Best Science Visualization Videos of 2009
This clip is a compilation of videos showing the evolution of a project called “Breaking Waves,” funded by the Department of Defense. It uses numerical flow analysis to tackle the challenge. (see more of the best visualization videos at Wired.com)
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This is all assuming the zombies don't have guns: But they rarely do. See Day of the Dead (original version) and Land of the Dead for exceptions.
Courtesy SuitovRemember in 8th grade, when you were taking geometry or pre-calc or whatever, and some cleverboots in the back row asked the teacher when anyone was every likely to use math in real life? Your teacher probably said something like, “Do I have to shake the answer into you, numbskull? You’ll use it every day! What if you want to figure out the rate of wear on your tires based on circumference? What about when you want to figure out the height of your favorite tree, using only the length of its shadow?” And because everyone involved could see the hollowness of this answer, you went home feeling a little darker.
But, see, what your lousy teacher should have said is that when the zombie apocalypse comes, math is what’s going to drag us out of that corpse-filled scenario and into a brighter, infection-free future. Because, when it comes to zombies, math is the real weapon.
JK, of course. Claw hammers and chainsaws will still be the real weapons. No getting past that—even the trickiest math problems will hardly destroy the brain, much less sever a spinal cord. But mathematical models will provide a strategy for survivors.
Mathematical models for vampire scenarios are old hat. They’re old, boring hat, in fact, on account of how people can’t agree about the methodology, and because vampires aren’t that great in the first place. But a practical zombie model is making the rounds in the popular press, because this is the sort of thing we need to know.
Taking into account infection rates, and the relative numbers of “suseptable,” “zombie,” and “removed” individuals, the model confirms what we have long suspected: that a zombie outbreak would suck. The model is, of course, much more complicated than this, and it has lots of fun little symbols and graphs, but that’s the long and short of it.
However, the model does leave room for hope. Putting victims into quarantine could eradicate the infection, but only under ideal circumstances (i.e., not in the real world), and a while a zombie cure could ensure the continuing existence of humanity, survivors would need to coexist with zombies. The remaining solution, and the only practical one, it turns out, is the old fashioned one: head smashing. As the paper puts it, “only sufficiently frequent attacks, with increasing force, will result in eradication.”
We’ve got to hit the zombies where they live. Or where they undead-live. Or whatever. The point is that when the time comes (any day now), we have to take the fight to the zombies, and we have to do it fast. So prepare your bite-guards and blunt instruments, and put them next to your fire extinguisher and emergency blanket. Be a survivor.
Here’s the original paper in pdf format.
A quick note: To all of you who are thinking, “Puh-leaze, JGordon. Zombies are played out like Super Bowl XLIII,” I respond with a puh-leaze of my own. I say y’all are the ones played out, played out like Mario 3, and I think y’all should check yourselves and just go watch Transformers 2, or whatever it is you people are into.
Much truth is spoken in jest.
Courtesy Meredith P.
We've all heard about global warming, the undeniable fact that the Earth's temperatures rose (dramatically / sharply / noticeably – take your pick) from 1980 to 1998. (We've heard considerably less about the equally undeniable fact that from 1999 to present temperatures have held steady or even dropped, but never mind.)
We've all heard that carbon dioxide, released into the atmosphere when we burn coal, gas or other fossil fuels, is the (only / primary / most important) source of the warming. (The Earth also warmed during Roman and Medieval times, when fossil fuel consumption was vanishingly small. But never mind.)
And we've all heard how this warming is going to bring about floods, drought, storms, extinctions and other ecological disasters if we don't reduce out carbon output by (the end of the century / 2020 / tomorrow afternoon).
Those first two points can be tested through observation and experiment. The last one cannot. It's a prediction about the future, and you cannot observe something that hasn't happened yet. But you can always bolster your position by accurately predicting the past.
Now, that may seem like a waste of time – I mean, it's the past. We know what happened. But that's what makes it such a great laboratory. Y'see, scientific predictions are based on models. Scientists take all those observations and experiments, put them in a computer, and see where the trends lead. You can test the model by taking observations from some point in the past, crunching the numbers, and seeing if the results match what we know happened next.
And that's exactly what Richard Zeebe, James Zachos and Gerald Dickens did. In an online article published by the journal Nature Geoscience, these three scientists took the model used by climate researchers to predict future global warming and applied it to an episode of past global warming. Specifically, they looked at a well-studied period 55 million years ago when the Earth's temperature rose dramatically. They plugged the data from that warming into the model used to predict current warming, and they found....
It didn't work. The climate models being used today were unable to duplicate known conditions from the past. They weren't even close – the results were off by about 50%.
Emily Latella, call your office.
Clouds, beautiful clouds
in Earth and Space Science and The Water Cycle, Weather and Climate
The King of All Clouds: ... here to rule the skies
Courtesy akakumoDid you know that mathematical equations can calculate the temperature, wind speed, and humidity of clouds? Well, the Center for Multiscale Modeling of Atmospheric Processes (CMMAP, pronounced “see-map”) is using these equations and developing a revolutionary approach to climate modeling that will help us understand the roles of clouds today and in the future.
So what is climate modeling exactly? Good question. Think of a giant grid that covers the globe, with cells the size of Delaware. Within each grid, the mathematical equations that I mentioned above are used to predict weather forecasts and climate simulations. But there’s a problem with this grid system: the clouds are much smaller than the cells used in the global models, thus creating a large source of uncertainty in today’s climate models.
CMMAP has come up with a solution to this problem called multi-scale modeling framework (MMF). Their radical new approach will simulate realistic cloud processes in a tiny-fraction of each Delaware-sized cell, greatly improving the climate model. In order to represent each small-scale process, scientists have invented equations that define the temperature and moisture content in a cloud based on the atmospheric conditions in the entire grid cell. Though this is quite an advancement from the technologies of the past, there is still work to be done to accurately represent clouds in the climate model. As developments in MMF continue, CMMAP could potentially hold the key that is necessary in unlocking the mystery to understanding the weather and climate.
If you’d like to learn more about the formation of clouds or more research that CMMAP is conducting, check out the links!
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has issued its Atlantic hurricane season forecast. The prediction -- "near-normal" -- fits pretty well with the forecasts from AccuWeather, Colorado State University, WSI Corporation, and the Weather Research Center. What does "near-normal" mean? NOAA is predicting 9 to 14 named storms, with 4 to 7 hurricanes, and 1 to 3 major storms (category 3 or higher on the Saffir-Simpson scale of storm intensity).
But storm prediction is a tricky business. More rainfall over West Africa, warmer sea surface temperatures, and reduced wind shear could encourage more storms. An El Nino pattern in the Pacific or cooler ocean temperatures could discourage them. NOAA will issue another prediction in August, just before the usual peak in the hurricane season.
Predicting flu cases and locations
in Life Science, History and Nature of Science, Math, Scientific Inquiry, and Human Organism
A research group led by Dirk Brockmann at Northwestern University has created a computer model that predicts the spread of the 2009 H1N1 influenza virus in the US. (It uses a complex set of mathematical equations to describe the movement of people and virus.)
How can you track and predict the movement of something so small?: Follow the money, of course! (This is a colorized negative stained transmission electron micrograph (TEM) showing some of the ultrastructural morphology of the A/CA/4/09 swine flu virus. Got that? Good.
Courtesy CDC/C.S. Goldsmith and A. Balish
(Brockmann was a guest on Minnesota Public Radio's Midmorning show today, and you can listen to it online.)
The good news is that, based on what we know now, and assuming that no one takes any preventive measures, we could expect to see some 1,700 cases of swine flu in the next four weeks. Because of the preventive measures being taken wherever a suspected case of H1N1 flu has popped up, we should actually see fewer cases. (You can see Brockmann's models here.) That's lousy if you're one of the folks who picks up the virus, but not a devastating number of cases. Of course, this is a rapidly developing, fluid situation, and things may change. Still, tools like Brockmann's model help to ensure that emergency supplies and other resources get to the places likely to need them most before they're needed.
Professor's Computer Simulations Show Worst-Case Swine Flu Scenario from Northwestern News on Vimeo.
Don't have faith in computer models? Well, a second research group at Indiana University is using another model, with different equations, and getting very similar results. That's a pretty good indication that the predictions are reliable.
You might remember Brockmann from a 2006 study that used data from WheresGeorge.com, a site that allows users to enter the serial numbers from their dollar bills in order to see where they go, to predict the probability of a given bill remaining within a 10km radius over time. That gave him a very good picture of human mobility, reflecting daily commuting traffic, intermediate traffic, and long-distance air travel, all of which help to model how a disease could spread.
If your answer is "Nothing, yet," then you might consider stopping by the museum.
Minnesota's Water Resources: Impacts of Climate Change
Dr. Lucinda Johnson, National Resources Research Institute, University of Minnesota-Duluth
Thursday, April 9, 2009
7 - 8:30 pm in the Auditorium
Over the past 150 years, Minnesota's climate has become increasingly warmer, wetter, and variable, resulting in undeniable ecological impacts. For example, more recent changes in precipitation patterns combined with urban expansion and wetland losses have resulted in an increase in the frequency and intensity of flooding in parts of Minnesota. Learn about exciting new research which will develop a prediction model for future climate changes specific to Minnesota, and discover its potential economic and civic impact.
Check it out.
Water vapor in action: Hoh Lake, Washington.
Courtesy S. McAfee
I hate it when bad news gets confirmed.
That’s just what happened when Andrew Dessler and his colleagues at Texas A&M were able to show that a warmer atmosphere holds more water vapor. Unfortunately, water is a greenhouse gas, so more water vapor means the earth warms, so the atmosphere can hold more water, which is a greenhouse gas . . . I think you can see where this is going. It’s a nasty feedback circle. If the earth stays more or less the same temperature, we don’t worry about this too much because there’s a really good way to get water out of the atmosphere. In fact, it just shut down air and highway travel all over the East Coast.
It may seem like a no-brainer that warmer air holds more water, but these scientists were able to put solid numbers on the link between temperature and water vapor, which is a big deal. They used information from a satellite called the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder to measure the amount of water in the air.
Using information from 2003 to 2008, they found that for every 1 degree Celsius the earth warms, the extra water in the air traps 2 watts for every square meter of the earth. If you stored that up over a square meter for an hour, you could run a 100-watt light bulb for about a minute. Bet you wouldn’t even notice that in your electric bill. But the earth is big, so let’s put it in perspective and do the math.
The surface of the earth is 510,072,000 square kilometers. According to howstuffworks, your run-of-the-mill power plant puts out 3.5 billion kilowatts in a year. That means the extra warming that water vapor adds for every degree the earth gets warmer is about the same as the annual output of 290 power plants, give or take. That’s a lot of light bulbs.
How thin is too thin?: A proposed law in France would make fashion shows, magazines, websites and other entities responsible for showcasing models who display healthy body sizes as a way of combating eating disorders.
Courtesy Peter DuhonWho’s responsible for the way people, especially young people, develop their concepts of body image?
That’s a huge question that French lawmakers are attempting to tackle. A bill is working its way through the French parliament that would make it illegal for anyone – magazines, website, advertisers – to “incite extreme thinness.”
The idea is one of the latest reactions to the 2006 death of an anorexic Brazilian model. And the bill is the toughest legal standard that’s been proposed in the wake of the growing recent concerns about super-thin bodies being shown in the fashion and glamour worlds. For instance, Spain last year banned ultra-thin models from appearing in live fashion shows. Sort of like boxing weigh-ins, models must weigh in before a fashion show and exceed minimum weight standards for their body size.
The full details of the proposed bill can be found at this weblink.
In the proposed French law, judges could level fines of up to $47,000 against offenders who promote extreme thinness. As an example, those responsible for a photo shoot involving an unhealthy thin model could face legal sanctions.
Clearly, there are two sides to this story. And people in the fashion and publishing world aren’t crazy about this concept, questioning if judges, or anyone, can determine who is too skinny.
And on another side of the issue, experts in anorexia say that media images are just one of many factors that can entice people, predominately young women, into unhealthy slimness.
What do you think? Is this a good role for government to play in the helping people have healthy body image development? Are there better strategies for dealing with this problem? Share your thoughts with other Science Buzz visitors.
A shark, doing it's best: Mostly he just wants to be left alone. (photo by Mshai on flickr.com)Scientists in New South Wales and Florida are testing a new method of measuring the biting force of a great white shark using computer models.
Attempts have been made to measure sharks’ biting force underwater, in captivity and in the wild, although these are known to provide inadequate results. Sharks will generally do weak a “test bite” before applying the full force of their jaws, and these test bites are generally all that’s measured.
In this new experiment, researchers are dissecting a 2.4-meter long great white shark, in part to make an extremely accurate computer model of its anatomy, and in part to drive home the point that the animal should have just allowed them to measure its bite while it was alive. Advanced computing methods, originally developed for “calculating stresses in structures such as bridges,” will then be applied to the model, and should provide a much more accurate range of the shark’s biting force.
This process contrasts sharply with my own, I believe, much more elegant test of shark biting power. There are several simple steps involved in my method: Step 1 – gather a variety of small to medium sized objects. Step 2 - Rate the hardness of these objects, not on an objectively quantified scale, but relatively (for example: The kitten is harder than the pillow, but not as hard as the dictionary). Step 3 - Take these objects to your nearest shark. Get the shark to bite the objects (this can be difficult, but the right combination of chum and verbal abuse should do the trick). You will then have a simple and easy to understand scale of shark biting strength (for example: the shark could crush the pillow, the kitten, the dictionary, and the cookie jar, but not the lawn mower engine). If you still feel, at this point, that you need a measurement that uses more universally accepted units, you can then crush similar objects by yourself, far away from the shark, using free weights, or forty-pound bags of dog food. These can then be easily converted into newtons, or pounds per square inch, or whatever your physics teacher requires.
If the computer model method proves to give reasonably accurate results, I suppose it will then be up to individual researchers to choose that method or mine. It will just depend on whether someone doesn’t want to get their hands dirty, or if they care about style and integrity.
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