The AIP Physics News service last week highlighted a new result from the Athena collaboration at CERN with the headline “First Antimatter Chemistry”. That conjures images of sticking anti-carbon atoms together to make anti-buckballs, but that’s not exactly what’s going on… The experiment in the case involves the interaction between anti-protons and molecular hydrogen ions.… Continue reading Antimatter Chemstry (For Small Values of Chemistry)
Author: Chad Orzel
ACC Basketball Preview
Some time back, I offered the right to pick a post topic to anyone who managed to name one of the Physics Nobel laureates for 2006. Tom Renbarger won, and picked his topic: OK, with Midnight Madness on the horizon, I’ve decided to request a sort of season preview of two (trying to press my… Continue reading ACC Basketball Preview
The Problem of Prognostication
Some time back, I offered the right to pick a post topic to anyone who managed to name one of the Physics Nobel laureates for 2006. Tom Renbarger won, and picked his topic: OK, with Midnight Madness on the horizon, I’ve decided to request a sort of season preview of two (trying to press my… Continue reading The Problem of Prognostication
Whose Fault Is That Again?
Inside Higher Ed today features an opinion piece calling for more basic research funding: For the first time since we won the Cold War, other nations are mounting an aggressive challenge to the United States’ position as a world leader in science. China and India combined produce more than twice as many engineers each year… Continue reading Whose Fault Is That Again?
Cranky Book “Meme”: Voted Off the Island
Jim Henley proposes a “meme” about literature: Adrienne Aldredge has a twist on Bookish Questions I’m herewith turning into a meme: What authors have you given up on for good? And why? I’m going to stick to authors who continue to produce work, and whom I used to follow eagerly, not authors I felt obligated… Continue reading Cranky Book “Meme”: Voted Off the Island
Jet-Set Nerds
Symmetry magazine has an article on travel tips for physicists, from other physicists. There are two scary things about this: 1) The degree to which the picture that emerges from the different tips aligns with unflattering stereotypes of physicists. Some of the items are funny travel stories, but the tips are all about keeping your… Continue reading Jet-Set Nerds
Ready for Some (Division III) Football
The preceding comments about my alumni oganization were brought on by a bunch of factors– the arrival of a Maryland alumni publication this week, the update-your-information questionnaire from the Society of Alumni, a visiting speaker last week who was two years behind me at Williams. Probably the biggest was the fact that this is Union’s… Continue reading Ready for Some (Division III) Football
Cult of the Purple Cow
No, it’s not another spoof religion like the Flying Spaghetti Monster, and it’s not a real religion for people to get outraged over. The title refers to my college alumni organization– Williams uses a cow as the unofficial mascot, and the school colors are purple and gold, so little purple cows are all over everything.… Continue reading Cult of the Purple Cow
Power Outrage
The previous post was written at about 9:30 last night, and ends on an optimistic note. Of course, any hint of optimism demands retribution from the Lords of Karma, so I got a phone call at 9:45 telling me the power had gone out on campus. The power was apaprently off for something like an… Continue reading Power Outrage
Vacuum Technology is Black Magic
We’ve continued plugging away at the optical excitation experiment discussed in the Week in the Lab series last year, and have finally managed to get a decent metastable signal out of the thing. The signals are at pressures that are considerably higher than I would like (and quite a bit higher than the turbopump is… Continue reading Vacuum Technology is Black Magic