Latest science stuff from Sciencebase:
- It’s like, okay to say like – Teenage vernacular has always confused adults, particularly when the terminology seems to fly in the face of conventional grammar. Of course, any cunning linguist will tell you that language evolves and that yesterday’s perfect grammar rule is often tomorrow’s quaintly archaic phrasing. Moreover, the errant use of the word “like”, which often like litters youthful conversation is merely the current filler word, the um and ah if you will of street and schoolyard vernacular. It’s merely a part of yoof culture, innit? Get over it, Emma, why don’t ya?
- Is chemistry worth it? – One in every five pounds in the UK economy is dependent on developments in chemistry research (£250billion, in other words), according to a new report published today. Science is Vital. It really is. Cut the cuts.
- Enjoy yourself…it’s later than you think! – There is a 50 per cent chance that time will end within the next 3.7 billion years, according to a new model of the universe.
- How to Memorize the Periodic Table With a Song – Kind of these people to link to my site, but I take issue with the idea of learning Tom Lehrer's song as a means to chemical education. It's fun and might help you remember the names of the elements, but learning this song is not going to give you any insights into the nature of the Periodic Table, the words fit the tune, but are in essentially random order, whereas the very essence of the PT is its order! And, another thing…the secret of all “memorization” is not repetition, it's association, you can memorize things much more effectively by finding or creating patterns and using those as a mnemonic.
- Metallic sponge – An area the size of a football pitch within a porous MOF could be used to store hydrogen for use in safer fuel cell vehicles or trap carbon dioxide for greenhouse gas amelioration.
- Metallic sponge – An area the size of a football pitch within a porous MOF could be used to store hydrogen for use in safer fuel cell vehicles or trap carbon dioxide for greenhouse gas amelioration
- Cosmic Log – How to spot quantum quackery – Forget the quantum bit. Do they really have a website called "Cosmic Log"?
- FDA action against aromatase inhibitor supplements – Aromatase catalyzes the appropriately termed aromatization of testosterone to 17β-estradiol. Inhibitors are usually used in cancer therapy, but bodybuilders have been turning to supplements containing such inhibitors to help pump up their pectorals…
- Material priorities in Europe – Materials sciences and engineering: European Science Foundation (MatSEEC), chaired by semiconductor expert Guenther Bauer of the University of Linz, Austria, has identified its first priority topics for the future of research in this field and will finalise and disseminate information and recommendations to its participating organisations and the research community in Europe by the end of 2010.