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Tag: brownian motion

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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)

  • The Wanderings of Micro-Scallops

    The Wanderings of Micro-Scallops

    In the 19th century, botanist Robert Brown observed pollen granules beneath his microscope jittering randomly. Einstein showed that this motion resulted from the impacts of much-smaller atoms against the particles. For small enough objects, the random walk of Brownian motion dominates their dynamics. A new study explores how flexible objects move at this Brownian scale.

    The researchers used trios of colloids — microscopic particles — held together by a lipid fluid layer that allows the three particles to change shape without losing contact. Essentially, each trio forms a tiny hinge. As atoms strike the colloids, they both move and change shape.

    Compared to rigid shapes, the researchers found their flexible hinges moved around in space about 3-15% faster. They also found coupling between the shape changes and motion. When the colloids hinge closed, it propels them in the direction the hinge points. Because this resembles the propulsion of scallops, the researchers refer to this as the “Brownian quasi-scallop mode.” (Image and research credit: R. Verweij et al.; via phys.org)

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    Brownian Motion

    Have you ever noticed how motes of dust seem to dance around even in still air? The reason they do is because all the atoms and molecules in the air have a certain amount of random motion and all those tiny random motions result in collisions on the dust particles that shift them around. The technical term for this is Brownian motion, named for botanist Robert Brown who noticed through his microscope that particles of pollen floating on water moved constantly under no apparent force. The video above demonstrates the effect in 2D with vibrating brass particles representing atoms and a polystyrene ball as the pollen. Alternatively, you can see Brownian motion in the movement of nanoparticles in water. Although most areas of fluid dynamics do not explicitly consider the random motions of all these particles, the concept is fundamental to the nature of pressure and temperature, both of which are important quantities in fluid dynamics. (Video credit: Sixty Symbols; topic requested by just-a-random-nerd)