Latest Introductory physics Stories
Polymer power Researchers have discovered yet another way to harvest small amounts of electricity from motion in the world around us – this time by capturing the electrical charge produced when two different kinds of plastic materials rub against one another. Based on flexible polymer materials, this "triboelectric" generator could provide alternating current (AC) from activities such as walking. The triboelectric generator could supplement power produced by nanogenerators that use...
Isotech Inc., has introduced a new line of lightweight, non-magnetic linear ball slides designed for motion applications that are sensitive to magnetic influence. From sensitive electronics, medical equipment, and semiconductor, to liquid crystal manufacturing and inspection equipment, the applications for non-magnetic linear ball slides are numerous. Hatfield, PA (PRWEB) June 04, 2012 Isotech Inc., a supplier of precision linear motion products, has introduced a new line of lightweight,...
Friction is a key phenomenon in applied physics, whose origin has been studied for centuries. Until now, it has been understood that mechanical wear-resistance and fluid lubrication affect friction, but the fundamental origin of sliding friction has been unknown. Dr. Lasse Makkonen, Principal Scientist at VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, has now presented an explanation for the origin of sliding friction between solid objects. According to his theory, the amount of friction depends...
Contest Will Help Homeowners Identify Energy Savings and Become More Efficient RICHMOND, Va., April 3, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Richmond Region Energy Alliance (RREA) and the state's Virginia Energy Sense program today launched the Earth Day Energy Challenge with 16 other organizations to help Richmond-area residents make their homes more energy efficient. To enter the challenge, which runs...
On Earth all biology is subjected to gravity. Some biological systems require gravity for correct orientation (geotropism: plants grow up, roots grow down). In the absence of gravity even human biology is affected: astronauts lose bone density at 1-2% a month rather than the usual 1-2% a year on Earth. But the effects of gravity on cellular processes are less well understood. New research published in BioMed Central's open access journal BMC Genomics has used diamagnetic levitation to...
Similar to the way pavement, softened by a hot sun, will slow down a car, graphene—a one-atom-thick sheet of carbon with wondrous properties—slows down an object sliding across its surface. But stack the sheets and graphene gets more slippery, say theorists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), who developed new software to quantify the material's friction. "I don't think anyone expects graphene to behave like a surface of a three-dimensional material, but our...
The December GSA TODAY science article, "Unique geologic insights from “non-unique” gravity and magnetic interpretation,” is now online at www.geosociety.org/gsatoday/. All GSA Today articles are open access. In many fields of applied science, such as geology, there are often tensions and disagreements between scientists who specialize in analyses of problems using mathematical models to describe sets of collected data, and those that rely on on-the-ground observations and empirical...
PerpetualGreen's Dynamic EnergySave System increases the effectiveness of all forms of renewable energy by an average of 25%. The Dynamic EnergySave is designed to concurrently integrate several principles of physics, to safely balance the reactive energy of an electrical system to raise the energy efficiency to as close to 98% as possible - at all times. The result is unparalleled efficiency gains coupled with a quick return on investment. Draper, UT (PRWEB) April 18, 2011...
Completing the story they started by creating synthetic magnetic fields,* scientists from the Joint Quantum Institute (JQI), a collaboration of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Maryland, have now made atoms act as if they were charged particles accelerated by electric fields.Reported in the journal Nature Physics,** these synthetic electric fields make each atom in a gas act, individually, as if it were a charged particle, but collectively they...
COLUMBUS, Ohio, Feb. 9, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Delta Energy Services, an industry-leading provider of energy management services in North America, today announced that it has formed a strategic alliance with Bergen Energi and Comerc Energia. The alliance, known as Energy Experts, was created with the mission to offer a global solution to better serve the energy management and data reporting needs of industrial and commercial clients with facilities around the world. The member companies of...
Latest Introductory physics Reference Libraries
General Relativity -- General Relativity is the common name for the theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1915. According to general relativity the force of gravity is a manifestation of the local geometry of spacetime. Although the modern theory is due to Einstein, its origins go back to the axioms of Euclidean geometry and the many attempts over the centuries to prove Euclid's fifth postulate, that parallel lines remain always equidistant, culminating with the...
Escape Velocity -- An escape velocity is the minimum speed at which an object without propulsion can move away from a source of a gravitational field indefinitely if there is no friction. This definition may need modification for the practical problem of two or more sources in some cases. In any case, the object is assumed to be a point with a mass that is negligible compared with that of the source of the field, usually an excellent approximation. It is commonly described as the speed...
