In a past post I mentioned the serendipitous discovery of an encrypted message attached to the leg of a pigeon. The message, from WWII, had eluded the experts at GCHQ and the contents of… Read More »The most secret of messages… cracked!!
If is said that if a cell is the building block of life, then a transistor is the building block of the digital era. Without them a lot of the gadgets, gizmos and technology we… Read More »Transistor – Sci-advent – Day 16
Lasers have become so common that the number of applications they have do not surprise us. Nonetheless, their characteristics still captivate all of us. Laser is an acronym of Light Amplification by the Stimulated Emission… Read More »Laser – Sci-advent – Day 15
One may think that anti-matter features only in theoretical physics textbooks or in sci-fi devices, nonetheless it is very much in current use. Positrons are the anti-particle of electrons and their existence was proposed… Read More »Positron Emission Tomography – Sci-advent – Day 14
The Peltier effect is named after Jean Charles Athanase Peltier who discovered it by accident while investigating electricity. In the eventful experiment, Peltier joined a copper and a bismuth wires together and connected them to… Read More »Peltier Effect – Sci-advent – Day 13
Materials that respond to the application of a magnetic field are described as magnetic materials. Magnetism can be attractive (paramagnetism) or repulsive (diamagnetism). Some materials are permanent magnets, this mess that their magnetic fields are… Read More »Magnetism – Sci-advent – Day 12
A 1970 periodic table by Prof. Wm. F. Sheehan of the University of Santa Clara that claims to show the elements according to relative abundance at the Earth’s surface. Dmitri Mendeleev published a first… Read More »Periodic Table (by abundance) – Sci-advent – Day 11
If only for a minute my clock will show the date to be 12/12/12/ at 12:12pm Last time this century that such a thing will happen. Indeed it is just another Wednesday, but if only… Read More »12/12/12 at 12:12
Spiders and their webs are an excellent example of a predator, but can you enslave a spider? Well it seems that a species of wasp has mastered the art. The unsuspected spider is instructed by… Read More »Zombie Spiders – Sci-advent – Day 10
Ada Lovelace. Painting by Margaret Sarah Carpenter (1793–1872) Ada Augusta Byron, Countess of Lovelace, was the daughter of the poet George Gordon, Lord Byron. She studied mathematics at the University of London with Charles Babbage, whose analytical engines… Read More »Ada Lovelace – Sci-advent – Day 9