#A-GAS Electronic Materials

[agaselectronicmaterials]

Advanced Equipment for High-Quality Services at A-Gas Electronic Materials

Explore the wide range of advanced equipment at A-Gas Electronic Materials, ensuring top-notch services for our customers. Our state-of-the-art tools include CVS analysis, Yamoto wafer plating, rectifiers, and more. Trust us for precision and reliability in all your industrial needs.

[jcmarchi]

MIT chemists synthesize plant-derived molecules that hold potential as pharmaceuticals

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/mit-chemists-synthesize-plant-derived-molecules-that-hold-potential-as-pharmaceuticals/

MIT chemists synthesize plant-derived molecules that hold potential as pharmaceuticals

MIT chemists have developed a new way to synthesize complex molecules that were originally isolated from plants and could hold potential as antibiotics, analgesics, or cancer drugs.

These compounds, known as oligocyclotryptamines, consist of multiple tricyclic substructures called cyclotryptamine, fused together by carbon–carbon bonds. Only small quantities of these compounds are naturally available, and synthesizing them in the lab has proven difficult. The MIT team came up with a way to add tryptamine-derived components to a molecule one at a time, in a way that allows the researchers to precisely assemble the rings and control the 3D orientation of each component as well as the final product.

“For many of these compounds, there hasn’t been enough material to do a thorough review of their potential. I’m hopeful that having access to these compounds in a reliable way will enable us to do further studies,” says Mohammad Movassaghi, an MIT professor of chemistry and the senior author of the new study.

In addition to allowing scientists to synthesize oligocyclotryptamines found in plants, this approach could also be used to generate new variants that may have even better medicinal properties, or molecular probes that can help to reveal their mechanism of action.

Tony Scott PhD ’23 is the lead author of the paper, which appears today in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

Fusing rings

Oligocyclotryptamines belong to a class of molecules called alkaloids — nitrogen-containing organic compounds produced mainly by plants. At least eight different oligocyclotryptamines have been isolated from a genus of flowering plants known as Psychotria, most of which are found in tropical forests.

Since the 1950s, scientists have studied the structure and synthesis of dimeric cyclotryptamines, which have two cyclotryptamine subunits. Over the past 20 years, significant progress has been made characterizing and synthesizing dimers and other smaller members of the family. However, no one has been able to synthesize the largest oligocyclotryptamines, which have six or seven rings fused together.

One of the hurdles in synthesizing these molecules is a step that requires formation of a bond between a carbon atom of one tryptamine-derived subunit to a carbon atom of the next subunit. The oligocyclotryptamines have two types of these linkages, both containing at least one carbon atom that has bonds with four other carbons. That extra bulk makes those carbon atoms less accessible to undergo reactions, and controlling the stereochemistry — the orientation of the atoms around the carbon — at all these junctures poses a significant challenge.

For many years, Movassaghi’s lab has been developing ways to form carbon-carbon bonds between carbon atoms that are already crowded with other atoms. In 2011, they devised a method that involves transforming the two carbon atoms into carbon radicals (carbon atoms with one unpaired electron) and directing their union. To create these radicals, and guide the paired union to be completely selective, the researchers first attach each of the targeted carbon atoms to a nitrogen atom; these two nitrogen atoms bind to each other.

When the researchers shine certain wavelengths of light on the substrate containing the two fragments linked via the two nitrogen atoms, it causes the two atoms of nitrogen to break away as nitrogen gas, leaving behind two very reactive carbon radicals in close proximity that join together almost immediately. This type of bond formation has also allowed the researchers to control the molecules’ stereochemistry.

Movassaghi demonstrated this approach, which he calls diazene-directed assembly, by synthesizing other types of alkaloids, including the communesins. These compounds are found in fungi and consist of two ring-containing molecules, or monomers, joined together. Later, Movassaghi began using this approach to fuse larger numbers of monomers, and he and Scott eventually turned their attention to the largest oligocyclotryptamine alkaloids.

The synthesis that they developed begins with one molecule of cyclotryptamine derivative, to which additional cyclotryptamine fragments with correct relative stereochemistry and position selectivity are added, one at a time. Each of these additions is made possible by the diazene-directed process that Movassaghi’s lab previously developed.

“The reason why we’re excited about this is that this single solution allowed us to go after multiple targets,” Movassaghi says. “That same route provides us a solution to multiple members of the natural product family because by extending the iteration one more cycle, your solution is now applied to a new natural product.”

“A tour de force”

Using this approach, the researchers were able to create molecules with six or seven cyclotryptamine rings, which has never been done before.

“Researchers worldwide have been trying to find a way to make these molecules, and Movassaghi and Scott are the first to pull it off,” says Seth Herzon, a professor of chemistry at Yale University, who was not involved in the research. Herzon described the work as “a tour de force in organic synthesis.”

Now that the researchers have synthesized these naturally occurring oligocyclotryptamines, they should be able to generate enough of the compounds that their potential therapeutic activity can be more thoroughly investigated.

They should also be able to create novel compounds by switching in slightly different cyclotryptamine subunits, Movassaghi says.

“We will continue to use this very precise way of adding these cyclotryptamine units to assemble them together into complex systems that have not been addressed yet, including derivatives that could potentially have improved properties,” he says.

The research was funded by the U.S. National Institute of General Medical Sciences.

[nasa]

A Tour of Cosmic Temperatures

We often think of space as “cold,” but its temperature can vary enormously depending on where you visit. If the difference between summer and winter on Earth feels extreme, imagine the range of temperatures between the coldest and hottest places in the universe — it’s trillions of degrees! So let’s take a tour of cosmic temperatures … from the coldest spots to the hottest temperatures yet achieved.

First, a little vocabulary: Astronomers use the Kelvin temperature scale, which is represented by the symbol K. Going up by 1 K is the same as going up 1°C, but the scale begins at 0 K, or -273°C, which is also called absolute zero. This is the temperature where the atoms in stuff stop moving. We’ll measure our temperatures in this tour in kelvins, but also convert them to make them more familiar!

We’ll start on the chilly end of the scale with our CAL (Cold Atom Lab) on the International Space Station, which can chill atoms to within one ten billionth of a degree above 0 K, just a fraction above absolute zero.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Just slightly warmer is the Resolve sensor inside XRISM, pronounced “crism,” short for the X-ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission. This is an international collaboration led by JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) with NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). Resolve operates at one twentieth of a degree above 0 K. Why? To measure the heat from individual X-rays striking its 36 pixels!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Resolve and CAL are both colder than the Boomerang Nebula, the coldest known region in the cosmos at just 1 K! This cloud of dust and gas left over from a Sun-like star is about 5,000 light-years from Earth. Scientists are studying why it’s colder than the natural background temperature of deep space.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Let’s talk about some temperatures closer to home. Icy gas giant Neptune is the coldest major planet. It has an average temperature of 72 K at the height in its atmosphere where the pressure is equivalent to sea level on Earth. Explore how that compares to other objects in our solar system!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

How about Earth? According to NOAA, Death Valley set the world’s surface air temperature record on July 10, 1913. This record of 330 K has yet to be broken — but recent heat waves have come close. (If you’re curious about the coldest temperature measured on Earth, that’d be 183.95 K (-128.6°F or -89.2°C) at Vostok Station, Antarctica, on July 21, 1983.)

We monitor Earth's global average temperature to understand how our planet is changing due to human activities. Last year, 2023, was the warmest year on our record, which stretches back to 1880.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

The inside of our planet is even hotter. Earth’s inner core is a solid sphere made of iron and nickel that’s about 759 miles (1,221 kilometers) in radius. It reaches temperatures up to 5,600 K.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

We might assume stars would be much hotter than our planet, but the surface of Rigel is only about twice the temperature of Earth’s core at 11,000 K. Rigel is a young, blue star in the constellation Orion, and one of the brightest stars in our night sky.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger 

We study temperatures on large and small scales. The electrons in hydrogen, the most abundant element in the universe, can be stripped away from their atoms in a process called ionization at a temperature around 158,000 K. When these electrons join back up with ionized atoms, light is produced. Ionization is what makes some clouds of gas and dust, like the Orion Nebula, glow.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

We already talked about the temperature on a star’s surface, but the material surrounding a star gets much, much hotter! Our Sun’s surface is about 5,800 K (10,000°F or 5,500°C), but the outermost layer of the solar atmosphere, called the corona, can reach millions of kelvins.

Our Parker Solar Probe became the first spacecraft to fly through the corona in 2021, helping us answer questions like why it is so much hotter than the Sun's surface. This is one of the mysteries of the Sun that solar scientists have been trying to figure out for years.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Looking for a hotter spot? Located about 240 million light-years away, the Perseus galaxy cluster contains thousands of galaxies. It’s surrounded by a vast cloud of gas heated up to tens of millions of kelvins that glows in X-ray light. Our telescopes found a giant wave rolling through this cluster’s hot gas, likely due to a smaller cluster grazing it billions of years ago.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Now things are really starting to heat up! When massive stars — ones with eight times the mass of our Sun or more — run out of fuel, they put on a show. On their way to becoming black holes or neutron stars, these stars will shed their outer layers in a supernova explosion. These layers can reach temperatures of 300 million K!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Jeremy Schnittman

We couldn’t explore cosmic temperatures without talking about black holes. When stuff gets too close to a black hole, it can become part of a hot, orbiting debris disk with a conical corona swirling above it. As the material churns, it heats up and emits light, making it glow. This hot environment, which can reach temperatures of a billion kelvins, helps us find and study black holes even though they don’t emit light themselves.

JAXA’s XRISM telescope, which we mentioned at the start of our tour, uses its supercool Resolve detector to explore the scorching conditions around these intriguing, extreme objects.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/CI Lab

Our universe’s origins are even hotter. Just one second after the big bang, our tiny, baby universe consisted of an extremely hot — around 10 billion K — “soup” of light and particles. It had to cool for a few minutes before the first elements could form. The oldest light we can see, the cosmic microwave background, is from about 380,000 years after the big bang, and shows us the heat left over from these earlier moments.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

We’ve ventured far in distance and time … but the final spot on our temperature adventure is back on Earth! Scientists use the Large Hadron Collider at CERN to smash teensy particles together at superspeeds to simulate the conditions of the early universe. In 2012, they generated a plasma that was over 5 trillion K, setting a world record for the highest human-made temperature.

Want this tour as a poster? You can download it here in a vertical or horizontal version!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Explore the wonderful and weird cosmos with NASA Universe on X, Facebook, and Instagram. And make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

[dandelionsresilience]

Good News - July 22-28

Like these weekly compilations? Tip me at $kaybarr1735 or check out my new(ly repurposed) Patreon!

1. Four new cheetah cubs born in Saudi Arabia after 40 years of extinction

“[T]he discovery of mummified cheetahs in caves […] which ranged in age from 4,000 to as recent as 120 years, proved that the animals […] once called [Saudi Arabia] home. The realisation kick-started the country’s Cheetah Conservation Program to bring back the cats to their historic Arabian range. […] Dr Mohammed Qurban, CEO of the NCW, said: […] “This motivates us to continue our efforts to restore and reintroduce cheetahs, guided by an integrated strategy designed in accordance with best international practices.””

2. In sub-Saharan Africa, ‘forgotten’ foods could boost climate resilience, nutrition

“[A study published in PNAS] examined “forgotten” crops that may help make sub-Saharan food systems more resilient, and more nutritious, as climate change makes it harder to grow [current staple crops.] [… The study identified 138 indigenous] food crops that were “relatively underresearched, underutilized, or underpromoted in an African context,” but which have the nutrient content and growing stability to support healthy diets and local economies in the region. […] In Eswatini, van Zonneveld and the World Vegetable Center are working with schools to introduce hardy, underutilized vegetables to their gardens, which have typically only grown beans and maize.”

3. Here's how $4 billion in government money is being spent to reduce climate pollution

“[New Orleans was awarded] nearly $50 million to help pay for installing solar on low to middle income homes [… and] plans to green up underserved areas with trees and build out its lackluster bike lane system to provide an alternative to cars. […] In Utah, $75 million will fund several measures from expanding electric vehicles to reducing methane emissions from oil and gas production. [… A] coalition of states led by North Carolina will look to store carbon in lands used for agriculture as well as natural places like wetlands, with more than $400 million. [… This funding is] “providing investments in communities, new jobs, cost savings for everyday Americans, improved air quality, … better health outcomes.””

4. From doom scrolling to hope scrolling: this week’s big Democratic vibe shift

“[Democrats] have been on an emotional rollercoaster for the past few weeks: from grim determination as Biden fought to hang on to his push for a second term, to outright exuberance after he stepped aside and Harris launched her campaign. […] In less than a week, the Harris campaign raised record-breaking sums and signed up more than 100,000 new volunteers[….] This honeymoon phase will end, said Democratic strategist Guy Cecil, warning the election will be a close race, despite this newfound exuberance in his party. [… But v]oters are saying they are excited to vote for Harris and not just against Trump. That’s new.”

5. Biodegradable luminescent polymers show promise for reducing electronic waste

“[A team of scientists discovered that a certain] chemical enables the recycling of [luminescent polymers] while maintaining high light-emitting functions. […] At the end of life, this new polymer can be degraded under either mild acidic conditions (near the pH of stomach acid) or relatively low heat treatment (> 410 F). The resulting materials can be isolated and remade into new materials for future applications. […] The researchers predict this new polymer can be applied to existing technologies, such as displays and medical imaging, and enable new applications […] such as cell phones and computer screens with continued testing.”

6. World’s Biggest Dam Removal Project to Open 420 Miles of Salmon Habitat this Fall

“Reconnecting the river will help salmon and steelhead populations survive a warming climate and [natural disasters….] In the long term, dam removal will significantly improve water quality in the Klamath. “Algae problems in the reservoirs behind the dams were so bad that the water was dangerous for contact […] and not drinkable,” says Fluvial Geomorphologist Brian Cluer. [… The project] will begin to reverse decades of habitat degradation, allow threatened salmon species to be resilient in the face of climate change, and restore tribal connections to their traditional food source.”

7. Biden-Harris Administration Awards $45.1 Million to Expand Mental Health and Substance Use Services Across the Lifespan

““Be it fostering wellness in young people, caring for the unhoused, facilitating treatment and more, this funding directly supports the needs of our neighbors,” said HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra. [The funding also supports] recovery and reentry services to adults in the criminal justice system who have a substance use disorder[… and clinics which] serve anyone who asks for help for mental health or substance use, regardless of their ability to pay.”

8. The World’s Rarest Crow Will Soon Fly Free on Maui

“[… In] the latest attempt to establish a wild crow population, biologists will investigate if this species can thrive on Maui, an island where it may have never lived before. Translocations outside of a species’ known historical range are rare in conservation work, but for a bird on the brink of extinction, it’s a necessary experiment: Scientists believe the crows will be safer from predators in a new locale—a main reason that past reintroduction attempts failed. […] As the release date approaches, the crows have already undergone extensive preparation for life in the wild. […] “We try to give them the respect that you would give if you were caring for someone’s elder.””

9. An optimist’s guide to the EV battery mining challenge

““Battery minerals have a tremendous benefit over oil, and that’s that you can reuse them.” [… T]he report’s authors found there’s evidence to suggest that [improvements in technology] and recycling have already helped limit demand for battery minerals in spite of this rapid growth — and that further improvements can reduce it even more. [… They] envision a scenario in which new mining for battery materials can basically stop by 2050, as battery recycling meets demand. In this fully realized circular battery economy, the world must extract a total of 125 million tons of battery minerals — a sum that, while hefty, is actually 17 times smaller than the oil currently harvested every year to fuel road transport.”

10. Peekaboo! A baby tree kangaroo debuts at the Bronx Zoo

“The tiny Matschie’s tree kangaroo […] was the third of its kind born at the Bronx Zoo since 2008. [… A] Bronx Zoo spokesperson said that the kangaroo's birth was significant for the network of zoos that aims to preserve genetic diversity among endangered animals. "It's a small population and because of that births are not very common," said Jessica Moody, curator of primates and small mammals at the Bronx Zoo[, …] adding that baby tree kangaroos are “possibly one of the cutest animals to have ever lived. They look like stuffed animals, it's amazing.””

July 15-21 news here | (all credit for images and written material can be found at the source linked; I don’t claim credit for anything but curating.)

[alt-wannabe]

MCSR As Chemical Compounds

idk either man. expect very little actual explanation and a lot of chemical yapping from a very big nerd

Silverr as Silver Nitrate:

AgNO3

the above is the crystal structure

appearance is just a white crystal kinda like sugar

it took everything in me to not just make silverr plain Ag

silver nitrate is the most common precursor for all other important silver salts

also an extremely important compound in the development of photography! (and iirc silverr is a film major)

Feinberg as Ozone:

O3

produced during lightning strikes

pale blue at high ppm

only leaves gas state at cryogenic temperatures

naturally occurring in the stratosphere and absorbs UV rays from the sun

Fruit as Nickel(II) Chloride Hexahydrate:

NiCl2•6H2O

green

the non-hydrate form is a sort of olive-y yellow color

used to absorb ammonia in gas masks

Raddles as Potassium Permanganate:

KMnO4

Sometimes referred to as Purple Potion Powder

goes CRAZY purple when dissolved and is lowkey my favorite chemical

very strong oxidizing agent

one time i stained my hand purple through my glove with this shit idk how it happened

if made in specific solvents can look extremely similar to dragon's breath in minecraft imo

K4 as Octathio[8]circulene:

C16S8

also referred to as Sulflower (like sulfur and sunflower haha get it)

planar which is fairly uncommon for molecules of this size

can be stacked together to make sheets of sulflowers

Cube as Cubane:

C8H8

yeah this is self-explanatory

what is interesting though is that ring strain in 4 membered rings/squares is really high, so cubane existing is a bit of a chemical anomaly

i havent read into it enough to know for sure but i suspect that ring strain is why cubane is a precursor to a HELLA STRONG explosive compound

Reignex as PPTA:

Poly-p-paraphenylene terephthalamide

[-CO-C6H4-CO-NH-C6H4-NH-]n

the name is complicated as shit but this is just kevlar!

aka bulletproof vest material

looks fluffy when not woven completely together

aligning of polymer chains w hydrogen bonds creates EXTREMELY high tensile strength

Mime as Phenylmagnesium Bromide:

C6H5MgBr

a common grignard reagent aka a compound that can be used in a grignard reaction, an extremely important reaction in organic synthesis as it creates new C-C bonds

another fun fact about grignard reagents is that if water is added to them- or even if they're handled in particularly moist air- they fucking explode

extremely strong nucleophile and base

Poundcake as Xenon Hexafluoride:

XeF6

Noble gases don't react unless you REALLY make them

so a compound containing xenon is really interesting

colorless as a solid but sublimes (aka skips straight from solid to gas) into a bright yellow gas

fun fact a lot of instances where typical chemistry rules are broken (noble gases not reacting, octet rule in general, etc) involve fluorine to the point ive heard it referred to as a "batshit electron thief"

Fulham as Iron Hexacyanidoferrate:

C18Fe7N18

also known as prussian blue

extremely common pigment in paints and the first modern synthetic pigment

used extensively in The Great Wave

another one of my favorite molecules bc im biased and like inorganic chem aka things that contain metals

used as an antidote for heavy metal poisoning which is interesting bc it contains cyanide ligands!

Couriway as Bullvalene:

C10H10

in a state of constant resonance

aka the double bonds are CONSTANTLY shifting and reforming bullvalene into... itself but moved around a little

the bonds fluctuate so rapidly that in nmr analysis each carbon and hydrogen in the entire molecule is read as equivalent (for my non-chem people that's very uncommon and very cool)

formed through photolysis (aka using light/photons to fuel a reaction)

[livingforstars]

Rampaging Fronts of the Veil Nebula - March 7th, 1996.

"A supernova explosion of a high-mass star results in fast moving blast waves. At the front of the waves shown above, ionised gas in the Veil Supernova Remnant rushes out from the explosion, sweeps up material, and breaks up many atoms into constituent ions and electrons. Observations with the Hubble Space Telescope in 1993 indicate that the blue shock wave was catapulted away from the stellar explosion after the red shock wave, and had yet to catch up to it in some regions. The Veil supernova remnant's has a very large angular size - six times the diameter of the full Moon - and different parts of it are known as the "Cygnus Loop" and catalog numbers NGC 6960, NGC 6979, NGC 6992, and NGC 6995."

[sustainabilitythoughts]

Can it be fixed?

Most of us live in areas with a “throw-away culture”.  Single-use items are everywhere, and it is generally easier (and frequently cheaper) to replace an item than to fix it.  Unfortunately, many consumer items are actually designed to be difficult or impossible to repair.  Significant resources are used to create, transport, sell, and dispose of even simple items.  Once an item is thrown away, its component materials are no longer available and eventually, the earth’s resources will be used up.  And there is no “away” for our trash.  We just hide it in landfills, where it is out of sight but can still create significant problems for the earth.   Every time we repair an item and continue to use it, we are helping the earth.  A little research can help you repair many items (or find a business that can perform the repairs).  CAUTION: do not attempt to fix items that use electricity, natural gas, propane, or hazardous chemicals unless you have appropriate training.  If you make a mistake, you could start a fire or injure or kill yourself or others. And always unplug an electrical item before working on it.  Now that we’ve covered the safety concerns, let’s talk about repairs. The article at the link provides lots of links to information to help you repair many of your own items, including clothing and some electronics, appliances, and furniture.  Sometimes you can hire someone who can fix these items for a reasonable price. 

[girlactionfigure]

Israel journalist @Roi_Yanovsky just published an amazing piece in Hebrew about what Gaza is REALLY like, based on his personal observations there. Here is an English translation that you NEED to read🧵

100 reserve days officially ended yesterday. Some initial insights: 

1. Gaza is seen as a backward area, the "most densely populated in the world" which has been under Israeli "siege" for years. There is no bigger lie than this. Gaza is a modern, beautiful, developed city, with large modern houses, wide boulevards, public spaces, a promenade 

by the sea and parks. Looks much better than any other Arab city from the Jordan to the sea, much more similar to Tel Aviv than to Kfar Qasim or Umm Al Fahem. And of course it is very far from being "the densest in the world". 

2. If it's a siege, let me live in a siege. the houses are bursting with goods and food from all countries of the Middle East, latest furniture, electronics and whatnot. There are also luxurious mansions that wouldn’t embarrass Savion and Kfar Shemariahu (rich areas in Israel) 

There is absolutely no shortage of wealth in Gaza. In general, most of the houses I've been in were much bigger than the apartment I live in in Tel Aviv. The sentence "If only they had a chance for a good life, they wouldn't fight in Israel" is simply not relevant to Gaza. 

3. The most common thing in the houses of the Gaza Strip: a map of the Land of Israel the heading "Map of Palestine". There is no mention of Israel or Israeli towns in general. And it is found in almost every home, in every school and in every public institution, the goal of 

erasing the State of Israel is neither hidden nor suppressed, it is almost everywhere. The historical distortion of this map which is taught from age 0 is a topic for another discussion that only emphasizes the distorted perception of reality by the residents of Gaza. 

4. In all the neighborhoods we were in, there are ready-made Hamas combat complexes - weapons, tunnels, charges, launching complexes, all inside residential houses, some of which are also prepared with openings in the walls for passing between buildings and what not. 

The residents of the Gaza Strip who live in the combat zones know this, they have received countless notices to evacuate. Long before the IDF entered. IDF announcements are still there everywhere. Those who decided to stay in the fighting areas are either Hamas members in 

various positions or people who consciously decided to stay in the areas used by Hamas for fighting, for their own reasons. 

5. Hamas members rarely walk around armed. They are neither stupid nor suckers. They know they won't be shot if they go in "civilian" guise. 

They prepare the weaponry ahead of time at the entrances to the buildings and arm themselves just a moment before they attack. That’s why the fighting is much more complex than any other arena. those judge from the outside why soldiers shot X or didn’t shoot Y - 

enter Gaza for a week or 2 and you’ll return with insights. 6. The circle enabling Hamas is much larger than its tens of thousands of terrorists. The ideology of Hamas is found in almost every home, in pictures, in propaganda materials. Hamas in Gaza is like Messi in Argentina. 

7. The strengthening of Hamas at this level requires active assistance of a population. There is no way that the residents of the compounds where we located rockets and weapons did not know that the place is used as a launching complex where they try to massacre Israelis daily. 

And I find it hard to believe that the parents in the kindergarten where there was a tunnel shaft do not know this. Who chooses to send their children to a kindergarten that serves as a terrorist infrastructure? 

8. Hamas's strongest weapon is lies and propaganda. It's his fuel. This is how you will maintain the "siege" lie for years, this is how they are doing now with the photos of the innocent victims and the killing of the "journalists" who turn out to be terrorist operatives. 

Gaza is the only place in the world where 500 deaths are reported half an hour after an explosion. Even in earthquakes and heavy disasters it takes the rescue forces a few days to identify and estimate the number of dead, but the Palestinian Ministry of Health already knows 

a minute after the explosion what the damage is. This is ridiculous and the world media quoting the numbers as living words of God is pathetic. I would attribute the same level of credibility to the reports this week about "hunger" in Rafah. 

Gaza is the only place in the world where 500 deaths are reported half an hour after an explosion. Even in earthquakes and heavy disasters it takes the rescue forces a few days to identify and estimate the number of dead, but the Palestinian Ministry of Health already knows 

a minute after the explosion what the damage is. This is ridiculous and the world media quoting the numbers as living words of God is pathetic. I would attribute the same level of credibility to the reports this week about "hunger" in Rafah. 

Unroll available on Thread Reader (Hebrew)

ShipofTheseus

@JewishSpaceLazr

[mysticstronomy]

WHAT ARE WHITE DWARFS??

Blog#356

Saturday, December 9th, 2023

Welcome back,

White dwarfs are what is left when stars like our sun have exhausted all of their fuel. They are dense, dim, stellar corpses — the last observable stage of evolution for low- and medium-mass stars.

Whilst most massive stars will eventually go supernova, a low or medium mass star with a mass less than about 8 times the mass of the sun will eventually become a white dwarf, according to NASA. Approximately 97% of the stars in the Milky Way will eventually become white dwarfs, according to researchers.

Compared to our sun, a white dwarf has a similar carbon and oxygen mass though it is much smaller in size — similar to Earth, according to New Mexico State University (NMSU).

White dwarf temperatures can exceed 100,000 Kelvin according to NASA (that's about 179,500 degrees Fahrenheit). Despite these sweltering temperatures, white dwarfs have a low luminosity as they're so small in size according to NMSU.

Main-sequence stars, including the sun, form from clouds of dust and gas drawn together by gravity.

How the stars evolve through their lifetime depends on their mass. The most massive stars, with eight times the mass of the sun or more, will never become white dwarfs. Instead, at the end of their lives, white dwarfs will explode in a violent supernova, leaving behind a neutron star or black hole.

Smaller stars, however, will take a slightly more sedate path. Low- to medium-mass stars, such as the sun, will eventually swell up into red giants. After that, the stars shed their outer layers into a ring known as a planetary nebula (early observers thought the nebulas resembled planets such as Neptune and Uranus ). The core that is left behind will be a white dwarf, a husk of a star in which no hydrogen fusion occurs.

Smaller stars, such as red dwarfs, don't make it to the red giant state. They simply burn through all of their hydrogen, ending the process as a dim white dwarf. However, red dwarfs take trillions of years to consume their fuel, far longer than the 13.8-billion-year-old age of the universe, so no red dwarfs have yet become white dwarfs.

When a star runs out of fuel, it no longer experiences an outward push from the process of fusion and it collapses inward on itself.

White dwarfs contain approximately the mass of the sun but have roughly the radius of Earth, according to Cosmos, the astronomy encyclopedia from Swinburne University in Australia. This makes them among the densest objects in space, beaten out only by neutron stars and black holes. According to NASA, the gravity on the surface of a white dwarf is 350,000 times that of gravity on Earth. That means a 150-pound (68-kilogram) person on Earth would weigh 50 million pounds (22.7 million kg) on the surface of a white dwarf.

White dwarfs reach this incredible density because they are collapsed so tightly that their electrons are smashed together, forming what is called "degenerate matter." The former stars will keep collapsing until the electrons themselves provide enough of an outward-pressing force to halt the crunch. The more mass, the greater the pull inward, so a more massive white dwarf has a smaller radius than its less massive counterpart.

Those conditions mean that, after shedding much of its mass during the red giant phase, no white dwarf can exceed 1.4 times the mass of the sun.

When a star swells up to become a red giant, it engulfs its closest planets. But some can still survive. NASA’s Spitzer spacecraft revealed that at least 1 to 3 percent of white dwarf stars have contaminated atmospheres that suggest rocky material has fallen into them.

Originally published on www.space.com

COMING UP!!

(Wednesday, December 13th, 2023)

"METHUSELAH STAR IS THE OLDEST STAR IN OUR UNIVERSE??"

[talonabraxas]

Solar Aether “For the wild nature was not yet overcome, and light and darkness wrestled so long the one with the other, till the sun arose, and with its heat forced this tree, so that it did bear pleasant sweet fruit; that is, till there came the Prince of Light, out of the heart of God, and became man in nature, and wrestled in his human body, in the power of the divine light, in the wild nature.” ― Jakob Böhme

The Ethers and the Spiritual Worlds

“What we call chemical action is projected into the physical world from the world of Devachan — the realm of the Harmony of the Spheres. In the combination of two substances according to their atomic weights, we have a reflection of two tones of the Harmony of the Spheres. The chemical affinity between two substances in the physical world is like a reflection from the realm of the Harmony of the Spheres. The numerical ratios in chemistry are an expression of the numerical ratios of the Harmony of the Spheres, which has become dumb and silent owing to the densification of matter. If man were able to etherealize material substance and to perceive the atomic numbers the inner formative principle thereof, he would be hearing the Harmony of the Spheres.” --Esoteric Christianity and the Mission of Christian Rosenkreutz, Lecture 6, 1 October 1911

But what of the other ethers, are they also bearers of different ‘realms’ of the spiritual world?

In the lecture quoted above, there follows a diagram indicating that a relationship exists between light ether and the astral world, tone ether and lower Devachan, also called the Harmony of the Spheres, and life ether and higher Devachan.

These ‘layers’ of the spiritual world interpenetrate; they are not spatially separate. In Anthroposophy, the names for these worlds changes depending on the perspective from which they are described (see CW17 The Threshold of the Spiritual World, Chapter 16). The astral world is the closest realm to the world we ordinarily perceive, it is also called the soul world or the elemental world. Devachan is the pure spiritual world – called Spiritland in Theosophy (CW9), the realm of archetypes. These realms are accessible to different forms of spiritual cognition and from this perspective are also called the worlds of Imagination (astral world), Inspiration (lower Devachan) and Intuition (higher Devachan). We can examine the nature of these three spiritual worlds to gain a better understanding of what is meant by light, tone and life.

[agaselectronicmaterials]

High-Transparency Ostemer 322 Crystal Clear Polymer for Microfluidics and MEMS Applications

Discover Ostemer 322 Crystal Clear, a dual cure polymer with exceptional transparency and bonding capabilities. Ideal for microfluidic cartridges, MEMS antennas, and rapid prototyping, this material ensures high precision and reliability in advanced applications. Contact A-Gas Electronic Materials for expert solutions.

[jcmarchi]

This sound-suppressing silk can create quiet spaces

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/this-sound-suppressing-silk-can-create-quiet-spaces/

This sound-suppressing silk can create quiet spaces

We are living in a very noisy world. From the hum of traffic outside your window to the next-door neighbor’s blaring TV to sounds from a co-worker’s cubicle, unwanted noise remains a resounding problem.

To cut through the din, an interdisciplinary collaboration of researchers from MIT and elsewhere developed a sound-suppressing silk fabric that could be used to create quiet spaces.

The fabric, which is barely thicker than a human hair, contains a special fiber that vibrates when a voltage is applied to it. The researchers leveraged those vibrations to suppress sound in two different ways.

In one, the vibrating fabric generates sound waves that interfere with an unwanted noise to cancel it out, similar to noise-canceling headphones, which work well in a small space like your ears but do not work in large enclosures like rooms or planes.

In the other, more surprising technique, the fabric is held still to suppress vibrations that are key to the transmission of sound. This prevents noise from being transmitted through the fabric and quiets the volume beyond. This second approach allows for noise reduction in much larger spaces like rooms or cars.

By using common materials like silk, canvas, and muslin, the researchers created noise-suppressing fabrics which would be practical to implement in real-world spaces. For instance, one could use such a fabric to make dividers in open workspaces or thin fabric walls that prevent sound from getting through.

“Noise is a lot easier to create than quiet. In fact, to keep noise out we dedicate a lot of space to thick walls. [First author] Grace’s work provides a new mechanism for creating quiet spaces with a thin sheet of fabric,” says Yoel Fink, a professor in the departments of Materials Science and Engineering and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, a Research Laboratory of Electronics principal investigator, and senior author of a paper on the fabric.

The study’s lead author is Grace (Noel) Yang SM ’21, PhD ’24. Co-authors include MIT graduate students Taigyu Joo, Hyunhee Lee, Henry Cheung, and Yongyi Zhao; Zachary Smith, the Robert N. Noyce Career Development Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT; graduate student Guanchun Rui and professor Lei Zhu of Case Western University; graduate student Jinuan Lin and Assistant Professor Chu Ma of the University of Wisconsin at Madison; and Latika Balachander, a graduate student at the Rhode Island School of Design. An open-access paper about the research appeared recently in Advanced Materials.

Silky silence

The sound-suppressing silk builds off the group’s prior work to create fabric microphones.

In that research, they sewed a single strand of piezoelectric fiber into fabric. Piezoelectric materials produce an electrical signal when squeezed or bent. When a nearby noise causes the fabric to vibrate, the piezoelectric fiber converts those vibrations into an electrical signal, which can capture the sound.

In the new work, the researchers flipped that idea to create a fabric loudspeaker that can be used to cancel out soundwaves.

“While we can use fabric to create sound, there is already so much noise in our world. We thought creating silence could be even more valuable,” Yang says.

Applying an electrical signal to the piezoelectric fiber causes it to vibrate, which generates sound. The researchers demonstrated this by playing Bach’s “Air” using a 130-micrometer sheet of silk mounted on a circular frame.

To enable direct sound suppression, the researchers use a silk fabric loudspeaker to emit sound waves that destructively interfere with unwanted sound waves. They control the vibrations of the piezoelectric fiber so that sound waves emitted by the fabric are opposite of unwanted sound waves that strike the fabric, which can cancel out the noise.

However, this technique is only effective over a small area. So, the researchers built off this idea to develop a technique that uses fabric vibrations to suppress sound in much larger areas, like a bedroom.

Let’s say your next-door neighbors are playing foosball in the middle of the night. You hear noise in your bedroom because the sound in their apartment causes your shared wall to vibrate, which forms sound waves on your side.

To suppress that sound, the researchers could place the silk fabric onto your side of the shared wall, controlling the vibrations in the fiber to force the fabric to remain still. This vibration-mediated suppression prevents sound from being transmitted through the fabric.

“If we can control those vibrations and stop them from happening, we can stop the noise that is generated, as well,” Yang says.

A mirror for sound

Surprisingly, the researchers found that holding the fabric still causes sound to be reflected by the fabric, resulting in a thin piece of silk that reflects sound like a mirror does with light.

Their experiments also revealed that both the mechanical properties of a fabric and the size of its pores affect the efficiency of sound generation. While silk and muslin have similar mechanical properties, the smaller pore sizes of silk make it a better fabric loudspeaker.

But the effective pore size also depends on the frequency of sound waves. If the frequency is low enough, even a fabric with relatively large pores could function effectively, Yang says.

When they tested the silk fabric in direct suppression mode, the researchers found that it could significantly reduce the volume of sounds up to 65 decibels (about as loud as enthusiastic human conversation). In vibration-mediated suppression mode, the fabric could reduce sound transmission up to 75 percent.

These results were only possible due to a robust group of collaborators, Fink says. Graduate students at the Rhode Island School of Design helped the researchers understand the details of constructing fabrics; scientists at the University of Wisconsin at Madison conducted simulations; researchers at Case Western Reserve University characterized materials; and chemical engineers in the Smith Group at MIT used their expertise in gas membrane separation to measure airflow through the fabric.

Moving forward, the researchers want to explore the use of their fabric to block sound of multiple frequencies. This would likely require complex signal processing and additional electronics.

In addition, they want to further study the architecture of the fabric to see how changing things like the number of piezoelectric fibers, the direction in which they are sewn, or the applied voltages could improve performance.

“There are a lot of knobs we can turn to make this sound-suppressing fabric really effective. We want to get people thinking about controlling structural vibrations to suppress sound. This is just the beginning,” says Yang.

This work is funded, in part, by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Army Research Office (ARO), the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), and the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation.

[saturnville]

garden kisses.

pairing:college!shuri xblack! reader. warning: fluuuuuff content: in which they finally see each other after time apart. song: garden kisses by giveon & say less by anthony ramos note: the concept of college/hbcu!shuri is NOT my own. the creator is @vargskelegore and should be acknowledged as such! full credit to the creator <3

Paranoia sunk into her being. The once faint sounds of sirens alerting the city of the authorities grew louder and louder with each growing second. The rate of her heartbeat increased, each moment passing only stirring up a wary feeling in the depths of his core. 

The steering wheel seemed thicker, and her hands were clammy, sliding off the top of the thick rubber. The sirens got louder. Her eyes flickered toward the electronic speedometer on the dash. 65. She eyed the sign to her left, just a few meters away from a top sign on the corner. Speed Limit 40. She'd never been so desperate to see her. 

Blue lights peaked over the hill she'd glided over. Her eyelids fluttered momentarily and his lips moved slowly, sending a silent prayer to the goddess she didn't believe in.

Her foot lifted from the gas, the acceleration decreasing with ease. The blue lights flew straight past her and swerved behind the car in front of her. Good. She'd had too many run-ins with the authorities in America. She pressed down on the gas again and with a light jerk, her car sped down the street.

It only took a total of fifteen minutes to get from point A to point B, the dorm where she laid her head at night. He only hoped she’d let her stay the whole night and not just for a portion of it.

The engine cut off as she parked next to her vehicle—a black Toyota Camry that had been passed down from her older brother.

Her nimble fingers danced across her phone screen to alert her of her presence. Come up. Roommate is gone, was her response. She raced out of the car and dashed toward the elevator quicker than an Olympian track star. 

Her footsteps were heavy as she walked down the narrow hallway full of different living areas. Hers was at the end of the hall, away from the commotion and possible distraction of the other residents and their guests. Away from the possibility of having her pulled away at any given moment. 

She wondered what she looked like. Was she dressed in her business suit or had she traded it for an oversize tee shirt and sweatpants? Were her thick, natural locks on display, full and flowing? The door peeled open slowly, and the strong scent of tropical body butter surrounded her.

“Hi,” she, Kenzi, greeted with a small smile. Her simple greeting went over his head. Such a beautiful woman, she was. She hated basking in the beauty of her for too long because she was well aware that the beauty that rested within her soul was far greater, but for the sake of everything holy. Her gaze was leering as she stood in front of her. Kenzi looked relaxed and peaceful. Remnants of a long day’s makeup still sat on her face but her work clothes had been replaced by a viridian green night slip and a robe. Her hair, long braids, was still intact and styled in a messy bun at her neck. 

“Come in.” She sidestepped to make room for her entry. Shuri slowly peeled her shoes off her feet and looked around her apartment-style dorm. Still looked the same, she noticed, save for the new black and white paintings scattered throughout. 

“You got here quickly,” Kenzi spoke in a hushed tone. “Speed your way here or somethin’?” Shuri's eyes followed her wandering body. The slip complimented her skin wonderfully. It was thin, too. Every curve and roll was emphasized through the material. The neckline was deep and showcased the swell of her chest, and the thin straps showcased her strong shoulders that she couldn’t wait to trail an array of kisses down. 

“Something like that,” she replied. She threw a smile over her shoulder before returning to fish for two glasses in her neatly organized cabinet. “So, you rush to the cabinet but don’t greet me?”

“I said hello."

“Barely.” Shuri scoffed with her hands across her chest. The sleeves of her purple tracksuit jacket ruffled.

Kenzi's eyebrow rose. “You wanted me to climb on you like a monkey or something as a form of greeting?”

Shuri pushed off the island and stepped towards her. “Wouldn’t be so bad.” She bracketed her body by placing her hands on either side of her, keeping her exactly where she wanted her. She lowered her head to her neck, the tip of her nose brushing against her soft skin. Shuri peppered a few kisses beneath Kenzi's ear cupping her neck with her hand, ghosting her lips over Kenzi's. It was a teasing game that she loved to play, and oftentimes, Kenzi played along, but there was no time for games this time. 

Kenzi reached for her lips, capturing them with her own dominantly. If walls could talk, they’d giggle at how they looked like lovestruck teenagers reuniting after a few days apart. A frantic kiss was exchanged with heavy breathing, teeth clattering, and hands wandering. Shuri's back hit the front door and a moan escaped her lips. Her gentle hands cradled Kenzi’s face before traveling down her shoulders where her robe rested. She pushed the fluffy material down and her palms followed the trail past her waist and down her hips, which she gripped tightly. 

A sweet sound from her lips spurred her further. Kenzi’s wandering hands tugged at the string that secured Shuri's sweatpants around her slim waist while Shuri's hands danced along the curve of her bottom before scooping her in her arms. 

“Missed you, Princess…” Kenzi breathed against her lips once Shuri laid her against the plush couch cushion. 

Shuri's light eyes met her deeper ones, fiery desire exchanged between four orbs. “Missed you, too…”

[materialsscienceandengineering]

A metal-free organic framework for electrocatalytic production of ethylene from carbon dioxide

Use of the greenhouse gas CO2 as a chemical raw material would not only reduce emissions, but also the consumption of fossil feedstocks. A novel metal-free organic framework could make it possible to electrocatalytically produce ethylene, a primary chemical raw material, from CO2. As a team has reported in the journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition, nitrogen atoms with a particular electron configuration play a critical role for the catalyst. Ethylene (ethene, C2H4) is an essential starting material for many products, including polyethylene and other plastics. Ethylene is produced industrially by the high-energy cracking and rectification of fossil feedstocks.

Read more.

[theexclusivestory]

Stellar Evolution: An In-Depth Journey into the Lifecycle of Stars

Stellar evolution tells the fascinating story of how stars are born, change, and eventually die. It's a process that takes billions of years and has a big impact on the universe and even life itself. In this article, we'll explore the journey stars take throughout their lives, looking at the different stages they go through and what causes them. Let's dive into the details of stellar evolution and understand how these celestial objects live and evolve.

Formation of Stars: Birth from Cosmic Clouds

Stars begin their journey in huge clouds of gas and dust called nebulae. These clouds are like giant factories that have all the ingredients needed to make a star. When something like a shockwave or a disturbance happens, parts of the nebula start to get denser. This denser area is where a new star begins to form. It starts as what we call a protostar. As more and more material gets pulled in by gravity, the protostar grows bigger and denser. Eventually, it becomes so dense and hot that nuclear fusion starts happening in its core. This is when the star "turns on" and starts shining.

The Main Sequence Phase: A Star's Brightest Period

When a star begins nuclear fusion, it enters its main phase, which is its brightest time. In this phase, hydrogen atoms in the star's center combine to form helium, releasing a lot of energy. This energy pushes outward, balancing the star's gravity and, keeping it stable. How long this phase lasts depends on how big the star is. Bigger stars go through this phase faster than smaller ones.

Stellar Metamorphosis: Beyond the Main Sequence

Once a star runs out of its hydrogen fuel in the center, it starts changing and moves away from its main form. What happens next depends on how big the star is to begin with. Different-sized stars go through different changes, each with its own special things happening.

Red Giant Phase: The Stellar Expansion

When stars like our Sun start running out of hydrogen, they enter a phase called the red giant phase. At this point, the star gets bigger and expands outward, but its core gets smaller and hotter. This makes the outer layers of the star glow red. Inside the star, helium starts fusing together, creating even more energy. This red giant phase shows that the star is getting closer to the end of its life.

Planetary Nebulae and White Dwarfs

When a star becomes a red giant, it swells up and eventually sheds its outer layers into space. This creates a beautiful cloud called a planetary nebula. What's left behind is the core of the star, which becomes a white dwarf. A white dwarf is a small, dense object about the size of Earth. It's made mostly of a special kind of matter called electron-degenerate matter. Over a very long time, white dwarfs cool down and become less and less bright. Eventually, they become invisible and mark the end of the star's life for smaller stars.

Supernovae and Neutron Stars: The Fate of Massive Stars

When big stars run out of fuel, they collapse suddenly, causing a massive explosion called a supernova. This explosion is so bright that it can outshine entire galaxies. During this explosion, heavy elements made inside the star's core are scattered into space, which later helps in forming new stars.

After a supernova, the core of the big star can shrink even more, forming a neutron star. Neutron stars are very small, like cities, and are made mostly of tightly packed neutrons. They have strong magnetic fields and spin very fast, leading to interesting things like pulsars and magnetars.

Black Holes: The Mysterious End

When really big stars run out of fuel, something incredible happens. They collapse under their own gravity, squeezing down into a tiny, super-dense point. This creates something called a black hole. Black holes are mighty, with gravity so strong that not even light can escape from them. They're like cosmic vacuum cleaners, sucking in everything around them. Black holes are mysterious and fascinating, and they impact how galaxies work, shaping the universe in a really big way.

Conclusion

Stellar evolution is like a never-ending story of how stars are born and eventually fade away. It starts with the peaceful formation of baby stars in cloudy areas of space called stellar nurseries. Then, stars grow and shine brightly during their main life phase. But as they run out of fuel, some stars become red giants, swelling in size. Eventually, smaller stars become white dwarfs, while bigger ones explode into supernovae, scattering elements into space. This process helps shape the universe, showing us how everything in space is connected. By studying stars, we learn more about where we come from and our role in the vast cosmos.

FAQs

Who came up with stellar evolution? In the early 1900s, two astronomers named Ejnar Hertzsprung and Henry Norris Russell found a helpful way to compare different stars. They called it the Hertzsprung-Russell (H-R) Diagram. It's like a big chart where scientists can see how stars compare to each other based on their brightness and temperature. This diagram has been super useful in understanding more about stars and how they work.

What are the elements of stellar evolution? These are some of the building blocks found in space i.e. hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, sulfur, chlorine, sodium, magnesium, potassium, calcium, and iron.

What is the lifetime of a star? Very big stars burn through their fuel fast, so they don't live very long, maybe just a few hundred thousand years. But smaller stars use their fuel more slowly, so they can shine for billions of years. However, no matter how big or small a star is, eventually, it starts running out of hydrogen, which is what keeps it shining.

What is the stellar life cycle? Stars go through a cycle of being born, burning fuel, and spreading out material when they die. This cycle is ongoing and helps create elements that fill the universe. Depending on how much stuff a star has (its mass), it follows a different path in its life.

What are the 7 types of stars? Stars come in different types, and scientists classify them based on how hot they are. There are seven groups, starting with the hottest and ending with the coolest. They are named O, B, A, F, G, K, and M stars. O stars are the hottest and brightest, while M stars are the coolest and dimmest.

Read more

[cognitivejustice]

The Max-Planck-Institut für Eisenforschung becomes the Max Planck Institute for Sustainable Materials to reflect its solarpunk futures

The Max Planck Institute for Sustainable Materials will explore methods for producing, utilising, and recycling materials in a climate-friendly way.

The  Düsseldorf-based institute has been investigating how to optimise steel and other metallic for applications in energy, mobility, infrastructure, production, and medicine over the past few decades. In recent years, researchers have increasingly directed their focus on how steel and other metallic materials can be produced with minimal greenhouse gas emissions, as well as on maximising the efficiency of limited raw materials for electronic devices, electric motors, and generators.

To reflect this shift in research focus, the Institute has undergone a name change:  it will now be known as the Max Planck Institute for Sustainable Materials.