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Erkin | October 24, 2014
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ISS Experiment Studying How To Use Water To Start Fires

While water is typically used to help put out fires, astronauts currently serving on the International Space Station (ISS) are working on a special type of H2O that actually has the opposite effect, NASA officials revealed on Friday.

fire-waterAccording to Mike Hicks of the Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio, the liquid is known as “supercritical water” and it is formed when ordinary water is compressed to a pressure of 217 atmospheres and heated to temperatures greater than 373 degrees Celsius – known as the critical point.

Under those conditions, regular water becomes something that does not fit into any of the three basic states of matter. Rather than being a pure solid, liquid or gas, Hicks explains that it becomes more of a “liquid-like gas,” and when it is mixed with organic materials, it undergoes a chemical reaction and oxidizes. Read more

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Erkin | October 23, 2014
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Does Water Always Completely Wet Water?

The molecular scale behavior of water at a solid/liquid interface holds fundamental significance in a diverse set of technical and scientific contexts, ranging from the efficiency of oil mining to the activity of biological molecules. Recently, it has become recognized that both the physical interactions and the surface morphology have significant impact on the behavior of interfacial water, including the water structures and wetting properties of the surface.

01In a new review, Chunlei Wang, Yizhou Yang and Haiping Fang of the Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics report recent advances in atom-level understanding of interfacial water that exhibits an ordered character on various solid surfaces at room or cryogenic temperature. Read more

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Erkin | October 21, 2014
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New tracers can identify frack fluids in the environment

Scientists have developed new geochemical tracers that can identify hydraulic fracturing flowback fluids that have been spilled or released into the environment.

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Acid mine drainage flows through a stream in western Pennsylvania.

The tracers, which were created by a team of U.S. and French researchers, have been field-tested at a spill site in West Virginia and downstream from an oil and gas brine wastewater treatment plant in Pennsylvania.

“This gives us new forensic tools to detect if ‘frac fluids’ are escaping into our water supply and what risks, if any, they might pose,” said Duke University geochemist Avner Vengosh, who co-led the research. Read more

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Erkin | October 17, 2014
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Filter Drinks: Drink from River, Feed Baby

Do you want to drink from the nearest river? No problem. To make a sip from the bottle of water and turn it into a lamp in one touch? Also possible. Gadgets for all these miracles have already been invented and are being sold.

A special bottle for feeding babies was invented by two Israeli scientists for young parents. It will notify moms and dads about how much food their baby needs and when to feed him. Sleevely bottle fixes child swallows and transmits the information to the computer via Bluetooth.

sleevely2Besides monitoring the amount of eaten food, Sleevely can determine the composition of milk or food and its temperature. Computer program processes the data and provides recommendations on feeding scheldule and amount of food needed. It is assumed that the bottle will cost 29 USD. The prosuct can be ordered at Kickstarter, where two enterprising dads from Tel-Aviv raised money for their project. Read more

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Erkin | October 16, 2014
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Clearer Than Air Robots, Coal and Peat Make Water Cleaner

Gadget which fights against black silt, peat briquettes against heavy metals and robotic jellyfish hunting for chemical products – that’s what the scientists have come up with for cleaning water reservoirs.

In USA an 8-handed robot was inventes for patroling the territorial waters. The gadget is also planned to be used for cleaning water from chemical and other contaminants. The robot was constructed by the order of the United States Navy Research Corps and the Center for Advanced Defense Studies of the United States Navy.

robotic-jellyfish2Swimming robot reminds of a jelly-fish and it was named Cyro, according to Сyanea Сapillata (the kind of jelly fish) and robot. Read more

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