Dr. Anomaly

Re: The Puzzle of Astronomy's Unexplained Anomalies I knew about all of those except the Saturn one. It'll be interesting to see how those turn out, regardless of it being a new theory or a "um, it was measurement error" end of things.

Star Trek transparent aluminum comes to real life! Transparent aluminium is 'new state of matter' July 27th, 2009 Transparent aluminium is 'new state of matter' Enlarge Experimental set-up at the FLASH laser used to discover the new state of matter. (PhysOrg.com) -- Oxford scientists have created a transparent form of aluminium by bombarding the metal with the world’s most powerful soft X-ray laser. 'Transparent aluminium' previously only existed in science fiction, featuring in the movie Star Trek IV, but the real material is an exotic new state of matter with implications for planetary science and nuclear fusion. In this week’s Nature Physics an international team, led by Oxford University scientists, report that a short pulse from the FLASH laser ‘knocked out’ a core electron from every aluminium atom in a sample without disrupting the metal’s crystalline structure. This turned the aluminium nearly invisible to extreme ultraviolet radiation. ''What we have created is a completely new state of matter nobody has seen before,’ said Professor Justin Wark of Oxford University’s Department of Physics, one of the authors of the paper. ‘Transparent aluminium is just the start. The physical properties of the matter we are creating are relevant to the conditions inside large planets, and we also hope that by studying it we can gain a greater understanding of what is going on during the creation of 'miniature stars' created by high-power laser implosions, which may one day allow the power of nuclear fusion to be harnessed here on Earth.’ The discovery was made possible with the development of a new source of radiation that is ten billion times brighter than any synchrotron in the world (such as the UK’s Diamond Light Source). The FLASH laser, based in Hamburg, Germany, produces extremely brief pulses of soft X-ray light, each of which is more powerful than the output of a power plant that provides electricity to a whole city. The Oxford team, along with their international colleagues, focused all this power down into a spot with a diameter less than a twentieth of the width of a human hair. At such high intensities the aluminium turned transparent. Whilst the invisible effect lasted for only an extremely brief period - an estimated 40 femtoseconds - it demonstrates that such an exotic state of matter can be created using very high power X-ray sources. Professor Wark added: ‘What is particularly remarkable about our experiment is that we have turned ordinary aluminium into this exotic new material in a single step by using this very powerful laser. For a brief period the sample looks and behaves in every way like a new form of matter. In certain respects, the way it reacts is as though we had changed every aluminium atom into silicon: it’s almost as surprising as finding that you can turn lead into gold with light!’ The researchers believe that the new approach is an ideal way to create and study such exotic states of matter and will lead to further work relevant to areas as diverse as planetary science, astrophysics and nuclear fusion power. A report of the research, 'Turning solid aluminium transparent by intense soft X-ray photoionization', is published in Nature Physics. The research was carried out by an international team led by Oxford University scientists Professor Justin Wark, Dr Bob Nagler, Dr Gianluca Gregori, William Murphy, Sam Vinko and Thomas Whitcher. Provided by Oxford University (news : web)

Re: Why Obadiah Stane went bad.... Huh. I just figured he'd been left out of the refrigerator too long...

Re: Holding the end of the world Dr. Anomaly: First, get someone to wrap whatever cloth was handy tightly around the hand he is using to hold it, so he doesn't accidentally drop it; then set about researching and analyzing it. Being a sorcerer-scientist, chances are good he'd figure out how to defuse it. If he can't, the next thing to try is draining the magic from it to make it (at least temporarily) harmless; fortunately for an attempt like that, the team's base is in a literally indestructible building that drains magic on contact (unless you've spent a lot of time practicing within it and near it). Failing THAT, he'd use his science (not magic, just in case) to open a portal to an empty dimension, stick his hand (with the crystal) through the gate... and then shut the gate. He'll need a new hand, but that shouldn't take too long. Govannon: One of the Celtic gods, Govannon will come back from the dead as long as the condition preventing his resurrection isn't met. Failing some way of magically de-naturing the thing, he'd take his chances by having one of his teammates take him far out into interstellar space and then, once they were far enough away... let go.

Re: What would happen - and at what cost? Something else that could be an economic reason for doing manufacturing off the Earth, if the posited cheap transport were available: pollution. Given a relatively cheap way to travel, and a supply of the most needed bulk raw materials somewhere else (asteroids, Mars, moons of Jupiter, whatever) I could see a corp going: "Hmmm. Comply with all the environmental regulations here, which is very costly, or move our production to a place without an environment to worry about [and no in-place regulations about what we can dump into it]? Let's take a look at a cost/benefit analysis and see which is cheaper, or which improves our bottom line more."

Re: Warp Drive article on the Discovery website Yup. Acceleration is what makes the difference. Acceleration establishes a frame of reference.

Re: Genre-crossover nightmares The Tuxedo Mask (Jackie Chan movie + Jim Carry movie) Oh, wait, that's been done... it's called Sailor Moon...

Re: Your PCs might be Underpowered if... Your PC might be underpowered if they have to use Aid on a Power before that power has one full die of effect.

Re: Superbeing Rights Debate Balabanto, having read this whole thread, it looks to me like you have already made your mind up and instead of wanting opinions, are looking for a chance to publicly justify your stance. If I'm wrong, please forgive me, but that's how it looks, especially considering your responses have grown increasingly hostile with time.

Re: Genre-crossover nightmares Whoops. That's what I get for assuming...

Re: Genre-crossover nightmares I think he was being funny, given the post he quoted has an "h" missing from the spelling.

Re: Genre-crossover nightmares Makes me want a Cth-hoola Hoop...

Re: Genre-crossover nightmares I didn't draw this, I just found it on the web, but it seemed to fit the idea...

Re: Celebrities This reminds me of one of the best convention games I ever played, years ago at GenCon. It was a horror-themed Hero System game, and took place on the movie set of a low-budget horror movie. We played the actors who were there to film the horror movie, the twist being the monster was real. It was, not unexpectedly, a TPK, but was a blast right up to the last, and my character almost survived! We were, basically, normals each with a couple of low-level Skills and maybe a Perk or Talent. Why this thread reminded me of this game is that at the beginning, while looking over our character sheets, the player who got the star of this low-budget movie, looking at the skills, blurted out: "Oh my God, my acting's only a Familiarity!!!" In the character's background was the fact that she'd landed the starring role by sleeping her way into it and couldn't act to save her life... literally, as it turned out... There are more than a few of today's celebrities who I suspect only have a 1 pt. Familiarity with Acting...

Re: Hero System Good Idea/Bad Idea... Good idea: playing Champions in the new millennium Bad idea: playing Champions: New Millennium

Re: Hero System Good Idea/Bad Idea... Maybe something like one of these:

Re: How Many "Super-Cities" is too many? Lawnmower Boy FTW!

Re: Psychological Limitation: Dangerous When Bored.... This isn't a character Disad; it's a player disad.

Re: Ripsaw MS1 Like Laumer's Bolo Try creepy crawler...

Re: NASA plans 'Armageddon' spacecraft to blast asteroid That just points out that nothing is sure but death & taxes...

Re: NASA micro-satellite eyes space bacteria Didn't the origin of the monster in the remake of The Blob start from a project like this...?

Re: Useless Hero Facts This reminds me of the time, back in 4th Ed, when I decided to see if Superleap could be used to reach FTL speeds (due in part to the way the time to execute a leap was defined back then). Short answer: Even using just a 200 pt. character, it was indeed possible... and this was in the days before Megascale! Of course, the "scatter from target hex" when you got to the end of your leap could be a killer... literally!

Re: Devils Tower: How to?

Re: Devils Tower: How to? Flight, only straight up, 1 charge, Area of Effect (Mega), Physical Manifestation. Add inches to suit, shake well, and figure Real Cost (which won't be much). Physical Manifestation should take care of the "create an object" problem...

Re: The cranky thread Thanks for the well-wishes, guys; though I stayed home from work today to deal with stuff, the morning makes it look brighter, not worse, to my surprise. This is a big hassle, but in the long run I'll be fine. Incidentally, the fire was started by a kid playing with a lighter. Nobody got hurt in the fire (thankfully!) but the apartment above me is a complete loss. The manager and maintenance came through this morning to take pictures of the damage done to MY apartment by the water, and to tell me they'll schedule some time for repairs as soon as possible. Hermit, I've never been in that situation, and never lost everything in a place I lived, though I've come close. You have my sympathies, and I am very glad, on this new day, the damage to my place was not worse than it is. Yes, something to be thankful for... trying to focus on the positive here.