Category: Science and Tech

How is Science Sculpting the Modern Athlete?

by Jackie Edwards

Sport is big business these days, with the market worth $60.5 million in North America and predicted to rise to $73.5 billion in 2019. Sports is not only a moneymaker for event promoters and the media; it is also increasingly being seen as a top career choice for those with the talent, drive, and commitment required to succeed. New developments in sport have shown that success is not all about the individual athlete. In popular sports like tennis, football, or golf, science & technology are playing an important role in helping competitors perform at their full potential. In this post, we look at just a few ways that science is changing the way we play and compete.

Swing Training Technology for Golf

You would need to be a master physicist to work out the exact angle at which to position your club when playing golf, but science and technology are making it a whole lot easier with swing training technology, which brings real-time body positioning analysis to everyday golfers with the help of a handy app. The app ‘tells’ golfers exactly how to position their body and gives them top information on how to do better next time. Of course, the app won’t fix deeper problems such as weak muscles in the shoulder and back. Top level athletes will also need to regularly carry out specific training programs for golf, which include strength training for key muscle groups. In essence, performing the right swing depends on issues like back strength, so you may need to address this first to perfect your game.

Head and Neck Support for Motor Sports

Dale Earnhardt’s death on the track at the Daytona 500 race revealed the extent to which the head and neck area are vulnerable in motor sports. HANS devices have been created by scientists to stop the head from whipping forwards and backwards in the event of an accident, and to lend more support to the neck. The device is U-shaped and is positioned behind the neck, with two ‘arms’ that extend over the pectorals. Over 140,000 devices have already been sold worldwide.

Wearable Computers and Hawk-Eye Camera Systems

Wearable computers are allowing both players and managers to assess a player’s level of fatigue, hydration levels, etc. This type of information is vital to avoid heart attacks and other major health events from taking place on the field. Smart fabrics will enable athletes to glean even more information, including heart function data and movement of the body’s center of mass. Scientists have stated that the future could take us beyond wearables. The Hawk-Eye camera system is currently used to obtain information on running biomechanics and other metrics during games of elite players. The NBA, meanwhile, relies on Second Spectrum’s computer vision technology to obtain information about player positioning and other 3D data such as ball and referee positioning.

We have presented just a few ways in which science and technology are enabling athletes to perform more optimally, but also to stay safe. Wearable devices and fabrics, aerial camera systems, and new safety gear are making sport a much more scientifically accurate and appealing pursuit. Information is power, and nowhere is this truer than on the field or track.

The Psychology Behind Scamming

by Jackie Edwards

From winning the lottery and PPI refunds to identity theft and online marriage proposals, we’re all potential targets for fraudsters. Globally, scammers conned unsuspecting victims out of $12.7 billion in 2013 — and that was just with 419 advance fee fraud scams. Scam victims typically lose out financially — often without reimbursement — and suffer significant emotional trauma, making them less likely to come forward due to embarrassment. While scams have become more complex and harder to detect in the modern age, the foundational influence techniques scammers use on their victims remain the same. Become aware of how scams exploit emotions and human nature, and you’re less likely to fall for these psychological techniques.

Exploitation of social norms

From birth, we’re conditioned to have unwavering respect for authority figures. Scammers take advantage of this social norm and therefore often pose as bank employees, government officials, or qualified professionals who appear trustworthy. In a similar vein, scammers try to exploit man’s inherent good nature. You may find it hard to say “no” to a charity asking for donations. Or you may be compelled to send money to help pay for emergency medical or travel expenses — which often plays out in online dating scams.

Scarcity-based incentives

Most of us have fallen prey to tempting “limited-time only” sales when shopping. Retailers and scammers alike rely on scarcity-based incentives: offers that expire soon, offers that are one-time only, or deals that will fall through if you don’t act RIGHT NOW! They conjure a sense of urgency in order to get you to take immediate action. The fear of missing out is primal and you’re more likely to forgo rationality and self-control in the face of it. Scammers want you acting now instead of taking time to asses the situation and likely realizing things don’t add up.

Eliciting of emotion

People who lack control over their emotions are more likely to be persuaded by scammers, a report by the UK Office of Fair Trading reveals. Sometimes these will be positive emotions like the excitement of winning money or online relationships. Alternatively, negative feelings like fear and panic are often elicited via supposed fraudulent bank activity. It’s natural to want to alleviate strong, unpleasant emotions as soon as possible. People will therefore act out of fear and desperation — rather than reason — and respond to the scam in order to feel better in the short run.

So, how do you know who to trust? Never give out personal information or money to anybody — especially on first contact. Delete emails from people you don’t know. Do your own research to verify something — but don’t call numbers or click links you’ve been given. Give yourself time to carefully think about the situation. Does it elicit strong emotions urging you to act? If in doubt, always go with your gut. Finally, if you find yourself the target of a scam, report it and let others know, so they can avoid falling prey to the same or similar scam in the future.

Evolution of Ergonomics: From Early Man to Modern Human

by Jackie Edwards

The word ergonomics was first used in 1857 in a philosophical narrative by Polish scientist Prof. Wojciech Jastrzebowski. The term derives its name from two Greek words – Ergon, which means ‘work’ and Nomos, which translates to ‘natural law,’ literally translating into ‘how to work according to nature.’ So, ergonomics is a scientific discipline involved in the design and creation of safe and comfortable workspaces so as to best utilize a person’s abilities and boost productivity.

For example, viewing cute pictures to increase workplace productivity is also an important discovery in the field of ergonomics which increases work efficiency by enhancing the mood of workers. In layman language, ergonomics refers to designing products, environments, and systems where people are involved so as to minimize risks of harms or injuries and also, related mental or emotional stress. Interestingly, this principle has been in existence for a long time even though the term itself may have just been coined in recent history.

Where it all began

Ergonomics has been in the very cradle of human evolution, ever since early man began making tools from bones and pebbles to make tasks easier. Archaeological findings have revealed sophisticated ergonomic devices, tools, and equipment from ancient Egyptian dynasties and 5th Century BCE Greece. Several centuries later, we still use axes, plows, hammers and several such tools only in their more improvised and sophisticated designs to fit into our advanced living environment. However, it was not until the 16th century that ergonomics began to be understood and studied. It all started with Bernardino Ramazinni’s medical journal ‘De Morbis Artificum (Diseases of Workers)’ which brought to light the various injuries incurred by his patients, resulting from unfavorable conditions in their occupations and workspaces.

Industrial Revolution

During the historical Industrial Revolution of 19th century, ergonomics was at the pinnacle of attention, being studied like never before. Spinning Jennies and rolling mills were invented to speed up work. Frederick W. Taylor pioneered the process of ergonomics by evaluating the best and easier ways of accomplishing a task and eventually succeeded in improving worker productivity and wages in a shoveling job. Frank and Lillian Gilbreth, on the other hand, standardized materials, work processes and tools and began time motion analysis to make workflow efficient and less tiring.

World War II

With World War II, ergonomics reached a newer height, prompting research in man and machine interaction. This began to prominently reveal itself especially in the design of military systems like naval ships, aircraft and weaponry. The complex devices from radar to aircraft that were manufactured for the war began to demand a better grip of ergonomics without which there was a continuous risk of loss of personnel or equipment. In 1943, a U.S Army lieutenant, Alphonse Chapanis brought to light how so-called “pilot errors” could be greatly reduced. That is when logical and easier to understand control buttons were born in the cockpits of aircraft.

Ergonomics today

Work or ergonomic-related musculoskeletal injuries contributed to a third of day-offs from workplaces as per data published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2013. And, most of these were reported from sectors like agriculture, manufacturing, construction, transportation and warehousing, healthcare and entertainment/recreation. These injuries have not only sparked concern but with it, have also spiked renewed interest in the subject of ‘ergonomics’ to inspire futuristic designs for new age tools tailored to modern technological advances and lifestyle of humans.

Ergonomics may be a relatively new term and newer field of study. However, it has been a part of our life since the very moment of Stone Age. Today, Ergonomics is studied in-depth with specializations in cognitive, organizational and physical sciences.

In A Modern World Can We Learn From Cave Paintings?

BY JACKIE EDWARDS

The ‘dumb Neanderthal myth’ is continually debunked. With the discovery of prehistoric art galleries on rocks worldwide we see how our extinct human cousins appreciated beauty and life. Advancement in understanding Palaeolithic Europeans and their accomplishments and communications – especially as seen through cave paintings – has opened our eyes to a people that were creative and adventurous. Is there anything that we can learn in our modern lives based on an understanding of cave painting? In particular, what can cave paintings teach us about communication and community?

Painting a picture of community

What message about community do some of the oldest cave paintings have for us today? We can learn from the oldest cave paintings in Spain and recent discoveries in America, that date back 6,000 years. Discovering ancient cave images that depict acts of service, celebration or community involvement allude to an understanding of humanity. Today, such things are paramount to our health and well-being. Upper Paleolithic humans understood the importance of community involvement. Today, nine out of ten people report getting a profound ‘emotional high’ from participating in activities that build community cohesion.

The importance of the Magura Cave

The Magura Cave in Bulgaria shows a great example of community. The depiction dating back over 8,000 years, shows women and men engaged in what is thought to be a festival. In the cave art, the community is capturing what is important to them – hunting to provide for the community and a fertility dance. To this day, coming together for important life events is essential human behaviour. The Magura Cave in particular is still a place for the community to gather for music concerts and other events.

Using art to communicate

Cave paintings illustrate the human need to communicate. This communication takes its form in leaving a mark for the future- to help guide, or communicate something so important that it needs a permanent representation. That is why the Altamira Cave in Spain is of major importance. Believed to be over 35,000 years old it mainly depicts bison. It goes beyond what you may have seen in ancient cave art. Instead, with these artworks the creators took into account the rock formations so that they could communicate the viscosity of the animal. The artist used the protruding rocks to exaggerate the features of animals and make them appear as though they were three dimensional. This experimentation shows an understanding of how to communicate effectively using visual prompts.

Pride and persuasion in cave paintings

Effective communication is particularly important when symbolism is used. The human beings ability to communicate symbolically has long been linked with our ‘humanness’.  Modern studies on how the brain responds to stimulus shows that humans have a powerful response when an image is distorted. In the Altamira Cave bisons are distorted according to the meat that they offer. Almost like an image in a butcher shop window that advertises the best organic meat available. This shows us that pride and persuasion were big parts of communication when cave painting.

We should not underestimate the importance of visual communication and how it shapes what we see as important. We can question the images we are presented with and endeavour to understand what they represent to us as a community member. Representing our lives via a set of symbols is nothing new. The hashtag movement, children under 12 ‘dabbing’ and a blue thumbs up for liking a youtube clip are all ways that we communicate today. Imagine what people will make of that in 35,000 years!

Death by Plastic Ingestion Is Increasing Among Sea Creatures

by Megan Ray Nichols 

Research suggests that around eight million metric tons of plastic finds its way into the oceans each year — enough to fill five plastic bags for every foot of coastline on the planet.

This plastic has a more significant impact than just being unsightly though. It’s killing growing numbers of marine creatures. One of the most comprehensive studies of the issue to date, conducted by researchers at Plymouth University, found that documented cases of floating debris affected as many as 700 different species, with plastic making up 92 percent of cases they studied.

How Plastic Affects Marine Life

The plastic that ends up in the ocean impacts sea creatures in a variety of ways. One of the most harmful is plastic ingestion. A wide range of sea creatures eat plastic, either by happenstance or because they mistake it for food.

Research into the impacts of plastic ingestion is ongoing, but both anecdotal and scientific evidence show that it can be extremely harmful. In the worst cases, it can lead to death. It could also have impacts on things such as animals’ metabolism and reproduction.

Impacts All Animals

Plastic ingestion can harm all sorts of marine creatures from the largest to the smallest.

A sperm whale recently washed up onto the coast of Spain. The 33-foot-long whale had more than 65 pounds of plastic in its stomach. It could not expel the plastic, so its digestive became infected.

Research has recently confirmed that anchovies are also eating plastic debris. The debris they ingest is known as microplastic that’s less than five millimeters in length and is made up of partially broken down pieces of plastic.

This doesn’t only affect anchovies though. When larger fish eat the anchovies, they also ingest the plastic. This pattern continues up the food chain and could even eventually make its way to humans.

Surface to Lowest Depths

Plastics also impact creatures from the ocean’s surface down to some of its lowest depths. Turtles tend to eat debris floating near the surface with a translucent appearance, such as bags or balloons. This may be because it looks similar to jellyfish. Seabirds also eat plastic, likely because it collects algae and takes on a smell that’s similar to the food these birds eat.

Researchers have also found microplastics at deep ocean depths. One way it can get there involves tiny ocean invertebrates called larvaceans. The plastic ends up in their fecal pellets, which sink quickly into the deep ocean.

Ingestion isn’t the only way that plastic debris harms marine life either. It can also entangle them and cause damage to their habitats.

Ongoing Projects

The growing amount of research and publicized events, such as the death of the sperm whale off the coast of Spain, has inspired various projects that aim to clean up the oceans.

The sperm whale incident led local officials to launch a public awareness campaign of the plastics issue that included 11 beach cleanup events and 19 public forums. Similar events and campaigns are going on around the world.

Several technological solutions are also making headlines. One of the most promising ideas came from an 18-year-old from the Netherlands named Boyan Slat. He founded an organization called the Ocean Cleanup in 2013 based on a passive plastic collection system.

The system floats and moves with the currents the same way that plastic debris does. A drift anchor keeps the system moving slower than the plastic, however, which enables it to catch it in its solid screen. The organization estimates that it could reduce the size of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch by 50 percent in just five years with full deployment. It expects to deploy its first system in mid-2018.

How You Can Help

You don’t necessarily have to be a scientist, engineer, inventor or public official to help protect marine animals from the harm caused by eating plastic.

Perhaps the most effective thing you can do is simply use less disposable plastics. If you do use some disposable plastic, ensure that it gets recycled or reuse it.

Another way to help is to find volunteer activities or participate in cleanup events. Even spreading the word about the plastics issue can also have a profound effect.

SOURCES:

http://time.com/3707112/plastic-in-the-ocean/

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-02/uop-nsr021915.php

https://www.livescience.com/62266-dead-sperm-whale-plastic-bags.html

https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/08/ocean-life-eats-plastic-larvaceans-anchovy-environment/

http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0040884

https://oceanconservancy.org/trash-free-seas/

https://www.plasticsmakeitpossible.com/plastics-recycling/plastics-recycling-101-recycle-plastics-2/

https://www.theoceancleanup.com/about/

Awesome ‘Possum

Today I received a copy of Awesome ‘Possom volume 3 in my mail from Angela Boyle, a natural science illustrator and cartoonist who has curated and edited the fourth volume of Awesome ‘Possum. Before I had laid my hands on the book, I had imagined it to be a few-pages-long book that I would sit down and devour in the evening. Boy I was wrong. When I opened my mailbox, I was pleasantly surprised by a 400 page beast of a book. I flipped a few pages and was blown by thinking about the amount of cumulative effort and coordination that must have gone in realizing this book.

Excited, I sat down and started reading every word from the cover and beyond. Not having ever read an illustrated book, I had judged them to be the books for children. I was too old to enjoy them I had thought. When I sent the pictures of the book to my friends, “Aww that’s such a sweet children’s book” is what I got from these other engineers too. I think this is a disease we engineers have, assuming cartoons = children.

Not having experienced something like this, if that’s you, let me tell you, you should get a volume of Awesome ‘Possum to get rid of that delusion. It is indeed a fantastic book for children of all ages. But it is equally good, if not better, for adults! Adults would definitely extract a lot of great experience and knowledge out of it. That is exactly what I told my friends too.

First of course was a beautiful introduction by Ursula Vernon who has a peculiar hobby of taking pictures of moths, and does it despite being a not-so-great photographer or etymologist. With these hobbies in her life she has managed to do big things which I think will touch you better if you read the actual introduction yourself. Maybe, this book right here was a gateway to my own peculiar hobby I thought, and turned the page.

Being an engineer I honestly do now know a lot about animals. A few general things and when I manage to dig few obscure facts, I get excited, do more research and often write about them on my blog here. My point is that the natural world is inherently very fascinating. If you think it is not, you have not known a lot about it.

Awesome ‘Possom was a perfect exposure of the natural world for me. It talks to me about things like, how I should be thankful for little known scientists like Philip Henry Gosse, Anna Thynne and Jeanne Willepreux Power because of whom we are able to decorate our homes with glass boxes (aquariums) with little alien worlds in them. Or things like how rolling bees in sugar could sometimes be a better way to do a mite count and figure if the mite infection is above the threshold to proceed with a treatment. Because alcohol kills the bees.

I noticed a stark difference in the illustration style of each comic and conveniently found the name of the cartoonist or natural science illustrator on top of every page of that chapter. The works of these talented people from across the North America and the world, compiled into this book, refresh you with a diverse subject matter and illustration style every few minutes. And this is just the volume 3 I’m talking about. Then there’s 1, 2 and 4 which is up on kickstarter right now. Volume 4 includes cover art by Eisner-nominated Tillie Walden, creator of Spinning (First Second, 2017) and a foreword by Jon Chad, creator of Volcanoes: Fire and Life (First Second, 2016). I for sure am going to read all of them. In my free time I have been exploring the amazing works of various artists mentioned on this kickstarter page.

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Say, Elise Smorczewski for example. She grew up on a farm that fostered a lifelong fascination with animals of all kinds. And Spratty, a cartoonist living near Philadelphia with their various human companions, two snakes, and two cats. They think reptiles are great. More importantly they have had first hand experiences and deep insights to share from their own experiences. Also, they are a wonderfully reliable to get your science facts from!

Chicken Scratch, by Elise Smorcsewski

I have been finding that the snippets of wisdom I get out of illustrations actually stick as if I someone had told me about them. That’s because everything is so visual and is delivered in a way that is easy to digest. You do not get this out of reading dense textbooks. Especially true for people like me who are not directly involved in natural sciences research. We are not great at extracting knowledge out of reference texts without a significant amount of experience in that particularly narrow field. Just within the first few pages I had extracted enough things to delve deeper into and to write about them on my blog. I will be doing that as I go.

I know that the book / scholar world thrives on criticism. That’s not me. i get my style from reading people like Maria Popova of Brain Pickings who believes in book recommendations rather than book reviews. I want to do that. I do not deem myself capable to criticize the work that I myself am not capable of producing. The only thing I see is the endless value in the thousands of human-hours spent in producing carefully curated work for me.

Rattle snakes have infrared detectors on them. How is that not cool, especially for a person who works with infrared spectra on a daily basis.  I realize the importance of having specialized detectors for getting the right information at the right wavelength range. And that reminds me of how a son and dad open up the rattle of a rattle snake in their youtube video to see how it works. And who would have known that rattle snakes also are great parents. The rattle snake illustrations making it easier for me to understand actual rattle snake research also inspires me to look for, or think about making illustrated research papers for the layman to understand my own field! This source of inspiration does not stop for hundreds of pages.

Do not forget to go explore the kickstarter to help the artists get their fair share for their hard work. 

What Does Science Say about Psychics?

by Jackie Edwards

Extrasensory perception and haunted houses seem to be the stuff that horror stories or comedies are made of. Yet, a Gallup survey indicates that around three out of four Americans hold at least one paranormal belief. Around 32% of people believe that spirits of those who have passed away can return to certain places, and 31% believe in telepathy. Around 21%, meanwhile, believe that people can communicate mentally with someone who has died, which begs the question: has science ever established the existence of psychic powers?

An Academic Study on Psychic Phenomena

A study that is often cited when discussing what science has to say on psychic abilities is D Bem’s Feeling the Future: Experimental Evidence for Anomalous Retroactive Influences on Cognition and Affect, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The study involved nine experiments and over 1,000 participants.

In the experiments, aspects of stimuli were shown to correlate with participants’ responses which occurred before the stimuli were produced randomly by computer. For instance, participants were shown two curtains on a computer screen and were told to pick the one they thought had an image behind it. In fact, none of the screens had an image behind them. Rather, after the participants made their choices, the computer randomly chose which curtains would hide an image, and the researchers subsequently found that the participants had ‘predicted’ the positioning of the images at a higher rate than chance would indicate.

Continue reading What Does Science Say about Psychics?

Health Benefits of Gaming

by Marcus Clarke

Apparently it was the Buddha who first said ‘health is the greatest gift’. He was certainly right. However, he probably never imagined that one of the ways we can receive this ‘greatest gift’ is video games, as much research is now showing that gaming can be extremely good for your health, in a bewildering number of ways.

For example, gaming can increase the strength and size of the brain areas associated with a number of key skills, such as motor skills and spatial awareness. So gaming can actually increase the size of your brain! As well as this, gaming can reduce sensations of pain. Studies on soldiers who had been injured in battle, in which half were asked to play on a virtual reality game and half acted as a control group, found that those who played video games were less likely to need pain meds. Amazing! There’s more! Gaming can slow down cognitive decline in the elderly and those that are suffering from degenerative neurological disorders. As such, gaming in this sense has many public health applications.

Have you recently suffered from some sort of trauma? Fear not. Gaming may be the answer, and research has shown that gaming can minimize the effects of trauma. One study showed, for example, that those who had recently undergone surgery and played video games were likely to recover more quickly. Likewise, those who had undergone traumatic events were likely to have fewer flashbacks and after effects if they played video games.

So, gaming is not just about fun, and vegging out on a weekend after a hard week at work. It can actually have really positive effects, particularly on your cognitive health. Likewise, modern games are increasingly good for your cardio health, as games become more active, and your body becomes the controller.

To find out more about how gaming can be good for your, see the infographic below from Computer Planet.

Continue reading Health Benefits of Gaming

Simple Steps for IIoT Cloud Security

BY MEGAN RAY NICHOLS

The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) makes it easier than ever to track and analyze data, integrate multiple different hardware platforms and achieve next-gen connectivity. While it serves as a one-stop shop for many manufacturers, some find it difficult to maintain proper security. Facing threats from all angles, it’s impossible to safeguard your system against every possible cyber-attack. You can, however, take some steps to ensure your initial preparedness and bolster your reaction time in the event of an intrusion.

Monitoring Evolving Industry Standards

Despite its usefulness, the IIoT is anything but standardized. Much of the technology powering the platform is still in its infancy, so the ultimate potential of the IIoT is subject to future breakthroughs and innovations in general IT. This makes it difficult to adopt standards for network security, cloud access and IIoT integration – but that hasn’t stopped some organizations from trying.

Make sure to research the security systems of any cloud services or IIoT devices you incorporate within your company to make sure you receive the quality protection you deserve. Companies tend to use unique strategies to ensure security across their networks, so it’s important to find one that aligns with your needs, requirements and expectations. Although there isn’t a strict protocol for processing and securing such vast amounts of data, the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) recently established ISA99 standards for industrial automation and control systems security.

But ISA99 is also a work in progress. A part of the larger IEC 62443 series of regulations and codes, the IEC hopes to usher in a new age of security and efficiency throughout the entire industry.

Establishing Your Own Best Practices

It’s important for manufacturers to develop their own best practices in regards to IIoT technology. Not only does this help you to maintain acceptable standards of data collection, storage and security for the time being, but it also enables you to retain the option of transitioning over to new industry regulations as they develop.

The process of establishing your own best practices for IIoT integration depends on your unique requirements. Will your connected devices communicate via Bluetooth or a cellular connection? Do you have legacy hardware, such as tape backup, which currently holds your company’s critical data? Answering these questions is the first step in creating standards for IIoT integration.

Next, consider how your employees will access the cloud and your IIoT network. The rising popularity of smartphones and mobile devices has prompted some to embrace the bring-your-own-device (BYOD) model of connectivity. Others would rather limit access to the desktop computers and workstations around the factory.

Identifying and outlining your exact needs is critical when balancing network accessibility with cloud security, and it makes the process of safeguarding your system as straightforward and simple as can be.

Implementing Security to Protect Your Data

The final step in achieving IIoT cloud security requires you to introduce the systems that will secure your network. Manufacturers use various tools to protect their data, including encryption, file signatures and firewalls.

Keep in mind that you’re protecting your digital assets from external and internal threats. By placing all the focus on counteracting and preventing cyber-attacks, it’s easy to lose track of employees who might have physical access to your IIoT cloud. This is where user access privileges, consistent system administration and strong password requirements are helpful.

Creating a Security Model That is Versatile, Flexible and Scalable

It’s also important to develop a security model that is adaptable to future trends and innovations. Hardware regarded as groundbreaking today will be replaced by newer, upgraded versions within the coming years. Likewise, hackers and cybercriminals are always devising new and innovative ways to access vulnerable systems and take advantage of weaknesses before they’re patched.  It’s a never-ending tug of war that requires a lot of diligence on behalf of your IT team because the success of your company might depend on it.

Newtonian vs. Non-Newtonian Liquids

By Megan Ray Nichols

If you’ve seen any viral videos in the last few years, you’re probably familiar with the concept of non-Newtonian fluids — liquids that are fluid when moving slowly but when struck with force, they take on a solid consistency. Videos have gone viral of people filling entire swimming pools with a mixture of water and cornstarch, allowing them to literally run across the surface of the water. What is the difference between a Newtonian fluid and its non-Newtonian counterpart, and where might you encounter these fluids in your daily life?’

Newtonian vs. Non-Newtonian Liquids

First, what is the difference between Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluids?

Newtonian fluids have a constant viscosity that doesn’t change, no matter the pressure being applied to the fluid. This also means they don’t compress.

Non-Newtonian fluids are just the opposite — if enough force is applied to these fluids, their viscosity will change. These fluids are broken up into two categories — dilatants, which get thicker when force is applied, and pseudoplastics, which get thinner under the same circumstances.

These can be further broken down into rheopectic and thixotropic categories. Rheopectics work like dilatants in that they get thicker when force is applied. Thixotropic materials get thinner, like pseudoplastics do. The difference here is that the latter two categories are time dependant. The viscosity doesn’t change immediately but changes slowly over time as more and more force is applied.

Newtonian Fluids in Daily Life

These fancy names might sound like something out of a science fiction novel, but they’re really just the scientific names for things you encounter in your daily life. What Newtonian fluids have you encountered today?

If you took a shower this morning or had a drink, then you’ve already encountered the most common Newtonian fluid — water! Water does not change viscosity no matter how much pressure you put on it — it also cannot be compressed, so the amount of pressure you can put on water as a Newtonian fluid is negligible.

Other common Newtonian fluids include mineral oil, alcohol and gasoline.

Non-Newtonian Fluids in Daily Life

For this section, we’re going to break it down into the four categories of non-Newtonian liquid that we listed above.

Dilatants are probably the most well known nonnewtonian fluids. They become thick or almost solid when force is applied to them and are made up of water mixed with other materials. Oobleck, the colloquial name for a mixture of water and cornstarch, is probably the most well-known, but quicksand and silly putty also fall into this category.

Pseudoplastics might not sound very appetizing, but you probably have a bottle of one in your fridge right now. That’s right — ketchup is a non-Newtonian fluid. The fact that the viscosity changes as each new ingredient is added to the mix makes it tricky to mix ketchup on a large scale.

Now we get into the weird non-Newtonian fluids.

Rheopectic fluids get thicker in relation to the pressure being applied to them and the time that the pressure is being applied. The best example of a rheopectic fluid is cream. With enough time and pressure, cream becomes butter.

Thixotropic fluids are similar to pseudoplastics in that they get thinner as pressure is applied to them, but it’s also dependant on the time that the pressure is being applied. Things like cosmetics, asphalt and glue all fall into the thixotropic category.

It might seem like this is useless information, but it can actually be very useful, especially if you’re ever in a restaurant that still uses glass ketchup bottles. Simply remember that ketchup is a non-Newtonian pseudoplastic and will get thinner as more force is applied to it. Give that bottle a couple of good thumps, and you’ll be in French fry heaven.

Sources:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIUEZ3AhrVE

https://blog.craneengineering.net/what-are-newtonian-and-non-newtonian-fluids

https://www.philamixers.com/news/how-condiments-are-made/

Spider Eyes are Nature’s Marvels

Now I do not exactly remember where and how I started my journey down this rabbit hole. But the deeper I went the more interesting it became. It was a great learning experience. I’m clearly not an expert. Here I share the understanding I developed of the spider eye over the few hours of exploration. For this I referred to various sources all of which are mentioned in the links. And if you know more or would like to add something interesting to the article please let me know in the comments below.

The  first thing about spider eyes is that 99% of spiders have 8 eyes. A little less than 1% of them have 6 eyes. In some fringe species there are 4, 2 or no eyes at all. Apparently, based on the pattern these eyes are arranged in, on their cephalothorax (let us mortals call it the ‘head’ to make things simple), the family to which the spider belongs can be determined. Some blessed human, made the following schematic to help us do exactly that. In case you ever feel the need to do so, here it is:

And in much greater detail, right here.

For their small size and the limited number of photocells, spider eyes, especially the jumping spider’s (Salticids) eyes perform surprisingly well. Their resolution is better compared with larger mammals than with insects. In the human world a camera of such standards this would simply be an engineering miracle. You will understand why I say that soon…

In the image above if you locate the family Salticidae, you will see those two large eye in the front which are particularly very interesting. These are called the principal eyes (or anterior median eyes) and are the ones that allow high resolution vision. So much that the spider would be able to resolve two spots on a screen 20 cm away from the spider, sitting just 0.12 mm apart from each other. An acuity of about ten times that of a dragonfly – 0.04°.

The brain of this spider, show in blue in the image below is pretty big for its size. The proportion of the volume of brain to body is more or less similar to that of human beings. The brain of Salticids also have a rather large region dedicated for visual processing.

The principal eyes we are talking about are in the shape of elongated tubes as seen below, in the front of which is a hard lens and at the other end is a layer of photocells. Inside the tube, near the retina is another little lens which moves back and forth along the tube like a telephoto lens system. These elongated tubes are like the tubes of a binocular which allow for a higher resolution using a small package.

However the downside of such a tube like architecture is that it limits the field of vision. Here’s how that problem is dealt with.

The front part, with the big corneal lens is fixed. It has a long fixed focal length. The farther end where the retina is located, is connected to these muscles shown in red. These muscles allow for the tube’s farther end to move around in several degrees of freedom to make quick movements and scan a larger image in its head, one small field of view at a time.

In the video below you can see the retinal end of the black tubes moving around inside the translucent exoskeleton of the spider as the spider forms a high resolution complete image of its surroundings, one small field of view at a time.

If you peer deep into their eyes you will see a dark (black) when you are looking into the small retina. However when the farther end of the tube moves, you see a honey brown color with spots. This is the inner wall of the tube that you are seeing in the following video.

Then the retina itself is another biological marvel. Unlike our single layered retina, the Salticid’s retina is made up of four layers. The four layers are arranged one behind the other. This lets the nature pack more photocells in a smaller area and also helps the spider see in color as different colors (different wavelengths) with different refractive indices are focused in different planes.

Counting from the rear end, the spider uses different layers of retina to obtain different colors of the image. The retina’s layer 1 and 2 to get the green color (~580 nm – 520 nm wavelengths), blue color using the layer 3 (~480 – 500 nm wavelengths) and layer 4 for ultraviolet (~360 nm).

An important detail in the above image reveals how spiders manage to keep focus on different objects at different depths, in focus. The layer one has photocells arranged in a step fashion, with varying distance from the lens which makes sure that all objects are focused on at least one part of the layer 1.

The other problem of distance estimation which matters a lot for jumping spiders is again solved rather elegantly by the same apparatus. Humans use their stereo vision – two eyes which are far apart to estimate distance. Other animals move heads to do the same but I’m not getting into that.

Jumping spiders employ a completely different algorithm, utilizing degree of blur cues. For which the second layer plays a crucial role. The second layer would have received a sharp blue image, but they are not sensitive to blue light like I mentioned above. The green they detect is rather blurred at that plane. It turns out that the amount of blur depends on the distance of the object and helps the spider determine the depth by processing the amount of blur in the image. Hence allowing it to jump and hunt accurately.

If you are a university student with free access to journals, I think a quick look at the paper titled: “‘Eight-legged cats’ and how they see – a review of recent research on jumping spiders,” will help you delve into greater detail.

Psst: Someone has it uploaded on research gate for free access for I don’t know how long: here.

Please leave a comment below to let me know your thoughts on this, or if you have any ideas for future posts. I plan to reward the top commentators every month so do not forget to say something.

Humans Are to Blame for These Environmental Disasters

Humans have changed the environment drastically, especially in the last century. As our population has grown, so has our effect on our natural world. Much of that impact has, unfortunately, been negative.

Since our population has begun booming, we’ve made gradual changes to the environment — as well as caused some large, environmental disasters that have caused acute harm both to the environment and human health.

An environmental disaster is an event caused by human activity that’s damaging to the environment. This differentiates it from a natural disaster, which occurs due to natural processes.

Our planet and humankind have seen many environmental disasters in the recent past, but a few stand out as especially costly in terms of money, environmental damage and human health impacts. Here are five of the most catastrophic.

  1. The Dust Bowl

The dust bowl, which occurred in the 1930s in the Southern Plains of the United States, is a well-known environmental disaster. Drought, coupled with rapidly expanding poor agricultural practices, caused dust storms that ripped away the fertile soil of the semi-arid region and created “black blizzards” that reached heights of up to 10,000 feet in the air.

The event made the region virtually uninhabitable and worsened the economic difficulties of the Great Depression. It also inspired lawmakers to pass bills promoting responsible farming practices. It was years before rain finally returned to the region, eventually restoring the plains.

  1. Chernobyl

The Chernobyl disaster is infamous as the most devastating event involving a nuclear power plant in the planet’s history. In 1986, one of the reactors at Chernobyl in Ukraine exploded, spewing huge amounts of radiation into the air.

The explosion itself killed two workers, and more died in the hours following the event. Twenty-eight workers died in the next four months, as did many emergency responders. The radiation may have caused an increase in instances of thyroid cancer in the region.

The radiation also killed all the trees in the area, and the site is still largely off-limits due to fears about the impacts of lingering radiation.

  1. Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

When oil spills from a tanker, pipeline or other source, it can harm wildlife and ecosystems and contaminate groundwater and soil, as well as impact human health. The destruction of plant life associated with oil spills can increase erosion by as much as four times the normal amount.

One of the most infamous oil spills occurred in 1989 in Alaska’s Prince William Sound. An oil tanker, called Exxon Valdez, hit a reef that tore open the hull and allowed 11 million gallons of crude oil to spill into the water. The leak killed an estimated 250,000 seabirds, 2,800 otters and 300 harbor seals. You can still find oil under beaches near the location of the accident.

  1. London Smog

Smog is a common occurrence in cities around the world, but in 1952 in London, it reached unheard-of levels of severity. For five days, a heavy fog merged with sulfurous fumes from coal fires, power plants and vehicle exhaust.

The incident killed around 12,000 people, hospitalized 150,000 and killed thousands of animals. To this day, it remains one of the largest air pollution events in history. It led to the eventual creation of the UK’s Clean Air Act of 1956, which limited the use of coal in cities.

  1. The Bhopal Disaster

Industry makes our modern life possible, but also comes with environmental risks. In 1984 in Bhopal, India, the worst industrial disaster of all time killed approximately 25,000 people.

On Dec. 2, a chemical plant began leaking a deadly gas known as methyl isocyanate (MIC). Safety systems were not functioning properly, so 27 tons of the gas spread throughout the city.

Many thousands of people died within the next few days of respiratory failure, cardiac arrest and other health problems. The disaster also killed many animals and plants in the area and contaminated the groundwater. Toxic elements still remain at the site today due to improper cleanup.

These environmental disasters had a devastating impact on their local environments, animals and people, and may have also contributed to global issues. As we move forward, we must strive to learn more about our natural world and do our best to protect it.

7 Health Benefits of Chocolate — Backed by Science!

If you like chocolate, you’ll be happy to know that in moderation, this tasty snack is actually good for you. No, this isn’t us just trying to find a way to justify our chocolate habit — there’s some actual science here! Whether you like the occasional Snickers bar or just can’t get enough of dark chocolate, here are some of the science-backed health benefits of cocoa.

First, a Disclaimer

Don’t rush out to the grocery store just yet. It’s important to know what type of chocolate to look for. Some types of chocolate have different health benefits, while others might not have any benefit at all.

First, make sure your chocolate is real instead of what is known in the industry as compound chocolate, which uses cocoa powder for chocolate flavoring but has no cocoa butter in the product. It’s easier for some manufactures — cocoa butter can be difficult to work with in large batches — but it isn’t good chocolate. If your ingredients show other forms of fat, like vegetable oil or soybean oil instead of cocoa butter, skip the candy bar.

Now, on with the show!

1. Chocolate Helps Your Heart

Chocolate can be a great tool to help you mend a broken heart, but it can also help keep your ticker healthy. One study, completed over nine years by Swedish scientists, found that one to two servings of dark chocolate every week helped to reduce the risk of heart failure in adults.

It wasn’t Hershey bars these individuals were eating, though — milk chocolate is so heavily processed that it doesn’t contain the kind of beneficial components dark chocolate does. Dark chocolate contains flavonoids, which help to protect the heart when eaten in moderation. These are the same antioxidants that are found in things like red wine, onions and tea.

2. High-Quality Tasty Nutrition

Believe it or not, a bar of high-quality dark chocolate can help you get a good portion of your daily recommended value for minerals like iron, magnesium, copper and manganese. A 100-gram portion also contains 11 grams of fiber.

Now, you don’t want to eat 100 grams regularly — that equals about 3.5 ounces, or 600 calories worth of chocolate — but even a small portion offers a host of nutritional benefits.

3. Candy Helps You Lose Weight

This might sound like we’re making stuff up, but it’s true: Dark chocolate in moderation can help aid weight loss. This is due to the fact that it is more filling than milk chocolate — due in part to that higher fiber content we mentioned a moment ago — and it also helps to lessen your craving for other sweet, fatty or salty foods that could make it harder to stick to your diet.

4. Keep That Cholesterol in Check

One of the main components in chocolate, cocoa butter, is a fat — and we’ve been told for years to avoid fat because it can be detrimental to our cholesterol levels. As it turns out, though, dark chocolate can help to both raise HDL — the good cholesterol — and lower total LDL in men with already elevated cholesterol.

The flavanoids in dark chocolate also help to prevent LDL from oxidizing. When bad cholesterol reacts with free radicals, it becomes oxidized and starts damaging tissues.

5. Pack It With Your Sunscreen

This is a benefit that only appears after you eat chocolate for a while — 12 weeks, minimum, according to researchers — but eating dark chocolate regularly can help to protect your skin from sun damage. This is no replacement for sunscreen, but regular chocolate consumption can more than double your minimal erythema dose or MED. This is just a fancy term for the amount of sun exposure it takes before you start to get sunburned.

The flavanoids in dark chocolate help to improve blood flow to the skin. They can also help increase skin density and overall hydration. Don’t skip your sunscreen, though — this might be an added level of protection, but it won’t keep you from getting sunburned during a day at the beach.

6. Not Just Good For The Body

In addition to helping with skin and heart health and cholesterol, chocolate has also shown signs of being good for your brain. Studies have shown that chocolate can help improve blood flow to the brain, which can help improve brain function. This benefit has been primarily studied in young adults. It has also been shown to help improve cognitive function in elderly patients who suffer from cognitive impairments.

7. Candy to Prevent Diabetes — Not as Crazy as It Sounds

People with diabetes are generally told to avoid candy and other sugars, but dark chocolate could actually be the key to help diabetic patients regulate their symptoms or prevent diabetes from developing at all. A small study out of Italy found that patients who ate dark chocolate every day for 15 days displayed reduced insulin sensitivity.

The amount of chocolate that was consumed during the trial equaled about 480 calories, so it’s important to consider the amount of chocolate you’re eating. However, if it can help reduce insulin sensitivity, it might be worth it to add a square or two of dark chocolate to your diet.

Chocolate isn’t as bad for you as your dentist or doctor might be telling you — eating high-quality dark chocolate in moderation can be a great way to improve your health over time. Just make sure you’re eating your chocolate in addition to a healthy diet.

How This Hurricane Season Is Affecting U.S. Oil

Just when it seemed U.S. oil couldn’t be stopped, hurricane season 2017 arrived to rain on parade. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association predicts 2017 will bring 11 to 17 tropical storms and up to four massive hurricanes between June and December.

For offshore oil platforms, signs of a nasty season mean it’s time to baton down the proverbial hatches. When weather forecasters predict conditions like this seasons, all non-essential personnel are evacuated from platforms to ensure their safety. While this is a drill that rig operators have been through in the past, every storm is different, and you can’t be too prepared for the chaos a hurricane can bring.

Preparing for the Storm

Making an offshore rig ready to sustain a hurricane is a delicate balancing act between protecting the employees who work on the platform and safeguarding as much oil production as possible.

The very real impacts that hurricane season can have on production make every last operating hour crucial, so personnel essential to rig operation are allowed to remain aboard until a few days before the storm. Sometimes it can be less than a day, but well-trained crews know how to stay professional even under pressure because failure could mean a natural disaster.

Within a few day of the storms arrival, drilling stops and all personnel are evacuated. Drill ships that are in the potential path of the storm are relocated to safe waters. The unpredictable nature of storms makes it necessary to stop operations even outside of the direct path of the hurricane.

Technology is the biggest asset oil manufacturers have in the fight against storms like Harvey, Irma and Jose. Modern oil rigs are equipped with GPS systems that allow supervisory staff to monitor their positions during and after the storm and locate them should the rig be pulled away from its drilling location by storm surges.

Restarting Operations

This year’s flurry of storms poses a grave threat to America’s prominent position in the global oil market because of its impact on multiple critical areas for US oil production. Hurricane Harvey struck Texas’ gulf coast, which is home to 45 percent of American refining capacity.

Add to that the offshore operations in the Gulf, which account for 17 percent of crude oil production, and now the rigs struck by Irma and Jose, and you have the makings of a disaster.

Once again, technology will be essential in restoring production capacity as quickly as possible. Many offshore rigs are designed around lean manufacturing principles. Assuming they can endure the winds and waves, that should help get oil production on its feet as quickly as possible.

Lean manufacturing practices focus on reducing waste in the form of motion, downtime, over-processing and four other potential inefficiencies. By allowing an oil rig to continue producing up to days before a storm hits, and restart operations with minimal crew, these practices can help recover days of production time.

Assessing Damage

No amount of preparation can guarantee that sensitive equipment won’t be damaged in the course of a storm, which is why drilling companies practice special flyover and assessment procedures to determine if offshore sites are safe to send personnel back to following a massive storm.

Remobilization, or “re-mob” as it’s called, is the process of gathering all company assets and ensuring they’re safe to continue work before beginning drilling operations again. Following an assessment by helicopter, small teams are dispatched to rigs and ships to determine if everything is in working order.

The ability to track every single asset using GPS makes the process of finding ships and platforms simpler than it was in the past, but the real challenge comes in repairing damaged equipment after a storm. It can take days or weeks to repair complex extraction equipment with crews sometimes working round-the-clock to get a significant drilling facility back online.

Ultimately, the small teams can bring rigs and ships back online. Once operational, assets can begin receiving more personnel. It’s a race against the clock every time, and this year it looks like those assessment crews are going to get more than their fair share of practice.

Frozen Tissue Array Methodology, Applications and Benefits

Frozen tissue array is a methodology that is used in modern molecular and clinical research to analyze hundreds of tumor samples on a single slide. It allows a high throughput analysis of proteins and genes in a huge unit. It consists of frozen tissues where separate tissue cores are lumped together to allow simultaneous histological analysis. It has made it easy to streamline several research projects thus saving significant time. It also conserves precious reagents for analysis numerous slides that contain a single section per slide. It is an ideal screening tool that is used before

embarking on extensive research and analysis.

Preparation of frozen tissue array

Each product is produced using the state-of-the-art preparation technique by the use of the finest quality specimens. Upon excision, the tissues are then placed in liquid nitrogen and then sorted meticulously by an expert pathologist. Cores from 20 different tissues or more or with pathologically relevant tumors are then combined in a single block. With the use of unique staining methods, the quality of each
slide is selected. Tissues with a diameter of 2 mm from the region of interest
are sorted from frozen tissue OCT blocks by varying their freezing temperatures, see more here.

Features of frozen tissue array

Every product is designed to conform to the FDA guidelines and must meet the requirements of therapeutic antibody validation and vitro diagnostic device certification. There is a vast range of tissues in every array. The technique is suitable for both radioactive and non-radioactive detection. It combines arrays from variety human donors. Compared to paraffin-embedded tissues, frozen array tissue contains better antigen exposure.

Frozen Tissue array applications

The technique has been employed in various areas such:

  • Rapid screening of protein expression or novel gene against a large panel of tissues
  • Diagnostic and high throughput therapeutic analysis in antibody
    variations
  • Analysis of gene expression patterns
  • In situ hybridization and used together with immunohistochemistry
  • Novel gene and protein expression comparison
  • It is also an excellent approach in FISH-based experiments in the
    analysis of DNA. In summary, frozen tissue array provides an excellent target
    material for an effective study of RNA, DNA, and proteins.

Samples of DNA, RNA, and certain antibodies don’t perform optimally when used in pre-fixed paraffin-embedded tissues. However, they work pretty well when used in frozen tissue array. Again, the procedures that require fixation can be identified and conducted in an appropriate manner. This means it is possible for you to include a wide array of samples in your final analysis than when using the paraffin-embedded
procedure
The only drawback with frozen tissue array is that some cell morphology and tissue architecture distortion is likely to occur. This can be seen by comparing it with the sections from paraffin-embedded. Additionally, a limited number of samples can be embedded in one array. This is due to the fact that there may be a tendency of OCT compound cracking or bending particularly when samples are placed one millimeter apart.

Conclusion 

The invention of this technique has become a boon to many scientists from around the world. It has saved scientists and pathologists significant time when conducting several tests. It also has numerous potential applications in basic research,
prognostic oncology, and drug discovery.