Apr 29, 2009
Recently, an innocuous-seeming press release was released by German astronomers announcing that they had found two of the most complex molecules ever in space – n-propyl cyanide, more commonly known to chemists as butyronitrile, and ethyl formate. Now, butyronitrile is a nasty poison with a characteristic odour and I’m sure you’d get a whiff of bitter almonds as you lay dying should you breathe it in too deep or …
Apr 27, 2009
Swine flu has been labelled as the next major disease pandemic. It appears to have emerged in Mexico has possibly killed more than 100 people and infected a few thousand, most of whom have recovered, incidentally. Cases and suspected cases have now been identified in the USA, New Zealand, France, Scotland, Israel, Spain, and elsewhere (see the swine flu outbreak Google Map).
In Sciencebase on April 26, I …
Apr 26, 2009
UPDATE: World Health Organisation took us to Phase 6 on June 11, which only means that they see the distribution of the virus across the globe as being at levels associated with a flu pandemic, the first such declaration since 1968. The virus itself has not become any worse nor have the chances of any individual dying from the disease increased.
Swine flu is …
Apr 24, 2009
Most of you will be familiar with the concept of tools from primitive hand axes, clubs, and even prehistoric smoothie makers, we humans have used them for millennia (and if you’ve noticed several animals use them too).
Of course, our tools have grown exponentially more and more sophisticated, so much so that we now have …
Apr 22, 2009
My previous post on stupid things people have done in the lab as a kind of Darwin Awards for scientists was described by Guy Kawasaki, of Alltop fame. It also seemed to be so popular a post with lots of people sending me their own anecdotes that I thought more stupid science would be a good idea, so I …
Apr 20, 2009
I was offline with my family last week, walking and drinking ale in Derbyshire, so I’m a bit late in alerting you to my latest news stories on SpectroscopyNOW, they went live in my absence. So here’s the catchup:
Tyson’s toxic technique – The first accurate test for arsenic compounds in contaminated soil has been developed by US chemists. Their atomic emission approach to the problem could provide improved environmental …
Apr 17, 2009
My April Spotlight on physical sciences news is now available as is this week’s Chemweb Alchemist.
Under the Spotlight:
Pores for thought – A solid, but sponge-like material has been synthesised by chemists in Singapore. The silica-type material has the most complicated pore structure ever reported…
Chips are down and, eventually, out – Graphene is a modified form of the all-carbon pencil “lead” material graphite and is being touted as the material …
Apr 15, 2009
Are digital inclusion projects in the developing world booming or are they doomed to failure? That’s the question asked by legal expert Dinusha Mendis of the University of Central Lancashire, Preston, UK.
Mendis has investigated the digital divide in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nigeria, and how laws such as those governing intellectual property rights and copyright might be acting …
Apr 13, 2009
As a follow up to last week’s resurrected laboratory advice column – Wear Goggles – here are a few tales from the bench, that may convince you to take that advice. When you get down to it, science is simply about real people in real laboratories trying to figure out how the world works and how to make it a better place for us …
Apr 10, 2009
For the chemical class of 1999…
More than a decade ago, American journalist Mary Schmich offered her advice to youth in the form of a spoof graduation speech centering around the crucial maxim ‘wear sunscreen‘, the article was published in the Chicago Tribune. As is the way with these things it struck a chord among the literati and quickly spread to the Internet through the …
Apr 8, 2009
It’s a crude schoolroom axiom around which many an adult pub debate might also revolve: He who smelt it, dealt it.
However, there is a serious side to quickly locating the source of noxious odours in an indoor environment of varying airflow, as Zhenzhang Liu and Tien-Fu Lu of The University of Adelaide, Australia, will attest. They are developing an insect-like robot capable of odour plume tracing that could be used to …
Apr 6, 2009
I’ve let quite a pile of review books accumulate on my desk again as well as a couple of non-book oddities, so here’s a quick round-up.
First up is the Instant Egghead Guide to the Mind by Emily Anthes published by Scientific American. The first in a series, Anthes breaks down the overwhelming topic of mind into bite-sized chunks. She covers the basics of how the various parts of the brain work …
Apr 3, 2009
Bond, Q, and controlled cleavage – US chemists have made an iron catalyst that can be used to rapidly break strong carbon-hydrogen bonds within molecules, up to one thousands times faster than other methods. The research could solve one of the great chemical challenges.
Depressing brain scans – The first study of its kind has used MRI to demonstrate how changes in cortical thickness may surprisingly relate brain structure …
Apr 1, 2009
Meanwhile, I have been trawling the medical and scientific literature for more than two decades, hoping to spot a genuine medical panacea that might also be used to get greasy deposits off your kitchen surfaces.
Now, is the time to reveal what I’ve found Hydridic Oxygen(II) Subhydrate (HOS). This dessicated compound is astounding. It looks and behaves like Dihydrogen Monoxide but has none of the lethal effects.
The DHMO site explains …
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