gravity

Showing 22 posts tagged gravity

Here’s an excellent discussion starter… what is happening to the liquid in this video?

This is Supermajor, a project by teacher and artist Matt Kenyon that was inspired by the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. From the project: 

In the gallery a wire rack of (vintage) oil cans sits.  One oilcan has a visible fissure out of which oil slowly flows cascading onto the pedestal and gallery floor…  The only thing is, the oil isn’t exactly flowing out of the can. Instead, oil appears to slow slowly drop by drop back into the can.  At times the drops of oil hover unsupported in midair. Other times the drops are in the process of a slow motion splash onto the pedestal.

I don’t know exactly how this demonstration is being executed, but I might suggest watching some of these videos next… and definitely watch this one…

There’s also an interview with Kenyon over at Cool Hunting and FastCo Design, and more projects at Swamp.nu.

Thanks, @AmebaCuriosa.

When eating pizza, New Yorkers will recommend that you fold the slice in half longways to reduce mess. Now find out about the math and physics working behind the scenes of that tradition in TED Ed’s Pizza physics (New York-style) by Colm Kelleher, animation by Joel Trussell.

We wish that all of our foods explained related math and physics ideas to us… and more about shapes, too.

via SciAm’s Video of the Week.

The Canadian Space Agency has one of the better summary videos about Expedition 34/35’s return to Earth from the International Space Station. Watch CSA Astronaut Chris Hadfield and his crewmates Tom Marshburn and Roman Romanenko climb into the Soyuz spacecraft, separate from ISS, and parachute down before getting extracted out of the amazingly small capsule that brought them safely home. Regarding Hadfield’s historic trip, CSA tweets: 

They also conducted over 130 science experiments, a record amount for the Station.

Our gravity must feel strange after five months of floating.

So how many people are in space right now? 

Canadian astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield has made it a part of his five month mission to educate about space, science and the International Space Station through a series of videos about daily life in space. In this one, he shows us how astronauts sleep on the ISS.

In case you’ve missed any of his fascinating reports, he’s also shown us how to wash our hands, brush our teeth, how we use math in space, how microgravity effects the body — how eyesight is affected and how food tastes — as well as what it’s like to cry in space: 

Be sure to watch all of Commander Hadfield’s Expedition 34/35 videos.

Using 160 large helium balloons and the help of 100 team members, Matt Silver-Vallance successfully flew from Robben Island to 300 meters off the coast of Cape Town, South Africa to raise money for the Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital. The flight was not only a daring feat, but was a tribute to former South African President and Nobel Laureate Nelson Mandela. In his opposition to apartheid, Mandela was a political prisoner on Robben Island for 18 years of his 27 years in prison. 

Though the weather was not in his favor at first, Silver-Vallance tweeted this sunny photo, saying, “I knew I had gone high but didn’t realise that this is what the 1000m high looks like!”

Related flying with balloons: National Geographic recreates the balloon house from Pixar’s Up.

via Telegraph.co.uk.