sciencecapsules

                                   The man loves art.  He fills space and time with art.  He can create art in any dimension.     Lines and curves are one-dimensional art.  Also frieze and calligraphy.      Painting, photographs are two-dimensional art.      Sculpture, architecture are 3-dimensional art forms.      If we add 'time' (fourth dimension) to these spatial dimensions, what it will yield?      If we add 'time' to one dimension, we get 'music'.      If we add time to photo (2-dimensional), we get a movie.      Adding time to frozen actors yields drama and theatre.      If you move the time to and fro in a movie or drama, you get historical or science fiction.  If time takes many paths, you get a variety of stories with many endings (black mirror in Netflix).      Fractional dimensions also exist       A straight line occupies one dimension.  A photo fills two dimensions.  Suppose, you create an intricate pattern on a shee

            Let us learn, how to protect ourselves from cold properly.  Our body is slightly at a higher temperature than the environment.  The body's heat warms up the air surrounding it.  Hence there is always a thin layer of warm air surrounding the human body.  In summer, we want to push away the air layers continuously.  Hence we use high- speed fans.  Nature also cools the body by sweating.      In winter, we want to retain the warm air layers as much as possible.  Hence, we use woolen clothes with hairy fibers.  These hairy structures in the cloth trap the air molecules and do not allow them to escape easily.  That is why some animals have hairs naturally on them.  Tight thermal-wears also trap the air layers.      We shiver in cold.  That is the body's response to chillness.  The shivering-contraction and relaxation of muscles create heat and increases the body's surface temperature.      If you run in a winter morning, does it help? Yes.  If you run fas

           Photos lack depth perception.  The above photo clearly illustrates that. Because the photos are shot with a single eye or lens .      We have two eyes separated by a distance of 2.5 inches.   The two eyes see the same scene or object in two different angles.  Hence two slightly different images fall on the retina of the eyes.  Brain process these images and gives the depth perception or third dimension.      Thousands of years back, we required two eyes for hunting and to escape from wild animals.  Today, we require depth perception for crossing a busy road!!  Only using two eyes, we can estimate the distance of approaching vehicles and take a decision to cross the road.       Consider the birds like chickens and pigeons.  They have two eyes, one on the left side and the other on right side of the head.  Hence they get a 360-degree view of the world.  It will help them to easily escape from predators.  But there is a price to pay.  They lack binocular visio

 Life :  An organism composed of cells have a life cycle; undergo metabolism; can grow, adapt to their environment, respond to stimuli, reproduce and evolve. Virus;   It is a biological agent that reproduces inside the cells of living hosts.  When infected by a virus, a host cell is forced to produce thousands of identical copies of the original virus at an extraordinary rate.     Let us try to find out whether a computer virus is a life according to the definitions.       Suppose, a press is printing a recipe for making tea.      If a proof-reader deliberately replaces the word 'sugar' by 'salt' and sends it for printing, thousands of copies will be printed with the error.  Here an error has crept in and multiplied.  It is a kind of virus.  But it can be rectified easily using common sense.      Consider the following computer code:      for adding 1 to 10      for I = 1 to 10      SUM = SUM + I      NEXT I      PRINT SUM      The above program works

            Kick a ball on the ground.  It goes in a straight line.  OK.  Here you are applying a force straight on the ball.  Suppose, you turn a car driving wheel, what exactly you are doing?  You hold the wheel at the edge and apply a force perpendicular to the axis of rotation.      We will take another example to understand more clearly.  The opening and closing of a door is also a rotation.  Here, you push the door horizontally at the edge.  That is, you are applying the force perpendicular to the axis of rotation and at a distance from the hinges(axis of rotation).      This kind of rotating or turning force is called torque.  It is the product of the force applied and the distance from the axis (Torque = F * r). From the formula, we can understand, if you either increase force or distance, the torque will also increase.     Suppose, a mechanic wants to loosen a heavy bolt in a machine.  He takes a spanner or a wrench and applies a force as explained above to creat

       Yes, it did for Andre Gelm and Konstantin Novoselev in 2004.  We know pencil contains graphite lead -a form of carbon.  They took a pencil and draw a line on a cello tape.  The line is made up of layers and layers of bonded carbon atoms.  They took another tape; put it on the drawn line; then peeled it off.  Now, the half of carbon-layers stick to the second tape and came off with it.  They took yet another piece of tape and repeated the process.  The number of layers in the very first tape reduced further.  They repeated the procedure again and again.  Finally, they are left with just one single layer of carbon-atoms.  It is just one atom thick.  The atoms are arranged in a hexagonal lattice as shown in the figure.  It is graphone which has the potential to become wonder material of the future.      Graphene is stronger than steel.  It is the thinnest material known to man.  It is an excellent conductor of heat and electricity.     We will see some applications of gra

     Aerofoil is an interesting and ingenious shape which helps us to fly in the air-plane.            The shape is more curved on the top and less curved at the bottom.  It is fixed at an inclined angle to the air plane wings.  The working of the foil can be explained in two ways. 1. Bernoulli's principle      Consider wide width pipe connected to a narrow width nozzle.  When the water flow from the pipe to the nozzle, the speed of flow increases;consequently we get forceful jet of water from the nozzle.  (eg: water fountains).  It happens because of the conservation principle. "Same quantity of water must enter and leave the pipe in the same time".  Here the water flow is constrained by narrow nozzle; Hence speed has to increase to maintain conservation principle.      In the case of aerofoil; when the plane runs or flies, the air-flow is constrained by top curvature; Hence the wind speed will increase and consequently air pressure drops over the foil (

         Say, two teams, A and B is clashing in the finals of a cricket-international cup.  Betting is going on, of course illegally.  How to bet wisely and not to lose any money?  There is a way.      Tom strongly thinks that 'A' is going to win.  You bet with Tom on the basis; If 'A' team wins, you will pay Tom 2 dollars. If 'B' wins, Tom will pay you 3 dollars.".  Tom will be happy and accept the bet.      Bob thinks only 'B' team has winning chance.  Hence you bet with Bob on opposite terms.  That is, if 'B' wins, bob gets 2 dollars from you, otherwise you get 3 dollars from him.      Whatever may be the outcome of the match, you will always win.  In the victory of A or B, you will get 3 dollars from Tom or Bob and you pay out 2 dollars to one of them.  Hence, you will gain one dollar whatever may be the result of the match.      This is called "Hedging". It is used by the investment fund managers.  The fund is cal

             Take an A4 paper.  Measure length and breadth.  It will be 297 mm and 210 mm.  297/210 gives 1.414.  This is the square root of 2.  We can also say, the A4 paper has the ratio 1:1.414.  For any A series paper, we always get this ratio.  We know, if you cut the A4 paper into halves, we get two A5 papers.  If you double -up the A4 paper, we get an A3 paper.  This is the concept of A series paper.      Why should we maintain a fixed ratio?  Suppose you want to photocopy the contents in the A1 paper to A5 paper using Xerox machine.  The contents will exactly fit in the small A5 page.  This is because of the constant ratio of A series papers.  If we do not maintain the ratio, the contents will either over-fit or underfit.  That is, either some contents will be left out or blank space will appear.      When a movie is telecast in the TV or streamed in the mobile, a black space appears at the top and bottom of the screen.  It is because of mismatch of ratios.  Mobile

      Take two empty soda-Pepsi cans.  You can stand on them.  They will easily bear your weight, even though their walls are paper thin.  The curvature of the cans gives the strength.      Take an egg.  Hold in your palm.  Squeeze it as far as possible.  You cannot break it.  But, if you make a small dent in the shell, it will break.  The egg is curved on both sides (lengthwise and breadthwise).  Hence it is so strong.      A curved glass-blade has strength.  So it is not damaged by heavy rains.      The curves are always used in constructions to give strength to the building.  Arches, Domes, entrance etc.      You might have seen 'corrugated' cardboard box.  They have an undulating wave of cardboard inside their walls.  They are lightweight and thin.  But they are stiff enough to resist bending under considerable loads.  so once again, curves mean strength.  We use corrugated metal sheets, fiber sheets for the same reason.      Coming to potato chips and Prin

         Why the diamond is so bright and shiny(brilliance)?  Why it is so colorful (fire)?  Let us explore.      The diamond is a form of carbon, lived inside the earth for thousands of years, hardened by the pressure; mined out; cut and polished; and sold by the slogan "diamonds are forever", and given the status as "the great gift to one's lady-love."      Let us go into some optical characteristics of a diamond.  The diamond has a very high refractive index of 2.4 compared to water (1.3) and glass (1.5).  That means, the light rays are bent (refracted) by a very large angle when they pass through a diamond.  Consequently, it has a very less critical angle of 24 degrees.  That means, a light ray which tries to emerge from the diamond at or more than 24 degrees to the vertical, will not pass out instead it will be reflected internally.  Hence, mostly all the light rays undergo multiple reflections within a piece of diamond giving the characteristic bri

           An egg has a peculiar shape.  It is not a sphere or ellipsoid.  But  a 'ovoid'. More curved at one end and less curved at another end.  Also more elongated at one end.  This asymmetry has a purpose.      Take the egg on a rough surface-a plate.  Tilt the plate slightly- not more than 35 degree.  The egg; will roll down, but in a circular path; and will reach its initial position like a boomerang.  The egg-shape does this trick.     This kind of eggs are laid by birds on uneven rocky surfaces.  The wind and other disturbances may push the eggs here and there.  The eggs will not roll down, fall and end its life.  But they will go in arcs and survive. Note:  The eggs that are laid in nests and holes are normally spherical or elliptical.      They are more reasons for the egg-shape. 1. The curves are always strong.  They withstand any stress. 2. The eggs can be closely packed during incubation than the spherical eggs.  Hence, there will be less cold air be

        First, let us see how a bird is lifted up.  As a bird flap its wings, it gives downward force on air.  The reaction of two downward forces acts at the center and towards the body of the bird lifting it up.      It can be compared to bow and arrow.  The pulled string gives a reaction force on the arrow.  Hence it is fired straight forward.      Once the bird takes to flight, another principle comes into being.  Birds wings are in the aerofoil shape (another article).  When the aerofoil moves fast in the air, the pressure goes down on the up-side but increases on the down -side.  High pressure below the wings keep the bird afloat.      Next, another phenomenon takes place.  At the edges of wings, the air moves from high pressure to low pressure.  That is, from bottom of wings to top creating vortices of air flow.  As the bird moves forward, it will keep on creating spiral of air flow.  We know, a circular air flow has both upward and downward  flow.  Suppose, t

                It is a night 10:00 p.m.  I locked the house doors.  I checked security camera images on my smart phone.  It is all o.k.  I opened another app; switched off all the smart lights in the house and dimmed the hall-light. Then I tapped my smart watch.  It said, "you walked 7.2 km today and burned 2700 calories.  The heart-beat at the moment is 81 per minute.  The resting heart rate is 71 today".  I felt satisfied.  I switched on the "home projector".  It cast a big image on the wall of the hall.  I put on the blue-tooth head phone (I do not want to wake up others).  I begin to watch my favorite serial "Game of throne".  This is not a wild imagination but a reality in many modern Indian homes.  The technology is affordable and accessible to Indians today.      Out of many smart wearable and devices, smart watch stands prominently today.  Let us explore it deeply so that we can appreciate and exploit the device better.     First, let us