Applied Physics

Gray's Paradox Resolved: Dolphins Do Have Enough Muscle To Go That Fast Without Tricks

When E. F. Thompson stood on the deck of a ship cruise ship the Indian Ocean in the 1930s and observed a dolphin speed past the vessel in 7 seconds, he had no idea that this single observation would lead Sir James Gray to formulate the enduring paradox th ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 1 2014 - 1:09pm

3D Dirac Fermions: Natural 3D Counterpart To Graphene Discovered

The discovery of what is essentially a 3D version of graphene – the 2D sheets of carbon through which electrons race at many times the speed at which they move through silicon- could lead to much faster transistors and far more compact hard drives. Resear ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 17 2014 - 12:14pm

Making More Comfortable Shoes- The Science Approach

Researchers recently got 54 volunteers to try on free shoes. But this wasn't for fun, it was for a biomechanical study of the shoes manufactured by the Majorcan Camper brand. The six designs of men's and women's footwear were then analyzed u ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 19 2014 - 1:01pm

Biodegradable Battery Runs On Sugar

A new battery that runs on sugar has an "unmatched energy density", according to the team behind it. Other sugar batteries have been developed but energy density has always been the problem. There is a reason gasoline is still popular after 150 ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 21 2014 - 1:27pm

Why Beer Can Act Like A "Nuclear Explosion"- Cavitation

Why does beer transform from a liquid to a foamy state after an impact? Science is on the wave propagation case. As you know, if you shake a carbonated beverage, it will foam over when you open it. But one messy and slightly dangerous bar trick involves h ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 3 2015 - 5:46pm

Lego Video Car

I was able to find the EYESPY Spydercam at Goodwill. Several hacks for it came to mind, but the simplest is attaching it to a remote control vehicle. I have an old Lego remote control car that’s been gathering dust so I decided to use it for this article. ...

Article - Steve Schuler - Jan 29 2014 - 2:12pm

Snakes Are A Plane? The Physics Of Snakes That Fly

What would make snakes scarier? For spiders, the answer is easy. If you see one big enough to be feasting on Orc flesh in the caves under Mt. Doom, run, but snakes are tougher to make scary because they are slow. Not all of them. Snakes may not look aerod ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 30 2014 - 8:51am

Passing The Carnot Limit: Prototyping Of A Single Ion Heat Engine

Heat engines transform heat into mechanical energy with the corresponding efficiency of an Otto engine amounting to only about 25 percent, which is what your automobile gets. The efficiency of heat engines powered by thermal heat reservoirs is determined b ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 3 2014 - 10:53am

Leeuwenhoek Microscope From CD-ROM Drive Parts

This build is a simplified Leeuwenhoek microscope made from CD-ROM drive parts and construction toys. My initial design was simply a rectangle of corrugated cardboard with a hole punched in it and one of the glass spheres from the Chem C3000 kit, but the m ...

Article - Steve Schuler - Dec 18 2014 - 1:58pm

Phonon Lasers? At The Atomic Scale, Sound Is A Lot Like Light

You learned in high school that light has a dual nature- it exists as both waves and photons. It is this duality of light that enables the coherent transport of photons in lasers.  Physicists know that, at the atomic-scale, sound has the same dual nature, ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 5 2014 - 6:35pm