Journey Through a Wormhole: The “Weird” Reissner-Nordström Black Hole

Science

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October 26, 2020

Journey Through a Wormhole: The “Weird” Reissner-Nordström Black Hole

Ever wondered how it feels falling into a black hole? To get sucked into nothingness and keep falling until you meet the most dreaded creature lurking out there unchallenged- the singularity, which seals your fate to the end by devouring you, it would be a heck of a roller coaster ride, falling into one of the extremes of the universe. Thanks to the digital world, with thousands of lines of code, we now have a way to simulate the great fall, be it a black hole or a wormhole. But before diving into a black hole lets dive into the world of black holes and understand how exactly this wormhole works.

[Editor’s note: The video showing the journey through the wormhole is available below]

All the black holes that exist can be characterized by only mass, electric charge and angular momentum. Most of the black holes in the universe are really boring ones, where you fall in only to end up in singularity and die. But one of the solutions, the Reissner- Nordström black hole is a very bizarre solution and is sure to blow your mind. So let us dive in deeper into the Reissner- Nordström black holes.

Black hole – a waterfall in space-time…

A black hole can be unconventionally thought of like a waterfall in space-time. Space is flowing into the black hole like water flows down a waterfall. Consider light or photon as fish in the water. Outside the event horizon, water is flowing slower than the speed of the fish, so the fish can swim in any direction it wants. At the event horizon, the water itself is flowing at the velocity of the fish. So no matter how hard the fish tries to swim upstream, it will remain right there not going anywhere. Inside the event horizon, the water itself is falling down at speeds more than that of light. No matter how fast the fish tries to swim, it can never go against the stream and will always end up at the bottom of the waterfall.
[Relativity prevents matter from moving at speeds more than that of light, but space itself can do so without any restrictions]
A regular black hole would be a simple waterfall, a one-way road to the bottom and no way out. A Reissner- Nordström black hole is a weirdo. It has an electric charge which causes a negative pressure or a tension that is repulsive in nature. It is as if someone placed a powerful blower close to the bottom of the waterfall, a blower which blows the water back upwards.

fish climbing up a waterfall — No matter how hard the fish tries, it can never go swim upstream if the velocity of water is more than the maximum velocity with which the fish can swim.
[Art: Elton D’Souza]

The Reissner- Nordström black hole…

The Reissner- Nordström black hole has a repulsive singularity. It also has two horizons rather than one. The outer and the inner horizon.
The outer horizon is the point where space is falling inwards at the speed of light. The space from here onwards falls faster than the speed of light and goes on accelerating. But the closer one gets to the singularity, the outwards pressure increases, thus, space again slows down.

By the time it reaches the inner horizon it is falling with exactly the speed of light. Beyond the inner horizon, there is a point called the turnaround point where the repulsive tension slows down the space to make its velocity zero.

Moreover, it causes space to accelerate outwards. From the above correlation of black hole and waterfall, the water that is being blown upwards by the gigantic blower below can not take the same path as the water that is falling down. If it takes the same course, then it creates a region where water is flowing both upwards and downwards at the same time, which is physically impossible. Thus, it has to change its path and move through a different route. Similarly, space can’t be falling in and moving out at the same time, and hence it enters a separate region of space-time called the wormhole.

Here it starts accelerating and is moving out with the speed of light when it reaches the inner horizon. Between the inner horizon and the outer horizon, space moves outwards with speed more than that of light. After crossing the outer horizon, space emerges out from a white hole. This white hole might exist in a different part of this universe or in an entirely different universe too.

Doesn’t this all sound bizarre? The entire thought of space itself slowing down and turning around to get blown out of a white hole into a new universe is totally absurd. But sadly this type of black holes do not exist in this universe, an entirely different physical concept prevents the existence of such black holes. But in a purely mathematical point of view, such a black hole could indeed exist, as it is a valid solution to Einstein’s equations. Nevertheless, this does not stop us from imagining how the journey through such a wormhole would be. And as it turns out the Reissner- Nordström black hole has much more inexplicable facts up its sleeves and is sure to leave a visitor mesmerized and entranced.

Falling into a Reissner- Nordström black hole.

So now that we know about these peculiar black holes, its time to dive into one. Put on your seatbelts and prepare yourself for this enthralling voyage.

[The grids which were there, in the beginning, is turned off in the middle since it grows much more confusing as you fall inside.]

The map:

Colour	Zone
Green	The region where stable circular orbits can exist.
Yellow	The region where unstable circular orbits only can exist.
Orange	The region where no circular orbits can exist.
Red-lines	The two horizons.
Red	The region between the two horizons.
Blue line	The turnaround point.

Through the outer horizon:

As you pass through this outer horizon it splits into two. But without the grids, it would never be possible for one to know if he has fallen through the horizon or not.

Through the inner horizon:

At the inner horizon, you are greeted by an infinitely bright, infinitely energetic burst of light. This is the image of the outside universe reflected by the repulsive singularity. This burst of light contains, infinitely speeded up, the entire history of the universe.

Through the wormhole:

Inside the inner horizon space slows down, stops and then accelerates back out again. This region is the wormhole and connects the two different regions of the same space-time or different spacetimes.

Back out through the inner horizon:

As you pass through the inner horizon once again, but outwards this time, you see a second infinitely bright, infinitely energetic burst of light. The first time you saw the entire history of the future. But this time you will see the entire future of the universe fly by.

Through the white hole:

The white hole is the region where light is falling outwards faster than the speed of light. You will not end up getting out of the same black hole you fell in because that would require space to be simultaneously falling inwards and outwards which is not possible. So you get out into a very different region of space-time.

Through the outer horizon:

Passing through the outer horizon, you are treated for the third time with an infinitely bright and infinitely energetic beam of light. Unlike the previous two instances, this time what you see is the entire past of the new universe.
Looking back at the white hole, what you see is the entire of your own universe. This is because light falling into the black hole has travelled the same path as you and emerged out of the same white hole.

The Penrose diagram for the Reissner- Nordström black hole clearly shows the path a particle takes when falling through the wormhole. It also shows the cause for the bright light you see when you pass through various horizons.

penrose diagram — The animated version of the Penrose diagram shows the path a body takes through the wormhole.
[GIF: Andrew Hamilton]

At the inner horizon, there takes place a phenomenon called mass inflation instability. This is exactly what vaporizes you and prevents you from entering a wormhole. So all imaginations aside, nature prevents the existence of such black holes. You fall into one of these black holes, you are vaporized at the inner horizon itself and no wormhole opens up to take you to a different universe.

This is an example of the beauty of mathematics and physics, an example of how elegant a theory can be. The physics and maths behind this are difficult and counterintuitive. Based on these calculations, these visuals of how it would be to fall into the different black holes were created by Andrew Hamilton at JILA. All these visualisations are eerie, counterintuitive and beautiful, giving you the bewitching view you would see if you were adventurous enough to fly over a black hole once, and fall in through the event horizon

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science.
ALBERT EINSTEIN

You can watch all of Andrew Hamilton’s simulations here. He also hosts a website where you can read and watch more crazy stuff.

Is this the Time to Phase Out The IC Engines?

Umakant Bohara

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October 24, 2020

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Is this the Time to Phase Out The IC Engines?

The first modern engines were created in 1876. Since then internal combustion engines have been an integral part of transportation systems and automobiles. Awareness regarding the environment has increased in recent times, making the scientific community to re-evaluate the use of such technology. Alternatives to Internal combustion (IC) engine are commercially available, such as Electric Vehicles (EVs), among other possible options. IC engines are being portrayed as a primary knave behind environmental issues like climate change and global warming.

Moreover, G7 countries like France, the UK and Germany have strategized to phase out IC engines completely in the coming two decades. A constant pressure to improve the air quality and increasing GHG emissions, would the Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) still prevail as the power-horse of our future transportation needs?

Electric Mobility and IC Engines

According to an estimation, presently, there are more than 2 billion IC engines under operation around the world. Evidently, these engines are not just deployed in cars, but they are also used to run trucks, ships, trains and more. The amount of research in the ICE, over the years, has been phenomenal.

At the same time emissions due to these have significantly decreased. Catalytic converters have proven to be effective in controlling emissions in gasoline engines, but this is not the case with diesel engines. Concededly, fossil fuels are limited and the fact that these fuels contribute to emissions, it imperious that an alternate solution must be found. Electric vehicles seem to be the most popular alternative among others, in the markets around the world.

The future mobility is characterized by a combination of alternatives, involving Battery-Electric and Hybrid Electric Vehicles (BEV and HEV), Fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) and traditional vehicles. This all depends on consumer recognition, the country under consideration and type of application. Ostensibly, the combustion engines will still play a central role in power generation or vehicles, even in the entire electrified power train systems. All this has stimulated the improvements in the thermal efficiency of IC engines without a significant increase in the purchase and operating cost within this short to medium term.

A plug in Hybrid EV to overcome IC engines — A plug in hybrid EV (image: bmw.com)

Market Summary in the View of E-Mobility

In all major markets, electric vehicles have witnessed an upward trend. More and more companies have been coming up with EVs and placing them in the market. Evidently, in 2017 nearly, 1 million such vehicles entered the global markets. China, the European countries and the US are the leading ones in the EV markets. India, on the other hand, is emerging as a major market, with National E-mobility programme, announced by the government. This targets 30% of the vehicles to be sold by 2030, to be electric.

Affordable energy has been contributory in raising the standard of living of the people around the world, particularly in poor nations. Owing to the fact that, in the history of humanity, people have been relying on fossil or bio-derived fuels to meet the energy needs. For this fact, IC engines have and will be in an imperative position in the market for the upcoming decade.

Emissions from the Internal Combustion Engine and the Environment

Throughout the history of IC engine and ages before climate change concerns came to prominence, researchers have striven in the direction of improving fuel efficiency, reducing pollutant emissions and operating cost. This all was to guarantee the optimal use of limited fuel resources for prevailing and upcoming generations. In a duration of the last four decades, as a response to air quality issues, research on fuel combustion, exhaust after-treatment and controls has led to a significantly noticeable cleaner environment.

Electrification of transport has received great interest from investors around the world. Among all, only battery-based electric vehicles can completely eliminate the prevailing need of IC engines. However, the Life Cycle Analyses of greenhouse gas impact of battery-electric vehicles have revealed the truth about the use of batteries. Majority of analyses ignore the upstream CO2 in fuel extraction, refining and transportation, as well as in the production and distribution of electricity. Batteries require critical raw materials like lithium and cobalt, that need a large amount of energy for extraction.

Manufacturing of batteries, motors and other related infrastructure like charging stations, manufacturing units would again need a large flow of materials, energy and man force for setting up of such utilities.

Conclusively, in practice, people solely have the freedom to choose among the available powertrains based on factors, like cost, for instance. Politics, car-makers or academia have no role to play in the preference of consumers. Unilaterally favoring one technology through policies can be inefficient and perhaps a wrong solution on a long term basis. Use of real-world data is a better approach so as to allow competing technologies to flourish.

Lastly, Continuing such developments would need more young and skilled minds to contribute to these fields and ensure the consistent delivery of vibrant and sustainable development of Internal Combustion Engines.

Click here to read about how Carbon dioxide has now-a-days changed the perception of its “Green House Gas”

Particles, Waves and Now Fields!… What next?

Science

Vibhor Singh

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October 23, 2020

1

Particles, Waves and Now Fields!… What next?

Over the years, physics has made drastic changes, bringing in new theories discarding the previous ones. But many times it so happens that the previous theory is not completely discarded only because it is more intuitive than the new one.

Maxwell introduced the word ‘field’ when he was working with magnetic force, and this is the case with the theory of fields. He noticed that one magnet was able to deflect another magnet without being in physical contact with each other. For that era, it was something new, and by using symmetry, he similarly introduced ‘electric fields’ and combined them to form ‘electromagnetic fields’.

Quantum Field Theory and the particles

It’s been many years since Quantum Mechanics came into the picture, (dealing with things at lower scale) with the known theory of fields and the QM physicists introduced “Quantum Field Theory”. It was a completely new idea. This theory predicted that not only the electromagnetic force but all the fundamental forces (except gravity) are associated with fields. What was left out was the things we see, things we touch,… then QFT went a step ahead and said, “all the things we call particles are not particles, they are actually vibrations in fields”.

spatial graphs and representations of particles explaining field theory — These fields are not steady, the wobble even in small region

The Standard Model

Consisting of 12 fundamental particles (6 quarks and 6 leptons) describing matter and 4 particles for fundamental forces (now 5 with the addition of the Higgs Boson). The Quantum field theory replaced all these particles with fields. Take for example an electron, there is this electron field spread all across the universe. If there us a lump of energy at any point in the field, it is called an excitation, and this excitation is called the electron.

Suppose you have two electrons, they are the excitations of the same fundamental electron field. Now, the question arises how do these electrons interact with each other. All of these fields exist everywhere, at any place there will be a certain value of each field. Now suppose there is an excitation in the electron field, it starts oscillating up and down vigorously. This causes it to interact with the electromagnetic field which produces light (not necessarily in the visible region) by causing a fluctuation in the electromagnetic field. This fluctuation travels as a wave and may interact with another electron or proton. This was the brief idea of the field theory.

When someone tells you “You don’t understand me…” just tell him/her “You are full of quantum fields and I don’t understand it”

Recently in 2012, Higgs Boson was discovered, confirming one more prediction of the standard model, i.e the Higgs field responsible for the mass of the particles. Discovery of the Higgs Boson was a very important discovery, not only because it was a prediction, but also because it was the last prediction of the standard model, making it a complete theory.

So, we had fields for particles and forces, can we just write them down in a single equation, forming a theory of everything?

the theory of everything — (image: YouTube)

Theory of everything and the unsolvable equation

This is the equation physicists gave, but the problem is that no one really knows how to solve this integral. But, we can go one step ahead and ask, “the terms corresponding to the Strong force, Weak force and the Electromagnetic force are similar, can we just merge it into a single term?” Physicists did that, and came up with the “Grand Unified Theory”. Now, the question arises that can we merge all the terms of the equation into a single term? Physicists coined the term ‘string theory’ for that. It all sounds so great, that we can finally have a single term explaining everything. But the results were not so great.

LHC does not confirm the predictions done by the GUT and the string theory. There can be several reasons for that, maybe LHC needs greater updates to bring out such predictions or maybe it requires more patience. This is what LHC is working on from the past several years.

Previously we said the equation was “equation for everything” that was not completely true. It was only true for all the experiments we have done so far. There are a few things the equation does not contain any information about. : Inflation, Dark matter, Dark energy and so on.

what stuff we are missing, dark matter, dark energy, inflation, particles? — (image: YouTube)

There has not been any successful theory regarding these matters but the hunt for a “complete theory” is still on…
First, we had particles, then came fields, and who knows what will come next…

The Socratic Learning Method – Jackpot to think and assess critically

Guest Post

Dhruvi Saraniya

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October 22, 2020

1

The Socratic Learning Method – Jackpot to think and assess critically

When considering their approach to pedagogy, pedagogues are always looking for the method that is advantageous for all of their students. Teachers want their students to enjoy the learning process and they want the classroom to be well ordered and controlled. Ergo, the discourse of teacher-centred v/s student-centred education has been in the vanguard of educator’s minds for long-standing. The Socratic learning method is a very promising way of inculcating knowledge in a thought-provoking and critical way.

The Different Teaching Methods

Teaching method A is teacher/instructor-centred methods, teacher casts himself/herself in the role of adept of the subject matter. The teacher is looked upon by the learners as a person with expertise in a certain area who may be called upon as necessary to perform a task or provide information. Learners on the other hand are presumed to be submissive and profuse legatee of knowledge from the teacher. Instances of such learning techniques are explanatory which doesn’t require any stab in the teaching process. Such methods are called ‘Closed-Ended’ as they hold a lack of participation from the mentee.

The method categorized B is the content-focused methods. In this class of methods, both the teacher and the learners have to fit into the subject that is taught. By and large, this means individual fact and adroitness to be taught are contemplated as unimpeachable or salient. The whole prominence is situated upon content and heedful scrutiny of content. Both the teacher and the students cannot alter or become condemnatory of anything to do with the content.

The teacher centered and content focused methods.

In the programmed learning approach, novices gain an understanding from learning materials like textbooks, teaching machine or computer. This is a research-based learning method in which materials provide in a logical and tested sequence. The text is in small step or in the hunk. After each step, mentees have to go through some questions relevant to the subject matter to testify their apprehension. Correct answers are shown right away. It means learners make responses at all stages and is given their results instantly.

For a particular method to be pertinent and efficient, it has to correspondence with the trait of the learner and the kind of learning it is presumed to bring out. According to the great Greek philosopher, Socrates, it is in us where all the answers to human questions inhabit. All the answers are easily achieved if we participate in disciplined and thoughtful dialogue, seeking to discover the ultimate truth. The Socratic method of questioning is named after the Greek philosopher, Socrates(469 BC-399 BC) who lived in Athens due to his habit of engaging in philosophical conversations in public and at private gatherings.

The Socratic Learning Method

The objective of Socratic’s learning method is ‘inquiry’. It does not intend to flout students’ original arguments, but partially modifies their original arguments. Teachers keep captive students by asking questions that require procreative answers. Ideally, the answers to questions are not an accomplishment for thought but are instead dawn to further scrutiny and research. Teacher questions their students in a manner that requires them to consider how they rationalize and acknowledge the topic. The purpose of the questions are not to create an environment of tactical shrewdness, but rather to aid students to assesses these attitudes, beliefs, knowledge and logic. The goal of this method is to help students process information and engage in a deeper understanding of topics.

Discussion between students and teachers is collaborative and open-minded as opposed to debate, which is fierce and peculiar. There is no predetermined argument or terminus to which the teacher attempts to lead the students. They don’t use PowerPoint slideshow. Generally, the teacher comes up with open-ended questions about the subject matter and encourage students to use textual evidence to support their beliefs and answers. Thought itself is a continuous thread woven throughout lives rather than isolated sets of questions and answers. The practitioners of the Socratic method may want students to know facts, but they want to focus more on what the student think about these facts, not what others think! It’s about self-guided improvement.

The Socratic method pivots on virtuous education, on how one ought to live. Socratic inquiry necessarily proceeds in an ad hominem style. The subject inquiry is not one’s notion of the world in general but what each participant thinks or says about the world. The aim is not to depersonalized premises and abstractions, but to probe the underlying values and beliefs of each inquirer.

In Plato’s Gorgias, Socrates says, “Do not take what I say as if I were merely playing, for you see the subject of our discussion – and on what subject should even a man of slight intelligence be more serious? – namely, what kind of life should one live…”Socrates generally applied his method of examination to concepts that seem to lack any tangible definition. The key moral concepts at the time, the virtues of piety, wisdom, temperance, courage and justice. Such an examination challenged the inferred moral beliefs of interlocutors, bringing out meagre an inconsistencies in their beliefs, and usually resulting in aporia.

Socrates himself professed his soi-distant ignorance, but others still claim to have comprehension. Socrates believed that his awareness of his ignorance made him wiser than those who, though ignorant, still claimed knowledge. While this belief seems paradoxical at first glance, it in fact allowed Socrates to discover his own errors where others might assume they were correct.

How Is The Socratic Method Different From A Debate?

A Socratic Circle is not a debate. The objective of this pursuit is to have participants work together to construct meaning and arrive at an answer, not for one student or one group to “win the argument”. Rather than memorizing the particulars that have been provided to them, this approach more focuses on the belief that participants seek and gain a deeper understanding of concepts in the text thoughtful dialogue.

The Socratic Method can be divided into two foremost categories. The classical method refers to the early Socrates’ dialogues and some other dialogues of Plato. In these dialogues is, Socrates claims to have no knowledge of even the most fundamental principles such as justice, holiness, friendship or virtue. The aim is to achieve an adequate understanding of basic principles instead of moving to more advanced and complicated topics. This method fails to give satisfactory answers in a conversation. This phase deconstructs people’s previous understanding and help them be conscious of their ignorance of a certain topic at all and helping them know what they do not know.

The Modern Socratic Method originates in Plato dialogues which leads a person step by step and knowledge is gained by more and more questions. The classical approach is just naming or identifying different topics, the Modern method is one that goes deeper, producing the specific knowledge of those topics. It makes the situation in which the students are not ignorant and in which they know the answer.

benefits of socratic circles/seminars — The benefits of a Socratic seminars/circle [Image: Jackie Gerstein]

A Look At The Cons

Some educators and teachers claimed to have complications with this method. The concepts usually related to this are perplexity, humiliation and shame as bad effects of the Socratic Method user. The manners that teachers use are like “I don’t think it is true” or “Are you sure you are right” and those like “You just think you are so smart, don’t you”, which will then cause the negative feelings for sure. The feelings of embarrassment and shame are the psychological factors brought to the discourse by the students.

Socrates showed that even a slave boy can be dealing with complex mathematical problems and that no man can be sure he is completely right in his claims unless he examines it with someone more experienced than he himself. Sometimes incompetence doesn’t know he/she is incompetent.

The Socratic Method is an outlook that can help hearten students learning effectively. Socrates instructed his students to inquire and question logical principles and beliefs and not to be condemning thinkers. The application of this technique is to make students independent learners and cultivate their thinking process.

As we have seen possible disadvantages of this technique, it is extremely important for teachers who will use the method to know its principles, the possible application instruments and techniques to avoid causing mentioned disadvantages. The students are free thinkers and learners and the teacher is adept and the one who will avert all misinterpretations and misconceptions with the Method usage.

Atomic Dhruvi

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7 of the most Awesome Science Facts That No One Knows

Science

Om Desai

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October 19, 2020

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7 of the most Awesome Science Facts That No One Knows

Ever imagined how everyday science works, or what lightning does to the atmosphere surrounding it? Well if you have had imagined such science facts, then congrats, we will be not discussing those common science facts here, which all people know.
We will be diving into the deep sea of facts, rather unknown interesting science facts that will blow your mind. This will force you to say, Science is truly beyond imagination.

Little Warning: This article is mere created to enjoy beauty of science. Writer is not responsible for collapse of thoughts or freezing of brain after complete reading of this bizarre article.

But before reading, let me make you aware that how much scientists are spending on their shopping now-a-days.

Scientist’s shopping list
Item – Bucky Ball
Price – only $167 million per gram

Chemistry is home to exotic materials. One such material is Endohedral Fullerenes which are basically nitrogen atoms encaged inside 60 carbon atoms. Recently, Oxford based start-up, Designer Carbon Materials manufactured these atoms and became one and only one manufacturer of such astonishing materials.

Science facts about nanotechnology — These Bucky Balls cost $167 million per gram
(Quick FYI: The only thing now more expensive is anti-matter)
(image: LAMUNDUS)

Interesting part is that, they sold 200 micro-grams of this material at a price of $33,400. This, on scaling-up becomes almost $167 million for just 1 gram of this ever-synthesised material.
Evidently, such materials are of great importance in making Atomic clocks because of their extraordinary electrical and spin properties. This can be boom to autocar makers, which are now moving towards self-driven cars. Atomic clocks used in GPS can give accuracy of millimeter range, which is utmost important for safety and reliability of such technology in near future.

Spiderman of the Chemicals: This Superfluid can climb the wall

Science fact of Helium superfluid that can climb the wall — This is not jelly; this is superfluid that can climb the wall
(image: ZME SCIENCE)

Helium superfluid can defy the gravity of the earth, and climb the wall. When temperature of liquid Helium is lowered to 2.17 K, that is nearly to ZERO kelvin, weird properties are observed. With this, there is a remarkable transition in the properties of liquid, and a part of it becomes super-fluid. One of the most interesting properties of it is, that it acts as zero-viscosity fluid, which can rapidly move through any pore in the apparatus.

Every Hydrogen Atom in your body is likely to be 13.5 Billion Years Old

Science facts directly related to our origin and existance — Incredible creations, Incredible Universe
(image: ZME SCIENCE)

This is because they were created at the time of birth of the Universe. Initially, during the formation of Universe (i.e. Universe’s Singularity) the very first chemical element was Hydrogen. All the other elements were result of fusion of Hydrogen to helium and then to carbon and so on. Interesting science facts to note here are, almost 73% of the visible Universe is in the form of hydrogen. And, 25% mass is of Helium, and everything else makes up only 2% mass. Also, by mass, hydrogen and helium both combined make up less than 1% of the Earth.

Car Accidents can be “Toxic” now-a-days!!

Safety is the key factor that is necessary and demanded by all automakers and even buyers. One of the essential amongst them is the airbag. Airbag is that big thing which give passengers cushioning during the impact of accidents and protect them from fatal injuries. But what if I say the material packed inside them is very toxic!!

deflating air bag — A dummy can sustain in toxic environment. But can you?
(This isn’t just about airbags, think deep)
(GIF: tenor)

Airbags are filled with salt Sodium Azide, which are responsible for the working of airbags. When the collision occurs, the sensors of the car trigger electrical impulse. Because of this, the temperature of the salts dramatically raises in a fraction of a second. These, then decompose to form harmless nitrogen gas and airbag expands rapidly.

Well known chemist Glenn Seaborg was the only person to write his name and address in chemical elements

In how many ways could you write your name? Or, let me rephrase, in how many silly bizarre ways could you write your name?
Well Nobel laureate Glenn Seaborg was only person to write is name and address in chemical elements. He would just write,

Sg Lr Bk Cf Am.

Glenn T. Seaborg standing in front of the Periodic Table
with the Ion Exchanger illusion column of Actinide Elements
(image: Wikimedia Commons)

Sg- Seaborgium (his last name Seaborg)
Lr- Lawrencium (named after Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory)
Bk- Berkelium (named after city of Berkeley, home of UC Berkeley)
Cf- Californium (named after state of California)
Am- Americium (named after America)

(Fun Fact: Most of the readers have now tried writing their names the same way after reading this)

Rarest of the Rarest it is!!

Astatine, is the rarest naturally occurring element in the Earth’s crust. In Greek, Astatos means unstable. Astatine is naturally occurring semi-metal produced from the decay of Uranium and Thorium. At any one time, less than 1 gram of this element is available in Earth’s crust.
Evidently, only 0.00000005 grams of Astatine have been made by Scientists so far. This is because, in its most stable form (Astatine-210), it has half-life of only 8.1 hours. So, if scientists have to anytime use it, they have to made it from scratch. As the matter of science facts, scientists have never made it in its pure form, as any macroscopic specimen would be immediately vaporized by the heat of its own radioactivity.

Peace of Mind or Noise of Heartbeats?!!

If you stand here for quite a while, you will start to hear your heartbeat. Ringing in the ears deafens soon. Grinding noise of your bones can make you feel annoying. The more you stay there, the more you feel uncomfortable.
We are here talking about the World’s Quietest Room- Anechoic Chamber. This is because, it creates no echo at all. Chamber like this is present at the Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, Washington.

Quietest room on the Earth
(FYI Science facts: You can die inside this room if you live more than some time inside there!)

Here, background noise reaches to such low levels, that mathematicians have theorized it as absolute zero of sound, and beyond it, is vacuum. This chamber is exclusively is used for the testing of various products and equipments. This include, audio equipment such as microphones, receivers, headphones and speakers, or to analyze clicks and hums from computing devices like keyboards, mice, fans and backlight modules on touch panels and displays.

Indeed, this room offers a very rare and sensational experience, with minuteness of sounds to loudness of human beings.
—OSD

Stellar Remnants: The Remnants of the Dead Star

Keith Kamson Fernandes

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October 18, 2020

0

Stellar Remnants: The Remnants of the Dead Star

We have already known about Stellar Evolution, the formation and death of a star (If not, Read the previous articles on Stellar Evolution Birth of a Star and Death of a Star). As we already know that stars die, but as they do so, they leave behind remnants, usually compact objects of some sort, like a white dwarf, neutron star or black hole. What kind of remnant it becomes depends on the initial mass of the star.

1. White Dwarf (The most common remnant)

A white dwarf, also known as a degenerate dwarf, is a stellar core remnant composed mostly of electron-degenerate matter. A white dwarf is very dense and small with its size comparable to that of Earth and its mass is comparable to that of the Sun. A white dwarf’s faint luminosity comes from the emission of its stored thermal energy as no fusion takes place in it.

As the white dwarf continues to cool and dim with time, it eventually becomes a Black Dwarf, a cold, dense, burned out cinder in space. A white dwarf is usually the core of a planetary nebula or supernovae, but at times a naked one is seen whose outer envelope has been expelled invisible a long time ago.

Artist’s impression of debris around a stellar Stellar Remnants: The Remnants of the Dead Star called white dwarf — Artist’s impression of debris around a white dwarf star (Image: ESA/NASA)

How is it formed?

When a star (with initial masses of less than 1.4 solar masses) forms into planetary nebula or supernovae, its carbon core, which continues to cool down is no longer able to continue the nuclear fusions in it, which leads it to become a white dwarf.

2. Neutron Star

Neutron Stars are extremely small and massive. Composed purely of neutrons packed together in a tight ball about 20km across, a typical neutron star is as big as a small asteroid or a terrestrial city, yet its mass is more than that of the Sun (1.989 × 10³⁰kg). As its mass is squeezed into such a small volume, neutron stars are incredibly dense at about 10¹⁷ or even 10¹⁸ kg/m³, nearly a billion times denser than a white dwarf. The gravity of a neutron is incredibly strong such that if a person stands on it, the person will be flattened to a thin piece of paper.

In addition to the large mass and small size, the newly formed neutron star have two important properties:

The rotate extremely rapidly, with periods measured in fractions of a second. Which is a direct result of Law of Conservation of Angular Momentum, which states that any rotating body must spin faster as it shrinks, and the core of the parent star almost had some rotation before it began to collapse.
They have very strong magnetic fields as the original magnetic field of the main-sequence star is amplified as the collapsing core squeezes the magnetic field lines closer together. It is seen that the magnetic field of the neutron star is more than a trillion times stronger than that of Earth.

As time passes by, theory indicates that a neutron star will spin more and more slowly as it radiates its energy into space, and its magnetic field will slowly begin diminish.

How is it formed?

When a large star (with initial masses of between 1.4 to 3 solar masses) forms into a planetary nebula or supernovae, the core of the star collapses until its neutron effectively comes into contact with one another, forming a ball of neutrons. At that point, the central portion of the core rebound which creates a powerful shockwave that races outward through the star, violently expelling matter into space.

Astronomers map a neutron star's surface for the first time — Astronomers map a neutron star’s surface for the first time (Image: Medium)

The main point here is that the shock wave does not start at the very center of the collapsing star, but at the innermost part of the core, the region that rebounds remains intact as the shockwave produced destroys the rest of the star. After the violence in the supernova or planetary nebula has subsided, this ultra-compressed ball of neutrons is all that is left which is known to us as a neutron star.

3. Black Holes

Black holes are a super-dense collection of matter that collapses from a giant star or stars and has a strong field of gravity that nothing can escape its grasps, not even light. Physicists know black holes as a singularity, a point with zero radius and infinite density. The Theory of General Relativity predicts that a sufficiently compact mass will able to deform space-time to form a black hole. The boundary of the region from which no escape is possible is known as the Event Horizon. Even though the event horizon has an impact on the circumstance and fate of an object crossing it, so according to General Relativity it has no locally detectable features.

Black Hole in a Star Cluster (Artist's Impression) — Black Hole in a Star Cluster (Artist’s Impression) (Image: ESA/NASA)

How is it formed?

When a massive star (with initial masses of more than three solar masses) forms into a planetary nebula or supernovae, the iron core continues to shrink. As the iron core doesn’t generate much energy but rather build up at the center of the star until it reaches a critical amount causing the balance between radiation and gravity to suddenly break. Due to the sudden imbalance the core collapses within a fraction of a second, the star implodes, moving at the quarter of the speed of light which results in more mass being feed into the core.

The gravitational pull in its vicinity becomes eventually becomes so great that nothing not even light can escape. This resultant object, which is the black hole, therefore emits no light and no other form of radiation (though it is seen to evaporate radiation called Hawking Radiation).

To Read Stellar Evolution: The Formation of a New Star click here

To Read Stellar Evolution: The Death of a Star click here

remnant remnant remnant remnant remnant remnant remnant

Well, Black Holes ain’t really black…

Science

Adithya A Rao

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October 15, 2020

7

Black holes are the most troublesome creatures in the fascinating zoo of the universe. They are the most despicable objects, throwing up unimaginable infinities and unending paradoxes, making physicists the laughing stock of the world. Unable to resolve these paradoxes or contain these infinities, physicists are stuck in a limbo, where they can neither explain and embrace nor reject and discard the existence of these entities. Yet these remain as the most elegant entities, enclasping the extremum, encoding the infinity, and imagining the incongruity.
Last week showed the global recognition of black holes, with the Nobel prize in physics being awarded to people who proved that black holes are an unavoidable prediction of the theory of General Relativity, and also people who discovered the presence of a black hole in the centre of the milky way. But now, out of the blue, what if I tell you that black holes are not really black, but they emit radiation in contrast to their very name…

What are Black holes?

In short, black holes are extremely dense compact objects which form as a consequence of a dying star. The star at the end of its life consumes all of its fuel and stops burning, and starts collapsing under its own weight. Since there is no outward force present to balance, the collapsing goes on and on until all of the mass gets concentrated at a single point in space-time. The event horizon is a surface enclosing this point at a fixed distance from it. The point is called the singularity and its gravitational effects are soo strong that not even light can escape from inside the event horizon.
The event horizon is called the point of no return. Outside the event horizon, matter is still attracted inwards by the singularity but outward accelerations can cause it to move in different directions, even away from the black hole. But once inside the event horizon, the future of the matter is only the singularity, no force can cause it to escape out and its fate is sealed to end up falling into the singularity.

Black hole entropy paradox.

The universe loves its entropy, and always sticks to the second law of thermodynamics which states that the entropy of the universe is ever increasing and never decreasing. You want to defy this law? Simply throw the entropy into the black hole. You have no ways to measure the entropy of the black hole, it has infinite entropy and any entropy you add into it, it gets eaten into the infinity and is lost. You throw some object into it, the black hole’s entropy remains unchanged and the entropy of the surroundings decreases, thus decreasing the net entropy of the universe, violating the second law. There is no reason that the very loved law of physics is allowed to be broken by the black holes. This was a clear paradox which took the genius of Bekenstein and Hawking to get resolved.
Hawking calculated that the area of the event horizon would increase when some matter falls in. He also noticed that when two black holes merge, the area of the event horizon of the resulting black hole would be more than the sum of the areas of the individual black holes. This looked similar to the case of entropy, the area of the event horizon always increases just like the entropy. This motivated Bekenstain to state that the entropy of the black hole is not infinity but in fact a finite value. This entropy, surprisingly, is directly proportional to the surface area of the event horizon rather than its volume. Any object falling into the black hole would increase its size in such a way that the increase in the event horizon’s area proportional to its entropy. This clearly fits into the model and resolved the entropy paradox, but silently gave rise to a new paradox…

Elementary derivation of Black Hole area-entropy relationRead

The new paradox…

The fact that the entropy is not infinite but finite should mean that the black hole should not be at absolute zero, but should be having some temperature. And any body that has temperature would emit some radiation given by the blackbody spectrum. But how can something black emit radiation?
This paradox was resolved by Hawking who proposed the theory that every black hole emitted radiation called Hawking radiation which corresponds exactly with the blackbody spectrum. But where does this radiation come from?
The vacuum is not really empty space but is filled with fields like the electromagnetic field, Higgs field etc. These fields cannot have zero value constantly because then we would know both the value and rate of change precisely and the uncertainty principle prevents exactly this. So there are fluctuations constantly in the values of these fields and the energy is always non zero. What this non-zero energy means is that there is constant excitation of the field in form of virtual particle-antiparticle pairs. Virtual means that these particles cannot be directly observed, but their presence can be verified by their effects. These pairs come to existence randomly and annihilate each other. From the conservation of energy, the particle has positive energy and the antiparticle has negative energy. The antiparticle is short-lived, thanks to its negative energy and hence, within that short period, it has to meet its particle counterpart and annihilate it. This keeps on happening forever in the vacuum, with all sorts of particle-antiparticle pairs popping in and out of existence randomly.

Hawking Radiation…

If you introduce a black hole to the recipe, things change drastically. The gravitational field of a black hole is so strong that even a real particle could have negative energy there. One of the particles from the virtual pair may fall into the black hole. Now there is no one to annihilate its pair on the outside and hence it can escape out to infinity. In this process, it absorbs energy from the black hole and turns into a real particle. To an observer outside, it seems as if this radiation is being emitted by the black hole. The energy of the radiation comes from the black hole itself and as the black hole emits the hawking radiation, it constantly loses mass and gets smaller in size. But the entropy of the emitted radiation is always greater than the entropy lost due to the decrease in size of the black hole and hence the second law is never violated.
The Hawking radiation is mostly photons rather than other particles. This is a real form of radiation. It has real energies and calculable energy distribution for its photons, and you can calculate both the flux and temperature of this radiation based on the black hole’s mass alone. Generally, the Hawking radiation is a long wavelength and low energy radiation.

The fact that black holes emit radiation defies the very definition of black. This gives rise to another paradox, the most perfectly black objects in the universe are not at all black but they do emit radiation. It is right to say that black holes are indeed pandora box of paradoxes, very tempting to open, but suffocating at the same time.

Gaze at the infinite, the universe never ceases to amaze.

One new reality check on “The Relativistic Mass” concept

Roshan Raj

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October 13, 2020

2

One new reality check on “The Relativistic Mass” concept

Those interested in reading the original Hindi version written by the author please do download from the link below:

[wpdm_package id=’4593′]

Remember that when we used to study in high school, some of our friends used to meet and discuss topics related to physics. Among those discussions, one thing would always come up, that in future we will know Einstein’s theory of relativity in detail. We know some things about the length contraction, time dilation and an idea that states, mass increases with the increase in speed (Velocity). In simple words an in reality, the concept of Relativistic mass; this particular idea of Relativistic mass(M) was always fascinating.

Building up the background

Today also, some experts from physics understand this and believe that the real fact is that mass is a function of velocity. Thus, faster the object moves, the greater is its mass. Surprisingly, using this idea, they want to explain why no object can move faster than the speed of light. They argue that for this infinite energy is required and mostly refer to the formula:

$building up the idea of relativistic mass$ ———————Equation (1)

Asking someone who has some knowledge of mathematics, he would say that the mass(M) will increase if the velocity (v) is increased. That is, for most people this formulation is meaningful and true, which even nature accepts.

In science, nothing can be accepted quickly. It is necessary to strengthen the criterion, whether it is the criterion of logic or experiment. So now we must know whether mass is really just a function of motion? I propose that we can find a solution to this task with the help of logic, irrefutable logic!

Seeking help from the history

If we look at the history, we will find that the origin of this sutra was initiated by Albert Einstein to keep the concept of momentum alive. When he was writing special theory of relativity in detail, he understood that the expression of conventional linear momentum given by Descartes as p=mv, is an utter failure and false when the object is moving at high speed. As a result, the law of momentum conservation also becomes untrue. To fix this issue, the great physicist imagined that momentum should also be a function of a certain quantity. This might be depending on the speed of the object itself. When the equations were solved; famous Lorenz Factor equation was obtained. Now the formula for linear momentum modified to:

Lorentz factor describing relativistic mass; reality — image: ( Dauntless Jaunter)

$Lorentz factor related to the relativistic mass$ ———————–Equation (2)

We call this formula Relativistic linear momentum.

This is the most accurate momentum formula yet and it also holds some physical meaning. If we want, we can find something more accurate than this, but before that we will have to find some flaws in the sutra of this linear momentum.

Coming back to the originality to reality

Let us return to our old question where we need to know whether mass is a function of motion or not. To achieve this, we must look back carefully at the formula for this new momentum, and we will find that the numerator of the represents the formula of the old momentum p=mv. This means that if we identify it by following two ways. In reality, it would be:

$first way of finding relativistic mass$ ——————–Equation (3a.)

Or

$second way of finding relativistic mass$ ———————Equation (3b.)

And again, we want to simplify it, we can write:

$\dpi{150} p=M\cdot v$ ————————Equation (4a.)

Or

$\dpi{150} p=m\cdot \eta$ ———————-Equation (4b.)

But this time, remember what is this mass M, and what is the velocity η ? Both situations have their own names in the world of relativity. The first case is called Relativistic mass (equation 3a) and the second case is the proper velocity (equation 3b). We can write our new formula as the old formula if we choose either one of these two cases. (equations 4a. and 4b.)

Understanding with a simple example

These situations can be better explained by a simple case – ‘the likes and dislikes of Mohan and Sohan’.

If Mohan says I like the first case 4a, that’s how it should be written, then it’s against Sohan. He will then say, I can write the same formula using the second case 4b, so that original form of expression can be achieved.

Moreover, if he gets a little more aggressive, he will also say that this is the only true way to express it.

Let they continue their quarrel, meanwhile we continue to understand that this new sutra can be written in two ways.

If our aim is to write it in original compact form, then both the conditions are the same and the (equation 3) have no earthly and physical meaning. That is, they are called mathematical structures and these mathematical structures have no meaning in physics but are just abstract concepts.

The juggling of equations starts here…

However, one can get a qualitative description of these mathematical structures like for the relativistic mass M, one can say that it increases with the increase in the velocity, but keep in mind that this thing will not be applicable in reality to the original concept of mass(m).

Similarly, one can also understand the meaning of proper velocity in following ways:

Let simple velocity u of particle in inertial frame S as

$u_{x}=\frac{dx}{dt}$ (considering only x-coordinate)

$\dpi{150} dx$ is the change in displacement from point A to B along in time period under inertial reference frame S.

Also, there exist another inertial frame S’, which has frame velocity with respect to our old S frame. We will imagine our S’ in such a way that old frame (S), these two events might be occurring at same point so that time interval between the event in S’ will be a proper time as,

$\tau =t\sqrt{1-\frac{v^{2}}{c^{2}}}$ ———————–Equation (5a.)

It is necessary to note down in reality here that, this condition can only be fulfilled if we understand that (i.e. magnitude of particle and frame velocity are equal)

Thus, rewriting Equation (5a.) we get

$\tau =t\cdot \sqrt{1-\frac{u^{2}}{c^{2}}}$

$d\tau =dt\cdot \sqrt{1-\frac{v^{2}}{c^{2}}}$ ——————–Equation (5b.)

It is interesting here that proper velocity is being defined as,

$\eta _{x}=\frac{dx}{d\tau }$ —————————-Equation (6)

I know it is difficult to accept that proper velocity is not actually ‘properly’ defined but we can’t do anything 😊.

Into the final stretch of reality – Just there…

One may also find it that it’s of no use but it has it use in the formation of four-vector for velocity & transformation.

Interested can also show that equation (6) as equivalent to equation (3b).

[Hint: Use equation (6) & equation (5b)].

One can say that proper velocity is something as a ratio of a displacement of particle in S-frame to the change in time when observed in S’-frame.

(Such that uniform velocity of the S’-frame with respect to S is same as the velocity of particle moving within S frame.)

Don’t worry if you are getting confused, it had taken me 3 years to understand difference between S & S^’.

In wholesome we can say that when people wanted to stick to the old definition of momentum then two new concepts:

concept of relativistic mass and
The concept of proper velocity was observed.

Thus, it’s an arbitrary choice for someone to write down the expression of relativistic linear momentum p either in the term of relativistic mass (M) or proper velocity .

This arbitrary choice of writing expression of linear momentum has overthrown the reality of relativistic mass and make us always to recapitulates that mass (rest mass) is a something that does not depend on velocity of any kind.

Culminations and Codas on reality of Relativistic Mass Concept

Now it will be easy for you to understand that wherever you study that mass is a function of motion is not pretty true. There are no events in nature to prove that the mass of moving object increases if its speed (velocity) is increased. Taking a little more time, I would like to show the following picture in which Albert Einstein himself wrote his thoughts about relativistic mass.

It is clear from this picture that Albert Einstein himself has emphasized that concept of Relative mass should be discarded. It clears the mind in reality that mass should be of two types, but we have not seen it in a fair way to accept such things and also understood (hope so!), Why it is like this?

We should always remember that the mass, which is measure of matter/Energy content, (in any extreme condition of momentum) would not show alternation in its value by any amount. And we earthly being use the small m of the English alphabet to represent the mass (generally)…

At last, let’s take a comic picture from reality for fun…

Can you relate this to the concepts above?
Do write your opinion on this in the comment section….
(image: momentumcomic)

To read more about such new ideologies on great theories ; Click Here

Smile Big Universe! You are Under 3200 Megapixel Surveillance!

Harshil Bhanushali

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October 12, 2020

8

Smile Big Universe! You are Under 3200 Megapixel Surveillance!

Memories! This word includes almost everything that has happened in our ongoing life in the Universe. “Memories are Strengths, Memories are Weaknesses!” (Not that I’m being emotional; it’s just a way of transitioning! 😉) For the sake of satisfying our needs, we created Digital cameras that would capture our most precious memories. Pictures are the most integral part of someone’s memories. A hazy picture may lead to false memories or false perceptions. Analogous to this, a distorted picture of the Universe hinders any chance of our understanding of the Cosmos.

Site of LSST: Elqui Province, Coquimbo Region, Chile [Image: lsst.org]

Thus, Ground-based and Sky-based observatories were invented to capture the astounding data showered upon us by vast Space. While many telescopes have been designed to serve the purpose, resolution plays a vital role in forming theory and laws about the Cosmos. To tackle this problem, the SLAC National Accelerator Lab is constructing the World’s Largest Digital Camera, ‘LSST camera’ which will be mounted on the ‘Simonyi Survey Telescope’. Nicknamed “Vera.C.Rubin Observatory” after the American astronomer and pioneer Vera Rubin who discovered the existence of Dark matter. (If you want to read more about candidates of dark matter: click here)

How large is the Universe’s Largest Camera?

For starters, the resolution offered by this camera is a whopping 3200 Megapixel that can capture the dimmest light in the night sky. The weight of the camera is over 3 tons and its front lens is over 5ft tall. At the heart of the camera is the focal plane which is 2ft*2ft and has a 0.6 m diameter. The resolution if compared is 1500 times that of an HD-TV. One cannot engineer this big a focal plane, so it is a Mosaic. To achieve this feat, 4k*4k resolution CCDs were used. With so powerful a camera, they can’t risk any distortion in the images. For this, they had to construct an additional component which is Cryostat, because heat can turn into unwanted noise.

Exploded view of whole digital camera that captures universe — The Exploded Rendering of Digital Camera [Image: lsst.slac.stanford.edu]

Parts That Make The Heart

A CCD or a Charge-Coupled Device is an integrated circuit containing an array of coupled capacitors. In CCD there is a photoactive region and a transmission region where the whole operation is carried out. An image is projected on the capacitor array through a lens. This causes each capacitor to accumulate an electric charge proportional to the light intensity at the location. A control circuit causes each capacitor to transfer its content to its neighbor and the last one dumps it into a charge amplifier which converts it into voltage. Repeating this process the entire contents of the array are converted into a sequence of voltages. This sequence is then sampled, digitalized, and stored. These are the basics of the operation.

charge transfer in CCD; a GIF — Charge transfer process in a charge-coupled device [Image: sparkfun.com]

Coming back to the Mosaic, it is made of 189 CCDs and each CCD is assembled in a 3×3 unit called ‘Raft’. Each raft has a 144-megapixel count and costs about 3 million dollars each. With the heart in place, the three lenses that are used for the camera give it the size of an average SUV. The amount of area that can be captured in one shot is equivalent to 40 full moons giving it a very wide Field of View.

Raft assembly — Assembling the 144 megapixel CCD’s [Image: lsst.org]

automated process to assemble rafts — A carefully optimized automated process to assemble raft. [Image: lsst.org]

focal plane and its dimensions — Focal Planes and Its Dimensions. [Image: lsst.slac.stanford.edu]

The wavelength range that LSST will focus on is 320-1500 nm ie. near-ultraviolet to near-infrared region. As we all know that the Universe is expanding, the light coming from distant galaxies often becomes red-shifted. Due to this apparent shift, the age of the galaxy often comes out to be a bizarre number. Also, the light that enters our atmosphere contains different colors. Many times red refracts differently than blue light and on focusing they create a blurry image. To tackle these problems, LSST uses a combination of 5 different filters to process the incoming light. Each filter can be swapped automatically based on the wavelength of incoming light.

Filter system to optimize the wavelength of light coming in — Filter changing mechanism in the Camera to optimize the wavelength of light coming In. [image: lsst.org]

Filter changing mechanism and its working — Filter Changing mechanism and its working. [Image: lsst.org]

Together these ‘Parts of the Heart’ work in synchronization to create the most perfect image of the vivid night sky.

The Holy Grail of LSST

The goal to construct such a high-resolution camera is to search for answers to the most natural and perplexing questions of Astronomy that are beyond our understanding. LSST will mainly look into advancing our knowledge of Dark matter, Dark energy (that make up 95% of the universe), the formation of the Milky Way, and potentially perilous asteroids.

Assembling station of camera — Whole Team of LSST with assembly. {Image: lsst.org]

Artistic rendering of completely assembled LSST — Artistic rendering of fully assembled camera in dome. [Image: lsst.org]

LSST or the “Large Synoptic Survey Telescope” will scan the southern sky every 30 seconds for the next 10 years. It will scan the entire visible sky twice a week, visiting the same patch of sky at least 1000 times during the survey. It will take nearly 3.2 gigapixels 1000 images every night, that’s 15TB of data per night. With so overwhelming numbers, they also decided to build an underground data facility that would allow them to analyze these images. And for the very first time, a Telescope is going to explore more galaxies than people on Earth. LSST is going to catalog 37 billion galaxies during its 10-year survey.

Artistic rendering of lsst — Artistic Rendering of LSST site [Image: lsst.org]

The pandemic has thrown the whole schedule off-track but the team is persistent and optimistic. Their target operational deadline is 2022. With this remarkable and cutting edge technology, scientists are challenging their understanding by proving themselves wrong and catch the universe in action.

“Amid the vast darkness that veils the brightest of objects, the dimmest light of the Universe impels man to denounce his intellection of the Cosmos.”
RDX

Diamonds have Never Failed to Surprise Scientists

Umakant Bohara

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October 10, 2020

2

Diamonds have Never Failed to Surprise Scientists

Diamonds hold the pride of place as most precious among all gemstones. They possess a dazzling array of technologically useful properties. Being the hardest, most thermally conducting, and chemically resistant among all known materials, diamonds have now also become a field of interest in the field of the electronics industry.

The Discovery of Triplet Spin Superconductivity in Diamonds

Diamonds have a firm foothold in our commercial world. The properties of the diamond often serve as metaphors for quality, purity, and hardness. Apart from the reputation of this rare material in the luxurious and decorative applications, these precious stones are also extremely valued in the industry where they are used to carve and polish other hard materials and develop radiation detectors.

About a decade ago, a group of scientists introduced high concentrations of boron to the diamonds and found astounding results-Superconductivity. Superconductivity is observed when two electrons with opposite spin form a pair, called Cooper pair, which results in zero electricals resistance in the substance. A high magnitude current flowing through the material can have advanced technological applications. As of now, very limited work has been done in investigating the nature of superconductivity in the diamonds.

Wallpaper glitter, gemstones, Diamonds images for desktop, section макро - download

Professor Somnath Bhattacharyya led new research in the School of Physics at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, which details the phenomenon of “Triplet Superconductivity“, observed in a diamond. Triplet superconductivity refers to the movement of electrons in a composite spin state rather than as a single pair. This phenomenon being highly tenuous has been observed in very few materials and only theoretically in them .

Magnetic fields and impurities destroy the superconductivity of traditional superconductors like aluminum. However, triplet superconductivity in a diamond remains unaffected even when combined with magnetic materials. Hence, a more efficient and multifunctional operation of material becomes achievable.

Bhattacharyya and his team worked with excitement for the practical evidence of triplet superconductivity in diamonds.

This is something that has never been claimed in precious stones like diamonds. Using a specialized piece of equipment called vapour deposition chamber, they can be manufactured in a laboratory. This owes the fact that naturally occurring diamonds are rare and hence expensive. The concerned university department has developed its own plasma deposition chamber. This allows them to manufacture diamonds of a higher than normal quality, ideal for high-end research.

Things that thrilled the Scientists !

superconductivity in diamonds that thrilled the scientists

When considering the nanocrystalline boron-doped system, the reduced dimensionality and confinement effects have led to several intriguing observations. Of this most notably, signatures of a mixed superconducting phase. Scientists observed hallmark features of spin-orbit coupling (SOC) manifested as the weak anti-localization effect.

The enhanced SOC is believed to result from a combination of inversion symmetry breaking at the grain boundary interfaces along with antisymmetric confinement potential between grains, inducing a Rashba-type SOC. From a definite zero-bias peak in the differential conductance, they demonstrated signatures of a triplet component. This was believed to result from spin mixing caused by tunneling of singlet Cooper pairs through such Rashba-SOC grain boundary junctions.

They are now well regarded as quantum materials and now these findings expand the potential applications. Conventional technology is based on semiconductors which have electron charge. As of now, we are decently capable of controlling such charges. But gaining control over quantum states like superconductivity and entanglement would involve a lot more physics with the charge and spin of electrons. A surge of superconducting materials, one of which is diamond, could eventually replace the traditional silicon technology. Along-with low power consumption and cost-effective solutions can also be adopted with this novel technology.

With such innovative and extensive properties, Diamonds have always fascinated the scientists.

Reality and the Evolution of Theories

Science

Vibhor Singh

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October 8, 2020

1

Physics is a very broad region of science, covering everything from the motion of planets and galaxies to the motion of planets and galaxies to the motion of an electron in a cloud chamber. Every now and then we encounter new theories which try to explain what we call “Reality”. Reality is a topic of debate from many decades among physicists and philosophers. Every genius has his own understanding of reality, some of which have been agreed upon by many, and some more discarded. We have many theories to explain the notion of reality and they all describe it in different and accurate ways. Today we are not going to talk about reality described by these theories, but the theories themselves, about how they emerge, how a higher-level theory emerges from a low-level theory.

First of all, by high/low level we don’t mean more/less important or which one is more fundamental, but this shows the direction of flow of emergence of a theory.

For example, Boltzmann’s theory of statistics tells us about the motion of atoms and particles, how they behave, how they interact and how they respond. And if we take a whole lot of them together, we might have what we call solid, liquid or gas. To study these, we have theories like fluid mechanics, thermodynamics and other theories. An interesting point here is that these theories can be studied without having to know about the Statistical Theory of Boltzmann or the field theory of particles. Like if we want to study fluids, we can do that directly by knowing about the density, pressure, temperature, etc. without knowing the interaction between atoms/molecules and their velocity or momenta. Here fluid mechanics or thermodynamics is a high-level theory which emerges from the theory of atoms, i.e a low-level theory.

The condition is that these theories should always agree in overlapping domains. Thus we can define “emergence” roughly as ~ a higher-level (macroscopic) theory emerging from a low-level (microscopic) theory.

Here, the microscopic and the macroscopic theories cover a portion of the reality and in certain domain both the theories agree with each other.

Coming back to our example, the theory of gases has emerged from the theory of atoms.

Theory of atoms contains the information about position(x) and momentum(p) of particles while the theory of gases contains information like density(⍴), pressure(P), temperature(T) and volume(V). Relation of the emergent theory from the parent theory can be given as:

density(⍴) -> (number density) x (mass of each particle)

temperature(T) -> Average Kinetic Energy of the molecule

Pressure(P) -> force by atoms across an imaginary barrier.

But the quantities like density, the temperature can also be thought as independent variables from those of atoms, without knowing the parameters of the atoms. This emergence can be the fact that this is how nature works.

Another sneaky example can be the centre of mass motion. The earth can be thought of as made of 10⁵⁰ particles, each having its parameters (x,p) which can be described with 6×10⁵⁰ dimensional space with each point in this space representing a particular configuration of earth. Or we can just find the centre of mass of earth which is just a point and then the whole of the motion of the earth can be described in just 6-dimensional (3 space, 3 momenta) space. We call it sneaky because it is somewhat unbelievable that 6×10⁵⁰ parameters can be contracted to 6 parameters. So, was the rest of the data irrelevant? But this does not seem so, because if I will give you the position and momentum of every particle except for one particle, then the information is still insufficient to predict the motion of the earth. This is what we call “coarse-graining” or many to one mapping. This is also an example of the emergence of a theory.

Another example of emergence can be given by taking limits.

The above chart gives the overall emergence of Newtonian mechanics from GR or vice-versa. Like, if you want to send a rocket to the moon, you don’t need to know quantum gravity or General Relativity of gravitational waves or Black Holes. Newtonian Gravity is very much accurate to that stage. This shows that neither Newtonian mechanics nor General relativity is wrong, but both of them are quite accurate in their own domains of reality. This is known as “fine-graining” or one to one mapping of the theory, but it is “heterostructural” because the structure of General Relativity and Newtonian mechanics is completely different. The previous example of the centre of mass motion is a “homogenous” mapping.

The relation can be shown as the following 2×2 matrix:

	HOMEOSTRUCTURAL	HETEROSTRUCTURAL
FINE	Simplification, Eg. Frictionless plane	GR -> Newtonian Gravity
COARSE	The motion of the Center of mass	Individual atom -> gas

Thus concluding, we can say that emergence is precious because it gives us the “real patterns” about the notion of reality. We have come far across in physics but we do not know how far this “Road to Reality” goes.

Organic Chemistry Or Memory Booster? New Study Reveals The Mystery

Science

Om Desai

-

October 6, 2020

2

Organic Chemistry Or Memory Booster? New Study Reveals The Mystery

Our brain is a complex structure. Exercising it is important for its growth and development, and in turn our own. Everyone of us here, have someday thought of mastering our memory skills and wanted to have photographic memory. At the same time, we people are bit lazy towards striving for that. Then, why am I writing this all? Because, after reading this, many of you will start working to improve your capabilities using organic chemistry.

Yes!! Organic chemistry. Study of different properties, structures and compositions, reactions and many such things of carbon-containing compounds is included in this branch of chemistry. Most of the students have common hatred for chemistry subject. One of the major reasons for that is because they don’t like to study organic chemistry. Not only amongst students, but to anyone you may ask that why you hate science as a field of study, many of them would say because of chemistry, and majority will answer that it is because of organic chemistry.

So why is that? Is it too hard? Is it not appealing to their brains? They don’t like to study Organic Chemistry?

Well questions are many, reason is one. Organic chemistry involves logical reasoning for the understanding of the reactions, as well as test learner’s memory for remembering names, properties and structures of compounds (and many-a-times drawing skills too 🙂 )

Because of this, not all find organic chemistry very interesting and feel hard to study. Many of them leave it or ignore it, while focusing on physical and inorganic chemistry.

But what if I tell you that, ignoring organic chemistry can be a big mistake of yours while learning chemistry!! Yes, researchers and Psychologists at Carnegie Mellon University have proposed a new study, which clearly reveals that studying organic chemistry can actually surge, cultivate and develop learner’s brain skills and memory. They have presented deductions that state, there were changes in memory related areas of brain by learning scientific information. Also, changes were observed due to encoding of new information in those areas. With this, changes were also seen in network nodes that jointly contain new information and in its coordination.

How and What did they do?

Professor of psychology, Timothy Keller, selected nine students who have not taken chemistry majors. He taught those students the names and molecular structure of nine organic compounds. While doing this, those students were in MRI scanner.

Among these nine organic compounds, one was ethanol. Above is the ethanol molecule, where black spheres are carbon atoms, red is oxygen atom and blue represent hydrogen.

Based on different types of imaging and research, professors saw that there were three types of changes in the brain, and those changes were occurring all in the same area.

The three changes in brain from organic chemistry:

First:

Very first method was based on the previous studies of brains on a mammal called rodent. It involved diffusion-based imaging method. It was also used on rats, which showed that when they developed their brain, there was decrease in water molecule diffusion in their brain.

When this imaging method was applied on humans, who were learning new knowledge here, revealed somewhat similar. There was decrease in the diffusion of water molecules in the CA (cornu ammonis) portion. This is located in the left hemisphere of hippocampus.

Chill!! Its biology. Simply this part of the brain is associated with the primary memory. It is also responsible for processing of long-term memory and emotions.

This is image showing position of hippocampus in the brain (if you are interested so much!! 😊). So, changes in that part, where water molecules slow downed, indicated that tissues in those students’ brains were changing. This could be possible due to synaptic changes.

Second:

Second was somewhat interesting. When we imagine, think or remember something in our mind, there becomes unique representations or neural signatures in the brain. These representations and signatures can be identified by functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). They used machine learning techniques to detect any individual’s brain activation pattern. From these patterns, it could be found that among which of the nine compounds was participant actually thinking of. Interestingly, these deductions were obtained from that same 1.3 cm² area hippocampus where water molecule motion was previously observed. This clearly defined that, the tissue changes have occurred.

Above image shows fMRI scans of people remembering something. Left image is of hippocampus of a stronger and healthy cognitive impairment. While, right is of mild cognitive impairment. Thus, it shows that this type of training can improve memory and brain activity.

Third:

The third and final change that was seen in the brain, was surprising and beneficial. Intraparietal Sulcus (IPS), is the part of brain that support visualization of 3-D structures. In this change, apart from hippocampus, this part of brain was also involved. As a change, it was observed that there was increase in the synchronization of activity in that same region of hippocampus (which was previously took in consideration) and in IPS.

From this change, it indicated that brain collectively improves coordination in representing multiple facets of concepts at the same time. This way, third change was really fruitful and showed activity in regions of brain.

Conclusions and Merits in Brain Memory from Studying Organic Chemistry:

Basically, these observations majorly indicated evidence of micro-structural, informational and network change in parts of brain during learning organic chemistry. From these deductions, improvement can be done in the effectiveness of teaching and learning science.

organic chemistry cartoons — Don’t Worry. This is Just For Fun. Chemistry Can Be Bizarre Sometimes. So Be Safe. 🙂
(image: CHRIS MADDEN CARTOONS)

For a better approach, neural signature and representations of a new student can be taken into consideration. They can be compared to those of a successful advanced student. From comparisons, it could be possible to determine neural similarities indicate accurate predictor of academic mastery of concepts or not.

Thus, improvising your organic chemistry skills can upgrade you brain skills and memory to an extent and can be really helpful. Also, not just organic chemistry, but chemistry as whole science can be incorporated to improve basic skills and knowledge.

So, now onward you better not ignore fundamentals of and in your life.

–OSD

Axion: The ultimate solution to the universe?

Science

Adithya A Rao

-

October 2, 2020

4

Axion: The ultimate solution to the universe?

Physicists love the word “radical”. They tend to answer even the simplest of the questions with solutions that try to alter our perception of the universe. Just the thought of penning a theory that will topple our understandings and make us wonder the very reason for our existence is enough to give them goosebumps. Most of the times, such theories go in vain, with the discrepancy they were trying to explain ending up being an experimental error. But here and there, a few theories end up being the correct ones and end up widening our perspective of the universe. The axion is one such radical theory, unproven yet, but has the potential to solve three major puzzles in physics.

Puzzle 1: The Strong CP Problem…

The Standard Model (SM) does an amazing job in comprehending the universe. But it is filled with loopholes that are hard to explain. The standard model is a constant battle between physicists and inconsistencies. One of the most underrated, but very principal puzzles of physics, which is not yet resolved is called the Strong CP problem.

The SM talks about particles in terms of mathematical ‘groups’. In everyday mathematics, we see that most of the stuff commutes, A+B = B+A or A*B = B*A. But that is not the general case as you know. The case with the groups is also the same. So fundamentally, the groups can be divided into two groups, the abelian – which commute and the non-abelian – that does not commute. For example, the group associated with translation is abelian, but the one associated with rotation is non-abelian.

non abelian rotation — This diagram shows that the rotation group is non-commutating.
Rotation by 90° about z-axis followed by 90° about the x-axis is not the same as a rotation by 90° first about the x-axis and then 90° about the z-axis.
[Image: Modern Quantum Mechanics by J J Sakurai.]

In the SM, Electromagnetism is abelian, Strong and Weak interactions are non-abelian. The difference between these is visible in its symmetries. Abelian theories must be symmetric under:
C (Charge conjugation): If the particle is replaced by anti-particle and vice-versa.
P (Parity): If the particle is replaced by its mirror image.
T (Time reversal): If the direction of time is reversed.

For abelian theories, interactions have C, P and T individually conserved, and the groups CP (C and P together), CT (C and T together), PT (P and T together) and CPT (All C, P and T together) are also conserved.
This is not the case with non-abelian theories. These do not require individual conservation of C, P and T, and also the combinations CP, CT and PT can be violated. But CPT should always be conserved.
This means that for electromagnetism, C, P, T, CP, CT, PT and CPT all are conserved. But for Strong and Weak forces, every symmetry except the CPT is allowed to be broken.

c p for muon — This image shows the C, P, and CP transformation for a muon interaction

The test for P violation: If the mirror image of a given interaction has a different outcome than the original interaction, then parity is said to be violated. For example, in the above image, the mirror image of the big particle is having a higher probability of decay than the original particle (as shown in the bar graph on the right). This indicates P violation.

[Images: Forbes]

Murray Gell-Mann has coined a principle called The Totalitarian Principle: Everything that is not forbidden is compulsory, which means that processes which are not forbidden should have a finite non-zero probability of occurring.
This should mean that CP violation which is not forbidden in Strong and Weak interactions should occur with non-zero probability. In Weak interactions, CP violation is plentily observed. But in Strong interaction, no CP violation is observed at all, not even once in a billion interactions. This is called the Strong CP problem and is one of the problems that question the very fundamentals of physics.

In 1977, physicists Roberto Peccei and Helen Quinn proposed a possible solution to this problem. They stated that there exists a scalar field called the axion field, that permeates throughout the universe. This scalar field influences the strong interactions and is the reason for the forbiddance of CP violation. If this is true, there should be a particle associated with the scalar field, and this particle was called the AXION.

Puzzle 2: Dark matter…

The above proposed Axion should be extremely light – about a billion times lighter than the proton, should have no electric charge and should be so huge in number that they should be floating everywhere literally, but rarely interacting with anything. All these properties make it the perfect candidate for dark matter. Due to its low interaction and omnipresence, it can clump together and form regions of high mass and low interaction, just like what is required for a dark matter candidate. Many experiments are currently working to find this Axion and effort is going on in the scientific community. The major experiment being the ADMX(Axion Dark Matter eXperiment), which uses a strong magnetic field to convert dark matter axions to detectable to microwave photons.

axion detection experiment — The search for Axions is still on, with setups like ADMX, we expect to detect Axions if they exist in real.

Puzzle 3: Baryon Asymmetry…

Matter and antimatter particles are always produced in pairs, and also annihilate each other once they come in contact, leaving behind pure energy. During the first few moments after the big bang, the universe was a nursery of particle-antiparticle pairs, with them popping in and out of existence continuously. This should mean that matter and antimatter should have been created in equal amounts and also should have been destroyed soon, leaving behind a universe with only energy. But this is not what is observed, we see matter present in this universe, and also it is way huger in amount than the amount of antimatter. The reason for this being still unknown. Scientists theorize that something happened in the early universe leading to an asymmetry in matter-antimatter annihilations causing a tiny portion of matter to survive, and this is what we see in the universe today.
Imagine a coin spinning on a table. The coin has a 50-50 chance of falling either heads up or tails up. But if there were some kind of special marbles that roll on the table, influencing the coin to fall more on heads than tails, the probability distribution would completely change.
According to a team of scientists, axions might be the answer for this too. They postulate that at the beginning of the universe, the axion field started oscillating, and this caused the matter to form a bit more in amount than antimatter. They have named this theory Axiogenesis, and this seems to be a potential explanation for the baryon asymmetry problem if axions are found.

axiogenesis — The rotation of the QCD axion (black ball) produces an excess of matter (coloured balls) over antimatter, allowing galaxies and human beings to exist.
[Image: EurekAlert!]

The fact that axions have the potential to solve the three greatest puzzles in physics is truly amazing. This has caused a stir among the scientific community has pressurized the experimentalists to further pursue the search for these axions. These puzzles have also promoted a new field of physics beyond the standard model. In case the axion is found, then it can be termed as the saviour of physics, with three successes in its bag. Also, it could mean that all the puzzles in physics could be solved if thought of as being influenced by axions. In short, if the axion is to be found, then it might potentially solve all the puzzles in the world of physics.

Science is what we have learnt about how to keep from fooling ourselves.
RICHARD FEYNMAN

Measurement Problems: The Quantum Catastrophe

Dhruvi Saraniya

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October 1, 2020

3

Measurement Problems: The Quantum Catastrophe

The quantum world is a mystery in itself. There is no path you can take that does not end up in an enigma. These puzzles are solved only after a gruesome battle with our common sense, where it is beaten to a pulp, and we are obliged to alter our perception of the world. Fasten your seatbelts and hold on tight, because we are about to roll on a journey on the roads of quantum “weirdness” which is sure to cause nausea and also might test the airbags of your brains. If you have motion sickness called “I believe in determinism” or “I hate quantum stuff”, disclaimer: this article might make you sick and cause you to throw up. You have been warned…

Wave-particle Duality

The duality is always presented as a puzzle, a dilemma, a paradox or even a contradiction: always as something to be overcome and done away with. This idea has changed the whole notion of understanding of quantum theory. Particle theory could not explain thoroughly established facts of interference.

German physicist Albert Einstein first showed (1905) that, what had been considered a form of EM waves, must also be thought of as particle-like. In 1924, French physicist Louis de Broglie came with the wave nature of electrons. Wave nature of electrons was experimentally entrenched by American physicists Clinton Davisson and Lester Germer and independently by English physicist George Paget Thompson.

So the duality, even though it seems to be absurd, is the fundamental picture of the universe. And has to be duly accepted. Even if it has to be accepted, it is still difficult to comprehend the real nature of the quantum world, with its both wave and particle properties.

Copenhagen Interpretation

This interpretation was authored by Niels Bohr and Heisenberg in the 1920s. In this strange quantum world, a quantum particle exists in every possible state it can exist simultaneously. But when we try to observe, it the wave function collapses and we can only see one state. The Wave function is unobservable and the predictions are probabilistic and what makes the function collapse is mysterious.

This state of existing simultaneously in all possible states at once is called an object’s Coherent Superposition. For example, photons that exist in both wave & particle form that travel in both directions at once-makes up the object’s wave function. When we observe a quantum object, the superposition collapses and the object is forced into one of the possible states of its wavefunction.

Schrödinger’s Cat

We all have heard of Schrodinger’s famous diabolical thought experiment which he proposed in 1924. He set up a Geiger Counter in a box along with a bit of radioactive substance and put his cat in that box. The counter was designed so that when it sensed the decay of the radioactive material, it triggered a hammer which was poised to break a flask containing hydrocyanic acid, which when released, would kill the cat.

To avoid any certainty regarding the cat’s fate, the experiment was to take place within an hour. This was long enough so that some of the radioactive material could possibly decay, but short enough so that it was also possible none would.
The cat was sealed in the box, and it came to exist in an unknowable state. The cat was alive and dead at the same time until we observe it. It’s sort of like quantum physics’ answer to the old Zen question: If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

Many worlds interpretation

This theory was originated from Hugh Everett’s thesis which he had done under the guidance of John Wheeler which has bedeviled physicists since the 1920s. He was a brilliant mathematician and iconoclastic quantum theorist. This theory was quite ignored by everyone. It is the most cunning, enchanting and thought-provoking theory in all of the ways which quantum mechanics has been interpreted.

Everett was saying that it’s our concept of reality that’s at fault. We only think that there’s a single outcome of measurement because we only see one of those realities. But, the others have a separate physical existence too. He was trying to purport that the entire universe is described by an enormous wave function that contains it all possible realities. This “Universal wave function”, as Everett wrote it in his thesis.

The wave function is a mathematical expression that provides information about a particle’s all possibilities of location and its characteristics. Begin as a combination or superposition of all possible states of its constituent particles. As it evolves, superpositions break down, making certain realities distinct and isolated from one another. Worlds are not ‘created’ by measurement; they are just separated.

Many worlds interpretation and multiverse are totally different concepts. The multiverse is a hypothetical collection of myriads of observable universes containing different realities. Where MWI holds that there exist many worlds in parallel to our world in the same space and time as our own. In every event that happens in the quantum world, the world splits into all possible realities.

Decoherence And Quantum Problem

Decoherence is simply the loss of coherence in which the wavelike states of a Quantum system become uncoordinated and scrambled by their interactions with their environment. The waviness of particle gives rise to quantum effects like Superposition, entanglement and interference.

Decoherence, therefore, destroys these fundamentally quantum properties and the states start to behave more like distinct classical systems. Macroscopic objects don’t display quantum interference or exist in a superposition of states because their wave functions are decoherent.

Once the parallel quantum worlds have decohered, they spit and they lose causal influence on one another. Decoherence removes all interference between universes.
Quantum coherence is essentially what permits ‘quantumness’.The object remains in a coherent state until we measure it. Measurement somehow destroys quantum coherence.

Wigner’s thought experiment

winger thought experiment — [Image: MDPI]

In a famous ‘Wigner’s thought experiment’, Wigner put his friend Will in the laboratory with 0/1-measurement on the physical system. The superposition state of the lab is then a linear combination of ‘System is in state 0/ friend has measured 0’ and ‘System is in state 1/ friend has measured 1’. Winger’s idea can be used to formally prove that measurements in quantum mechanics are subjective to observers. There are observer-dependent theories like Quantum Bayesianism-agent’s actions and experiences are central concerns of the theory.

Whichever answer his friend gives Wigner would then assign the state. But he realized about his friend’s result that the superposition state of the laboratory collapses.
From his friend’s point of view, the measurement result was determined long before Winger had asked about it. And in turn the state of the physical system has already collapsed. Now the question is when exactly did the collapse occur?

Von Neumann’s catastrophe of infinite regression

Why there is something definite when we look at decoherence? Whatever particles were used to collapse another, what was used to collapse that particle? and so on.
The reason behind this is the wavefunction of a particle cannot be unentangled from whatever we used to measure by another they entangle. If one particle measures another, it inherits part of its wave function and that particle which is supposed to be measured cannot be fully explained without what it is measuring.

So we need another measuring device to collapse that initial measuring particle to a definite state. But then we need something else to collapse that measuring apparatus as well and so on. This creates a chain of material objects in a superposition of measuring which is known as a Von Neumann Chain.

We here need something nonlocal, outside the entire material system, which escapes this chain by not being bound by the same physical laws. A conscious observer is able to cause the final collapse of everything in the chain. A non-physical conscious observer is not required to explain the collapse of the wave function. Quantum system and its environment are always given purely with no true collapse.

What is happening with particle when it is going through a double-slit experiment is still a mystery. Which path particle took and why? Why wave function collapses? or is this all just about consciousness. Everyone has proposed their epistemological theories and put wondrous and capricious questions in front of the world. As Richard Feynman said “Double-slit experiment has in it the heart of quantum mechanics. In reality, it contains the only mystery.”

Atomic Dhruvi

Physics is never ending science, and science has never ending problems. Find out more about this here.

$3m Breakthrough Prize: Proteins Like Never Before Synthesized

Science

Harshil Bhanushali

-

September 30, 2020

1

$3m Breakthrough Prize: Proteins Like Never Before Synthesized

Ever since the Stone age, man has been swotting and evolving himself inspired by the most singularly crowned source which is Mother Nature itself. All the inventions and discoveries of the decades are somehow influenced by the elegant wonders of nature. But the most wonderful thing that nature has nurtured is Life itself. The complex, the simple, the tiny, and the big all are an extraordinary bioengineering feat of Mother Nature. However, the most stupendous bioengineering feat is the Human Body.

Just one living cell in the human body is, more complex than New York city
Linus Pauling

This Complicated architecture offers endless possibilities for innovation. It possesses a treasure trove of things that can be manufactured by itself only. For centuries we humans have been trying to synthesize these materials in the laboratory. And on the 10^thof September, the Breakthrough prize of $3M in Life Sciences (it’s a huge amount!!) was awarded to Dr. David Baker for synthesizing new kinds of protein through a Unique method. These proteins can also have a huge potential in therapeutic cure strategies of various diseases including Covid-19.

Breakthrough prize in Life sciences — Breakthrough Prize offered by Breakthrough Prize Board [Image- Breakthroughprize.org]

Dr. David Baker PhD in Biochemistry, Director of IPD — Dr. David Baker PhD Biochemistry. Director of IPD [Image- IPD]

Virus and Its Attachments with You

Viruses are a very dangerous and devilish (in my opinion!) class of organisms that exist on earth. They cannot survive and as such need a host to thrive. Now I believe there’s no introduction needed for one of the most potent and lethal viruses of today, and of course famous too is the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

Artistic rendering of coronavirus — Artistic Rendering of Coronavirus and ‘S’ domain [Image- FDA]

A SARS-CoV-2 virus is dotted all over their surface with Spike Glycoprotein domains or ‘S’ domain giving them a ‘crown’ like appearance giving them their distinctive name- “Corona Viruses”. Each ‘S ’ domain has around 20nm surface projection surrounding the periphery of Coronaviruses. Every ‘S’ domain has a small part on their surface which is essential to interact with endogenous receptors known as “Receptor Binding Domain”. How exactly does the virus bind?

ribbon protein structures of SARS-CoV-2 RBD and ACE2 receptor — RBD of SARS-CoV-2 and ACE2 human receptor ribbon structure [Image- nature.com]

RBD’s help the viruses to dock to the host cell just like rockets that dock to ISS. More importantly, they are the target sites for neutralizing antibodies and other therapeutic strategies. All the treatments and cures, target the RBD of any virus to prevent it from docking to the host cell and minimizing the chances of infection and virus replication.

Now if a person is infected, the virus binds to the host cell and fuses with it. The ribosome processes the RNA of the virus and starts replicating the virus. Once the ribosome creates viral proteins, it cannot be utilized unless it is cleaved by a protein called “Protease”. The work of this protein is to break the viral polypeptide chain into functional proteins. Now the Protease is a dimer of two identical protein chains and binding any one of them to a drug will prevent them from dimerizing, ultimately breaking the chain. This is another therapeutic strategy to prevent infection.

**The DE NOVO Approach**

The researchers at the Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, and the Baker Lab accepted the challenge. The team decided to bring a new player in the game, the Classical Supercomputer. Sorry, Quantum Computer, our old friend is here to stay. So the team used special software to design and synthesize proteins using two DE NOVO (to design from scratch) approaches.

computational designs and approaches — Overview of computational design approaches. a) design of helical proteins around ACE2 helix b) large scale *de novo* proteins
[Image- Sciencemag.org]

Their main goal was to synthesize proteins that would compete with ACE2 to bind with the RBD of the virus and inhibit its replication. Therefore they decided to make high-affinity protein minibinders. First, they incorporated the alpha helix from ACE2 into small designed proteins that make additional interactions with RBD. For this, they designed scaffolds (biologically temporary structures) around the ACE2 helix to map out its design. Next, they designed proteins from scratch. An advantage of the latter approach is that it offers a range of possibilities and greater diversities for design. For the first approach, the used the Rosetta blueprint binder while for the second approach they used RIF docking and large miniprotein binders.

RIF docking GIF — Rotamer Interaction field of a compound [Image- Wikipedia]

Armed with a large pool of minibinders, their main aim was to identify the one suitable candidate for the job: ‘Hitman’ (this is what I like to call it! Cool Nah?) The DS method identified three ACE2 helix scaffolded designs and 105 de novo designs.

Improvisation Is Key To Optimization

The modification of ACE2 scaffolded designs by PCR mutagenesis leads to a variant called AHB1 which binds to RBD with an affinity of 1nm. But the design had a low thermostability. Modifying the modified design AHB1, they found one particular design to be thermally stable.

Sequence mapping of AHB2, LCB1, and LCB3 — High-resolution sequence mapping of AHB2, LCB1, and LCB3 before sequence optimization [Image- Sciencemag.org]

For now, I told you that viruses dock with the ACE2 receptor. Exactly the RBD contains residues(open ends) of amino acid sequence chains that interact with the residues on the ACE2 receptor via hydrogen bonding. Why I’m saying this now will be relevant in the next para.

Out of the 105 minibinders, 50 of them made using approach 2 and 2^nd gen ACE2 scaffolded designs were used. They generated SSM libraries in which each of the residues were substituted with 20 of the amino acid one at a time. Using FACS methods, they were able to identify the 8 highest affinity designs. They selected designs: AHB2 and LCB1-LCB8 were found to bind the RBD with high affinity in a manner competed by the ACE2 receptor.

optimized designs and its affinity graphs — Optimized designs bind with high affinity to RBD competing with ACE2 receptor [Image- Sciencemag.org]

The CD spectra of purified minibinders were compatible with the design versions, and the melting temperature for most was > 90°C. And the best part is that they all retained full binding activity after 14 days at room temperature. AHB1/2 and LCB3 also displayed an affinity towards SARS-CoV RBD. An exciting and detailed analysis of the models by the cryoEM method revealed the consistencies of computational designs with experimental models. This shows that our old friend is not only highly accurate but also at the top of his game!

experimental and computational model comparison and overlay — CryoEM structures of AHB2, LCB1, and LCB3 consistent with the computational designs [Image- Sciencemag.org]

Counterpoising The Menace

Keeping track of all the ‘Hitmans’ and monitoring if they are doing their job properly. They observed that AHB1/AHB2 strongly neutralized the SARS-CoV-2 FFU with IC₅₀ values of 35 nM and 15.5 nM(nano-Molar). On close inspection, the de novo minibinders LHB1, and LHB3 were more potent in nullifying the threat. The observed IC₅₀ values were 23.54 pM and 48.1 pM(pico-Molar). IC₅₀ values refer to half of the max amount of substance needed to inhibit a given biological process or component.

IC50 value graphs of AHB1/2 and LCB1-5 — Neutralization of live virus by designed mini-protein inhibitors [Image- Sciencemag.org]

On a mass or molar basis these “Hyperstable Minibinders”, is a term coined by Dr. Baker. He also adds “Owing to the small size and stability of these proteins, they are 20 times more efficient than the most efficient monoclonal antibodies today(used in the same mass)!” The retention of activity even at elevated temperatures indicates that a Temperature controlled chain is not needed.

Binding The Present And Future

The cost of scaling up this technology is very less for much simpler mini proteins than antibodies production. According to Dr. Baker “The small size and stability also make it compliant for direct delivery into the respiratory tract via nebulization or dry aerosol powder.” Here Immunogenicity can be a bit of a problem. Immunogenicity is our body’s response to foreign molecules. So far, they didn’t observe any attack by human cell towards these proteins.

“Timing is very critical witnessing the current situation! Potent therapeutics are needed ASAP!!” He is very excited about his work and has decided to pour in all the prize money in the research. He says “Our lab’s sole aim is to bring today’s Biology out of the Stone Age!” With continuations in the development of the computational field, he believes such advancements would help to prepare against future pandemics.

If You Want Something New, You Have to Stop Doing Something Old!
Peter F. Drucker

Eustress or Distress? Know Your Stress for Better Living

Guest Post

Om Desai

-

September 29, 2020

7

Eustress or Distress? Know Your Stress for Better Living

So; you are stressed…

For many; in today’s world, stress refers to something negative, something not normal and something really bad for our life and lifestyle. Most of us don’t realize it, but stress is very natural and important part of our life.

Without stress, there will be no life at all !

When we talk about stress we usually refer to – distress. Distress results when our bodies overreact to events. It leads to what is called “Fight or Flight” reaction. That might be useful in times when our ancestors faced situations that translated to life and death mares. But, Lile did you know, there is another type of stress that helps to keep us alert, motivates us to face challenges and drives us to solve problems – eustress.

When we view something as manageable, our body remains calm, alert and takes decisions consciously and efficiently. When we react too strongly, we may run into physical and psychological problems.

Have you ever been called upon to give a presentation?
And… Your heart pounded loudly….
Your mouth went dry…
You couldn’t feel like you were breathing at all…
Your body temperature rose like
And you thought you just couldn’t do it? That’s overreaction.

Overcoming the stress and step towards better living

Organize Yourself:

Organizing your stuff and managing your time and energy helps you beat the constant stress hovering on your head. This, at the same time also reduces the chances of going super messy and disoriented repeatedly in short periods of time.

Take Control of Your Environment:

Well, I understand that you cannot control who is doing what in the world, but you can always control who and what is surrounding you. Managing things around you and having the right mindset can influence your work efficiency. As well as it reduces stress that builds when you want to do some work and be at peace.

Love Yourself:

How can you expect someone to love you when you don’t love yourself! Learn to forgive, have gratitude and be happy for what you have and who you are because you know exactly how hard things were at the lowest point of your life; how your pulled yourself out of bad times and how good you are at your best. So, cheer up buddy !

Reward Yourself:

This is important when you force yourself down a rabbit hole of endless workhours. This psychological trick also helps with motivation and reduces the chances of you being distracted as you know what you’re working for.

Exercise Your Body:

You do crave for dopamine, don’t you? You may have heard this a thousand times, but anyways, “Dopamine is a feel-good hormone” that is released in your brain. And it is responsible for that good mood you have after running a mile, or doing a HIIT workout.

So, 1 2 3 GO ! …….!

graph showing different types of stress and their effects — how following these useful points can affect your living (image: contentstack)

Relax Yourself:

Being Human is great, but Being Busy, not good. In order to be more productive rather than busy you need to be at peace not only while making decisions but also while executing them. This will help keep all the mindless chaer of the mind away and increase your focus. Hence, enhances efficiency. So, you need to calm down !

Rest Yourself:

You are not a robot, even they need downtime. Take breaks, rest well and order to maintain the only body and unfathomable mind you have. Studies have shown, downtime boost dopamine levels and productivity and reduces the effect of stress hormones.

Be Aware of Yourself:

You have the power to change and improve if an only if you are not only aware of your surroundings but also yourself. Here’s a tip: Every day when you go to bed, analyze your day, just briefly, do not overthink and complicate the matters, just view yourself and visualize with affirmations.

Feed Yourself:

FOOD… Believe me, this is one of the major factors that drives your productivity through the day.

Enjoy Yourself:

Love yourself, be happy and always keep smiling. This is reverse psychology, if you are not okay and yet fake happiness, it works ! Everytime ! Try it for yourself.

Better living comes with better thoughts. Having faith in yourself and keeping minds happy is the main key to a better living. Remember, it is not the stress that kills oneself, it is our reaction towards it. More importantly, it is also said that tension and stress are things that someone thinks who should he/she be. at the same time, relaxation and calmness in mind are things he/she think who they actually are. And believe me, this makes the difference for sure in real world.

The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over the other.
William James

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Stellar Evolution Part 2: The Death of Stars

Keith Kamson Fernandes

-

September 28, 2020

2

Stellar Evolution Part 2: The Death of Stars

In the previous article, we spoke on how stars are born. In this one, we will talk about how do they evolve from a newborn star and then how they eventually die. The death of the stars is not the end as they go on to form Planetary Nebula and White Dwarf. These stars also leave stellar remnants like the Black Hole and Neutron Star which we’ll be discussing about in the future. (if you missed the previous article click here as this article is the continuation to it)

Continuation to the Life Cycle of a Star

4. Mature Star

As the Star has just entered the main sequence (read the previous article on the birth of a star to know more), its temperatures are about 10 million Kelvin (or 10⁷ K) which is the minimum temperature required for hydrogen to fuse with helium. As at this temperature, the hydrogen nuclei (or protons) have enough speed to overcome the electromagnetic repulsion between them as helium nuclei carry a greater positive charge, and their electromagnetic repulsion is higher.

This image is a colour composite made from exposures from the Digitized Sky Survey 2 (DSS2). It shows the area around the red supergiant star Betelgeuse. (Image: ESA/Hubble)

Now the temperature at the core is too low for helium fusion, due to which the hydrogen there begins to deplete and the nuclear reactions eventually subside. As a result, the location of the burning moves to the higher layers of the core leading the inner core of non-burning pure helium to glow. However, without nuclear burning to maintain it, the outward pushing gas pressure weakens in the inner helium core, but the inward gravitational pull does not change. As soon as hydrogen becomes substantially depleted, about 10 billion years after the stars enters the main sequence, the helium core begins to contract.

Hydrogen Shell Burning As a star’s core converts more and more of its hydrogen into helium, the hydrogen in the shell surrounding the nonburning helium “ash” burns ever more violently. — **Hydrogen Shell Burning** As a star’s core converts more and more of its hydrogen into helium, the hydrogen in the shell surrounding the nonburning helium “ash” burns ever more violently.

The shrinking helium core starts to release gravitational energy, increasing the central temperature of the star, leading the overlying layers to heat up and causing the hydrogen in there to fuse even more rapidly than before. Due to this, the hydrogen shell generates energy faster than it did in the main sequence and the shell’s energy production increases continuously as the helium core contracts. A strange noticed is that even though the disappearance of the nuclear fire at its center, star begins to get brighter.

Formation of Southern Crab nebula illustrates its hourglass-shared structure, that has been created by the interaction between a pair of stars at its centre: a red giant and a white dwarf. The red giant is shedding its outer layers in the last phase of its life before it too lives out its final years as a white dwarf. (Image: ESA/Hubble)

The pressure exerted by the hydrogen burning causes the star’s non-burning outer layers to increase in radius. Not even gravity can stop them. Even as the core heats up and shrinks, the overlying layers continue to cool and expand. The star, now aged and unbalanced, is on its way to becoming a red giant. This change from a main sequence star to a red giant takes about 100 million years.

The simultaneous contraction of the red giant’s core and expansion of its non-burning layers surrounding the core doesn’t continue forever. A few hundred million years, after the star leaves the main sequence, the central temperature reaches 100 million Kelvin (or 10⁸ K) needed for helium to fuse into carbon, the nuclear fires reignite. Once the burning starts, the core cannot respond fast enough to the rapidly changing conditions within it and the temperatures sharply rises in a runaway explosion called helium flash.

Eventually, the star’s core expands, its density drops and the outward gas pressure push and inward gravity pull comes under a balanced equilibrium. The now stable core, begins to burn helium into carbon at temperatures well above 100 million Kelvin (or 10⁸ K). As helium fuses to become carbon, a new carbon-rich inner core begins to form and a similar phenomenon to the build-up of helium core occurs. Now the helium that the helium has depleted, the fusion has ceased. The non-burning carbon core continues to shrink in size (even as mass increases due to helium fusion) and heats up as gravity pulls it inward, causing the hydrogen and helium burning rates in the overlying layers to increase.

The star now has a contracting carbon inner core surrounded by a burning helium shell, which in turn is surrounded by a hydrogen-burning shell. The outer envelope of the star expands, much as it did in the first red giant stage. Thus, becoming a swollen red giant once again, but the burning rates in the outer shells are fiercer as compared to the first time. In addition, the radius and luminosity are higher as compared to the first red giant and as the carbon core continues to shrink, the outer helium and hydrogen burning shells attain higher and higher temperatures and luminosities.

Helium Shell Burning Within a few million years after the onset of helium burning, carbon ash accumulates in the star’s inner core — **Helium Shell Burning** Within a few million years after the onset of helium burning, carbon ash accumulates in the star’s inner core

5. Planetary Nebula & White Dwarf

The aging star has now reached its predicament. As its carbon core is practically dead, while the outer helium and hydrogen burning shells consume fuel at an increasing and furious rate. As it expands, cools and reascends, the star begins to fall apart. As the intense radiation starts coming from within, the outer shells slowly begin to drift away into interstellar space. Slowly at first, then more rapidly as the luminosity of the core increases, the star loses its entire outer shells or envelopes in less than a million year.

his rounded object, named NGC 2022 is a vast orb of gas in space, cast off by an ageing star. The star is visible in the orb's centre, shining through the gases it formerly held onto for most of its stellar life. — This rounded object, named NGC 2022 is a vast orb of gas in space, cast off by an ageing star. The star is visible in the orb’s centre, shining through the gases it formerly held onto for most of its stellar life. (Image: ESA/Hubble)

The star, a former red giant now consists of two distinct parts: the exposed inner core and the escaping outer shell or envelope. As the core exhausts its last remaining fuel, it contracts and heats up. Eventually, it becomes so hot that its ultraviolet radiation ionizes the inner parts of the surrounding cloud, producing a spectacular display called a Planetary Nebula. In addition, the core becomes the White Dwarf shining only by the stored heat, not by nuclear reactions. This object has a white-hot surface when it first becomes visible, although it appears dim because of its small size.

This Hubble image gives the most detailed view of the entire Crab Nebula ever. The Crab is among the most interesting and well studied objects in astronomy. (Image: ESA/Hubble)

Theese stars also leave stellar remnants like the Black Hole and Neutron Stars which we’ll be discussing about in the future. So please do look forward to it. (Click Here)

Biggest Myth-busters of the Acceleration and Acceleration due to Gravity

Roshan Raj

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September 26, 2020

0

Biggest Myth-busters of the Acceleration and Acceleration due to Gravity

Understanding the nature, taking abstract out of it and doing better has always been a dream for humans. Some of the great thinkers from the history, like Galileo and Einstein have proved and gave some of the incredible theories to the world which seems to fulfil this dream. But were they, completely right? Were their theories definitely unquestionable? Don’t worry, we are not here to prove them wrong, but will try to resolve the conceptual opposition amongst us regarding acceleration and acceleration due to gravity.

Short disclaimer before you read the baffling article further, some may feel themselves out of this world after visualizing the gist of whole article. Some may get confused in between, so its advisable to take a pen and paper to tackle my words. Please hold your pen and paper…

Did you really do that?

Haa haa, I was just kidding. Feel free to read.

Now I request,

Just think of…

(this time take it seriously 😊)

Case 1:

freely falling box with woman inside it due to acceleration due to gravity

A pretty woman is inside a freely falling box (say in vacuum). Woman and the box is falling with the same magnitude of acceleration in the field of gravity. The woman feels like weightlessness.

Case 2:

woman inside box and box pulled by chains

A woman is inside the box and the box is pulled by chains to move upward in space i.e. absence of gravitation fields near-by the system. The woman who was inside it, would get strike to the floor of the box as the box gets pulled by chains. The woman feels like a pseudo gravitational force attracting her towards the floor.

Now I ask two questions based on the above cases.

Q1. Why in case-2 the simple woman doesn’t feel weightlessness?

Q2. Why in case-1 the pretty woman was not strike to the floor?

Simple answers to these, can easily deduced based on the results of Galileo’s experiment.

Galileo droping object from tower of pisa

Galileo did an experiment from the Leaning Tower of Pisa, which showed that gravity attracts everything irrespective of their masses with the same acceleration toward the centre of gravity. By this known information we can also answer the Q2.

So, What can Be Interpreted?

Since both, woman and box were equally accelerated by gravity, the woman felt like weightlessness. Note here that, this particular logic may not be analytically correct, but I want you to visualize like this way only, as this will help us to proceed in our imagination.

Now consider the principles of equivalence given by A. Einstein, which say

” it is impossible to know for the body with brain inside the box if it’s standing on floor is either due to box being placed on the massive planet or that box is accelerating like rocket with same acceleration as that of respective planet have. ” .

equivalence principle regarding acceleration and acceleration due to gravity — image: Cornell University

Thus, for sure we can say that, in Case-2, where the woman who was inside the box will not feel weightlessness, as she was not accelerated by chains with the same amount as the chained box was accelerated. Since only Box was chained not the lady, gravity is different for accelerating things.

Case-1 follows the Galileo experiment but chained box(case-2) doesn’t.

For case 1,

We may perceive this freely falling box with woman inside as two invisible chains pulling the system down. Out of which, one attached to box and other attached to the woman and pulling them downward with same acceleration. So, as both are accelerated equally woman feels weightlessness

But for case-2

We actually see that box is only attached to chain and there is no concept of invisible chain for the woman inside the box as assumed in Case-1. So only Box accelerated leaving the lady to strike the floor of the box as we saw in case-2. Thus, can it be concluded that gravity is different from acceleration?

& Gravity does cause acceleration but acceleration doesn’t cause gravity. This is because gravity acts equally to each part of the system (both box and the woman) by invisible chains resulting in attractions, in which each part feels weightlessness with respect to each other. But in case of acceleration, it only acts on those to which acceleration is given (applied). It does not follow the concept of invisible chains for every part of the system like gravity. In this way acceleration is different from gravitational acceleration. These results induce us to think again over the principles of equivalence given by Einstein, as these principles established the equivalence between mechanical acceleration and gravitational acceleration.!

Let’s dream and draw to get better with Acceleration and Acceleration due to gravity!

After much thinking on similar topics I found that there could be four cases at all, we must create them to visualize the ambiguous relationship between gravity and acceleration.

Divide a paper in four quadrants similar to the X-Y plane. This time bring a man in our story. (Now here you may require a pen and paper! 😊) .

● In the 1st quadrant:

Imagine that a spaceship is accelerated forward, so that the passenger was nicely able to stand on the base of the spaceship and feel gravity due to acceleration of the spaceship.

● In the 2nd quadrant:

man standing on planet surface due to gravity

Imagine that the man along with the box is standing on the surface of an isolated massive planet due to gravity.

● In the 3rd quadrant:

man inside box under free fall because acceleration due to gravity

Imagine that the man inside the box is under free fall along with the box under acceleration due to gravity.

● In 4th quadrant:

spaceship without nearby celestial bodies

Imagine that the space ship containing the man is isolated in space without nearby celestial bodies.

In these above-mentioned quadrant cases we find that in the 1st and 2nd quadrant, man is feeling a downward pull by acceleration of spaceship and gravitational force by a massive planet respectively, letting him to stand still. In the other two cases we find the man is feeling weightlessness due to acceleration due to gravity and absence of gravitation pull nearby in space.

Our initial case 1 and case 2 are also encapsulated in these four quadrant imaginative cases. But those two cases, I feel carry the potential to distinguish between g and a.

However, I noticed kind of opposition/non- compatibility/asymmetry in my recent write-ups of the four cases above. 1st and 2nd have provided the same outcome despite different systems or situations given. The 1st has a dynamic scenario and the 2nd has a static scenario.

Does it mean we tricked the nature? And why different situations provided the same outcome?

What I felt like is as follows:

If two experiments appear differently and give exactly the same result however then there must exist a frame of vision in which we can perceive both experiments as actually one single experiment. Here I feel that there must be one common interpretation of case 1st -2nd pair and 3rd-4th pairs. There must be a common way to visualize both, accelerating ship and planet as one common thing i.e. if results are the same of two different appearing equations then equations in principle must be having one single manifestation. There should be no duality.

Same is true for 3rd and 4th cases as here 3rd has dynamic scenario and 4th has static scenario which is actually opposite to the previous couple. Also, here we got the opposite outcome of standing i.e. floating in isolation(weightlessness).

Note that case 2nd and 3rd are done in proximity of a massive planet, having dependence on planet’s gravity and

1st and 4th case are imagined in outer space where ship having dependence on value of acceleration of ship. It seems that what is dynamic in absence of gravitation field (spaceship) is equivalent to that which is static in presence of gravitation field (massive planet) and vice versa. This, is what equivalence principle establish. We right now don’t know why this oppositions were there, but maybe this can be known when we will get to think much deeper than this, we will have to resolve this conceptual opposition in near future. Till then enjoy and observe the nature. And stay tuned here for further findings regarding this.

To read about more of such bizarre new theories and explorations. Click Here.

Deep Oceans can have Modern Engineering Solutions

Umakant Bohara

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September 25, 2020

2

Deep Oceans can have Modern Engineering Solutions

“Look deep into the nature and then you will understand everything better”

-Albert Einstein

A consequence of millions of years of continuous improvement through natural selection, nature appears to have a solution for everything – find out how nature has aided humans in solving contemporary world problems.

Despite the improbable inventiveness and engineering expertise, humans have demonstrated over the past millennia, we are continuously looking for new inspiration and ways to enhance our designs. Given, evolution has the advantage of millions of years of trial and error to rectify its patterns in nature, it is sensible that human development can benefit in enticing from its influence.

When we think about sponges, we tend to think of something soft and squishy. But researchers are using the glassy skeletons of marine sponges, found in deep-sea as inspiration for the next generation of engineering; including taller and stronger buildings, more sustained bridges, and lighter spacecraft.

Venus’ Flower Basket: The Deep Sea Sponge

Group of Venus’ flower basket sea sponges inspiring engineering — Group of Venus’ flower basket sea sponges
[Image: OER]

Venus’ Flower Basket (Euplectella aspergillum) is a marine sponge that lives anchored to the deep ocean floors in the Pacific Ocean. This animal has a seemingly delicate body, but the tube-shaped sculpture stands 10-30 cm tall and feeds on planktons by filtering the seawater flowing through the body. Their cylindrical skeleton is made of silica which is the main component of glass, hence the name glass sponges. Venus’ flower basket’s skeleton is tough and durable owing to its composition and arrangements, unlike glass which is usually brittle and fragile.

Dried skeleton of a Euplectella glass sponge. inspiring engineering — Dried skeleton of a Euplectella glass sponge inspiring engineering

The sponge’s glass skeleton is built up of spicules and tubule structures of concentric layers of amorphous hydrated silica insulated by thin organic layers, like a pastry with just a dash of sweet cream between flaky crusts. But these small organic layers play a major role in imparting a considerable toughness to the structure. Biomineralization is also seen in organisms such as the abalone, but the mineral portion does not seem to have a natural crystalline arrangement as detected in the glass sponges.

Experiments insinuate that the silica layers are composed of colloidal spheres of silica about 50 to 200 nm in diameter, which is in turn made up of smaller spheres about 2.8 nanometers in diameter. For comparison, the smallest sand grains on a beach are about 60 nm in diameter.

Each spicule has alternating layers of inorganic silica and organic compounds, which covers the central protein filament. The inorganic layers are composed of hydrated silica nanoparticles and are relatively rigid. However, the organic layers appear to be weaker but absorb energy. This layered organization of the alternating firm and weak layers can limit fractures at the surface of a spicule from expanding deep into the core.

Engineering Inspiration: Taller Building and Sturdy Bridges

According to the research paper published in Nature Materials, the researchers from Harvard’s Wyss Institute and SEAS attested that the diagonally-reinforced square lattice, as observed in the skeletal structure of Euplectella aspergillum, a deep-water marine sponge, has a higher strength-to-weight ratio than the traditional lattice designs that have been adopted for the construction of buildings and bridges since past few centuries.

Close-up of the Venus’ flower basket’s square lattice skeleton inspiring engineering.

Further, for a given amount of material, the sponge’s diagonal reinforcement strategy delivers the highest buckling resistance, which on implementing to a greater scale can build stronger and more resilient structures by effectively reconstructing existing material within the structure. Diagonal lattice architectures use multiple small, closely spaced diagonal beams to evenly distribute applied loads and can be found in covered bridges and storage shelf made of metal. This geometry was patented in the early 1800s, as a method to make sturdy bridges out of lightweight and cheap materials.

Apparently, such square lattices in construction are not optimal, require a greater amount of material, and limit the height of the design. One of the main aims of this research was to make these structures more efficient from the perspective of material allocation; achieving the same strength using less material.

engineering inspiration — Credit: Peter Allen, Ryan Allen, and James C. Weaver/Harvard SEAS

The glass sponges are otherwise known as Venus’ Flower Basket supports its tubular body by employing two sets of parallel diagonal skeletal struts, which intersect over and are fused to an underlying square grid, to form a robust checkerboard-like pattern.

The researchers used simulations and computational approaches for replicating this design and compared existing lattice geometries to the sponge’s skeletal architecture. The sponge design proved to be more optimized and better, it could withstand more load without buckling. The researchers also observed improvement in overall structural strength by more than 20 percent due to the paired parallel crossed-diagonal structure.

All this was achieved without the need to add extra new material.

“Our research demonstrates that lessons learned from the study of sponge skeletal systems can be exploited to build structures that are geometrically optimized to delay buckling, with huge implications for improved material use in modern infrastructural applications,” said Katia Bertoldi, Ph.D., a former Associate Faculty member of the Wyss Institute. The biologically-inspired geometry could pave the way towards designing lighter, stronger structures for extensive applications and indeed a marvel to engineering.

With inspiration of mother nature and perseverance to build most useful and stand-out engineering; we humans have evolved a lot.

To know how engineering will help in developing cleaner and greener energy storage options; Click Here

The Best PUBG Mobile alternatives out there in 2020

Jay Shinde

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September 24, 2020

2

The Best PUBG Mobile alternatives out there in 2020

The year 2020 has been a total disaster, starting with the Covid-19 pandemic to the tensions between India and China leading to the ban of PUBG Mobile in India. The last one hit us hard, as PUBG Mobile was the leading online multiplayer battle royale game with a player base of over 50 million Indians. Now that PUBG Mobile is being banned, most of the players are trying to find a good alternative with a similar experience as PUBG Mobile. So in this article, I’ll be discussing the top 3 PUBG Mobile alternatives out there on Play Store and aren’t banned.

Call of Duty Mobile

COD Mobile is the latest game in the Call of Duty franchise which was released back in October 2019 and its been killing out there in the mobile gaming scene. The game is amazingly polished, and brags its solid mechanics. It obviously has the 100-player battle Royale, but the Multiplayer part of the game is something else. It is a really fast paced and intensive PvP in smaller maps.

There are many modes to choose from like Hardpoint, Domination, Search and Destroy, Team Death match and many more. These matches are quicker and test your skills in the CQB (Close Quarter Battles). There are also tons of maps to choose from. The special features about the Multiplayer part are the score streaks and operator skills that make the matches really thrilling and engaging.

As for the Battle Royale, consider it similar to the PUBG Mobile’s Payload mode, with just a lot of new features sprinkled on top. It does have an amazing vehicle and movement mechanics though. Also there are a variety of classes that you can choose from, that assist you like the one called Poltergeist that makes you nearly invisible for a short amount of time or Trickster that creates 2 holograms which can distract the enemy.

These are just 2 of the 12 classes in the game with the other classes offering varied skills. You can also drive a tank that is dropped towards the end of the game and you can even choose your own guns before the match and get them in the airdrops.

It has very smooth and realistic graphics and is also compatible on fairly average handsets. There are also many interesting features like operator skills, score streaks etc. but the latest gunsmith update makes the game much more versatile. One can literally customize each and every aspect of their gun from the muzzle to the optics to even the rear grip which can help fit your play style. This is the best fit for all the PUBG players and even for the content creators as there is a lot of content to cover and also new content is added every single month.

Fortnite Battle Royale

Fortnite Battle Royale is a game published by Epic Games and was a hit as soon as it was released. It was primarily released for PC, PS4 and Xbox, but later on in mid 2018, it was released for Android and iOS. The one thing that attracts players from all around the world is the building aspect. While in a match, one can build walls, stairs, roofs and even place traps. This aspect of the game makes it really competitive and intense. With the latest update they have added marvel heroes.

You can find different weapons and superpowers spread across the map and use them to achieve the “VICTORY ROYALE”. This game has been following a story line since the Season 1 and there are live events every other month which are really cool. The game gets updated regularly and new skins are added to the item shop on a weekly basis.

The only downside about Fortnite is that since it is a cross-platform game you need a pretty hefty device, as the mid-range phone might not cut it. Other than that this game is really nice to play and the gameplay is also smooth. I would definitely recommend trying Fortnite as another alternative for PUBG.

As Fortnite Battle Royale isn’t listed on Google Play Store so you can download it from Epic Games or use the above link

Garena Free Fire

Garena Free Fire is a survival shooter game very much similar to PUBG Mobile. Each 10 minute game places you on a remote island where you are pit against 49 other players, all seeking survival. Players freely choose their starting point with their parachute, and aim to stay in the safe zone for as long as possible. Drive vehicles to explore the vast map, hide in trenches, or become invisible by proning under grass. Ambush, snipe, survive, there is only one goal: to survive and answer the Call of Duty.

If you are a Hardcore PUBG Mobile fan but don’t have a great device then, this should be your go to option. It’s not required for you to have a high spec phone to run this game. You can run the game even with a 1GB RAM device, but it is recommended to have a 2GB RAM device for smooth graphics. Even if this game seems to be on the lower end, it is pretty fun. The developers also put in a lot of effort to update the game and add new content with every season. You should definitely try it out.

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Black hole – a waterfall in space-time…

The Reissner- Nordström black hole…

Falling into a Reissner- Nordström black hole.

The map:

Through the outer horizon:

Through the inner horizon:

Through the wormhole:

Back out through the inner horizon:

Through the white hole:

Through the outer horizon:

Electric Mobility and IC Engines

Market Summary in the View of E-Mobility

Emissions from the Internal Combustion Engine and the Environment

Quantum Field Theory and the particles

The Standard Model

When someone tells you “You don’t understand me…” just tell him/her “You are full of quantum fields and I don’t understand it”

Theory of everything and the unsolvable equation

The Different Teaching Methods

The Socratic Learning Method

How Is The Socratic Method Different From A Debate?

A Look At The Cons

Scientist’s shopping listItem – Bucky BallPrice – only $167 million per gram

Spiderman of the Chemicals: This Superfluid can climb the wall

Every Hydrogen Atom in your body is likely to be 13.5 Billion Years Old

Car Accidents can be “Toxic” now-a-days!!

Well known chemist Glenn Seaborg was the only person to write his name and address in chemical elements

Rarest of the Rarest it is!!

Peace of Mind or Noise of Heartbeats?!!

1. White Dwarf (The most common remnant)

How is it formed?

2. Neutron Star

How is it formed?

3. Black Holes

How is it formed?

What are Black holes?

Black hole entropy paradox.

The new paradox…

Hawking Radiation…

Building up the background

Seeking help from the history

Coming back to the originality to reality

Understanding with a simple example

The juggling of equations starts here…

is the change in displacement from point A to B along in time period under inertial reference frame S.

Into the final stretch of reality – Just there…

Culminations and Codas on reality of Relativistic Mass Concept

How large is the Universe’s Largest Camera?

Parts That Make The Heart

The Holy Grail of LSST

The Discovery of Triplet Spin Superconductivity in Diamonds

Bhattacharyya and his team worked with excitement for the practical evidence of triplet superconductivity in diamonds.

Things that thrilled the Scientists !

So why is that? Is it too hard? Is it not appealing to their brains? They don’t like to study Organic Chemistry?

How and What did they do?

The three changes in brain from organic chemistry:

First:

Second:

Third:

Conclusions and Merits in Brain Memory from Studying Organic Chemistry:

Puzzle 1: The Strong CP Problem…

Puzzle 2: Dark matter…

Puzzle 3: Baryon Asymmetry…

Wave-particle Duality

Copenhagen Interpretation

Schrödinger’s Cat

Many worlds interpretation

Decoherence And Quantum Problem

Wigner’s thought experiment

Von Neumann’s catastrophe of infinite regression

Virus and Its Attachments with You

The DE NOVO Approach

Improvisation Is Key To Optimization

Counterpoising The Menace

Binding The Present And Future

Scientist’s shopping list
Item – Bucky Ball
Price – only $167 million per gram

$\dpi{150} dx$ is the change in displacement from point A to B along in time period under inertial reference frame S.

**The DE NOVO Approach**