It is well known that cleaning your dirty dishes with water alone is just not sufficient and so, we employ soaps like fairy liquid and use dishwasher tablets to help us get rid of the dirt, but why do we need these? Soap is a generic term for fatty acid salts, with the general formula … Continue reading Why we Need Soap to Clean Dirty Dishes
Even though the sun is almost 150 million kilometres away from us, its UV rays are still able to cause significant damage to humans here on Earth. Whilst UV radiation is able to mutate your DNA and promote the formation and growth of tumours, it is also beneficial to us as it facilitates the natural … Continue reading How Does Sunscreen Protect our Skin
Most of us have childhood memories of running through patches of tall grass and suddenly feeling a sharp pain as we scrape past a patch of nettles. The next few minutes would be spent frantically searching for a dock leaf to stop the pain, and for many of us this would still be our first … Continue reading Nettle Stings and the Dock Leaf Remedy
My name is Lauren and I am a chemist. I am currently in my second year studying towards my PhD in inorganic chemistry. The idea behind my research is to design and synthesise cages of different shapes and sizes on a molecular scale. These cages usually have some internal void space which can then be … Continue reading Meet Lauren
The speed of light is as frustrating as it is fascinating. The speed of light in a vacuum is the fastest thing we can measure at 300,000km per second, although in a vast and ever expanding universe, it is painfully slow. The universe currently measures 45 billion light years in all directions of observation. So … Continue reading The Speed of Light – So Agonisingly Slow.
Last week I wrote about the WOW! Signal. The most likely candidate for a formal effort of contact from extra-terrestrials due to its irregular and almost artificial qualities. This does pose a thought, are radio waves the best way to establish contact? Although radio signals are received by radio telescopes every day, some are extremely … Continue reading Using Radio Waves and Other Means To Make Contact.
All over social media, there are articles discussing radio signals from other galaxies and stellar systems. The number one rule in astrophysics and cosmology is - IT IS NEVER ALIENS. A lot of radio signals can be interpreted and can have natural sources; rapidly rotating neutron stars, supermassive black holes and so on. So how … Continue reading Extraterrestrial Contact Series Part 1 – The Wow! Signal.
By Jude Morrow My latest two blog posts regarding surface water on Mars and Titan seem to have generated an influx of questions. When researching material for blog series’, the questions and comments seem to give inspiration for future posts. One such comment mentioned a large reservoir of water located at a proper distance of … Continue reading Cosmic Water Series Part 3 – Water in The Early Universe.
Of all the bodies in our own solar system, Titan is definitely my favourite. The reason being, it is one of the most likely candidates for life. I'm sure plenty of subscribers are rolling their eyes thinking; here he goes about Titan again. For this series it is quite relevant as Titan almost certainly contains … Continue reading Cosmic Water Series Part 2 – Saturn’s Moon Titan.
First of all, allow me to apologise for the extended break I've had from writing. I have been reading and working behind the scenes to gain enough content to keep us going into the new year. From reading subscriber comments and questions, one topic I haven't really touched upon in any great detail is water … Continue reading Cosmic Water Series. Part 1 – Mars
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