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    Making Magnetic Crystals From Ferrofluids

    Ferrofluids are a great platform for exploring liquids and magnetism. Here, researchers trap ferrofluid droplets along an oil-water meniscus and then apply a magnetic field that makes the drops repel one another. The results are crystalline patterns formed from magnetic droplets. For a given patch of drops, increasing the magnetic field’s strength pushes drops further apart. But changing the drops’ size and levels of self-attraction also shifts the patterns. Check out the video to see the crystals in action. (Video and image credit: H. Khattak et al.)

  • How Venus Is Losing Its Water

    How Venus Is Losing Its Water

    Since Venus formed at the same time as Earth and is similar in size, scientists believe it once had the same amount of water our planet does. Today, hellish Venus has hardly any water, a fact scientists have struggled to explain completely. Most of its water was lost long ago, as incoming particles from the solar wind stripped water from the upper atmosphere; unlike Earth, Venus doesn’t enjoy the protection of a magnetic field.

    But that mechanism doesn’t explain just how arid Venus is now. A new study instead suggests that Venus’s water loss is ongoing, driven by simple chemical reactions. The team found that molecules of HCO+ (an ion made from one hydrogen, one carbon, and one oxygen atom) could mix with any remaining water to form a positively-charged molecule. Due to that charge, the chemical easily attracts loose electrons. Once combined, however, the resulting molecule is too energetic and breaks apart; when it does so, it releases highly-energetic hydrogen, which escapes the atmosphere into space. Without that hydrogen, water molecules can’t reform. This process of dissociative recombination could explain why the rest of Venus’s water has disappeared.

    Science missions that have flown to Venus so far haven’t been equipped to measure HCO+, and the authors recommend this as a priority for future missions to our neighbor. With that data, we could confirm or disprove this mechanism for Venusian water loss. (Image credit: NASA; research credit: M. Chaffin et al.; via Gizmodo)

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    How We Got Atoms From Brownian Motion

    In 1827, botanist Robert Brown observed an odd jittery motion of particles as he watched grains of pollen floating in water under his microscope. He saw the random motion also with inorganic — which is to say definitely Not Alive — particles as well. But it was Einstein nearly 80 years later who figured out how to connect this observable motion to atoms. Einstein realized Brown’s particles were being constantly jostled by atomic collisions, and, with a little work, we could use those moving particles to determine Avogadro’s number. Steve Mould walks you through the whole story in this video. (Video and image credit: S. Mould)

  • “Dew Point” Deposits Droplets

    “Dew Point” Deposits Droplets

    Artist Lily Clark loves to work in water. One of her recent sculptures, “Dew Point,” uses superhydrophobic ceramic to grow and manipulate water droplets over and over and over. Droplets coalesce in four corners until they grow large enough for gravity to pull them into a circular depression. Given their limited contact with the ceramic, the falling water droplets zip and slide on their way to a return slit in the center of the piece. You can see more of the action in the video below. Personally, I’m reminded of coins falling into a collection box! (Video credit: L. Turczan; artwork by: L. Clark; via Colossal)

  • Wind Sculptures

    Wind Sculptures

    Vibrantly colored fabrics move in the breeze in artist Thomas Jackson’s outdoor installations. During the golden hours, he captures that movement in photographs like these. Jackson uses tulle, silk, and other everyday objects in his projects, and when finished, he takes a “leave no trace” approach, removing all materials and recycling them into new projects. Find more work on his website and Instagram. (Image credit: T. Jackson; via Colossal)

  • Kelvin-Helmholtz and the Sun

    Kelvin-Helmholtz and the Sun

    Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities (KHI) are a favorite among fluid dynamicists. They resemble the curls of a breaking ocean wave — not a coincidence, since KHI create those ocean waves to begin with — and show up in picturesque clouds, Martian lava coils, and Jovian cloud bands. The instability occurs when two layers of fluid move at different speeds and the friction between them causes wrinkles that grow into waves.

    Scientists have long suspected that KHI could occur in solar phenomena, too, like the coronal mass ejections that drive space weather. The Parker Solar Probe, a spacecraft designed to explore the sun, caught evidence of a series of turbulent eddies during a 2021 coronal mass ejection, and a recent study of those observations shows that the series of vortices are consistent with KHI. Put simply, the team found that the features are spaced and aligned as we’d expect for KHI and, during the probe’s measurements, the features grew at the rate Kelvin-Helmholtz eddies would. Although the instability itself may be common in the sun’s corona, it’s unlikely that we’ll see it often, simply because conditions need to be just right for them to be visible. (Image credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/NRL/Guillermo Stenborg and Evangelos Paouris; research credit: E. Paouris et al.; via Gizmodo)

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  • “Bulging Balloons”

    “Bulging Balloons”

    This planet-like balloon started out as two elastomer sheets, heat-sealed together into a spiraling tube. As the balloon was inflated, it changed from flat to a saddle-like shape. With more air, the pressure inside increased, triggering an instability that caused the middle of the balloon to bulge. As inflation continued, the central bulge expanded, unbonding layer after layer of the seal. Even late in inflation, the balloon maintains hints of its original shape in the form of a ring around the Jovian bulge in the middle. (Image credit: N. Vani et al.)

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    “Serenity”

    Peering from directly above, landscapes take on a whole different aspect. That idea is the heart of Vadim Sherbakov’s “Serenity,” filmed by drone. From seething waters and meandering rivers to eroded landscapes and twisting ice, there’s lots of fluid dynamics on display here. (Video and image credit: V. Sherbakov)

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  • Black Holes in a Blender

    Black Holes in a Blender

    Massive black holes drag and warp the spacetime around them in extreme ways. Observing these effects firsthand is practically impossible, so physicists look for laboratory-sized analogs that behave similarly. Fluids offer one such avenue, since fluid dynamics mimics gravity if the fluid viscosity is low enough. To chase that near-zero viscosity, experimentalists turned to superfluid helium, a version of liquid helium near absolute zero that flows with virtually no viscosity. At these temperatures, vorticity in the helium shows up as quantized vortices. Normally, these tiny individual vortices repel one another, but a spinning propeller — much like the blades of a blender — draws tens of thousands of these vortices together into a giant quantum vortex.

    Here superfluid helium whirls in a quantum vortex.
    Here superfluid helium whirls in a quantum vortex.

    With that much concentrated vorticity, the team saw interactions between waves and the vortex surface that directly mirrored those seen in black holes. In particular, they detail bound states and black-hole-like ringdown phenomena. Now that the apparatus is up and running, they hope to delve deeper into the mechanics of their faux-black holes. (Image credit: L. Solidoro; research credit: P. Švančara et al.; via Physics World)

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    Etna’s Blowing Rings

    Mount Etna has long been known for its smoke rings, but thanks to the opening of a new vent on the volcano’s southeast crater, it’s now making more rings than ever. Etna’s smoke rings are, more precisely, vortex rings — produced in the same way dolphins, swimmers, and whales make vortex rings: a sudden push of air through a roughly circular opening. It’s likely that Etna and other volcanoes make far more rings than those we see; we’re limited to noticing only the ones that entrain smoke and condensation to make them visible. (Video and image credit: The Straits Times; via Colossal)

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