Science Etcetera, Venusday 20090703

Posted in Science Etcetera on July 3rd, 2009

Metallography is a type of scientific microimaging that involves mirror-polishing metal surfaces and then etching them with various reagents to reveal their microstructures” and it looks pretty darn cool too.

Metallografischer Anschliff einer Glockenbronze
Credit: Eisenbeisser

Mark Miodownik’s Materials Library is a collection of over 900 fantastic materials, including aerogel, the world’s lightest solid, and aluminium nitride, an amazingly effective conductor.

Among the Supreme Court’s lesser-publicized final rulings this year was one allowing a mining company to dump more than 4.5 million tones of slurry in Alaska’s Tongass National Forest’s Lower Slate Lake. Why do we bother having a Clean Water Act?

Vegans have 5 percent less bone density on average compared with non-vegans; however, this does not translate into more bone fractures, as vegans tend to be more health conscious.

A couple of names I didn’t recognize in New Scientist’s user-voted most inspirational women of science, but all are worth entries.

Hypatia of Alexandria
(Mathematician (370-415), murdered by a Christian Mob)

More reasons to stay away from plastics 3 and 7, as studies on animals find bisphenol A causes irreversible damage to fertility regulatory genes, as well as fetal developmental problems.

For healthy sperm, men should ejaculate daily (No problem.), according to a study that observed the sperm quality of men with higher than average DNA damaged sperm and had some of them practice onanism.

Scotland’s Soay sheep are 5 percent smaller than 24 years ago as climate change has made grass more abundant, meaning the sheep don’t have to put on as much weight to survive the winter.

Rocketboom: The Computer History Museum