gunner-the-great

[gunner-the-great]

I drew a little something for the Hiveworks micro comic summer~

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WE WISH YOU A

AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR

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A Bug’s Life, 1998

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ace attorney fans have one joke and

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THAT TIME OF THE YEAR AGAIN

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Okay so a guy in my solid state physics class was telling us about this muon scanning startup he worked at, GScan, and I'm going insane. I don't work there and I have no stake in the company, financial or otherwise, I just need to tell you about it.

Muons are short-lived subatomic particles, same charge as an electron but ~200 times more massive. On Earth, they're produced by cosmic rays colliding with the upper atmosphere, and they hit the ground at a rate of about ten thousand per minute per square meter.

They're moving extremely fast at ground level, like 0.99 c. So they careen right through matter, deflecting only very slightly around heavy atomic nuclei – they'll penetrate like a hundred meters into solid rock.

What do you do with this continuous shower of deep-penetrating charged particles, constantly blanketing every square inch of the Earth's surface?

(source)

The classic thing is use them to image the inside of massive structures, like we use x-rays to look inside living tissue – except instead of generating them yourself, you just use atmospheric muons. Muon archeology is a whole thing, they've used it to find hidden chambers in pyramids and stuff. Neat!

But this one Estonian company is doing some crazy bullshit and I love it.

Sandwich anything between a pair of portable muon detectors and get full 3D imaging of the interior, with sub-millimeter accuracy, by tracking the minute deflection of muons between them. Samples that are WAY too thick for x-rays, made of literally anything. Just put some muon detectors on some two by fours in a warehouse and call it a day.

You can just. Image anything??? Anything you want?? Completely passively!! Just detectors! No particle source! Put them anywhere. The detectors themselves are a mature technology, the company's tech is in the algorithms they use to get this level of spatial and elemental resolution.

You can detect failures inside cable-reinforced concrete bridges without cutting open the bridges.

Decommissioned Soviet nuclear submarine filled with concrete, with no drawings or documentation, that may or may not have spent fuel canisters in it? And you need to cut it up for storage? Just look at the muons.

One of the wackiest ideas is to put one detector under your bed and one on the ceiling, so you get a full 3D scan of your body every night, passively. I want one.

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More train than dragon but I fold, metro train from the DC area cause public transit is cool

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we’re cleaning out our book collection and my dad REFUSES to throw out the like 2005 toronto public school poetry anthology that has my fucking, sasunaru fanart as the cover and i’m going to pass out

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Concept art for Treasure Planet (2002)

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had a bad low blood pressure moment last night and messily asked my partner for saltines and water before realizing i should probably ask for the Blood Pressure Medication I Need To Take. while they went to go grab it though i still had water and crackers so in a daze i took a swig of water but didnt swallow and then tried to cram 2 saltines in my mouth. full of water. in bed. with mouth full of water

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Centipede economic sayings

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recently we were out on a hilltop taking photos of the comet and suddenly some car's headlights blind us from across the bay. literally four miles away.

who the fuck is out here with these nuclear fusion powered headlights. who puts naval searchlights on their fucking toyota tacoma.

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Do the right thing Baron

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who was the guy who said every indie game is named either "empoisoned" or "swumbles big jumble" . i swear this is a real thing someone said

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