Blue Blood?

Al Asks:

Is our blood the color blue before oxygen hits it?

Not really. It is darker than oxygenated blood, but it isn’t really blue. Well, maybe a little blue. Really dark purplish blue.

It is actually pretty hard to see blood without oxygen in it – because blood (really, hemoglobin – the stuff in blood that holds oxygen) is so good at binding to oxygen that you have to keep it in an oxygen free environment if you don’t want it to hook onto some oxygen. Or give it something it likes better – like carbon monoxide. If you’ve ever seen someone with carbon monoxide poisoning, their lips are “cherry red”. This demonstrates that the color of blood is dependent on what is bound to the hemoglobin. Oxygen turns blood the “normal” red, carbon monoxide turns it a brighter red. Carbon dioxide turns it dark purple, or “blue”.

There may be something that will bind to hemoglobin that would turn it bright, cobalt blue, but if here is, I don’t know what it is – and it would probably not be particularly healthy to experiment…..

Advertisement

is 55 MPH greater going uphill, downhill, or flat

Joe asks:

Is a vehicle going 55 mph downhill going faster than a vehicle going 55 on flat land? I just wonder because people seem to slow down going downhill in the mountains as compared to traveling on relatively flat land. Which then begs the question… heaven forbid… if a person were involved in an accident traveling 55 downhill would the forces exerted at impact be greater than traveling at 55 on flat land. I’m reminded of a mashed potato analogy in astronomy class 30 some odd years ago dealing with mass.

It wouldn’t make any difference. 55mph is the same downhill, uphill, or flat – speed is  not dependent on the slope of the ground. In a collision, the forces involved are going to be a result of the difference in the vectors of the two objects. In order to figure out the details, you’d need to do a vector analysis in 3D. Most High school physics courses should cover 2D collisions (or at least simple models of them). In the real world, things are a bit more complex – you need to take into account the deformation of the objects that are colliding, and a bunch of other variables (including the fact that the real world is 3D not 2D). In any case, the bottom line is that 2 objects colliding at a given speed and impact angle will have the same energy transfer. Going uphill or downhill will make some difference, but not much (this is the 3D part, and gravity plays into it). This is because the force of the vertical gravity vector would be added to the object going downhill, and subtracted from the object going uphill. For the slopes normally found on roads (including mountain roads) this wouldn’t be much.

Doctor Science

 

what has more energy?

Jenna asks:

What has more energy, an unburned log or the ashes of the log once it has been burned?

The wood has more energy. As the wood burn, it releases some of the energy that is stored in the wood – heat, sound, and light are all forms of the energy that is released.

What happens when wood burns is that many of the large complex molecules that the tree made while it was growing get broken down into smaller molecules. This releases energy. Some of that energy is used to break other molecules in the wood apart, and the rest is released to the environment. The reason wood doesn’t just light on fire by itself is because it needs that initial energy to start breaking the first molecules up. Once it’s going, it will keep going until it either runs out of things to burn (in which case it doesn’t have any more molecules that it can break up), or until it cools off enough that there isn’t enough energy to break up more molecules.

How do seeds know when to grow?

Joe asks:

why are seeds able to wait for the proper condition to germinate?

Because that’s what seeds do.  Really. Now, HOW they do it, that’s a whole different question…..

Without getting into some fairly complex biochemistry, the answer is fairly simple. Seeds have a whole slew of little biological switches. They are turned on and off depending on the environment that the seed is exposed to. Some of them are fairly simple. For example, if it is very dry, the seed’s shell will stay hard, and keep what moisture there is inside the seed where it belongs – inside the seed. If the outer environment gets wetter, the seed shell will absorb some of the water and get softer. This is actually lot more complex than just soaking up water – the proteins and lipids in the shell actually change shape and go through a bunch of other changes as they absorb the water.

These changes do all sorts of things. When they change shapes, they expose different parts of the proteins to the inside of the seed. When this happens, the newly exposed parts can trigger other reactions inside the seed. Those changes trigger other changes, and if conditions are right, the seed may start to grow.

This is a very simplistic example – all we are looking at is the amount of water int he environment. Temperature, light, nutrients, and a whole slew of other factors can come into play, but the basic concept is the same. If all of these “switches” ‘turn on” (or off) in the right combinations, and in the right sequence, the seed will start to grow.

Sometimes, a seed can “turn on”, then if conditions don’t stay right, they can “turn off” again until conditions get better, but not always. Of course, the longer the seed has been growing, the less likely it will be to be able to return to being dormant. Some seeds are really incredibly good at waiting for the right conditions. A few years ago, a 2,000 year old date palm seed was successfully sprouted, and is still growing. Pretty cool by my book…..

So there ya go. Seeds are basically little environment computers waiting for conditions to be just right  before they launch their “grow” application.

See, science isn’t all that hard if you ask the right questions……

On creationism, intelligent design and evolution

OK folks, Dr. science has had it up to here with the Holy Roller Crowd. Its simple: evolution is science. Creationism and intelligent design are religion. Or fantasy, depending on your outlook.

The church and its minions can spew all the misinformation that they want, and may be able to force through laws claiming that their fantasies are “science”, but it won’t make a bit of difference to the FACTS. Evolution is a FACT. If you choose to pretend it isn’t, that is your choice, but it won’t make you right (although it will make you look stupid to anyone with a basic education).

Oh yeah, and the Earth isn’t flat either. Just to clear that up….

Jeez people. Get a clue.

Why does climate change?

Sevinch asks:

how do environments change over time, and what causes them to change?

There are a lot of factors that contribute to environmental changes. The first critical concept is to accept that our environment is not static – it is always changing. The idea that climate change can be stopped is kind of like thinking that the Earth can be stopped – so that it stays in the same place in its orbit. It just ain’t gonna happen.

So, now that we have accepted that climate is variable instead of static, why does it change. The whole concept of “climate” encompasses a lot of different components – some of them are fairly stable, like the amount of sunlight that hits the earth, and some are a lot more variable like the detailed make-up of the atmosphere. Lets start with some of the more stable ones.

The amount of sunlight that hits the earth is pretty constant, but even that has some variability. As the sun’s activity changes, the amount of energy (light) that it emits also changes. Every 11 years, there is an increase in sunspot activity, which means that there is  a change in the amount of energy that the sun emits, which (of course) changes the amount of energy that hits the earth. The amount of the suns energy that is absorbed by the earth is also variable – a lot of the energy is reflected back out into space. The exact amount is determined by the reflectivity of the earth. The amount of energy that is reflected back out determined the albedo, or how bright the earth looks from space. Once again, this number is fairly constant, but still has variability. An increase in cloud cover, snow cover, or pretty much anything that changes the color of the surface of the earth will change the albedo, thus changing the amount of energy that the earth absorbs from the sun.

Now, lets look at some of the more variable components. The detailed make-up of the atmosphere plays a huge role in climate. Small changes in the amounts of certain elements or compounds can have huge effects on the ability of the atmosphere to retain energy. As the suns energy enters the earths atmosphere, it is either reflected back into space, absorbed by the atmosphere, or passes through the atmosphere to reach the surface of the earth. The atmosphere can only hold so much energy – it is stored as wind, heat, and in  a whole series of complex molecules that hold onto the energy or use it to form new compounds. As the chemical composition of the atmosphere changes, its capability to hold and store energy also changes, which in turn changes the temperature of the atmosphere.

So, how does the composition of the atmosphere change? Lots of ways. As the biota (all of the living things put together) on the earth changes, so does what they dump into the air. There was no free oxygen in the air until green plants started dumping it into the air (oxygen is a waste product of plant metabolism). Because the biota of the earth is also always changing, the content of the atmosphere is too.

Finally, that light from the sun can reach the surface of the earth. When it hits the ground (or a tree, or a building, or whatever), it has a chance to be reflected back through the atmosphere into space, or it can be absorbed by whatever it hits. If it is absorbed, it will either warm up what it hits, or (in the case of green plants) be used to drive metabolism. As the surface of the earth changes, what the sunlight hits will change, which will change the chances of it being absorbed or reflected. A good man-made example is paving – roads, parking lots, etc. Most paving is black, and is really good at absorbing the sun’s energy. So if, for example, we plot a great big parking lot down in the middle of Alaska, in the winter that parking lot will be a whole lot warmer than the surrounding snow because it will reflect a lot more light than the white snow surface does. One parking lot in the middle of Alaska won’t make much difference to the world environment, but a big area of pavement like any large city can (and does) make a difference. When you add up all the surface area of the world that is paved, you get a pretty good amount of extra energy being absorbed.

A natural (in some cases) case of surface change that effects the absorption of sunlight is changes in forest and plains. Large areas of wilderness undergo natural cycles between being grasslands/plains and forests. Forests tend to be darker colored, and are thus better at trapping the energy from the sun. As these natural cycles take place, they can drive climate change – but the relationship is complex – they not only drive climate change, but they are effected by climate change.

Finally, there can be sudden huge events that can trigger climate change. There are two excellent examples of this that we know about. The first is the asteroid that hit the earth and “killed off all the dinosaurs”. Is wasn’t the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs, it was the climate change that the impact caused. Similarly, when Krakatoa erupted, there was a “year of no summer”, and the climactic effects of the eruption lasted for decades. The reasons for the two changes in climate are the same: the event did the same major thing: they dumped a whole slew of dust into the air.

This dust changed the way that sunlight interacted with the earths atmosphere. A lot more light was reflected back out into space, and the light that wasn’t reflected was a lot more likely to be absorbed into the atmosphere. This means that the overall amount of energy that is trapped by the atmosphere/earth together is lowered (because more is reflected). IN the case of the asteroid, this was enough of a change to trigger a major long-term climate change. In the case of krakatoa, the change was much more short-lived, but still noticeable. Another effect of this is that all of the plant life on the surface that is relying on the sun’s energy to stay alive suddenly are starving – not as much sunlight is getting to them. Lots of plants die off. But wait: those plants are critical for keeping the oxygen in the air, so when they die, the balance is knocked even further out of whack. Then because there is less oxygen, the atmospheres ability to hold energy changes, and so on and so on.

Fortunately, the system tends to be self correcting – when it gets knocked out of whack, it self-corrects and swings back the other way – if it is too cold, the system reacts by becoming more efficient at trapping energy from the sun. But then it gets too warm, so it self-corrects again. Things keep self correcting back and forth in smaller and smaller swings until something else comes along and knocks it all out of whack again.

How to Make Charcoal

Timmy asks:

When I make a fire, I end up with little lumps of charcoal, but most of the wood burns to ash. How do they make charcoal without wasting all the wood?

The little bits of charcoal that are left in your fireplace or campfire are made one of two ways. The first way is that the fire goes out, and as it cools, it leaves little bits of unburned wood. The little bits are burned on the outside, but the inside is still partially unburned. To understand this, we have to look at how wood burns. There are a few stages:

1. As the wood heats up, gasses are released from the cells in the wood. These gasses burn up, and make a lot of the yellow flames that we see in a fire.
2. Once the wood has released the gasses, what is left is very dry, but solid. When these dry hard bits are exposed to high heat (like the heat produced when those gasses burn), they also burn, releasing more gas, heat, and finally leaving behind ash.

Sounds simple, no? Well, it is – sort of. The confusing bit is that once a fire is lit, all of these things happen at the same time. Fortunately, because the fire on the outside of the wood uses up all of the oxygen, the wood will burn from the inside out. If you have a fire and put it out before a log has burned up, you can cut open the log. You will find that the outside of the log is covered with charcoal that is full of cracks and fissures. This is where the phase 2 burning is taking place. The easy to burn gasses have been released, and the underlying structure is partially burned.

A bit deeper in, you will find charcoal that doesn’t have many cracks in it. This is the part of the log that has released most of the easy to burn gasses, but not all, and the structural part of the wood hasn’t started to burn yet. It hasn’t started to burn either because the heat hasn’t penetrated that deep yet (wood conducts heat very slowly), or because there is no oxygen to allow the structural part of the wood to burn (remember this: it’s important).

Even deeper in, you’ll find wood that hasn’t begun to burn at all.

The part that we’re interested in is the middle bit – the part where the charcoal doesn’t have a lot of cracks in it. We know that we can make charcoal like this by carefully controlling the temperature – getting the log hot enough to release all those easy to burn gasses, but not hot enough to actually burn the underlying structure. This is really tough to do, because if the log hot enough to release the gasses, it is hot enough to ignite the gasses, which will then heat up the underlying wood, and burn it too (this is why fire works instead of just going out).

A much easier way to turn the log into charcoal is to light it on fire, and get it good and hot, then to remove all of the oxygen. If the fire was big enough, the heat that is left over will continue to “cook” the logs, letting them release the easy to burn gasses. If you’re really fancy, you can allow in just enough oxygen to let some (but not all) of the gasses burn. This can generate enough heat to make sure the fire stays hot enough to keep cooking the wood until all of the gasses have been released, but the underlying structure doesn’t burn. This will create whole logs of charcoal.

That’s how charcoal was made in the old days. They’d make a great big pile of logs. I mean BIG: whole trees – lots of them. Then they’d coat the whole pile with a thick layer of mud (or clay), leaving a bunch of big holes around the bottom to let in air, and a hole in the top to act like a chimney. Light it on fire and the fire will bake the mud/clay into a rock-like wall, so that it won’t cave in as the wood burns. When the fire is going really good (you can tell by the color of the smoke coming out of the chimney – when the fire is burning well, there will be no smoke), start plugging up the air holes around the bottom. Watch the smoke. As it turns into a thick white smoke, you know that you have started starving the fire – there isn’t enough air getting in to burn all of the gas that is being released from the wood. The unburned gasses make the smoke white. By adjusting the amount of air that is allowed in, you can make sure that there is enough oxygen to let some of the gas burn (to keep it hot in there), but not enough to actually burn the charcoal that is left. Once the wood has released all of the gasses, you plug up all the holes. What is left of the fire will go out because there isn’t anything left burning – no oxygen.

Charcoal factories used to spend weeks or months building these wood piles, and they would often take weeks to burn. Sometimes they would take over a month to go out and cool completely once the holes were blocked off. Once the whole mess has cooled off, you bust open the baked mud walls, and you’ve got a big old pile of charcoal. In huge pieces – sometimes almost as big as the logs that went in. These are cut up (or broken up) into whatever size you need. Voila. Charcoal.

Ask Dr. Science. He knows more than you do.

Hey all. Time for a great new Blog service. Yep. I’m going to put that 15 years of graduate school to work for you. Got a question about something in the sciences or technology? shoot me a question (submit a comment), and I’ll apply all that great academic knowledge and ivory tower experience to answer your question. Remember: We’re trained professionals. Don’t try this at home. Objects in mirror are closer than they appear. Time to get another Timmy.
So whadaya waiting for? Send me a question already!

–Dr. Science

Fun with Dr. Science

Well folks, I have to admit that the Dr. science stuff is a lot more fun thatn I thought, So here’s a bit of Dr. Science History.

In the 50s and sixties, there were a bunch of science tv shows and elementary school movies that were supposed to teach basic science type stuff. In those shows, a lab-coated ‘scientist’ guy would talk his way through some basic science principle, aided with a 8-10 year old side kick, who always seemed to be named Timmy. The shows always had a “hands-on” demonstration of the principle, with the mandatory “don’t try this at home” warning. Demos included things like rocketry, playing with Oxygen and flames, explosions, and all the other cool things that attract geeky little scientist-to-be-kids (like me).

These shows were practically cultural icons, and, being cultural icons, were quickly outdated, and then spoofed. One of the better spoofs of was Ask Dr. Science. I don’t honestly remember where I first saw it, but the tagline (they called it a byline back then) really was “He knows more than you do” – or at least something that boiled down to the same thing.  Also, in every episode, Timmy somehow always ended up seriously maimed or dead. Great scientist humour, eh?

Fast forward to my many, many, many years in academia. During this phase of my life, I was not only a hardcore neuroscientist (why yes, I am a brain surgeon), but my paying job (sort of) was running the University Bookstore. Imagine spending 5-8 hours a day in a bookstore that has all of the readings for all of the courses at a major research university. There is actually work to do maybe a month out of the year – when the students buy their books. The rest of the year is dusting the shelves and waiting to see if someone realizes they actually need a textbook around mid terms or finals…. So what do you do? I don’t know about you, but I read. Everything. Literaly. Over the course of the 6 or so years I worked there, I read every single textbook used in every single course at the University.

Of course, being a geek, I was also building lazers and playing around with light shows, computers, chemistry, engineering, rockets (why yes, I am a Rocket scientist – well, at least my dad was. Ever see a liquid fuel rocket fail on the pad? whoooooosh!) and all kinds of other neat things. My friends, many of them also geeks and scientists, started calling me Dr. Science because I could help them out with their classes – even if it was something completely unrelated to my major, and answer (or at least theorize about) the random questions they’d come up with. (It’s worth noting that a bunch of college age geeks can come up with some really wierd questions – especially when aided by alchohol, sleep deprivation, and random illicit chemicals.) It became one of those nicknames that was a joke, but also something of an honor.

When I left University and started working in the “real world”, the name stuck. People I worked with would come to me trying to find something to stump me with. I can’t tell you how many hours of company time I spent researching absolutely insane topics to answer them. Gotta love corporate America….

Then, I move Here (I won’t actually name “Here”, but there are a lot of hicks Here). The land of intellectual dearth.  If intellect were oxygen, you’d need an airpack to live. Folks here consider a brain-bending question to be something like “how many beer cans can I stack up before they fall over?” or “I wonder what will happen if I insert this body part into that large meat processing machine?”. Of course, being curiouse, they take the obvious path, and experiment. In any case, Dr. Science pretty much fell into retirement. For the past decade or so, he has fielded an occasional question, but mostly stayed quiet and pursued other activities.

Then, I retired. And got bored. And started (maong other things) blogging. And one day, I had nothing to blog about, and decided to see what folks in the bloggosphere would present to Dr. Science. So there ya go. Here he is. Having a blast, and fielding questions again. Go ahead. I dare ya. Ask me. Here’s where you can ask Dr. science your question: Ask Dr. Science (please don’t post questions here – if you do, they may get lost in the comments for this article).

Ask Dr. Science. He knows more than you do.

Ask Dr. Science. He knows more than you do.

Please use Ask Dr. Science to ask questions.

Thanks

Dr. Science 

Hey all. time for a great new Blog service. Yep. I’m going to put that 15 years of graduate school to work for you. Got a question about something in the sciences or technology? shoot me a question (submit a comment at : Ask Dr. Science), and I’ll apply all that great academic knowledge and ivory tower experience to answer your question. Remember. We’re trained professionals. Don’t try this at home. Objects in mirror are closer than they appear. Time to get another Timmy.

So whadaya waiting for? send me a question already!

–Dr. Science