Spiders are zombies!!!

Image from: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/Arctosa_cinerea_fg01.jpg

Seriously I'm not kidding. Some scientists at the University of Rennes in France collected three different species of spiders, two from salt marshes and one from the forest, to see if the marsh dwelling spiders were more resistant to drowning than the forest spiders.

It took 24 hours for the forest spiders to apparently drown and 28 hours for one of the marsh species and 36 hours for the other. Apparently this is what the scientists had expected though I am already very impressed that any kind of spider can survive for 24 hours underwater.

Anyhow, the scientists drowned the spiders then took them out to dry in hopes of weighing them. But within several hours the supposedly dead spiders started moving again and were soon up and walking around. The species of marsh spider that took 36 hours to 'drown' requires roughly two hours to recover.

My thoughts:
1. poor spiders. Even if you are a zombie drowning can't be fun.
2. it takes 24 hours for a spider to drown?! Count me impressed.
3. spiders are zombies!!! Arg!!!!! No wonder so many people are terrified of them.

Disclaimer: this experiment was conducted with three species of Wolf spider. Big, hardy fellows. Do not go and attempt to drown your innocent house spiders just to see if they are zombies.

Short Science Fiction

This is a short story I wrote after reading an article in the New York Times Science. The article was about the increase in mortality in people with health problems and bipolar disorder.

You’d think it was depressing enough to be in a hospital in the first place. Then the doctor comes to your room and informs you that you have a 35 to 200% greater chance of dying than the guy in the next room with the exact same illness. And all because of a couple little mood swings! Seriously, it’s ridiculous. These people have no sense of the proper bedside manner. If I’m gonna kick the bucket in the next day or two, the last thing I wanna hear before I die is defiantly not a prediction that, “yes, you’re probably gonna die soon”. Yeesh, these people went through that expensive med school didn’t they? You’d think they’d know how to treat a guy about to conk out. Not that I’m about to die mind you! No, that’s the furthest thing from my mind. Well, maybe not the furthest, but pretty far I can tell you. I have no intention of dying anytime soon. None. Zero. Zip.
“Well, that’s pretty ambitious of you,” you think, “seeing as you’re in a hospital.”
Pfff. No problem. I only had a little fainting spell, then my overprotective parents panic and send me off to the emergency room. I guess I must’ve fainted again there, or done something, ‘cause the next thing I know, I’m waking up in a hospital bed and the white coated docs are telling me I haven’t got long to live. Utter nonsense if I’ve ever heard any. I’ll show them.

I’ve heard the doctors say I’m extremely lucky to be alive. Not many people survive the kind of trauma I’ve put my heart through. But I’m not expected to live much longer. I’ve heard the statistics, I know the numbers. My chances? Pigs might fly before I walk out of this hospital alive. The doctors don’t know I’m awake. I guess it looks like I’m sleeping, but really I’m not. I’m comtemplating my fate. Honestly, I don’t care. It’s not like my life was all that great to begin with; stuffed full of drugs at every moment of the day, ridiculed by the ‘cool’ kids. Yeah, if the grim reaper comes knocking, I’m not gonna fight. If it’s my time, I’m gonna go.

The doctors were here again. “Please be responsive,” they say. “Don’t pretend to sleep,” beg my parents. Ha. What do they know. I’m not pretending to sleep. I’m plotting. I’m plotting my escape from this cesspit. Being in a hospital is no fun; nothing to do but watch bad TV, nothing to eat except tasteless mush. Yeah, I’m getting out of here and I’m doing it soon.
It would help if I could move. But that’s only a minor setback!!! Besides a lack of certain motor functions I feel great! True, I’m a little woozy from all the meds the doctors have been dripping into my veins, but nothing hurts and my thinking couldn’t be clearer. Actually, I think I’m thinking more clearly now than I’ve been for a good long time. Usually I’m pretty drugged up, but now I’m clean except for the I-don’t-know-what the doctors are dripping into me, and those don’t really count because I don’t control them. They’re like a force of nature, outside influence. Like a tornado or something. Out of my control, not my problem. I can always blame it on the doctors if something goes wrong. Not that anything will! I’ve got a handle on things here.

Why am I still alive? Honestly, I have no idea. I don’t think the doctors know why either. I ‘overheard’ one of them talking with my parents. They’re surprised I’m still hanging in. I’m surprised too. I was ready. I’m still ready. But the end just won’t come. I don’t even know if I’m breathing by myself now. I’ve got so many machines stuck onto my skin I can’t even count them anymore. Or I couldn’t count them even if I could see. Am I too repulsive even for death to want? Now that’s a depressing thought. So horrible that lord death doesn’t want me, won’t take me. I’ll live in a vegetative state for years and years and years, hooked up to a humming machine that breaths, eats, and lives for me. I’ll just ‘exist’ until I’ve got gray hairs and death finally gives in shuffles me quickly into the tiniest corner of the underworld. What a life. What a death.

Coma? That’s a word for old, half dead people. Not a word for me. No way no how no nothing. My fate will be different. I’m sure of it. I’m me. And everything will work out just fine.

Um, just a slight malfunction

Picture from: http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/09/18/large-hadron-collider.html

The huge atom smasher in Switzerland was turned off Wednesday due to an electrical problem. The malfunction affected a cooling system for the high-powered magnets that steer the beams of shooting protons. A CERN spokesperson said that because it is a very complex piece of equipment it wasn't uncommon for a stoppage to occur. 

It was also mentioned in the article that the atom smasher took 20 years to build. Wow. I knew before that it took a long time but I was thinking like 10 years or something like that. 20 years is a looooooooong time. 

Well I hope they get it up and running again soon. 

From Exhaust to Energy

I was reading the Star Tribune over breakfast today when my dad pointed out this article. It was in the business section, which I never read, so if he hadn't mentioned it I never would've found it. I usually don't have much interest in the business type stuff but this article was very interesting. 

Apparently BMW (I just found out that the company is German) is testing vehicles with thermoelectric generators  to capture heat from the exhaust and turn it into energy. I think that is a really good idea because according so some estimates almost 60% of the potential energy in the gasoline burned by a car is let off as heat. 

This works due to the Seebeck effect, an process named after Thomas Johann Seebeck, a physicist who discovered that if he joined two different metals together with two junctions and created a temperature difference at the junctures, a nearby compass needle would be deflected. This is because the two different metals reacted differently to the temperature thus creating a current which created a magnetic field. At the time Seebeck didn't realize there was an electric current involved so he called the phenomenon the thermomagnetic effect. Hans Christian Orsted played a vital role in conceiving and explaining thermoelectricity (he is best known for discovering the relationship between electricity and magnetism called electromagnetism). 

However, though thermoelectric generators (thermogenerators) are relatively simple and low maintenance, they aren't very efficient. In car engines they convert about 6 to 8 percent of the heat into electricity.  But the lead researcher on this project, Rainer Richter, is convinced that new materials will make the generators much more efficient. 

There are also more places besides cars where this technology is or could be used. In the 1950s people placed thermogenerators over kerosene lamps to power radios. That same technique could be used to generate electricity from stoves or fires in developing parts of the world today. Thermogenerators could also be placed near chimneys, factories, smoke stacks and all sorts of places that give off heat. 

I think it could be a very useful invention once it is made more efficient. It would definitely be a good idea to make car engines more efficient but another good place to put them would be lawnmowers. Those engines are even worse than cars, probably 80% of the fuel is lost as heat. 

Facts of Germany

• The largest Wind Farm and Solar Power Capacity is installed in Germany
• In 2007 14% of the country's electricity was generated through renewable means
• It is one of the most populous countries in the European Union with over 82 million inhabitants but has the lowest fertility rate in the world with 1.39 children per mother
• The average life expectancy was estimated in 2005 to be 78.65, males 75.61, and females 81.81

The End of the World is Coming!! Actually no it's not, don't panic

Several years ago I watched a program on PBS about string theory. String theory is a still in the works approach to theoretical physics. It's based on the idea that all matter is made up of tiny tiny string like particles. It is very, very confusing and I certainly don't claim to understand it. But while I was watching the show there was a brief mention of a project by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN). Scientists were building a giant particle accelerator called the Large Hadron Collidor (LHC) in Geneva, Switzerland. It shoots beams of protons around a 17-mile underground track where they collide with each other supposedly recreating the immediate aftereffects of the Bing Bang. The scientists monitor the debris to learn more about the origin and workings of the universe. 

At the time I thought it was a crazy but cool idea. They weren't done building it yet so I sort of forgot about it. Now however, it's done! The scientists are planning to start shooting proton beams on September 10th. 

Among critics of the project there is fear that the high energy experiment could form a mini black hole that would expand large enough to swallow the earth! There were last minute appeals to court to stop the project and so on. There was an article in Britain's Sun newspaper about it on Sep. 1st with the title "End of the World Due in 9 Days". 

However in June CERN released a report that stated that even if a black hole was to be formed it would immediately evaporate due to Hawking Radiation (even though black holes swallow up matter and light they also leak it out faster than they can swallow). And CERN scientists say that this kind of collision happens thousands of times a day when cosmic rays collide with the earth and other objects in space.

So I believe that we needn't fear the world will end on September 10th. It will probably take a very long time for the results of this experiment to be analysed and debated and finally released to the public but I'm looking forward to it. And if for some strange reason the world really does end at least I won't have to worry about my SAT testing.

Stats of Switzerland:

• As of 2007 the life expectancy average was 80.6 years, 77.8 male, 83.6 female
  
• It is one of the richest countries in the world
• Two of its cities, Zurich and Geneva, have been ranked first and second in the highest quality of life in the world
• 60% of the country is made up of the Alps
• and they generate 53% of their electricity by hydroelectricity, 42% with nuclear power, and 5% with conventional power sources

 That's all for now,

Jasmine