If you’ve ever blown across the top of a bottle to make it play a note, then you’ve created a Helmholtz resonator. Air flow across the top of the bottle Keep reading
Month: September 2024
Testing a Supersonic Car
How do you test a supersonic car like the Bloodhound SSC in a wind tunnel? With free-flying objects like airplanes, wind tunnel testing is relatively straightforward. Mounting a stationary model in Keep reading
The Milk Crown
This frequently imitated photograph of a drop of milk splashing was taken by engineer Harold Edgerton in 1934. Edgerton pioneered the application of stroboscopic photography to everyday objects, allowing him Keep reading
5 Years of SDO
NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) is our premiere source for data on the sun. In honor of its five-year anniversary, NASA released this beautiful video compiling some of the highlights Keep reading
Snowy Deserts
Windblown snow bears a certain resemblance to desert sands or a Martian landscape. Many of the same aeolian processes–like erosion, transport, and deposition–take place in each. The animation above shows Keep reading
Plasma
For those of us who are Earthbound, it’s easy to think of liquids and gases as being the most common fluids. But plasma–the fourth state of matter–is a fluid as Keep reading
Singing Toads
Many male frog and toad species sing during warmer months to attract mates. Some, like the American toad in the photo above, can be heard for an impressive distance. Here’s Keep reading
Wingtip Vortices
Wingtip vortices are the result of high-pressure air from beneath a wing sneaking around the end of the wing to the low-pressure area on top. They trail for long distances Keep reading
Reader Question: Submarines
Reader elimik asks: Why do modern submarines have round bows instead of pointy ones, like the early WWII ones? Interestingly, there are more factors that affect this design choice than Keep reading
Underwater Currents
Like the atmosphere, the ocean is constantly in motion, churned by currents that often go unnoticed by humans watching the surface. Filmmaker Julie Gautier and free diver Guillaume Néry demonstrate the Keep reading