News tagged with columns

Physicists Explain Why Liquid Optical Fibers Don't Collapse

Jul 29, 2008 | 4.7 / 5 (34) | 1

(PhysOrg.com) -- For several years, physicists have known that liquid columns can be used to guide light. By trapping a light beam, a liquid column can act like an optical fiber, but with a liquid sheathing ...

Solving a 300 year old geology problem using kitchen materials

Physics / General Physics

Dec 16, 2008 | 4.4 / 5 (25) | 3

(PhysOrg.com) -- Physicists at the University of Toronto have cracked the mystery behind the strange and uncannily well-ordered hexagonal columns found at such popular tourist sites as Northern Ireland's Giant's ...

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Yale team finds mechanism that constructs key brain structure

Scientists find mechanism that constructs key brain structure

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Sep 16, 2009 | 5 / 5 (4) | 0

Yale University researchers have found a molecular mechanism that allows the proper mixing of neurons during the formation of columns essential for the operation of the cerebral cortex, they report in the ...

Concrete columns with internal bars made of glass fibers can make a building sturdier

Technology / Engineering

Jul 14, 2009 | 4 / 5 (4) | 0

Conventional means of internal reinforcement for concrete member in buildings involve steel bars. Yet for structures that function in harsh environments like coastal regions, or for structures that support ...

Method makes refineries more efficient

Chemistry / Other

Dec 22, 2009 | 4.5 / 5 (6) | 0

(PhysOrg.com) -- Refineries could trim millions of dollars in energy costs annually by using a new method developed at Purdue University to rearrange the distillation sequence needed to separate crude petroleum into products.

Shape matters in the case of cobalt nanoparticles

Nanotechnology / Nanomaterials

Jun 17, 2009 | not rated yet | 0

Shape is turning out to be a particularly important feature of some commercially important nanoparticles—but in subtle ways. New studies* by scientists at the National Institute for Standards and Technology ...

Measuring the Footprint of Cells

Technology / Engineering

Jun 06, 2008 | 4 / 5 (1) | 0

Even the slightest differences are important in competitive sport: To improve a ski jumper's performance, the trainer can analyze the jump very accurately using force sensors. Researchers in Jena and Bremen ...

Opening the Door for CO2

Chemistry / Materials Science

Aug 24, 2009 | 3.8 / 5 (9) | 4

(PhysOrg.com) -- Until recently, factory smokestacks that produced nothing but carbon dioxide and water vapor were considered exemplary. Now CO2 has become notorious as a greenhouse gas, and the danger of climate change has ...

Environmental fate of nanoparticles depends on properties of water carrying them

Nanotechnology / Bio & Medicine

May 02, 2008 | 4.3 / 5 (12) | 0

The fate of carbon-based nanoparticles spilled into groundwater – and the ability of municipal filtration systems to remove the nanoparticles from drinking water – depend on subtle differences in the solution ...

Glowing channels: Microanalysis system for rapid mercury detection

Chemistry / Analytical Chemistry

Dec 22, 2009 | not rated yet | 0

(PhysOrg.com) -- Water contaminated with mercury is very dangerous for both people and the environment, as mercury is one of the most toxic heavy metals. Though laboratory analyses do deliver precise quantitative measurements, ...