Check out our new Motivator component!
This looks like something that can be done at home:
Robert F. Furchgott achieved much in his career as a biochemist, climaxing in the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1998. In 1978 Furchgott discoved a substance in endothelial cells that relaxes bood vessels. After nearly a decade of investigation, he nailed down the properties of this substance - a simple compound known as nitric oxide (NO). NO enlarges blood vessels in the body and helps increase blood flow, which turned out to be a big bang of a discovery.
Why the Nobel? His work led to the development of one of the most popular recreational drugs since household adhesives - the little blue pill. Furchgott passed away last week at age 92. No word on how they got the lid closed on his coffin...
See also:
IAF655329a: Pilot Dickpill ring, one each
OK - couldn't resist. if you've seen MST3k (Mystery Science Theater 3000) you already know what's coming. If not, the bottomline is three 'guys' watch some of the world's worst movies and make sarcastic comments. Here's an eight minute clip with the 'best' moments from a terrible movie; "The Starfighters."
PS - If you can't handle the entire video, fast forward to 7:46 to hear a summation of what it's like to be an Air Force fighter pilot...
Well, not exactly. According to Michio Kaku, physicist, string theoeretician and author of several dumbed-down-so-you-can-understand it science books (Physics of the Impossible is his latest, and a great read, btw!), we are decades away from creating handheld particle beams that will anihilate anyone who gets in your way. But don't let that deter you - there's a lot of smart and clever backyard scientists who share the dream and have come up with some pretty cool stuff like handheld burning lasers and focusible solar deathrays. Here's a couple of fairly easy DIY projects that are a step in the right direction and should keep you entertained on a dull weekend.
With the advent of cheap DVD burners came a flood of parts for them - including the laser diodes inside. These diodes can be harvested from an old DVD burner or found on the web, and when properly driven (by an easy to build circuit) and focused can light matches, melt plastic and pop ballooons. Many build these lasers into hosts like regular LED flashlights, but a simple project box - though not as elegant - will suffice for most. Head over to http://www.laserpointerforums.com/ , where there are a number of resident experts to get you started. I'll wave the safety flag before you begin and let you know that powerful little red lasers like these can and will burn your cornea, so make sure you get some laser goggles before you start messing with them.
Another gee-whiz device that can be used for nefarious means is the Fresnel lens. The lens uses concentric circles to focus sunlight into a beam powerful enough to melt concrete and copper, boil water in a matter of seconds and well, build one and see! Fresnels allow you to take toasting ants with a magnifying lens to the graduate level and beyond. They are used in lighthouses and also in rear-projector TV's - a tv repair shop is a potentially good, free source. I bought mine on Ebay, but no matter where you get it they are one kick ass guy toy. Here's a great tutorial to get you started:
http://www.instructables.com/id/Giant-Fresnel-Lens-Deathray-An-Experiment-in-Opti/
We do, at least if they can ever get the LHC up and running again (it blew a major fuse last month and has been shutdown indefinitely). In the meantime, the good ole US has something pretty cool going on over at Lawrence Livermore Laboratory in California. Known as the National Ignition Facility, this multi-billion dollar 'science experiment' has 192 of the world's most powerful lasers in an array that will put a mother of a blowtorch to hydrogen isotopes like deuterium and tritium in hopes of creating a fusion reaction in a controlled environment. Currently, the only fusion reaction we have created involves using a fission bomb (think Hiroshima) to superheat the isotopes, resulting in a Hydrogen bomb (think Armageddon). This is pretty cool stuff that has tremendous real-world application potential that may prove to be far beyond the theoretical value of the LHC.
Not sure what to think about this ... Not my idea of a fun way to spend the afternoon at the County Fair.
Here's a clip from Nova's "The Race for Absolute Zero" on Bose--Einstein condensates, a state of matter where atoms begin to "clump" and exhibit quantum properties as a super-blob. That's about the extent of my quantum expertise, so watch on:
This past week scientists flipped the switch on the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), ushering in a new era in particle research. It's billed as the most expensive science experiments ever (a dubious claim
