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Category: energy – Page 320

Experiment reverses the direction of heat flow

Heat flows from hot to cold objects. When a hot and a cold body are in thermal contact, they exchange heat energy until they reach thermal equilibrium, with the hot body cooling down and the cold body warming up. This is a natural phenomenon we experience all the time. It is explained by the second law of thermodynamics, which states that the total entropy of an isolated system always tends to increase over time until it reaches a maximum. Entropy is a quantitative measure of the disorder in a system. Isolated systems evolve spontaneously toward increasingly disordered states and lack of differentiation.

An experiment conducted by researchers at the Brazilian Center for Research in Physics (CBPF) and the Federal University of the ABC (UFABC), as well as collaborators at other institutions in Brazil and elsewhere, has shown that quantum correlations affect the way entropy is distributed among parts in thermal contact, reversing the direction of the so-called “thermodynamic arrow of time.”

In other words, heat can flow spontaneously from a cold object to a hot object without the need to invest energy in the process, as is required by a domestic fridge. An article describing the experiment with theoretical considerations has just been published in Nature Communications.

This Startup Wants To Use A Hypersonic Catapult To Throw Satellites Directly Into Space By 2022

A secretive startup has been awarded a launch contract for the U.S. military using a rather novel launch system – based on kinetic energy technology that would essentially shoot satellites directly into space using a hypersonic vehicle.

Last week on Wednesday, June 19, California-based company SpinLaunch announced they had secured a launch contract with the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD). They didn’t release any further details, other than noting it was a “responsive launch prototype contract… for kinetic energy-based launch services.”

SpaceX launches hefty rocket with 24 satellites

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — SpaceX launched its heftiest rocket with 24 research satellites Tuesday, a middle-of-the-night rideshare featuring a deep space atomic clock, solar sail, a clean and green rocket fuel testbed, and even human ashes.

It was the third flight of a Falcon Heavy rocket, but the first ordered up by the military.

The Defense Department mission, dubbed STP-2 for Space Test Program, is expected to provide data to certify the Falcon Heavy — and reused boosters — for future national security launches. It marked the military’s first ride on a recycled rocket.

Moon Parka is made from synthetic spider silk

Outdoor sport brand Goldwin and Japanese company Spiber developed the Moon Parka, a ski jacket made from synthetic spider silk.

The parka was originally to be released by The North Face, marketed by Goldwin, in 2016, but its release was postponed. Back then, Spiber’s QMONOS was said to be the world’s first successfully-produced synthetic spider silk material (since then, other brands have succeeded in making products with this material, like Bolt Threads and Adidas).

Currently, most sports apparel is made from synthetic materials such as polyester and nylon. These materials are made using petroleum, and consume massive amounts of energy to produce.

This Homemade Rail Gun Shoots ‘Ionized Plasma’ Bullets

Of all the crazy garage-built weapons I’ve ever come across, this one from YouTuber/tinkerer Alex Smyth is definitely one of the craziest. Aside from the fact that it looks like a prop that was stolen from the set of District 9, Smyth’s “phased plasma” gun doesn’t just fire normal projectiles. It’s actually designed to fire rounds filled with ionized plasma, which in turn should, at least in theory, explode on impact.

If you’re unfamiliar, a railgun is a type of weapon that uses electricity instead of gunpowder to fire a projectile. Leveraging a phenomenon called the Lorentz Force, rail guns work by delivering a high power electric pulse to a pair of conductive rails, which in turn generates a magnetic field and rapidly accelerates the bullet situated between them.

Smyth’s gun is a bit different, though. Rather than using straight rails, his build features a pair of rails that are twisted to form a double helix. According to Smyth, this gives the projectile some spin and extra stability, just like the rifling on a firearm barrel would provide for a normal bullet. The only difference is that, in lieu of a regular metal projectile, Smyth’s gun is designed to fire glass vacuum tubes filled with neon gas. In theory, the electromagnetic fields created by the rails will ionize the gas to create plasma, which will be released when the glass projectile breaks.

Astronomers Discover Cool Halo Gas Spinning Like Galactic Disks

A group of astronomers led by Crystal Martin and Stephanie Ho of the University of California, Santa Barbara, has discovered a dizzying cosmic choreography among typical star-forming galaxies; their cool halo gas appears to be in step with the galactic disks, spinning in the same direction.

The researchers used W. M. Keck Observatory to obtain the first-ever direct observational evidence showing that corotating halo gas is not only possible, but common. Their findings suggest that the whirling gas halo will eventually spiral in towards the disk.

“This is a major breakthrough in understanding how galactic disks grow,” said Martin, Professor of Physics at UC Santa Barbara and lead author of the study. “Galaxies are surrounded by massive reservoirs of gas that extend far beyond the visible portions of galaxies. Until now, it has remained a mystery how exactly this material is transported to galactic disks where it can fuel the next generation of star formation.”

Navy Patents Sound Weapon

Imagine a day when a submarine could blast a target to smithereens using nothing more than acoustic energy. That’s the idea behind a recently granted U.S. Navy patent for a cavitation weapon. The powerful weapon would use sonar to generate “acoustic remote cavitation,” i.e. a big pressure bubble, that would destroy everything from torpedoes to mines. As the patent describes:

*A method is disclosed of generating a predetermined field of cavitation around a remote target in an underwater environment. The method includes the steps of identifying a remote target location, generating at least two acoustic beams, each at a high power output, from an underwater acoustic source, and controlling the generated acoustic beams to intersect with each other at the remote target location and thereby create a destructive cavitation field at the intersection of the beams. The acoustic source and target can be located in unconfined underwater space and at a distance of at least 100 m apart. *

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Russian Hackers Tried to Attack U.S. Power Grid

A hacking group linked to the Russian government has been attempting to breach the U.S. power grid, Wired reports.

Security experts from the non-profit group the Electric Information Sharing and Analysis Center (E-ISAC) and security firm Dragos tracked the hackers — and warn that the group has been probing the grid for weaknesses, searching for ways that they could access U.S. systems.

Even though there are no signs that the group has succeeded in accessing the power grid, the attacks still have experts worried. And that’s partly because of the history of this particular hacking group: Xenotime, who created the infamous Triton malware. In late 2017, Triton attacked critical infrastructure such as the industrial control systems used in power plants, and it could have been used to cause massive destruction through tampering with power plant controls. That lead it to be labeled the “world’s most murderous malware.”

Nothing Is Solid & Everything Is Energy – Scientists Explain The World of Quantum Physics

What we perceive as our physical material world, is really not physical or material at all, in fact, it is far from it. This has been proven time and time again by multiple Nobel Prize (among many other scientists around the world) winning physicists, one of them being Niels Bohr, a Danish Physicist who made significant contributions to understanding atomic structure and quantum theory.

“If quantum mechanics hasn’t profoundly shocked you, you haven’t understood it yet. Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.” – Niels Bohr

At the turn of the nineteenth century, physicists started to explore the relationship between energy and the structure of matter. In doing so, the belief that a physical, Newtonian material universe that was at the very heart of scientific knowing was dropped, and the realization that matter is nothing but an illusion replaced it. Scientists began to recognize that everything in the Universe is made out of energy.

Self-cleaning Clothes Made Possible By Nano-enhanced Textile

Circa 2016

Not a big fan of laundry day? Well what if you could wash your clothes just by stepping into the sunshine? Thanks to researchers at RMIT University in Melbourne, a self-cleaning textile could make that possible in the very near future. With the help of special nanostructures grown directly into the fabric, these new textiles could degrade organic matter like dirt, dust, and sweat when exposed to a concentrated light source.

To achieve this effect, the nanostructures used by the RMIT University team are made copper and silver. These metals are great at absorbing visible light, and when they’re exposed to light from the sun or even a light bulb, the nanostructures react with increased energy that creates “hot electrons”.

Hot electrons have to expend their excess energy somehow, and in this case they do so with a rapid burst that lets the nanostructures degrade organic molecules. Once a light source is introduced, the nanostructures take less than six minutes to break down organic matter — in effect cleaning themselves completely.

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