Science Megathread

[Meclazine for Israel]

These are just fluid inclusion data in diamonds.

These are tiny inclusions found in the diamonds using microscopy and then spectrometry.

In no way does this suggest large quantities of water in the mantle.

However, it is interesting, and it should be noted that most minerals have a hydrous phase, albeit lessening the further you go into the crust.

Water by itself would have a hard time surviving, more likely in combination with brines and re-mobilised structural corridors.

CO2 and H2O are more commonly associated with upper crustal geology.  

Once you go deeper, you drive off these two molecules and end up with the "anhydrous" phase of the mineral concerned.

There are large slabs of primordial mantle material extruded onto the Earth's surface called Peridotite, and they have water in them added during retrogressive metamorphism as they are brought to the Earth's surface.... albeit slowly.

The reason why diamonds are thought to have better inclusions is that most diamonds are brought from the mantle to the surface in a matter of minutes. Kimberlites named after vertical diamond pipes in my home state.

As they were formed under huge pressure, all diamonds on the Earth's surface are thought to be on a path of degradation back into Graphite over the next 30-100 Million years.

A small consolation when you pawn Grandma's ring.

[Meclazine for Israel]

The Neanderthals gave us a 'gift' before they went extinct, it seems:

Modern Humans Inherited Virus Defenses From Interbreeding With Neanderthals: Study

Neanderthals did not disappear 40,000 years ago.

We simply bred them out. The remnants of the Neanderthal species can still be seen in modern human genetics

1. Red Hair
2. Obscene bigotry towards other races
3. An unrepentant desire for leadership and self-glorification
4. A sexual urge to grab women without notice

Characteristics that one eventually cannot hide.

[Meclazine for Israel]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2018-10-12/genealogy-forensics-dna-long-range-familial-searches-identity/10363550

DNA database can extrapolate to 60% of the white population in the USA from Ancestry.com

[Meclazine for Israel]

This crater is 'supposedly' next to Meekatharra. I will reserve judgement at this stage.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2020-01-22/wa-crater-yarrabubba-meteorite-impact-worlds-oldest/11881786

It has a real outback country town feel of impoverished despair. It's a gold town.

I worked near their maybe once or twice. When I was shopping in the supermarket on the main street, i was getting groceries for our exploration program, and I grabbed some food and the like, and in particular, I placed an iced coffee and a newpaper in the top of the trolley where small things go.

But before I reached the checkout (cash register), they were stolen.

[Meclazine for Israel]

Interestingly, NASA appears to be seriously investigating the possibilities of faster than light travel. I guess the big improvement is that they've figured out a way to need less power than previously thought to fuel the thing. Previously, they thought they needed to generate the power put out by Jupiter. which is LOL, no.

You do realise that once you go faster than the speed of light, Einstein predicted that you would travel back in time.

And the reason why it is impossible to travel faster than the speed of light is actually quite simple.

I came up with this idea in theoretical physics in my honours year.

Let's say that in the year 2491, someone manages to travel faster than the speed of light and therefore has the ability to travel back in time. They build their device and throw it in the back of a Delorian for arguments sake.

Well, given the lack of people claiming to be from the year 2491 in 2020 (or any future year for that matter) and the lack of a technologically advanced space ship commensurate with the year 2491, it is therefore proven that you cannot travel back in time.

Apart from one member of Space Force, we have no spacey looking travellers claiming to be from the future. It's clearly not possible in 2020 or in the future.



And further, it follows that you cannot go faster than the speed of light and survive.

Your protons and electrons would disassociate from their respective neutrons, and you would disintegrate into a subatomic mush.

It is much more possible however to travel forward in time given Einsteins theories of relativity.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v32VypWeF0I

In 1987, William "Buck" Rogers was teleported into 2491 where he met the lovely Wilma:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNC8fBSvYOc

I want to go back to the 70's so bad. But I need a time machine to go back 42 years.

[Meclazine for Israel]

Apparently you've never heard of either Niven's law of time travel or of the Temporal Prime Directive, since you naively believe that our lack of knowledge of people travelling back in time is proof it cannot be done.

My apologies Ernest.

Turns out you were right after all.

https://m.facebook.com/drphilshow/videos/951674141940487

[Meclazine for Israel]

New maps offer detailed look at 'lost' continent of Zealandia
The maps show how volcanism and tectonic motion have shaped the submerged landmass over millions of years.

Earth's mysterious eighth continent doesn't appear on most conventional maps. That's because almost 95 percent of its land mass is submerged thousands of feet beneath the Pacific Ocean.

Zealandia — or Te Riu-a-Māui, as it's referred to in the indigenous Māori language — is a 2 million-square-mile (5 million square kilometers) continent east of Australia, beneath modern-day New Zealand. Scientists discovered the sprawling underwater mass in the 1990s, then gave it formal continent status in 2017. Still, the "lost continent" remains largely unknown and poorly studied due to its Atlantean geography.

That's nonsense from a geological perspective. That dark blue subduction zone is pushing west bringing everything up as it disappears.

These are colliding pieces of mafic Oceanic Crust, around 6-8km thick moving west at 10-18cm a year.

No continental geological processes will work on that block until it joins Australia and thickens up
through orogenesis and accretion (crust thickening through thrust slices stacking on top of one another).

Given that NZ is sitting on a transform fault, there is no guarantee that that slab will ever grow higher out of the ocean unless that Eastern slab subducts underneath and produces volcanism similar to that process creating the Andes Mountain chain in South America.

If you look to the south-east, you can see a block of oceanic crust in blue moving towards NZ in the NW direction. This is causing the general uplift of the oceanic crust east of NZ.

Keep in mind Continental Crust is 35km thick. The most likely outcome for these oceanic slabs is accretion with the existing Continent to the left. You can already see the shape of the Australian continent in one slab affected. It is the next part to join the Australian continent. All of Eastern Australia was 'accreted' onto Australia. It's just happening again. It's not another continent.

We don't call the gap from Alaska to Russia another continent. If an oceanic crustal slab starting uplifting short of South America, that is not a new continent.

If these slabs do come out of the water, they will attach to NSW, Victoria and Tasmania over 200 million years and be 4 times thinner in an E-W direction and 4 times thicker (guess) in a vertical direction. But there is a lot of volcanism which will go on before that process is finished (i.e. generating felsic Continental Crust from recycling Oceanic crust)

We essentially have a process where 8km thick Oceanic crust will morph into 32km Continental crust (at 16cm per year roughly), after which, NZ will be closer to Australia and connected to us.

There won't be any legal territorial disputes as we will all be wiped out by a virus by that stage anyway.

It will just be all cute Kangaroos and Koalas and birds.

[Meclazine for Israel]

New photos of Mercury.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-10-03/spacecraft-captures-first-glimpse-of-mercury/100510338

[Meclazine for Israel]

A guy testing a small piece of a neutron star.

Neutron Star

https://fb.watch/h8T4tryQsM/

Very interesting guy.

[Meclazine for Israel]

Antimatter

Does it exist? How much does it cost to make? Should the Universe exist?

https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2023-02-19/antimatter-factory-physics-most-expensive-explosive-substance/101948092

[Meclazine for Israel]

Smallest ever injectable chip tested in mice.

If I am understanding this article correctly, it can go inside you and measure temperature and wirelessly report that back to a base station.

https://interestingengineering.com/innovation/smallest-ever-injectable-chip-hints-at-cybernetic-medicine


The smallest-ever computer chip resting in a hypodermic needle.
Chen Shi / Columbia Engineering

In case of a COVID-24 outbreak, it would be a great thing for delivering vaccines into the bloodstream.

The little Wi-Fi antenna could report back to a digital scanner with your vaccination status live at entry to certain establishments.

[Meclazine for Israel]

Clive Willman

Gold Fluids in Faults

https://youtu.be/KDexpMBAs6M

Got to work with this guy last year. Probably the nicest and most experienced geologist I have had the pleasure to work with. If you want to learn a little about quartz vein hosted gold, this is a great introduction.

Pure class as a person, even before becoming a scientist.

[Meclazine for Israel]

Stephenson 2-18

https://www.facebook.com/reel/603466974852235

[Meclazine for Israel]

Kodak Detects Nuclear Explosion

https://fb.watch/lZs2AcS3lF/