Tag: science

Celebrating Liza’s Commencement and New Beginnings at Virginia Tech | May 16 2025, 02:00

Liza has finally graduated from the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, and now we have a certified architect in the family! Over here, a graduation ceremony is called a “Commencement,” which translates from English as “beginning.” Today, there was a formal diploma presentation ceremony. However, they don’t actually hand out diplomas but something like a voucher for a diploma, which can be converted into a diploma as long as you don’t have any “tails” left. Because the ceremony is a thing unto itself, and of course, no one is going to move or adjust it. The actual diploma will be sent by mail.

Today and tomorrow, our entire family, including our menagerie, is in Blacksburg—the place where the huge university campus is located, seemingly taking over the entire little town in southern Virginia. Nearly 40,000 students study here alongside about 13,000 staff members. It’s a whole universe, its branches shining even in our parts: campuses and research centers are not only here in Blacksburg. But this place is the “core.”

Well, now Liza, learn to drive! You won’t manage to get to work on public transportation around here; it’s very fragmented, slow, and unreliable. All in all, we are very happy. Tomorrow is the main event at the big stadium, and then, onto new tracks!

It seems like it was only yesterday. 2020, masks, COVID. But they let you study “in-person.” With a lot of restrictions, but at least not from home. You chose architecture, and people constantly asked us if we had architects in the family? Of course, we do, that’s me, except, well, I’m not really about houses and bridges. But now we have the full spectrum!

If the standard bachelor’s diploma in the States is obtained in four years, at Virginia Tech it takes five years to study architecture—and that’s still not a master’s degree. Initially, we were all worried about how we were going to afford this. When you apply to the institute, you show them all your income and expenses, and some smart system made up of a mix of people and computers tells you, for example, you’re poor but smart, so the university will charge you little, not a lot. Or it says, “you can afford it, I see,” so they give you the full load, tighten your belts. We didn’t quite meet the necessary level of poverty, and the numbers were initially scary, but somewhere along the way educational loans helped, and we also grew over time and started to get scared less.

And just like that, five years have flown by, and now Liza will start earning her own money. A big deal. From mid-June, Liza starts her first job—the one that had already offered her several internships in summer and winter. So there probably wasn’t even a question of whether to hire her full-time or not.

Lizochka, congratulations again! And wishing you success!

P.S. Also, today is Yuki’s birthday—he’s 4 years old. He sadly watched from the window as we loaded our suitcases into the car. Nadia quietly said, “Yuki, we’re going to Liza and Levchik,” and he, skidding his claws on the floor, charging at full speed, with skids on the turns, dashed to the door and sat next to it! And that’s considering how we usually have to shove him out the door to walk him—he’s a real homebody. Literally: you push him down the steps toward the door and he moves as long as you push him, reluctantly gets dressed in his harness, then he starts his half-hour pond avoidance program. But this time, he totally lost his mind! He understands us somehow.

How Ticks Use Electric Fields to Find Hosts | May 08 2025, 03:39

By the way, have you ever wondered how ticks, those slow, wingless creatures, end up on a human body so quickly? And not just on humans. It turns out the answer to this question emerged quite recently — in 2023.

Sam England and Katie Lihou hypothesized that ticks can sense and react to the electric fields emitted by all living beings, including humans. To test this, they collected ticks and placed them on a specially grounded surface that mimicked a plant. Then they passed a 750-volt electrode over them — approximately the amount emitted by a typical mammal. The ticks immediately “jumped towards the electrode. The same thing happened when the scientists used a charged rabbit’s paw.

In general, it was discovered that ticks do not jump, fly, or even crawl deliberately towards humans. They are simply attracted to us because of the electrostatic charge — like dust or hair to a charged balloon.

The Dual Legacy of William Mulholland | May 06 2025, 19:31

I just read that Mulholland Drive was named after William Mulholland, who on one hand provided Los Angeles with water, but on the other hand buried 431 people after the St. Francis Dam he built collapsed, merely twelve hours after he and his assistant had inspected it. Essentially, it was the worst technological disaster in the US of the 20th century.

So, he truly did supply the county with water. Initially through good engineering, and then again through bad.

Incidentally, it serves as a good example of why it’s improper to name things after living individuals.

Exploring the Morning Coffee Conundrum: Caffeine vs. Adenosine Dynamics | May 03 2025, 01:31

I started reading a very good book, Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker. It states that the caffeine in coffee operates by clogging up the receptors of adenosine, which accumulates throughout the day and contributes to sleep pressure—the growing urge to sleep. However, what the book doesn’t mention, and what I’m curious about, is why people drink coffee in the morning when there is minimal adenosine in the body to begin with. Well, theoretically, caffeine could linger for several hours, but usually, adenosine doesn’t build up enough within a few hours to cause drowsiness.

Interestingly, in the evening or at night, coffee works—but as they say, there’s a catch. Caffeine temporarily blocks the adenosine receptors, making you feel alert. Yet, adenosine continues to accumulate in the background, and by nighttime, there’s a ton of it. As soon as the caffeine level drops, all the accumulated adenosine molecules “crash onto the receptors. This causes a sharp wave of sleepiness and fatigue—and that’s the infamous “crash.

Is there an explanation for morning coffee? Or is it just tradition?

Hidden Flaws and Covert Repairs: The Citicorp Skyscraper Crisis | April 29 2025, 21:40

Check out this cool story on the Veritasium channel about a critical flaw discovered in the Citicorp skyscraper after the building was finished.

The incident occurred 46 years ago, in 1978, just a year after its inauguration, when structural engineer Bill LeMessur discovered a critical error in the design of one of New York’s most ambitious skyscrapers — Citicorp. The 59-story building was constructed on stilts that were positioned at the center of each side rather than at the corners, as is typical, to preserve an old church that stood at one corner. This unusual decision required a unique system of diagonal braces (chevrons) that redistributed the loads. However, it was later revealed that due to the substitution of welded joints with bolted ones, under diagonal wind — initially not accounted for in the calculations — the building could completely collapse from a hurricane with just 110 km/h winds, creating a real threat to the city with a shocking probability of 1/16. Had it fallen, the surrounding skyscrapers would have toppled like a house of cards.

Recognizing the scale of the threat, LeMessur clandestinely began overnight repair operations named Project Serene, literally sealing every vulnerable joint in the structure with metal ‘patches’ while office workers went about their day undisturbed. Neither the employees nor the citizens were aware of the danger in order to avoid panic. A covert evacuation plan for ten city blocks was even developed. Despite the patches, everything depended on a tuned mass damper — a massive 400-ton concrete slab installed on the roof of the building, which oscillated out of phase to dampen swaying movements. It was so critical that if the power went out, the system would stop working, and the building could almost certainly collapse in strong winds. The patches did help.

For a long time, it was believed that a Princeton student named Diana Hartley brought attention to the building’s problem. However, in 2011, architect Lee DeCarolus, who was a freshman architecture student at the New Jersey Institute of Technology at the time, claimed that he was the one who called William LeMessur in the spring of 1978. His interest in the building’s unique design and a remark from his professor, who doubted the project’s reliability, prompted his call. But, there still are doubts about who the real hero was. Well, it’s clear as mud.

Exploring the Engineering Marvel of the Hoover Dam | April 25 2025, 21:56

I watched a cool documentary about the Hoover Dam. We visited it 10 years ago when we were traveling through California, and the impressions are hard to put into words. Just now, I finally got around to finding out how it was built, and four days ago Animagraffs released an hour-long video with “x-ray style” 3D animation that details every aspect of the construction. Friends, it’s like the pyramids of Egypt, only projected onto the early 20th century and tech levels of that time.

First off — the gigantic volume of concrete. The dam contains enough to fill ~5850 average American homes. That’s roughly the amount needed to build a road from San Francisco to New York.

Next, you can’t just pour all the concrete in one go. If the concrete had been poured as a single solid block, the heat generated during curing would have dissipated over about 125 years, which would likely have caused fatal structural cracks. A complex system of pipes with chilled water was embedded in layers of concrete to artificially cool it down. I didn’t even know such a problem existed. Thanks to this design, the dam itself can physically last up to 10,000 years and will become one of the last visible and recognizable monuments of humanity on the planet. (Incidentally, the largest dam built by beavers is in Alberta, Canada — twice as wide as the Hoover Dam — and it’s visible from space. Just something that came to mind).

Extensive “grouting” was conducted — injecting cement slurry under pressure deep into the rocky foundation (up to 150 feet for the main “grout curtain”) to fill cracks and, essentially, “weld” the dam to the canyon, preventing leaks and uplifting pressure from water.

The dam was not poured monolithically. It was constructed from interlinked vertical columns built in 5-foot “lifts” (layers) to manage the heat release, control cracking due to expansion/compression, and ensure structural integrity. The video beautifully demonstrates this.

Four massive tunnels (17m/56feet in diameter, about 3/4 mile long each) were bored just to divert the Colorado River. Instead of abandoning them, they were later plugged and incorporated into the permanent structure as part of the intakes (penstocks) and emergency spillways.

“High Scalers”: Workers known as “high scalers” were lowered hundreds of feet down the sheer canyon walls in simple bosun’s chairs, using jackhammers and dynamite to remove loose rock.

Giant aerial trams: An extensive network of cableways crossed the canyon, including one with a capacity of 150 tons, which was used to move massive equipment (even trucks) and concrete buckets.

Special heavy-duty equipment: For the project, special trucks were developed with doubled load capacity, greater power, and frames made of lightweight aluminum alloys.

The emergency spillways have a total capacity of 400,000 cubic feet per second – about four times greater than the average flow of Niagara Falls during peak season.

In the spillways, massive, 100-foot tall hollow drum gates are used, which float at the water level in their chambers, automatically rising or falling to manage floodwaters. Quite an interesting engineering structure — no motors and designed to handle severe loads.

Despite its scale, the dam was officially opened in 1936, significantly ahead of schedule (construction began in 1931). Revenue from power generation had fully paid for the construction cost by 1987.

Link at the bottom, or Google Animagraffs Hoover

Recent Russian Popular Science Book Recommendations | April 25 2025, 02:49

Recommend something worthwhile from popular science in Russian — probably something that has been released in the last year and a half.

I’m organizing additions to my bookshelf – this time from publishers in the Russian language.

Dumplings and Density: A Culinary Physics Exploration | April 18 2025, 18:08

Suddenly, it hit me – why not have some dumplings? So now, for the second day in a row, I’m devouring dumplings, with three different kinds in the fridge already. Plus, I bought some herring, and Nadya, without coordinating, also brought some. The fridge is surprised; it hasn’t seen either in a long time.

So, while I eat another serving, I’m googling why dumplings float. It’s not trivial, by the way.

Overall, the physics of this floating process is complex. They don’t float just because. Let’s start with the dough. It contains starch which absorbs water and swells (gelatinization), increasing the volume. Inside, the proteins in the dough denature, creating a more rigid structure. Some water evaporates/boils, forming bubbles. Result: the density of the dough decreases, aiding the floating. Meanwhile, the proteins in the meat also denature, become denser, and release moisture, decreasing the meat’s volume. The fat melts. Thus, for the meat itself: density increases, which counters the floating. Moreover, water penetrates inside the dumpling where it wasn’t before, also acting against the floating, as it simply becomes heavier. But the moisture released from the meat (juice) and water in the meat itself can boil, forming steam bubbles inside the filling. These bubbles offset the densification of the meat, and overall density of the filling also decreases (or remains the same).

In the end, the reduction in density of both the dough and the filling (due to the bubbles) leads to a decrease in the overall density of the dumpling, making it float.

Salt barely affects the cooking speed. Although salt raises the boiling point of water (Raoult’s law), to significantly speed up cooking, you’d need to add so much (10g per 2L) that the dumplings would become unbearably salty. In normal amounts, salt is just for taste.

Also, there is such a phenomenon as osmosis which is the reason for the tasty broth. Water penetrates inside the dumpling through the porous dough (osmosis), making the filling juicier. Substances from the filling leach into the water, making the broth tastier and fattier.

Curating a Diverse Bookshelf: Art, Science, and Beyond | April 18 2025, 17:28

The books requested a new home. Brought the home, settled the home, group photos from the housewarming.

Fed the pics to ChatGPT, got a booklist. Edited a bit, it makes mistakes.

Top shelf – art. I only keep the best in the list:

1. Alla Prima II by Richard Schmid

2. Virgil Elliott – Traditional Oil Painting

3. Anatomy for Sculptors – Uldis Zarins

4. Anatomy of Facial Expression – Uldis Zarins

5. Form of the Head and Neck – Uldis Zarins

6. Impressionism by Bomford, Kirby

7. Lessons in Classical Painting by Juliette Aristides

8. The Practice of Oil Painting & Drawing by Solomon J. Solomon

Second shelf – science and other science pop

Sergey Yastrebov “From Atoms to the Tree” (biology, chemistry)

Kukushkin – Clapping with One Hand (biology)

Burlak — The Origin of Language (linguistics)

Eric Kandel – In Search of Memory (biology)

Andrew Solomon- Far from the Tree (biology)

Richard Dawkins – The Selfish Gene (biology)

Yuval Noah Harari – Sapiens (history)

Yuval Noah Harari – Nexus (history)

The Elegant Universe, Brian Greene (physics)

Carl Zimmer – Life’s Edge (biology)

Carl Zimmer – She has a mother’s laugh (biology)

Semikhatov — Everything That Moves (physics)

Poluektov – Mysteries of Sleep (psychology)

Noga Gál – The Living and the Dead Word (linguistics)

Kitaigorodsky – Entertaining Theory of Probability (mathematics)

Steven Pinker- How the Mind Works (biology, psychology)

Robert Sapolsky – Determined (biology, psychology)

Neil deGrasse Tyson – Accessory to War (astrophysics)

Flavor by Bob Holmes (biology)

Jared Diamond – Guns, Germs, and Steel (biology)

Marilyn Sheldrake – Entangled Life (biology)

Wolfram – A New Kind of Science (mathematics)

Frans de Waal – Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? (psychology)

Eidelman – How Propaganda Works (psychology)

Peter Godfrey – Metazoa (biology)

Asya Kazantseva – Who Would Have Thought! (hard to say)

Asya Kazantseva – Someone Is Wrong on the Internet (–“–)

Asya Kazantseva – The Brain is Material (–“–)

Gordon – Structures, why things don’t fall down (architecture)

Thomas Heatherwick – Humanize (? design, architecture?)

Ed Yong – I Contain Multitudes (biology)

Po Bronson, Arvind Gupta – Decoding the World (biology)

Jonathan Haidt – The Anxious Generation (psychology)

Plus, some books there are biographies and fiction. Unfortunately, many good books I’ve read and would like to put on the shelf are not in paper but in digital or left behind in a past life.

Recommend what else I might like.

Exploring the Intriguing History and Ecology of Kangaroos and Camels | April 17 2025, 22:47

Interesting. It turns out that before Russia imposed a temporary ban on kangaroo meat imports, it consumed 70% of all kangaroo meat produced in Australia.

It turns out that not only do camels roam in Australia, but there are more of them than in Central Asia and the Middle East, and Australia actively sells them to Saudi Arabia, for instance. Moreover, camels were introduced to Australia from the Middle East by Afghans, who left quite a significant (and positive) mark on the history of Australia.

For example, here’s a photo of the Ghan train — it features a camel on its logo. This is no coincidence; it is actually named after those Afghans who brought the camels.

Also interesting is that camels are originally from our regions. Yes, the USA is, in fact, the homeland of camels. According to some estimates, camels first appeared in North America between 40 and 50 million years ago, and 3 million years ago, they crossed into Asia via a land bridge in the Bering Strait area, and then made their way to Africa. In recent years, convincing evidence has been found that these animals inhabited almost all of North America. And of course, the climate was different back then.

Moreover, I read that there is such a thing as “kangatarianism” — a practice of following a diet that excludes the meat of all animals except kangaroo, for environmental and ethical reasons.

Also, it turns out that there are tree kangaroos (Tree-kangaroo). Also, in English, a group of kangaroos is called “a mob” – a gang 🙂 However, in Australian English, mob is not used in the same connotation as “mafia” or “gang”. Indeed, a group of crows with their “murder of crows” isn’t too far off either.

Oh, how could I not mention etymology! There is a legend that the word “kangaroo” means “I don’t understand”. I thought so too until I looked into it.

Actually, “kangaroo” originates from the Guugu Yimithirr language, an Indigenous language of northern Australia, where gangurru specifically refers to a type of kangaroo. But it’s not that simple 🙂

It all starts when James Cook asked the Guugu Yimithirr what the animal was called — they answered gangurru, which did indeed denote it. The English borrowed this word as kangaroo.

Latter, half a century later, the etymology starts to get tangled. In 1820, a certain Philip King sailed along a river near Cook’s landing place and recorded a list of words from the local Guugu Yimithirr dialect. Everything matched Cook’s records — except for one word. When asked “what is that animal called?”, they didn’t answer gangurru, but minha. It means that Cook clearly made a mistake. If minha is “kangaroo”, then what is gangurru?

This is where the myth begins. Some begin to think: maybe Cook misunderstood? Maybe he asked about the animal, and they didn’t understand him — and gangurru meant “I don’t know”? This version is a fabrication, and it didn’t go further than speculation, but it’s a funny story, historically plausible, and it began to be repeated. Thus, it turned into a persistent legend.

Then the confusion reversed. “Kangaroo” — then and now — became the stereotypical word from the “aboriginal language”. Every European settler coming to Australia knew exactly one word from Guugu Yimithirr — and only that one. The problem is that there were hundreds of languages in Australia, many of which were weakly or not at all related to Guugu Yimithirr. They simply did not have the word gangurru or its equivalent.

That’s where the problems arose. For example, settlers arrived in the area of modern Sydney and tried to “communicate” with the local people, i.e., they just yelled “kangaroo” at them. This would hardly have helped, but it is important to remember the geography: the Guugu Yimithirr lived on the Cape York Peninsula, in the far north of Australia, and the Sydney aborigines — the Iora people, speaking Dharuk language — lived almost at the other end of the continent. They didn’t know what the word “kangaroo” meant, so they assumed the Europeans were particularly interested in their domestic livestock. When cows began to be unloaded from the ship, the locals asked: “Is this your ‘kangaroo’?”

Such is the story.

Also, it turns out, kangaroos are good swimmers. In the second photo, a kangaroo tail sold in our town. For the dogs to gnaw on.