The Red Brick Times

How about ceramics and superconductivity?

Brookhaven National Laboratory is looking at holes where electrons aren't as a possible explanation for high-temperature superconductivity. New Insight Into Origin of Superconductivity in Magnesium Diboride gives an overview of atom arrangments as seen through the transmission electron microscope.

They also have built a "perfect fluid" out of a quark-gluon plasma. A "perfect fluid" is one with extremely low viscosity and the ability to reach thermal equilibrium very rapidly due to the high degree of interaction among the particles. Predictions using string theory led to the investigation. String theory uses 11-dimensional interactions instead of the "normal" four of Newtonian and Einsteinian spaces (3-D plus time). I can't even fold a tesseract and you only need four dimensions for that one. Go to the Official String Theory Web Site to get tied into this information. Nova also gives us string theory in their production of The Elegant Universe.

On May 24, Nova will also be airing a program about Mary Mallon. Popularly known as "Typhoid" Mary, she worked as a cook for well-to-do families in New York. She didn't believe in washing since she claimed that she wasn't dirty. But her gall bladder kept producing typhus without affecting her health, and she contaminated those she served. Her final 1915 incarceration and quarantine on North Brother Island in the East River served to keep her from spreading the disease.

North Brother Island is a rare find; an uninhabited island in the middle of New York City. It once housed unfortunate victims of the most hideous contagious diseases of the 19th and 20th centuries, but now is an unofficial bird sanctuary.

The National Lighthouse Museum recalls the North Brother Island Lighthouse, and the fire aboard the excursion ship "General Slocum" in 1904. The Slocum ran for North Brother Island when the fire broke out.
Posted 8:40 AM by Andy (0) comments

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