Turbulence is very good at spreading things out. Drop dye into a turbulent flow and it will quickly disperse. Add in particles — like rubber ducks — and they can Keep reading
Tag: diffusion
Why Nature Loves Fractals
Trees, blood vessels, and rivers all follow branching patterns that make their pieces look very similar to their whole. We call this repeating, self-similar shape a fractal, and this Be Keep reading
“Ink In The Water. Mix One.”
In this ASMR video, black ink diffuses in water. When the video starts, the ink is so diffuse that it’s not apparent the video is playing backward. It’s only as Keep reading
How a Storm Can Ruin Your Tea
Last November, a windstorm, known as Storm Ciarán in the U.K., blew through Europe with wind speeds as high as 130 kilometers per hour. All that wind came with a Keep reading
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 Keep reading
Disease and Placental Flows
The human placenta functions as a life-support system for a growing fetus. Despite its frisbee-like appearance, the organ is packed with nearly 10 square meters of blood vessels. On the Keep reading
Placental Fluid Dynamics
The placenta, critical as it is to human life and development, is likely the least-studied organ in the body. Reasons for that abound, from the ethics of studying pregnant people Keep reading
Chemical Flowers
These “flowers” blossom as two injected chemicals react in the narrow space between two transparent plates. The chemical reaction produces a darker ring that develops a streaky outer edge due Keep reading
Anoles Revisited
Longtime readers may recall seeing this little bubble-crowned anole previously. This species dives underwater to escape predators and will breathe and rebreathe a bubble of air for as much as Keep reading
Backswimmers
Backswimmers rule the surface of ponds, streams, and other bodies of water. These insects spend much of their time clinging just beneath the air-water interface, where they hunt larvae and Keep reading