some bios of “seminal” astronomers. Dr. Rubin was one of those I chose. In retrospect, I wish could have done a book on her work instead of simply a chapter.

I know that Vera Rubin didn’t work in a vacuum on dark matter — that, like Newton and every other astronomer has done — she stood on the shoulders of giants. Her work forged a new path in understanding dark matter and its affect on the universe. Now, she is a giant in her own right. Now, others will stand on her shoulders. Her insights and drive to understand the difficult “galaxy rotation problem” led directly to the theory of dark matter, and more recently to the confirming observations of its existence. It was a monumental achievement.

For her work, Dr. Rubin should have received a Nobel Prize. That didn’t happen and the Nobel physics committee should be thinking hard about why she was overlooked. She has been honored with many other prizes and awards for her insights, and she will be long remembered for her seminal contributions to astronomy.

RIP Dr. Vera Rubin, and deepest condolences to her extended family.

C.C. PETERSEN is a science writer and media producer specializing in astronomy and space science content. 

Source: The Spacewriter

Steve Gentleman, a neuropathologist, demonstrates the process of brain dissection and preservation for research. 

Why scientists are rooting for mushrooms

Mushrooms are the organisms that keep on giving. They grow and feed the soil by breaking down organic matter. For centuries, they’ve also been a staple in our diet. 

Recently, people have started taking a closer look at mushrooms, and more specifically, mycelium — the hidden root of mushrooms — as an engineering material to produce goods like surfboards, packaging materials, furniture and even architecture.

As far as natural materials go, there’s never been anything as versatile and cost-effective as fungi, says Sonia Travaglini, a doctoral candidate in mechanical engineering at UC Berkeley, who is collaborating with artist and mycologist Philip Ross to unlock the seemingly infinite potential of fungi.

Mycelium can grow into any shape or size (the largest in the world blankets an entire forest in Oregon). They can be engineered to be as hard and strong as wood or brick, as soft and squishy as foam, or even smooth and flexible, like fabric. 

Unlike other natural materials, mushrooms can rely on their recycling properties to break down organic matter so you can grow a lot of it very quickly and cheaply just by feeding it biodegradable waste. In as little as two weeks, you can cultivate a hunk of mushroom that’s brick-sized.

That mycelium actually takes in waste and carbon dioxide as it grows (one species of fungi even eats plastic trash) instead of expelling byproducts makes it far superior to other forms of production.

Plus, when you’re done with mushroom, you can compost it or break up the material to grow more mycelium from it.

“And, unlike forming synthetic materials, which have to be made while very hot or under pressure, all of which takes a lot of energy to create those conditions, mycology materials grow from mushrooms which grow in our normal habitat, so it’s much less energy-intensive,” said Travaglini.

In the lab, Travaglini and other researchers crush, compress, stretch, pull and bend mycelium to test the amount of force the material can tolerate.   

They found that mycelium is incredibly strong and can withstand a lot of compression and tension.

Most materials are only strong from one direction. But mycology materials are tough from all directions and can absorb a lot force without breaking. So it can withstand as much weight as a brick, but won’t shatter when you drop it or when it experiences a hard impact, said Travaglini. 

As one of the newer organisms receiving an application in biomimetics, a field of science that looks to imitate nature’s instinctive designs to find sustainable solutions and innovation, we might be getting merely a glimpse of what fungi is capable of.

“Mycology is still a whole new field of research, we’re still finding more questions and still really don’t know where it’s going to go, which makes it really exciting,” said Travaglini.

Image sources: Vice UK/Mazda & Pearson Prentice Hall

The multiverse might not be madness after all.

Alternate realities, parallel dimensions, and multiple universes. Whatever you call it, the notion of other versions of existence is one of the most popular tropes in science fiction. In some other universe, you’re not reading this sentence but skydiving. In another, you’re nothing but a cockroach. In yet another, not only is life impossible, but atoms don’t even exist.

In recent years, though, such seemingly crazy ideas have shifted from fantasy and speculation toward bona fide science. Even among physicists, the multiverse has gone mainstream.

Theoretically, infinite universes might stretch beyond our own, like endless bubbles in a sea of boiling water. Each bubble has its own laws of physics, and although we may never visit or even see another bubble, some physicists say growing evidence is making the multiverse increasingly plausible—and even probable. Learn more here.

This new drug is as strong as morphine, but without the side effects

Incredible pain relief – without the addiction.

Scientists have developed a new drug that could be a safer alternative to morphine for medical use. The researchers found that engineered variants of endomorphin, a naturally occurring chemical in the body, are as strong as morphine when it comes to killing pain.

On top of that, the medication doesn’t produce any of the unwanted side effects that come with opium-based drugs – such as being extremely addictive. At this point, the findings only relate to tests in rats, but it’s a promising start to what could be a powerful and less problematic painkiller.

Opioid pain medications are commonly used to treat severe and chronic pain, but in addition to their habit-forming qualities, patients also build up a tolerance to them over time. Hand in hand with their addictiveness, this can makes higher doses – and overdoses in drug abuse situations – dangerous. Overdoses can cause motor impairment and potentially fatal respiratory depression, resulting in thousands of deaths in the US every year.

Scientists are pretty sure that deep inside the moon, there’s water

While Earth’s surface cracks and spouts fire, the moon’s surface, for as long as we’ve known it, has been quiet. 

The youngest sign of volcanic activity scientists have found on the moon’s surface is 18 million years old.

But the traces of that long-ago volcanic activity could help scientists crack an enduring mystery: How much water is on the moon?

A study published Monday in Nature Geoscience suggests it may be more than we thought. Read more (7/24/17)

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The 2016 Nobel Prize in Chemistry is awarded to Jean-Pierre Sauvage, Sir Fraser Stoddart, and Bernard Feringa for the design and production of molecular machines with controllable movements: bit.ly/NobelSci2016