Is David Beckham a keen physicist?   Though he wouldn't know how to do the equations on a chalkboard, he certainly does it in his head and then with his feet - so perhaps he is an experimental physicist at heart.

I've often used baseball to talk about concepts such as drag, the Bernoulli principle, Reynolds number and the Magnus effect but Beckham's ability to curve the football so much can teach the same things.

The Bernoulli effect tells us faster moving air reduces pressure and a pressure difference is on either side of the ball  creates a net force called the Magnus effect:

   Velocity      Drag

A new strain of bacteria  can produce non-toxic, comparatively inexpensive rhamnolipids and effectively help degrade polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs – the environmental pollutants that are one of the most harmful aspects of oil spills.

The findings on this new bacterial strain, NY3, of a common bacteria that has been known of for decades, called Pseudomonas aeruginosa, that degrades the PAHs in oil and other hydrocarbons were just published in Biotechnology Advances by researchers from Oregon State University and two collaborating universities in China.   Because of some unique characteristics, this new bacterial strain could be of considerable value in the long-term cleanup of the massive Gulf Coast oil spill caused by BP.

Introduction

Green Pastures And Still Waters


The most fascinating episode in my entire life was the day I witnessed ice growing from needle-like frazil through all phases into white ice.  There had been no snow, and I had seen no ice elsewhere that day. 

The location was a canal in the English countryside.  There was a classic stone arch bridge, a gentle cold breeze and a venturi effect. 

Unfitted Up ?


This article starts off with some serious points about science and law.

It will become apparent soon enough why I have posted this under 'humor'.

Please bear with me.


Unfitted up?

Being 'fitted up' means being 'framed' - being on the receiving end of criminal charges founded on false evidence.

It occurs to me that if a person is acquitted through the framing of a defence based on false evidence, or the bad 'framing' by the judge of good evidence then the expression 'unfitted up' might be apt.


Means, motive, opportunity + ?

actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea

The 2010 World Cup will be watched online by nearly a third of British football fans, according to a survey released today by PC World. They questioned over 3,000 Brits in the run up to the World Cup following a surge in sales of its wireless networking and video streaming gadgets.

What did they find?

 30% of fans, which equates to over 14 million of those expected to watch the World Cup live, are planning on doing so over the Internet.

Nearly a quarter (23%) revealed they would be using laptops or desktop PCs.

In the tragic Huntsville shootings reported in Nature News Feature (Life after Death. http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100512/full/465150a.html. Nature 465, 150-155; 2010), Amy Bishop, an Assistant Professor in the University of Alabama’s biology department, methodically shot her colleagues during a departmental meeting, killing three and seriously injury three others.

Long after the shots rang out during that fateful departmental meeting, the ordeal still continues to haunt the victim’s families as well as students and trainees in the now shattered department. While colleagues pitch in to bring the department back to life, one could not help but ask why this horrible crime was committed. Why would an assistant professor do the unthinkable?

Is Eyjafjallajökull Playing Possum?



Since the April and early May grounding of aircraft in much of Europe, the Eyjafjallajökull eruption has been producing - relatively - much less plume and appears to be dying down.  It is natural to ask: is Eyjafjallajökull playing possum, or does the volcano still pose a risk to European airspace?


Southern Iceland. Part of MODIS/ Terra image:
http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?subset=Arctic_r01c03.2010153...

Players, most loudly in Brazil, are not happy with the Jabulani ball in use for World Cup 2010 and have made no secret about it recently - despite it being in use for months.    There hasn't been this much controversy over a World Cup ball since ... well ... the last World Cup, when the ball was called too smooth.

So will things get even weirder since the 2010 ball has new ridges and grooves?    They sure will, say physics experts at the University of Adelaide who believe the new Jabulani ball will play "harder and faster", bending even more unpredictably than its predecessor.

But why, and what will it mean for the World Cup?