Monday, February 23, 2015

Of not-so-tiny bubbles, infinities, and other news

Catching up with items of fascinating physics ...

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"Despite extensive analysis, Fermi bubbles defy explanation." Fermi bubbles (named for the Fermi gamma-ray observatory that first spotted them) are structures 30 thousand light-years across lying both above and below our galaxy. They emit incredible amounts of gamma-ray energy. (Gamma rays are extremely high-energy photons, more energetic even than hard X-ray photons.) Why are the bubbles there? How did they come to be? There are plenty of theories, none perfectly matched to observations. 

Now tip your head (or your perspective, anyway) by ninety degrees. Presto! Segue!

Do you know what's bigger then galaxies? Bigger than clusters of galaxies? Bigger than the ensemble of every galaxy the Hubble telescope can see? Infinity. And therein lies a problem. Cosmologist Max Tegmark walks us through the details in "Infinity Is a Beautiful Concept – And It’s Ruining Physics." In a nutshell, infinity blows up a lot of equations that we like to believe represent How the Universe Really Works. Something has to give ...

A bit of graphene
From the Really (if perhaps not infinitely) Big, let's shift our attention to the Really Tiny. How tiny? To graphene: an allotrope of carbon one atom thin.

Graphene is amazing stuff: super strong (far stronger than steel). It can be made highly conductive or into a semiconductor. Alas, graphene has also been super challenging to manufacture. Peeling graphene layers off bulk graphite using Scotch tape -- even though Nobel-worthy -- isn't a scalable industrial process. So: it's encouraging to read that "$10 Bet Leads To New Synthetic Graphene."

Ever envy Superman his X-ray vision? We mere yellow-sun mortals can't peer below the surface of most objects -- but that may soon change. The University of Maryland reports "Light Detector has Unprecedented Performance." Terahertz waves -- which have sub-millimeter wavelengths -- penetrate matter that is otherwise opaque. The new terahertz-band light detector is built using ... graphene.

For other (not quite) magic with light, consider this "Device cools itself in the blazing-hot Sun." Seriously (heh) cool. Look for this stuff to come within a few years to a roof near you.

And if won't burst your Fermi bubble, I'm going to call this a wrap.

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