TIZER'S SCIENCE NEWS

[Stanley]

I saw the same report. Amazing what can be done....

[Tizer]

`How the scramble for sand is destroying the Mekong' LINK
`...sand is one of the Earth's most sought-after resources. Up to 50 billion tonnes are dredged globally every year - the largest extractive industry on the planet....In the last two decade demand has increased threefold, says the UN, fuelled by the race to build new towns and cities. China consumed more sand between 2011 and 2013 than the US did in all of the 20th Century, as it urbanised its rural areas...[sand] is consumed at a rate of 18kg for every person on the planet each day...'.

[Stanley]

I am reminded of two things. First was the spoof report in the 1980s about the world running out of silicone for computer chips. Second is two brothers who sold their farm in Cheshire for an enormous sum because it had a a bed of silver sand on it. Evidently it is very rare to find it in large quantities coupled with high quality.
Overall, it's one more example of the extractive industries raping the planet. Bit like undermining the foundations of your own house..... Although in this case it's someone else's life and the Mekong peasants are expendable.

[Tizer]

Remember the village on the Devon coast where houses fell into the sea many years ago because of gravel extraction offshore?

[Stanley]

I'd forgotten that but went for a furtle.... (LINK.)
Doesn't it make you mad when some people, homes and even ethic survival is deemed expendable.

[Stanley]

See THIS report on the affect of Metformin on longevity. If this is correct it is good news for those of us already prescribed the drug for diabetes.
Good! I needed some good news!

[plaques]

Metformin. Sounds like we are heading towards some more mass medication like statins. There is also the convoluted logic that implies... over indulge on junk food, get fat, develop diabetes, take metformin and then benefit from a possible health improvement. Win, win, win.

[Stanley]

Not quite as simple as that P but I see what you mean.... It still cheers me up!

[Tizer]

`Lewis stone circle has star-shaped lightning strike' LINK
This interested me but for something not mentioned in the story. Magnetite (lodestone) is often described as magnetic. More correctly, it is capable of being magnetised and then has a magnetic field and can then be used a lodestone. Much of the magnetite found doesn't have a magnetic field. It's thought that naturally magnetised lodestone arises due to lightning strikes. Perhaps the standing stones were erected at the location in the article because ancient people found it a rich source of lodestone?

[Stanley]

I heard that report also Tiz, we monitor the same airwaves!
You've reminded me of one of Kipling's stories in Puck of Pook's Hill. It concerned a Viking sea goer who had as guide a Chinese man who owned a miracle direction finder that always pointed south. I wonder who first discovered the properties of Lodestone?

[Tizer]

One of the most commonly mentioned stories is that it was a young boy shepherd in ancient Greece who realised that the rock he was standing on was exerting a pull on his hobnailed boots. Greece does have some good examples of sites with strongly magnetised magnetite. The story doesn't go on to say he invented a compass!

[Stanley]

Imagine the surprise of the first person to notice that the black stones they had built their hearth with were themselves burning!
Archaeologists have found stray steel fragments on blacksmith's hearths long before steel was discovered in this country. There's a theory that some of them found out what was causing it and made steel long before it was officially 'invented'.
They call it serendipity.

[Tizer]

Imagine the surprise of the first person to notice that the black stones they had built their hearth with were themselves burning!

I've been reading one of Bill Bryson's books which has a description of Centralia, PA, where a big underground mine fire started in 1962 and is still burning. There are said to be similar uncontrolled coal mine fires in at least 20 US states. Just imagine how much CO2 they've added to the atmosphere! LINK

[Stanley]

Interesting article. I like this bit.

"The system has worked in dozens of coal fires across the United States, according to CAFSCO. In 2007, CAFSCO put out its largest coal fire yet, pumping more than 700 million gallons of foam into the Consolidated Buchanan No. 1 coal mine in Claypool Hill, Va. Cummins says Centralia could be put out in about a month, for about $60 million. “I understand the difficulties of the Centralia fire, but I know what this foam is capable of doing and I really believe we can put it out,” he says."

At least it offers hope and $60million doesn't sound too large a price....

[Tizer]

I found this further information...
`CAFSCO is developing new ways to use encapsulated CO2. The CO2 will be captured from the source of combustion, which causes global warming such as electric power generators and other fossil-fuel combustion processes. The CO2 foam can then be used to extinguish deep-seated coal mine fires. The simplicity of the compressed-foam system allows us to use other chemicals and products such as waste fly ash, and bottom ash created by the electric power companies that burn coal. This fly ash and bottom ash can be mixed with water to produce a foamable slurry that can be turned into compressed foam and injected into the burned out areas, thereby creating structurally sound, solid blocks of waste material to prevent subsidence and damage to homes and businesses that have been undermined. The fly ash and bottom ash will be treated with the pH balancing chemicals, when the slurry is turned into foam, to help neutralize acid water drainage caused by the previous coal mine fire.'

There's a lot more general information available and it seems that its a worldwide problem - `Thousands of coal fires are reported to be burning in at least 22 countries on every continent except Antarctica.' LINK We hear little about this in the news media. The climate deniers will probably leap on it as the cause of climate change but it can only account for a tiny fraction of CO2 emissions.

[Stanley]

Climate deniers.... we had an epidemic on Today yesterday when Charles Moore was guest editor. Very uncomfortable listening.

[Whyperion]

Archaeologists have found stray steel fragments on blacksmith's hearths long before steel was discovered in this country. There's a theory that some of them found out what was causing it and made steel long before it was officially 'invented'.

Possibly , see some re-creational archaeology, Time Team and similar. The hammering of iron particulary in sword formation over and over again drove out the oxygen, and the charcoal/coal added a bit of carbon, getting the metal to 'look' and presumably feel right against the hammer would have been done by the Vikings, and I think the Saxons too, possibly the Greeks , I dont know about the swordsmen of the Middle east if that goes back beyond BCE or not, but Japanese swords used similar methods, but it looks like only a number of constant hammerings on the metal, Viking technology included hammering flatter and folding the metal over, then beating back out again from what I recall seeing.

[Tizer]

Climate deniers.... we had an epidemic on Today yesterday when Charles Moore was guest editor. Very uncomfortable listening.

Moscow has been experiencing high temperatures and no snow this winter. Putin has admitted that global warming is happening but disputes the claim of scientists that it is due to human activities. He's using arguments that even the well-known western climate deniers have abandoned. He doesn't seem to understand that climate modelling already takes into account the physical factors that he mentions...

`Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday (Dec 19) said "nobody knows" what causes climate change, seeming to cast doubt over whether global warming is of man-made origin and stating it could be blamed on cosmological processes. "Nobody knows the origins of global climate change," Mr Putin told reporters at the start of his marathon end-of-year news conference. "We know that in the history of our Earth there have been periods of warming and cooling and it could depend on processes in the universe," he added. "A small angle in the axis in the rotation of the Earth or its orbit around the Sun could push the planet into serious climate changes," he argued. But Mr Putin acknowledged that climate change was a major issue, saying we "must undertake maximum efforts to ensure that the climate does not change dramatically". LINK

[Stanley]

[Stanley]

See THIS New Scientist article. A study in India has shown a link between air pollution and bone mass which in turn has major consequences for immune systems. These findings should be heeded in the west where 80% of the urban population are exposed to levels of pollution higher that World Health Organisation recommended levels.
The UK is a particularly bad offender of course.

[Tizer]

It's another step towards a better understanding but we have to be careful not to over-interpret the results. It's a correlation, yes, but it doesn't prove a cause. I'd like to see more studies tackle the difficult task of showing the mechanisms involved.

[Stanley]

Tiz. As I understand it that was what the researchers themselves said. They said they wanted to trigger more studies to produce a body of evidence that can be evaluated. They say that at the moment there is too little information.

[Tizer]

This morning the BBC News site has this report: `Juno 'reverse microwave oven' cools drinks in seconds' LINK
I looked elsewhere to get more information. Here is a web page about Juno: Juno
This Matrix Industries web site page has more on thermoelectric cooling. They also have pages on other applications of thermoelectric technology (click on the titles in the banner): Matrix cooling

[Stanley]

Amazing! For years I have been asking why microwaves can't cool things down. It looks as though it might be here!
I shall not be buying one......

[chinatyke]

Amazing! For years I have been asking why microwaves can't cool things down. It looks as though it might be here!
I shall not be buying one......

I once bought a Thermos flask that claimed to do that, keep hot things hot and cold things cold. I must have got a faulty one because when I opened it at lunchtime the next day I had melted ice cream and luke warm soup.